THE COMING OF MUCKLE JOHN
The muffled tramp of feet went beating past along the road. That
such an army should have caused such utter panic to the English
throne and sent London into a condition of wild terror, was amazing,
and must ever remain so. Ill clad, poorly armed, ragged, gaunt,
undisciplined, it presented a spectacle more like an assemblage of
starved vagrants than conquering soldiery.
Many were quite old men, many were stunted, sickly creatures,
coughing terribly as they limped along. Boys, many without shoes or
stockings, some not more than sixteen, made up a goodly part of that
desperate force. Many of those who owned swords had them tied about
their waists with ropes of straw. Perhaps a third of the entire
force were capably equipped with targe, claymore and dirk, while a
number had firelocks slung across their backs.
They may have been dusty, ragged, footsore, but to Rob they were
heroes of romance. He looked beyond their haggard faces and their
bleeding feet and shabby clothes. They were a veteran army as yet
unbeaten. They carried themselves with the confidence of victory,
accepting the cheers of Inverness with the air of men receiving their
due.
Through a sort of mist Rob saw the tartans swinging, looked into
unknown bearded faces, caught the glint of sunlight upon the cold
whiteness of steel. The crowd about him began to thin; the last of
the troops had passed. Already the road was a swaying, excited
tumult of people.
Now at the back of Rob there stood a tavern owned by Major Fraser of
Castleleathers, a former friend of Lord Lovat, but fallen into
adversity. He was a great rubicund man some sixty-six years of age,
and with no particular interest in either Jacobite or Whig. Rob knew
him well. Many a happy evening had he spent listening to his stories
of the great days of long ago.
Major Fraser thought things had come to a pretty pass when English
troops were hounding good folk about the country side. Rob heard him
say so from the tavern door. He was standing on the top step staring
with half-closed eyes after the disappearing Highlanders. Above his
broad red forehead, his white hair was fluttering in the quirky
February wind.
"That you, Rob," he cried, "come your ways in lad," and he shivered
and stamped within, Rob at his heels.
Inside the taproom there was a solitary occupant. He had evidently
never stirred for the tumult outside, for his legs were upon the
mantel-shelf, and his head was sunk upon his chest. All Rob could
see was a very broad back and a great red neck. He took him to be an
exceedingly powerful individual, and one more used to the saddle or
the hills than taverns.
"Have they passed?" growled the man at the fire, in a deep
contemptuous voice.
"They have," replied Castleleathers, shutting the door, "and Frasers
amongst them."
"Like enough, and the Master but a boy, James, fresh from college.
His father has muckle to answer for."
"I ken fine, but who knows how this will end? I'd no break my heart
if old Sim had his neck thrawn...."
The man at the fire brought down his feet with a bang and swerved
about on his chair. To Rob there was something strangely familiar
about him.
"Leave your bad debts to me," he said, "I have a bone to pick with
Lovat, and..." then seeing Rob, his eyes narrowed and he fell into a
sudden silence.
"Whist!" said Castleleathers, "it's only Rob."
But the other said nothing further, only frowning at them both, and
then of a sudden he uttered a low whistle, staring over their
shoulders.
Now the window was some four feet above the ground--one single
pane--and peering through it was Ephraim Macaulay, the school-master.
For a single instant Rob saw him, then with a bound the stranger was
at the door. He stood gazing up and down the street for a moment,
then returned.
"James," he said, "I knew I was right, and when I see yon face I
scent trouble brewing just as surely as when the corbies come sailing
over the brae."
"It's the schoolmaster," said Rob.
But neither heeded him, and without a word the Major took him by the
shoulders and pushed him out into the street, securely locking the
door behind him. With the strangeness of it all fresh upon him Rob
clutched his claymore and began to make his way homewards. He
wondered where he had seen the great man in Fraser's tavern before,
or whether he had dreamed of him. The memory of him though baffling,
was curiously vivid in its way.
Rob lodged with his aunt, his mother's sister, and was not ashamed to
admit that he had a wholesome terror for Miss Margaret Macpherson.
What would she say to his plans? What, indeed?
Miss Macpherson was very tall and exceedingly gaunt. Her countenance
was as bleak as a wind-swept hillside, and there was a stony glare in
her grey eyes which seemed to turn the very atmosphere to frost. Her
figure was all points and angles--jutting out where her shoulders
rose towards her neck, and seeming to extend indefinitely into her
arms. Rob knew those long, sinewy arms with their thin, gnarled
hands ever ready to swoop. Miss Macpherson's customary attitude was
like that of a great bird of prey, mightily beaked and clawed,
pouncing swiftly, and rising again to sit and watch upon a crag.
She was sitting before the fire as he entered, and when she saw the
sword in his hand there came over her grim countenance a quick
change--a swift tightening, as though she had received a shock but
would not own to it.
"Aunt Margaret," said Rob, with a rush to get it over, "I'm marching
with Prince Charlie's men to-morrow."
She made as though to rise, then sat where she was, only her hands
trembled as she held them to the fire.
"So schooling's over," she said, quietly, "and now we're off to the
wars, are we? A fine spectacle that will be for your father's son.
It's the gallows now, is it, along with a rag-tag and a bonny Prince?
Ye'll want a polish to this sword, I'm thinking, and some bannocks
for your travels. Oh, I'll cook ye bannocks, my mannie--fine, hot
bannocks."
She watched him narrowly, all the time, wishing to frighten him, and
finding that he remained unshaken she shrugged her shoulders and set
about laying the table, her long, thin arms clutching the dishes.
Rob noted with dejected eyes, that she was setting the things for one.
"How old are ye?" she asked at last, her back still turned.
"Sixteen past," he answered, slowly.
"Aye," said she, "I suppose ye are."
She stared at him then with a queer look in her face--as though she
would have beaten him had she been able. Then, placing another
platter upon the table, she jerked her head at him to sit beside her.
"Rob," she said, after a long silence, "to me you have always been
undergrown for your years. It seems but yesterday since ye came."
"It was eight years ago," he answered, still upon his guard.
"So long?" said she, and took up her knife, but eating nothing.
The meal proceeded in utter silence. Rob would have given a world to
be away. What was in his aunt's mind he did not know, he could not
guess. Her face expressed nothing, only her eyes stared at him
unblinkingly, like the unfathomable eyes of an eagle.
"Rob," said she, at last, "when do you get your marching orders?"
"To-morrow, Aunt Margaret," he replied. "You must not be grieved at
my going; I cannot bide here when my people are out. Of course, we
may not leave Inverness for a while."
"Yon old fox, Lovat, is safe at home," she retorted. "When the chief
bides it is not good for the clansmen to stir."
"But the Master is out," he hastened to add, referring to Lord
Lovat's son, who was in command of the clan Fraser.
"It is the sly pussie sits on the top of the wall. Well, well," she
concluded, "what's done's done, and so off to bed wi' ye, and get
your sleep."
Rob, concealing his delight at his aunt's apparent complacency, rose
to his feet, and wishing her a very good night--for which she thanked
him grimly--betook himself to the adjoining room, and flinging
himself down on his bed was soon fast asleep.
It was pitch dark when he awoke some two hours later, and he awakened
so suddenly that he started up in bed listening intently. Surely
somebody had spoken in the room! But there was no sound, only the
crying of the night wind in the street outside. And then there fell
on his ears a muffled murmur of voices in the kitchen, and a faint
noise like the falling of shoes upon the stone floor. Stealing
across the room, he knelt before the door and listened with a sudden
dread in his heart.
For a moment he heard nothing at all, then to his horror he caught
the whisper of a voice he knew too well--the shrill, nasal accents of
Mr. Macaulay, the schoolmaster, in close conversation with his aunt.
So near were they both to the door that he could hear every word they
said.
"I tell you I saw him," said the schoolmaster.
"But what of that? Every one knows that old Castleleathers is safe
as Mr. Hossack himself."
"Who cares two pins for Castleleathers--it is the other I want..."
"Ye mean the big man..."
"That I do. If I can lay hands on him I'll fling a net over more
rebels than if we had Lovat himsel'."
"But Rob knows nothing of this. He's only a laddie gone daft over
soldiers. He'll have forgotten all about it in the morning."
"Not he--but if he can tell me where one whose name I'll no breathe
to you nor to any one else, can be found, I'll see his neck is safe."
"Then on wi' ye," whispered Miss Macpherson, "for I doubt we must
save Rob if we can. Ye hae the rope."
"That have I," returned the master.
Then followed complete silence, and a second later the faint creaking
of the door behind which he crouched. Rob sprang to his feet, and
paused irresolutely. He was unarmed and helpless.
Very slowly the door began to open. He knew it by the draught of air
upon his face. In the pitch darkness he leaned close to the wall
waiting for them to pass him towards the bed.
But at that moment there sounded very faintly, like the sighing of
the wind--the far-off catch of a tune--a little twisted coil of
melody such as the fairies dance to.
"Hold!" whispered Macaulay, in a low tense voice.
"It is but a laddie's whistle," snapped Miss Macpherson, "haste ye."
But he appeared to have a dread of something in his mind.
"That is no boy's whistle," he replied sullenly, "but the pipe o'
Muckle John."
Then Rob could have shouted for joy, for he knew in a trice who the
great man in Fraser's tavern had been, who but the stranger on the
moor who had lured the weasel from his lair. Nearer came the ripple
of music, and then sounded a lusty banging at the street door and a
man's voice shouting for entry.
"Whist!" said his aunt, and again came the knocking.
"Wha's there?" she cried.
"Open!" returned the voice--a deep bass voice like the noise of a
bull. "Open in the name of the King!"
"Better open, Mistress Macpherson," counselled the master; "though I
would I were out of here. If I had a sword, but who ever saw a
dominie with such a thing?" and he laughed ruefully, while a furious
knocking beat upon the door. Presently Rob saw the yellow light of a
candle, and heard the falling back of the bolts.
A cold burst of night air rushed into the place, and with it there
entered a great, formidable looking man, so tall that he must needs
bend nearly double to enter, dressed in riding clothes, and with his
hat rammed down upon his face.
Rob slid into the room. Beside him stood Mr. Macaulay, the rope
still dangling in his hands. His aunt was facing the stranger,
holding the candle high so that its rays fell upon his face.
So they stood for a moment, and then the stranger closed the door
behind him, swung off his hat, and made a sweeping bow.
[Illustration: "MADAM," SAID HE, "I CRAVE YOUR PARDON FOR THIS
SEEMING INCIVILITY."]
"Madam," said he, "I crave your pardon for this seeming incivility;
but I am new come to Inverness, and am quartered here until
to-morrow."
(Not so new-come thought Rob, mindful of Fraser's tavern.)
All the time the stranger's alert blue eyes were speeding hither and
thither about the room. They paused for a moment on the rope in the
master's hands, took in Rob at a glance (but with no appearance of
recognition which grieved him), and then returned to Miss Macpherson,
who had never acknowledged his presence by word or nod.
"Sir," said Rob to the stranger, "Mr. Macaulay was even now enquiring
for you."
"Thank ye," he replied, "but I have already seen the rope in his
hands. Maybe it could be used for a better purpose..."
Mr. Macaulay was as near to the door as the stranger. With a bound
he reached it, and flung it back. And then with another swirl of air
he was gone into the night.
The stranger watched his departure with upraised brows and a smile
upon his lips, then he stepped to the door and closed it, bolting it
with careful hands.
"For the present," said he, turning to Rob, "he's gone: You are not
afraid of my company, are you?"
He grasped him gently by each shoulder as he spoke, and looked into
his eyes.
Rob shook his head. Afraid of the man of the moor! He was suddenly
overtaken by a curious shyness of this mysterious man with his
shrewd, inscrutable blue eyes, his great Highland nose, the whimsical
twist that lurked at the corners of his mouth, and his massive head
far up near the rafters through the vast height of him.
His clothes had a foreign cut, and he betrayed the inflection of a
strange accent underlying his words accompanied by occasional
gestures of the hands that strike a northerner as affected and
womanly. His voice was very deep and soft and so persuasive that few
could withstand him. Even in anger it was never harsh--but some said
he never permitted himself to grow angry and for that very reason
always won his own way. Even Miss Macpherson only angered him once.
Meanwhile the stranger was eyeing them both with droll intentness.
If only the honest can meet another's gaze without flinching then he
must have been a very honest man indeed, for there were few he could
not stare down, and what is more take a relish in so doing.
"How are you named?" he asked, still grasping the boy by the shoulder.
"My name is Rob Fraser," he replied, "and this is my aunt, Miss
Macpherson."
"Then I am in good company," he said, and letting go of Rob began to
warm his hands at the fire, turning them backwards and forwards to
the blaze. "It is good," he mused after a while, "to have peat reek
in one's nostrils once again. What a bonny room this is. There are
few pans like those in Inverness I'll warrant. I would like fine to
taste a bannock of your cooking, Miss Macpherson. I know a good
bannock when I see it, and it's long since I've had a taste of old
Scotland..." at which he sighed and stared upon the ground.
Somewhat mollified, despite herself, Miss Macpherson set the table
again, and busied herself amongst her household utensils. Over the
peat fire a pot was swinging on a chain from a cross beam above. The
place was full of the rare smell of it. But the stranger said
nothing, though he must have been eying out for a basinful. Instead
he drew Rob to the fire, and spoke to him in his low musical voice,
sitting upon a stool with his great coat hung up upon a peg beside
him and the steam rising from it and losing itself in the blueness of
the peat reek.
"I saw ye the day," he said. "It was just after our forces, heaven
help them, had passed. I canna bear to look at them. I feel like a
man watching a procession of bairns and dying men..."
"Have you been in another war?" asked Rob.
"War," said he, "this is not war. Man Rob, I've served all over
Europe and seen the armies of Frederick advance like the thunder of
surf on a western isle. I have seen service in Poland, Austria, and
the Netherlands. I have fought under Saxe."
He paused and seemed to draw some pleasure from Rob's flushed face
and eager eyes.
"Last year I lay before Tournay under a starlit sky while all around
me breathed thousands of men who lay before many hours on the field
of Fontenoy. That is war, Rob, not skirling up and down the country
with a few hundred puir Hielan' bodies."
"But I am enlisting," he said, considerably chilled by such words.
The stranger sniffed over the pot most audibly. The savour was more
than a hungry man could tolerate.
"You would make a rare campaigner, Miss Macpherson," he said, "Rob is
surely daft to think of losing such a stew for all the thrones of
Europe."
"It is only an ordinary stew," she said, with a faint flush on her
cheeks.
"It may be for you, Miss Macpherson--I'll no deny it--but as a man
not strange to stews I'd call it by another name..." and he smacked
his lips and drew in another draught of it with relish.
"Weel, weel," murmured Miss Macpherson, and taking off the lid she
set a knife into a piece of meat and with a spoon she emptied the
gravy upon a plate.
"Draw in your stool," she said, and laid the bannocks beside him.
Then after a momentary hesitation she laid a round black bottle upon
the table. "It is from Laggan way," she said.
"A bonny country," he replied, and without delay set to with the
greatest zest.
Meanwhile Rob drew near the fire, and laid a peat or two upon the
dying glow. He suddenly remembered how near he had been to falling
the prey to his aunt's schemes, and yet to look at her face one would
have said she suffered no disappointment or resentment. There was a
strong vein of fatalism in Miss Macpherson.
When the stranger had finished eating he pushed back his stool, and
wiped his mouth very genteelly with a kerchief.
"And now, sir," said he, addressing Rob, "what is this talk of the
wars?"
"Aye," re-echoed Miss Macpherson, brightening, "ye may well ask that,
Mister..." she hesitated.
"No matter," he replied quickly, "my name will keep."
"I want to fight for the Prince," said Rob, sturdily; "I have this
claymore." And he brought it from the corner where it lay.
One look was sufficient for the stranger.
"Ye are a hundred years too late, my man," he said, regarding the
rusty sword with a critical eye.
"It is all I have," said Rob.
"And all ye are good for," retorted his aunt.
The stranger meanwhile sat with his chin resting on one hand, a frown
upon his face. Of a sudden he stirred fretfully.
"What sort of talk is this?" he cried. "To-morrow or the next day
will see us scattered like muir fowl; but we've had a run for our
money, whereas, you, poor lad, will have a sair run for your life.
Bide a wee--there will be other risings," at which he stopped, and
won a smile from Miss Macpherson for his brave advice.
"Thank ye, sir," she said, cordially; "and listen to the gentleman,
Rob, for he speaks true words."
Rob was about to break in when the stranger motioned him to silence.
"Tak' your time," said he, "and choose your ain gait, for there's a
kind of empty satisfaction in that at a time--and I will play a bit
tune, if I may." At which he bowed to Miss Macpherson, and she bowed
back, and that none so stiffly.
Then drawing the selfsame reed from his greatcoat pocket that Rob had
heard two years before, he began to play, and the manner of his
playing was like the singing of a mavis at twilight. He played tunes
both Scottish and foreign, strange, melancholy snatches of music very
haunting to hear, and then, quite suddenly, he broke into a Jacobite
melody, and Rob sat with eyes glued upon him, while a great stillness
crept over the place.
The fire had died down, and the room fallen into darkness when he
ceased, and it was only to lay the pipe upon the table. For out of
the silence came the most wonderful voice; and the strange gentleman,
rising to his feet, was singing an old Highland lament as though his
heart would break. Rob stole a look at his aunt, and saw her
lip--that iron, resolute lip--was trembling. Even the stranger's
voice broke through the utter sadness of it all, at which he coughed
and smiled, and then before Rob could raise his eyes (it seemed to
him to have no beginning at all, so quickly was it done) the stranger
was upon his feet, and even while Miss Macpherson was secretively
concealing a tear he had snatched up his whistle and was in the very
middle of a Highland reel. With his fingers rippling up and down the
holes of the thing, and the rakish tilt of his head, and the manner
in which he kept time with his feet, and his shoulders and his whole
body--with all of this and the dancing firelight and the wind shut
out upon the street--the thing was like the work of a bogie. Had he
been a little man with silver buttons and silver-buckle shoes and a
velvet jacket, then there is no saying but that he might have played
himself up the chimney and over the heather, with Rob and Miss
Macpherson at his coat-tails.
The music grew faster. It grew wilder. It brought Rob to his feet
and sent him skipping and snapping his fingers in a frenzy. The
stranger was here and there, missing notes because he could not do
everything at once, and turn at the same time. And then just when
the rant was at its height Miss Macpherson was at it too, first
skirts held daintily from the ground, then arms akimbo, bowing,
twirling, spinning. The stranger threw aside his pipe. He sang the
lilt of it instead, and so facing Miss Macpherson they capered and
linked arms and clapped their hands and hooched until the stools were
jumping all over the floor and the bannocks after them, and the table
rocked upon its legs in the corner.
"Well, my lad," panted the gentleman after it was over, wiping his
face, "have ye settled the matter?"
"Sir," cried Rob, "it's the Prince for me."
"Well, well," said he, seating himself again, as though he had
guessed as much.
"I believe ye sang so on purpose," snapped Mistress Macpherson, now
thoroughly awakened to the danger, and considerably ashamed of
herself.
"On my oath, madam," he replied, "I advised the lad against it--ye
heard me with your ain ears."
"But thae songs?"
"Tuts," he said, "what are songs?"
The dawn was already in the east, and a faint grey light shone
beneath the door.
With a start, the stranger rose to his feet.
"The day is near," he said, sombrely, "I must be stepping"; and for a
breath or two he looked Rob in the eyes.
"And I, too, if I may go with you," said Rob, casting a glance at his
aunt.
For a moment she struggled with her anger, then, taking him roughly
by the shoulder, she shook him.
"Go then," she cried, "but dinna say it was with my leave. And you,
sir, do what you can for him."
"Madam," said the stranger, wrapping his greatcoat about him, "I
promise you that."
"What name do ye go by?" asked Mistress Macpherson, of a sudden.
He appeared for an instant slightly put about.
"The name I go by," repeated he, "is Muckle John."
"That's no sort of name," she snapped.
"It's sufficient for me," he replied, and touching Rob on the
shoulder, they passed into the street.
From far away came the shrill notes of many bagpipes, and the faint
stirring of assembling men.
"Rob," said Muckle John, slyly, "I thought you had forgotten."
"I knew you at once," said Rob, "but you never looked at me."
"Did I no," said Muckle John, "maybe there were reasons, Rob--there
are folk would do the world for a friend of mine, but there are
others, Rob--there are others."