THE GORBALS DIE-HARDS GO INTO ACTION
We left Mr. McCunn, full of aches but desperately resolute in spirit,
hobbling by the Auchenlochan road into the village of Dalquharter. His
goal was Mrs. Morran's hen-house, which was Thomas Yownie's _poste de
commandement_. The rain had come on again, and, though in other weather
there would have been a slow twilight, already the shadow of night had
the world in its grip. The sea even from the high ground was invisible,
and all to westward and windward was a ragged screen of dark cloud. It
was foul weather for foul deeds.
Thomas Yownie was not in the hen-house, but in Mrs. Morran's kitchen,
and with him were the pug-faced boy known as Old Bill, and the sturdy
figure of Peter Paterson. But the floor was held by the hostess. She
still wore her big boots, her petticoats were still kilted, and round
her venerable head in lieu of a bonnet was drawn a tartan shawl.
"Eh, Dickson, but I'm blithe to see ye. And, puir man, ye've been sair
mishandled. This is the awfu'est Sabbath day that ever you and me pit
in. I hope it'll be forgiven us.... Whaur's the young leddy?"
"Dougal was saying she was in the House with Sir Archibald and the men
from the Mains."
"Wae's me!" Mrs. Morran keened. "And what kind o' place is yon for her?
Thae laddies tell me there's boatfu's o' scoondrels landit at the
Garplefit. They'll try the auld Tower, but they'll no' wait there when
they find it toom, and they'll be inside the Hoose in a jiffy and awa'
wi' the puir lassie. Sirs, it maunna be. Ye're lippenin' to the polis,
but in a' my days I never kenned the polis in time. We maun be up and
daein' oorsels. Oh, if I could get a haud o' that red-heided Dougal...."
As she spoke, there came on the wind the dull reverberation of an
explosion.
"Keep us, what's that?" she cried.
"It's dinnymite," said Peter Paterson.
"That's the end o' the auld Tower," observed Thomas Yownie in his quiet
even voice. "And it's likely the end o' the man Heritage."
"Lord peety us!" the old woman wailed. "And us standin' here like
stookies and no' liftin' a hand. Awa' wi' ye, laddies, and dae
something. Awa' you too, Dickson, or I'll tak' the road mysel'."
"I've got orders," said the Chief of Staff, "no' to move till the
sityation's clear. Napoleon's up at the Tower and Jaikie in the
policies. I maun wait on their reports."
For a moment Mrs. Morran's attention was distracted by Dickson, who
suddenly felt very faint and sat down heavily on a kitchen chair. "Man,
ye're as white as a dish-clout," she exclaimed with compunction. "Ye're
fair wore out, and ye'll have had nae meat sin' your breakfast. See, and
I'll get ye a cup o' tea."
She proved to be in the right, for as soon as Dickson had swallowed some
mouthfuls of her strong scalding brew the colour came back to his
cheeks, and he announced that he felt better. "Ye'll fortify it wi' a
dram," she told him, and produced a black bottle from her cupboard. "My
father aye said that guid whiskey and het tea keepit the doctor's gig
oot o' the close."
The back door opened and Napoleon entered, his thin shanks blue with
cold. He saluted and made his report in a voice shrill with excitement.
"The Tower has fallen. They've blown in the big door, and the feck o'
them's inside."
"And Mr. Heritage?" was Dickson's anxious inquiry.
"When I last saw him he was up at a windy, shootin'. I think he's gotten
on to the roof. I wouldna wonder but the place is on fire."
"Here, this is awful," Dickson groaned. "We can't let Mr. Heritage be
killed that way. What strength is the enemy?"
"I counted twenty-seven, and there's stragglers comin' up from the
boats."
"And there's me and you five laddies here, and Dougal and the others
shut up in the House." He stopped in sheer despair. It was a fix from
which the most enlightened business mind showed no escape. Prudence,
inventiveness were no longer in question; only some desperate course of
violence.
"We must create a diversion," he said. "I'm for the Tower, and you
laddies must come with me. We'll maybe see a chance. Oh, but I wish I
had my wee pistol."
"If ye're gaun there, Dickson, I'm comin' wi' ye," Mrs. Morran
announced.
Her words revealed to Dickson the preposterousness of the whole
situation, and for all his anxiety he laughed. "Five laddies, a
middle-aged man and an auld wife," he cried. "Dod, it's pretty hopeless.
It's like the thing in the Bible about the weak things of the world
trying to confound the strong."
"The Bible's whiles richt," Mrs. Morran answered drily. "Come on, for
there's no time to lose."
The door opened again to admit the figure of Wee Jaikie. There were no
tears in his eyes, and his face was very white.
"They're a' round the Hoose," he croaked. "I was up a tree forenent the
verandy and seen them. The lassie ran oot and cried on them from the top
o' the brae, and they a' turned and hunted her back. Gosh, but it was a
near thing. I seen the Captain sklimmin' the wall, and a muckle man took
the lassie and flung her up the ladder. They got inside just in time and
steekit the door, and now the whole pack is roarin' round the Hoose
seekin' a road in. They'll no' be long over the job, neither."
"What about Mr. Heritage?"
"They're no' heedin' about him any more. The auld Tower's bleezin'."
"Worse and worse," said Dickson. "If the police don't come in the next
ten minutes, they'll be away with the Princess. They've beaten all
Dougal's plans, and it's a straight fight with odds of six to one. It's
not possible."
Mrs. Morran for the first time seemed to lose hope. "Eh, the puir
lassie!" she wailed, and sinking on a chair covered her face with her
shawl.
"Laddies, can you no' think of a plan?" asked Dickson, his voice flat
with despair.
Then Thomas Yownie spoke. So far he had been silent, but under his
tangled thatch of hair, his mind had been busy. Jaikie's report seemed
to bring him to a decision.
"It's gey dark," he said, "and it's gettin' darker."
There was that in his voice which promised something, and Dickson
listened.
"The enemy's mostly foreigners, but Dobson's there and I think he's a
kind of guide to them. Dobson's feared of the polis, and if we can
terrify Dobson he'll terrify the rest."
"Ay, but where are the police?"
"They're no' here yet, but they're comin'. The fear o' them is aye in
Dobson's mind. If he thinks the polis has arrived, he'll put the wind up
the lot.... _We_ maun be the polis."
Dickson could only stare while the Chief of Staff unfolded his scheme. I
do not know to whom the Muse of History will give the credit of the
tactics of "infiltration"--whether to Ludendorff or von Hutier or some
other proud captain of Germany, or to Foch, who revised and perfected
them. But I know that the same notion was at this moment of crisis
conceived by Thomas Yownie, whom no parents acknowledged, who slept
usually in a coal cellar, and who had picked up his education among
Gorbals closes and along the wharves of Clyde.
"It's gettin' dark," he said, "and the enemy are that busy tryin' to
break into the Hoose that they'll no' be thinkin' o' their rear. The
five o' us Die-Hards is grand at dodgin' and keepin' out of sight, and
what hinders us to get in among them, so that they'll hear us but never
see us? We're used to the ways o' the polis, and can imitate them fine.
Forbye we've all got our whistles, which are the same as a bobbie's
birl, and Old Bill and Peter are grand at copyin' a man's voice. Since
the Captain is shut up in the Hoose, the command falls to me, and that's
my plan."
With a piece of chalk he drew on the kitchen floor a rough sketch of the
environs of Huntingtower. Peter Paterson was to move from the
shrubberies beyond the verandah, Napoleon from the stables, Old Bill
from the Tower, while Wee Jaikie and Thomas himself were to advance as
if from the Garplefoot, so that the enemy might fear for his
communications. "As soon as one o' ye gets into position he's to gie the
patrol cry, and when each o' ye has heard five cries, he's to advance.
Begin birlin' and roarin' afore ye get among them, and keep it up till
ye're at the Hoose wall. If they've gotten inside, in ye go after them.
I trust each Die-Hard to use his judgment, and above all to keep out o'
sight and no let himsel' be grippit."
The plan, like all great tactics, was simple, and no sooner was it
expounded than it was put into action. The Die-Hards faded out of the
kitchen like fog-wreaths, and Dickson and Mrs. Morran were left looking
at each other. They did not look long. The bare feet of Wee Jaikie had
not crossed the threshold fifty seconds, before they were followed by
Mrs. Morran's out-of-doors boots and Dickson's tackets. Arm in arm the
two hobbled down the back path behind the village which led to the South
Lodge. The gate was unlocked, for the warder was busy elsewhere, and
they hastened up the avenue. Far off Dickson thought he saw shapes
fleeting across the park, which he took to be the shock-troops of his
own side, and he seemed to hear snatches of song. Jaikie was giving
tongue, and this was what he sang:
"Proley Tarians, arise!
Wave the Red Flag to the skies,
Heed nae mair the Fat Man's lees,
Stap them doun his throat!
Nocht to loss except our chains,
We maun drain oor dearest veins--
A' the worrld shall be our gains----"
But he tripped over a rabbit wire and thereafter conserved his breath.
The wind was so loud that no sound reached them from the House, which
blank and immense now loomed before them. Dickson's ears were alert for
the noise of shots or the dull crash of bombs; hearing nothing, he
feared the worst, and hurried Mrs. Morran at a pace which endangered
her life. He had no fear for himself, arguing that his foes were seeking
higher game, and judging, too, that the main battle must be round the
verandah at the other end. The two passed the shrubbery where the road
forked, one path running to the back door and one to the stables. They
took the latter and presently came out on the downs, with the ravine of
the Garple on their left, the stables in front, and on the right the
hollow of a formal garden running along the west side of the House.
The gale was so fierce, now that they had no wind-break between them and
the ocean, that Mrs. Morran could wrestle with it no longer, and found
shelter in the lee of a clump of rhododendrons. Darkness had all but
fallen, and the house was a black shadow against the dusky sky, while a
confused greyness marked the sea. The old Tower showed a tooth of
masonry; there was no glow from it, so the fire, which Jaikie had
reported, must have died down. A whaup cried loudly, and very eerily:
then another.
The birds stirred up Mrs. Morran. "That's the laddies' patrol," she
gasped. "Count the cries, Dickson."
Another bird wailed, this time very near. Then there was perhaps three
minutes' silence, till a fainter wheeple came from the direction of the
Tower. "Four," said Dickson, but he waited in vain on the fifth. He had
not the acute hearing of the boys, and could not catch the faint echo of
Peter Paterson's signal beyond the verandah. The next he heard was a
shrill whistle cutting into the wind, and then others in rapid
succession from different quarters, and something which might have been
the hoarse shouting of angry men.
The Gorbals Die-Hards had gone into action.
Dull prose is no medium to tell of that wild adventure. The sober
sequence of the military historian is out of place in recording deeds
that knew not sequence or sobriety. Were I a bard, I would cast this
tale in excited verse, with a lilt which would catch the speed of the
reality. I would sing of Napoleon, not unworthy of his great namesake,
who penetrated to the very window of the ladies' bedroom, where the
framework had been driven in and men were pouring through; of how there
he made such pandemonium with his whistle that men tumbled back and ran
about blindly seeking for guidance; of how in the long run his pugnacity
mastered him, so that he engaged in combat with an unknown figure and
the two rolled into what had once been a fountain. I would hymn Peter
Paterson, who across tracts of darkness engaged Old Bill in a
conversation which would have done no discredit to a Gallogate
policeman. He pretended to be making reports and seeking orders. "We've
gotten three o' the deevils, sir. What'll we dae wi' them?" he shouted;
and back would come the reply in a slightly more genteel voice: "Fall
them to the rear. Tamson has charge of the prisoners." Or it would be:
"They've gotten pistols, sir. What's the orders?" and the answer would
be: "Stick to your batons. The guns are posted on the knowe, so we
needn't hurry." And over all the din there would be a perpetual
whistling and a yelling of "Hands up!"
I would sing, too, of Wee Jaikie, who was having the red-letter hour of
his life. His fragile form moved like a lizard in places where no mortal
could be expected, and he varied his duties with impish assaults upon
the persons of such as came in his way. His whistle blew in a man's ear
one second and the next yards away. Sometimes he was moved to song, and
unearthly fragments of "Class-conscious we are" or "Proley Tarians,
arise!" mingled with the din, like the cry of seagulls in a storm. He
saw a bright light flare up within the house which warned him not to
enter, but he got as far as the garden-room, in whose dark corners he
made havoc. Indeed he was almost too successful, for he created panic
where he went, and one or two fired blindly at the quarter where he had
last been heard. These shots were followed by frenzied prohibitions from
Spidel and were not repeated. Presently he felt that aimless surge of
men that is the prelude to flight, and heard Dobson's great voice
roaring in the hall. Convinced that the crisis had come, he made his way
outside, prepared to harass the rear of any retirement. Tears now flowed
down his face, and he could not have spoken for sobs, but he had never
been so happy.
But chiefly would I celebrate Thomas Yownie, for it was he who brought
fear into the heart of Dobson. He had a voice of singular compass, and
from the verandah he made it echo round the House. The efforts of Old
Bill and Peter Paterson had been skilful indeed, but those of Thomas
Yownie were deadly. To some leader beyond he shouted news: "Robison's
just about finished wi' his lot, and then he'll get the boats." A
furious charge upset him, and for a moment he thought he had been
discovered. But it was only Dobson rushing to Léon, who was leading the
men in the doorway. Thomas fled to the far end of the verandah, and
again lifted up his voice. "All foreigners," he shouted, "except the man
Dobson. Ay. Ay. Ye've got Loudon? Well done!"
It must have been this last performance which broke Dobson's nerve and
convinced him that the one hope lay in a rapid retreat to the
Garplefoot. There was a tumbling of men in the doorway, a muttering of
strange tongues, and the vision of the innkeeper shouting to Léon and
Spidel. For a second he was seen in the faint reflection that the light
in the hall cast as far as the verandah, a wild figure urging the
retreat with a pistol clapped to the head of those who were too confused
by the hurricane of events to grasp the situation. Some of them dropped
over the wall, but most huddled like sheep through the door on the west
side, a jumble of struggling, panic-stricken mortality. Thomas Yownie,
staggered at the success of his tactics, yet kept his head and did his
utmost to confuse the retreat, and the triumphant shouts and whistles of
the other Die-Hards showed that they were not unmindful of this final
duty....
The verandah was empty, and he was just about to enter the House, when
through the west door came a figure, breathing hard and bent apparently
on the same errand. Thomas prepared for battle, determined that no
straggler of the enemy should now wrest from him victory, but, as the
figure came into the faint glow at the doorway, he recognised it as
Heritage. And at the same moment he heard something which made his tense
nerves relax. Away on the right came sounds, a thud of galloping horses
on grass and the jingle of bridle reins and the voices of men. It was
the real thing at last. It is a sad commentary on his career, but now
for the first time in his brief existence Thomas Yownie felt charitably
disposed towards the police.
* * * * *
The Poet, since we left him blaspheming on the roof of the Tower, had
been having a crowded hour of most inglorious life. He had started to
descend at a furious pace, and his first misadventure was that he
stumbled and dropped Dickson's pistol over the parapet. He tried to mark
where it might have fallen in the gloom below, and this lost him
precious minutes. When he slithered through the trap into the attic
room, where he had tried to hold up the attack, he discovered that it
was full of smoke which sought in vain to escape by the narrow window.
Volumes of it were pouring up the stairs, and when he attempted to
descend he found himself choked and blinded. He rushed gasping to the
window, filled his lungs with fresh air, and tried again, but he got no
further than the first turn, from which he could see through the cloud
red tongues of flame in the ground room. This was solemn indeed, so he
sought another way out. He got on the roof, for he remembered a
chimney-stack, cloaked with ivy, which was built straight from the
ground, and he thought he might climb down it.
He found the chimney and began the descent, confidently, for he had once
borne a good reputation at the Montanvert and Cortina. At first all went
well, for stones stuck out at decent intervals like the rungs of a
ladder, and roots of ivy supplemented their deficiencies. But presently
he came to a place where the masonry had crumbled into a cave, and left
a gap some twenty feet high. Below it he could dimly see a thick mass of
ivy which would enable him to cover the further forty feet to the
ground, but at that cave he stuck most finally. All round the lime and
stone had lapsed into debris, and he could find no safe foothold. Worse
still, the block on which he relied proved loose, and only by a
dangerous traverse did he avert disaster.
There he hung for a minute or two, with a cold void in his stomach. He
had always distrusted the handiwork of man as a place to scramble on,
and now he was planted in the dark on a decomposing wall, with an
excellent chance of breaking his neck, and with the most urgent need for
haste. He could see the windows of the House and, since he was sheltered
from the gale, he could hear the faint sound of blows on woodwork. There
was clearly the devil to pay there, and yet here he was helplessly
stuck.... Setting his teeth, he started to ascend again. Better the fire
than this cold breakneck emptiness.
It took him the better part of half an hour to get back, and he passed
through many moments of acute fear. Footholds which had seemed secure
enough in the descent now proved impossible, and more than once he had
his heart in his mouth when a rotten ivy stump or a wedge of stone gave
in his hands, and dropped dully into the pit of night, leaving him
crazily spread-eagled. When at last he reached the top he rolled on his
back and felt very sick. Then, as he realised his safety, his impatience
revived. At all costs he would force his way out though he should be
grilled like a herring.
The smoke was less thick in the attic, and with his handkerchief wet
with the rain and bound across his mouth he made a dash for the ground
room. It was as hot as a furnace, for everything inflammable in it
seemed to have caught fire, and the lumber glowed in piles of hot ashes.
But the floor and walls were stone, and only the blazing jambs of the
door stood between him and the outer air. He had burned himself
considerably as he stumbled downwards, and the pain drove him to a wild
leap through the broken arch, where he miscalculated the distance,
charred his shins, and brought down a red-hot fragment of the lintel on
his head. But the thing was done, and a minute later he was rolling like
a dog in the wet bracken to cool his burns and put out various
smouldering patches on his raiment.
Then he started running for the House, but, confused by the darkness, he
bore too much to the north, and came out in the side avenue from which
he and Dickson had reconnoitred on the first evening. He saw on the
right a glow in the verandah which, as we know, was the reflection of
the flare in the hall, and he heard a babble of voices. But he heard
something more, for away on his left was the sound which Thomas Yownie
was soon to hear--the trampling of horses. It was the police at last,
and his task was to guide them at once to the critical point of
action.... Three minutes later a figure like a scarecrow was admonishing
a bewildered sergeant, while his hands plucked feverishly at a horse's
bridle.
* * * * *
It is time to return to Dickson in his clump of rhododendrons.
Tragically aware of his impotence he listened to the tumult of the
Die-Hards, hopeful when it was loud, despairing when there came a
moment's lull, while Mrs. Morran like a Greek chorus drew loudly upon
her store of proverbial philosophy and her memory of Scripture texts.
Twice he tried to reconnoitre towards the scene of battle, but only
blundered into sunken plots and pits in the Dutch garden. Finally he
squatted beside Mrs. Morran, lit his pipe, and took a firm hold on his
patience.
It was not tested for long. Presently he was aware that a change had
come over the scene--that the Die-Hards' whistles and shouts were being
drowned in another sound, the cries of panicky men. Dobson's bellow was
wafted to him. "Auntie Phemie," he shouted, "the innkeeper's getting
rattled. Dod, I believe they're running." For at that moment twenty
paces on his left the van of the retreat crashed through the creepers on
the garden's edge and leaped the wall that separated it from the cliffs
of the Garplefoot.
The old woman was on her feet.
"God be thankit, is't the polis?"
"Maybe. Maybe no'. But they're running."
Another bunch of men raced past, and he heard Dobson's voice.
"I tell you, they're broke. Listen, it's horses. Ay, it's the police,
but it was the Die-Hards that did the job.... Here! They mustn't escape.
Have the police had the sense to send men to the Garplefoot?"
Mrs. Morran, a figure like an ancient prophetess, with her tartan shawl
lashing in the gale, clutched him by the shoulder.
"Doun to the waterside and stop them. Ye'll no' be beat by wee laddies!
On wi' ye and I'll follow! There's gaun to be a juidgment on evil-doers
this nicht."
Dickson needed no urging. His heart was hot within him, and the
weariness and stiffness had gone from his limbs. He, too, tumbled over
the wall, and made for what he thought was the route by which he had
originally ascended from the stream. As he ran he made ridiculous
efforts to cry like a whaup in the hope of summoning the Die-Hards. One,
indeed, he found--Napoleon, who had suffered a grievous pounding in the
fountain and had only escaped by an eel-like agility which had aforetime
served him in good stead with the law of his native city. Lucky for
Dickson was the meeting, for he had forgotten the road and would
certainly have broken his neck. Led by the Die-Hard he slid forty feet
over screes and boiler-plates, with the gale plucking at him, found a
path, lost it, and then tumbled down a raw bank of earth to the flat
ground beside the harbour. During all this performance, he has told me,
he had no thought of fear, nor any clear notion what he meant to do. He
just wanted to be in at the finish of the job.
Through the narrow entrance the gale blew as through a funnel, and the
usually placid waters of the harbour were a mass of angry waves. Two
boats had been launched and were plunging furiously, and on one of them
a lantern dipped and fell. By its light he could see men holding a
further boat by the shore. There was no sign of the police; he reflected
that probably they had become tangled in the Garple Dean. The third boat
was waiting for some one.
Dickson--a new Ajax by the ships--divined who this some one must be and
realised his duty. It was the leader, the arch-enemy, the man whose
escape must at all costs be stopped. Perhaps he had the Princess with
him, thus snatching victory from apparent defeat. In any case he must be
tackled, and a fierce anxiety gripped his heart. "Aye finish a job," he
told himself, and peered up into the darkness of the cliffs, wondering
just how he should set about it, for except in the last few days he had
never engaged in combat with a fellow-creature.
"When he comes, you grip his legs," he told Napoleon, "and get him
down. He'll have a pistol, and we're done if he's on his feet."
There was a cry from the boats, a shout of guidance, and the light on
the water was waved madly. "They must have good eyesight," thought
Dickson, for he could see nothing. And then suddenly he was aware of
steps in front of him, and a shape like a man rising out of the void at
his left hand.
In the darkness Napoleon missed his tackle, and the full shock came on
Dickson. He aimed at what he thought was the enemy's throat, found only
an arm and was shaken off as a mastiff might shake off a toy terrier. He
made another clutch, fell, and in falling caught his opponent's leg so
that he brought him down. The man was immensely agile, for he was up in
a second and something hot and bright blew into Dickson's face. The
pistol bullet had passed through the collar of his faithful waterproof,
slightly singeing his neck. But it served its purpose, for Dickson
paused, gasping, to consider where he had been hit, and before he could
resume the chase the last boat had pushed off into deep water.
To be shot at from close quarters is always irritating, and the novelty
of the experience increased Dickson's natural wrath. He fumed on the
shore like a deerhound when the stag has taken to the sea. So hot was
his blood that he would have cheerfully assaulted the whole crew had
they been within his reach. Napoleon, who had been incapacitated for
speed by having his stomach and bare shanks savagely trampled upon,
joined him, and together they watched the bobbing black specks as they
crawled out of the estuary into the grey spindrift which marked the
harbour mouth.
But as he looked the wrath died out of Dickson's soul. For he saw that
the boats had indeed sailed on a desperate venture, and that a pursuer
was on their track more potent than his breathless middle-age. The tide
was on the ebb, and the gale was driving the Atlantic breakers
shoreward, and in the jaws of the entrance the two waters met in an
unearthly turmoil. Above the noise of the wind came the roar of the
flooded Garple and the fret of the harbour, and far beyond all the
crashing thunder of the conflict at the harbour mouth. Even in the
darkness, against the still faintly grey western sky, the spume could be
seen rising like waterspouts. But it was the ear rather than the eye
which made certain presage of disaster. No boat could face the challenge
of that loud portal.
As Dickson struggled against the wind and stared, his heart melted and a
great awe fell upon him. He may have wept; it is certain that he prayed.
"Poor souls, poor souls!" he repeated. "I doubt the last hour or two has
been a poor preparation for eternity."
* * * * *
The tide next day brought the dead ashore. Among them was a young man,
different in dress and appearance from the rest--a young man with a
noble head and a finely-cut classic face, which was not marred like the
others from pounding among the Garple rocks. His dark hair was washed
back from his brow, and the mouth, which had been hard in life, was now
relaxed in the strange innocence of death.
Dickson gazed at the body and observed that there was a slight
deformation between the shoulders.
"Poor fellow," he said. "That explains a lot.... As my father used to
say, cripples have a right to be cankered."