Andrew Constable, with his wife and old-fashioned child Isie, was
seated at tea in the little parlour opening from the shop, when he was
called out by a customer. He remained longer than was likely to be
accounted for by the transaction of business at that time of the day.
And when he returned his honest face looked troubled.
"Wha was that?" asked his wife.
"Ow! it was naebody but Jeames Johnston, wantin' a bit o' flannin for's
wife's coatie."
"And what had he to say 'at keepit ye till yer tay's no fit to drink?"
"Ow! my tay'll do weel eneuch. It's nae by ordinar' cauld."
"But what said he?"
"Weel! hm! hm!--He said it was fine frosty weather."
"Ay, nae doobt! He kent that by the way the shuttle flew. Was that a'?"
"Na, nae freely. But cogues hae lugs, and bairns hae muckle een."
For Isie sat on her stool staring at her father and mother alternately,
and watching for the result of her mother's attempt at picking the lock
of her father's reticence. But the moment she heard the word _lugs_,
she knew that she had no chance, and her eyes grew less and their
pupils grew larger. Fearing he had hurt her, Andrew said,
"Winna ye hae a starnie jam, Isie? It's grosert-jam."
"Na, thank ye, daddie. Maybe it wad gie me a sair wame," answered the
solemn old-faced Scotchwoman of seven.
A child who refuses jam lest it should serve her as the little book did
the Apostle John, might be considered prudent enough to be intrusted
with a secret. But not a word more was said on the subject, till Isie
was in bed, and supposed to be fast asleep, in a little room that
opened off the parlour. But she was not asleep. And the door was always
left open, that she might fall asleep in the presence of her parents.
Their words therefore flowed freely into her ears, although the meaning
only played on her mind with a dull glimmer like that which played on
her wall from the fire in the room where they sat talking.
"Ay, woman," began Andrew, "it'll be sair news, this, to the lady ower
the watter."
"Ye dinna mean Mistress Forbes, Anerew?"
"'Deed I mean jist her."
"Is't her son? Has he met wi' ony mischeef? What's happent till him? Is
he droont, or killt? The Lord preserve's! She'll dee o' 't."
"Na, lass. It's a hantle waur nor a' that."
The woodcuts in Fox's _Book of Martyrs_, of which three folio volumes
in black letter lay in the room whence the conversation flowed to
Isie's ears, rose in all their hideousuess before the mental vision of
the child. In no other way than as torture could she conceive of worse
than being killed.
"Ye gar me grue," said Mrs Constable, with a shudder.
"Ay, woman, ye ken little o' the wickedness o' great toons--hoo they
lie in wait at ilka corner, wi' their gins and their snares and their
pits that they howk to catch the unwary yowth," said Andrew, in
something of the pride of superior knowledge.
From this elevation, however, he was presently pulled down in a rather
ignominious fashion by his more plain-spoken though not a whit more
honest wife.
"Anerew, dinna ye mint (aim) at speikin' like a chapter o' the Proverbs
o' Solomon, the son o' Dawvid. Say straucht oot 'at thae coorse jawds
that hing aboot i' the gloamin' hae gotten a grip o' the bonnie lad.
Eh! but he'll fair ill; and the Lord hae mercy upo' him--and nane upo'
them!"
"Hoot! hoot! lass; dinna speik wi' sic a venom. Ye ken wha says
_Vengeance is mine_?"
"Ay, ay, weel eneuch. And I houp He'll tak's ain upo' sic brazen
hizzies. You men-fowk think ye ken a hantle o' things that ye wad haud
us ohn kent. But nane kens the wiles o' a wumman, least awa them 'at
fa's into them, but anither wumman."
"It's nae savin' lore," said Andrew, a little troubled that his wife
should assert a familiar acquaintance with such things. But she went
on.
"Women's jist dreidfu'. Whan ance they gang the ill gait, they're
neither to haud nor bin'. And to think o' them layin' han's upo' sic a
bonnie weel-behaved laddie as that Alec Forbes, a ceevil, herty cratur,
wi' a kin' word an' a joke even for the beggar 'at he geid a bawbee
till! Weel, he'll come oot o' their cluiks, maybe no that nmckle the
waur efter a', as mony a man frae King Dawvid doonwith afore him."
"Noo, wumman!" said Andrew, in a tone of authority blended with rising
indignation; "ye're slidin' aff o' yer ain stule, and ye'll be upo' the
grun' afore ye win on to mine. Richt or wrang aboot the women, I bude
to ken mair aboot the men nor ye do; and I daur affirm and uphaud that
never man cam' oot o' the grip o' thae poor deluded craters--"
Mrs Constable interposed with one single emphatic epithet, not
admittable to the ears of this generation; but Andrew resumed, and went
on.
"--poor deluded craters, withoot losin' a great pairt o' what was left
in him o' the eemage o' God efter the fall. Woman, he tynes (loses) a
heap!"
"Hoo sud ye ken onything aboot that, Anerew?" returned his wife
sharply.
"The same way than ye ken sae weel aboot the she side o' the queston,
lass. We may jist enlichten ane anither a wee aboot some things,
mayhap."
Meantime the ears of the little pitcher in bed had been growing longer
and longer with curious horror. The something in itself awfully vague
about Alec's fate was wrapt in yet deeper clouds of terror and mystery
by the discord of opinion with regard to it on the part of her father
and mother, whom she had rarely heard differ. She pictured to herself
the image of his Maker being scratched off Alec by the claws of furies;
and hot pincers tearing nail after nail from the hand which had once
given her a penny. And her astonishment was therefore paralyzing when
she heard her father say:
"But ye maun haud a quaiet tongue i' yer heid, guidwife; for weel as ye
like the laddie, ye may blast his character gin ye say a word aboot
it."
"I s' warran' it's a' ower Glamerton afore it comes to your lugs,
Anerew," returned her mother. "They're no that gleg efter sic news. But
I wad like sair to ken wha sent hame the word o' 't."
"I'm thinking it's been young Bruce."
"The Lord be praised for a lee!" exclaimed Mrs Constable. "Haena I
tell't ye afore noo, sae that it's no upmak to pick the lock o' the
occasion, Anerew, that Rob Bruce has a spite at that faimily for takin'
sic a heap o' notice o' Annie Annerson. And I wadna wonner gin he had
set's hert upo' merryin' her upo' 's ain Rob, and sae keepin' her bit
siller i' the faimily. Gin that be sae, he micht weel gie Alec Forbes a
back-handit cloot (blow)."
"'Deed! maybe, gudewife. He's a burnin' and a shinin' licht amo' you
missioners, though; and ye maunna say ill o' 'm, for fear he has ye up
afore the kirk."
"Ay, deed is he! He's a burnin' shame, and a stinkin' lamp; for the
grace o' God wasna hauden to the nib o' 'm lang eneuch to set him in a
low (flame), but only lang eneuch to gar the ile o' 'm reek fit to
scomfish (suffocate) a haill Sodom."
"Hoot, lass! Ye're ower sair even upo' him. But it's verra true that
gin the story cam' frae that en' o' the toon, there's room for
rizzonable doobts. Sae we'll awa' to our beds, and houp things mayna be
sae far gane as the soun' o' them. Only I drede there's aye some water
whaur the stirkie droons."
It was long before little Isie got to sleep, what with attempting to
realize the actual condition of Alec Forbes, and trying to excogitate
the best means for his deliverance. Why should not all Glamerton set
out in a body with flails and pitchforks? And if she must not meddle
for that, seeing her father had said the matter must not be mentioned,
yet his prohibition could not include Alec's mother, whom it would be
wicked to keep in ignorance. For what would Isie think if she was taken
prisoner by a cruel woman and they would not tell her mother? So she
fell asleep, to wake in the morning with the sense of a mission upon
her important little mind.
What rendered it probable that the rumour came from "that end of the
town" was, that Bruce the younger was this year a bejan at Alec's
college, and besides was the only other scion of Glamerton there
grafted, so that any news about Alec other than he would care to send
himself, must in all likelihood have come through him.--For Bruce the
elder had determined that in his son he would restore the fallen
fortunes of the family, giving him such an education as would entitle
him to hold up his head with the best, and especially with that proud
upstart, Alec Forbes.
The news had reached Thomas Crann, and filled him with concern. He had,
as was his custom in trouble, betaken himself straightway to "the
throne of grace," and "wrestled in prayer" with God that he would
restore the prodigal to his mother. What would Thomas have thought if
he had been told that his anxiety, genuine as it was, that his love,
true as it was, did not come near the love and anxiety of another man
who spent his evenings in drinking whisky and reading heathen poets,
and who, although he knew not a little of his Bible, never opened it
from one end of the year to the other? If he had been told that Cosmo
Cupples had more than once, after the first tumbler of toddy and before
the second, betaken himself to his prayers for his poor Alec Forbes,
and entreated God Almighty to do for him what he could not do, though
he would die for him--to rescue him from the fearful pit and the miry
clay of moral pollution--if he had heard this, he would have said that
it was a sad pity, but such prayers could not be answered, seeing he
that prayed was himself in the gall of bitterness and the bond of
iniquity.
There was much shaking of the head amongst the old women. Many an
ejaculation and many a meditative _eh me_! were uttered over Alec's
fall; and many a word of tender pity for his poor mother floated forth
on the frosty air of Glamerton; but no one ventured to go and tell the
dreary tidings. The men left it to the women; and the woman knew too
well how the bearer of such ill news would appear in her eyes, to
venture upon the ungracious task. So they said to themselves she must
know it just as well as they did; or if she did not know, poor woman!
she would know time enough for all the good it would do her. And that
came of sending sons to colleges! &c., &c.
But there was just one not so easily satisfied about the extent of her
duties: that was little Isie Constable.