The Shoes of Fortune
CONTENTS
It is an odd thing, chance—the one element to baffle the logician and make the scheming of the wisest look as foolish in the long run as the sandy citadel a child builds upon the shore without any thought of the incoming tide. A strange thing, chance; and but for chance I might this day be the sheriff of a shire, my head stuffed with the tangled phrase and sentiment of interlocutors, or maybe no more than an advocate overlooked, sitting in John's Coffeehouse in Edinburgh—a moody soured man with a jug of claret, and cursing the inconsistencies of preferment to office. I might have been that, or less, if it had not been for so trifling a circumstance as the burning of an elderly woman's batch of scones. Had Mistress Grant a more attentive eye to her Culross griddle, what time the scones for her lodgers, breakfast were a-baking forty years ago, I would never have fled furth my native land in a mortal terror of the gallows: had her griddle, say, been higher on the swee-chain by a link or two, Paul Greig would never have foregathered with Dan Risk, the blackguard skipper of a notorious craft; nor pined in a foreign jail; nor connived, unwitting, at a prince's murder; nor marched the weary leagues of France and fought there on a beggar's wage. And this is not all that hung that long-gone day upon a woman's stair-head gossip to the neglect of her cuisine , for had this woman been more diligent at her baking I had probably never seen my Isobel with a lover's eye.
Well, here's one who can rarely regret the past except that it is gone. It was hard, it was cruel often; dangers the most curious and unexpected beset me, and I got an insight to deep villainies whereof man may be capable; yet on my word, if I had the parcelling out of a second life for myself, I think I would have it not greatly differing from the first, that seems in God's providence like to end in the parish where it started, among kent and friendly folk. I would not swear to it, yet I fancy I would have Lucky Grant again gossiping on her stair-head and her scones burned black, that Mackellar, my fellow-lodger, might make me once more, as he used to do, the instrument of his malcontent.
Neil Munro
THE SHOES OF FORTUNE
Illustrated by A. S. Boyd
THE SHOES OF FORTUNE
CHAPTER I
NARRATES HOW I CAME TO QUIT THE STUDY OF LATIN AND THE LIKE, AND TAKE TO HARD WORK IN A MOORLAND COUNTRY
CHAPTER II
MISS FORTUNE'S TRYST BY WATER OF EARN, AND HOW I MARRED THE SAME UNWITTINGLY
CHAPTER III
OF THE COMING OF UNCLE ANDREW WITH A SCARRED FOREHEAD AND A BRASS-BOUND CHEST, AND HOW I TOOK AN INFECTION
CHAPTER IV
I COME UPON THE RED SHOES
CHAPTER V
A SPOILED TRYST, AND OTHER THINGS THAT FOLLOWED ON THE OPENING OF THE CHEST
CHAPTER VI
MY DEED ON THE MOOR OF MEARNS
CHAPTER VII
QUENTIN GREIG LOSES A SON, AND I SET OUT WITH A HORSE AS ALL MY FORTUNE
CHAPTER VIII
I RIDE BY NIGHT ACROSS SCOTLAND, AND MEET A MARINER WITH A GLEED EYE
CHAPTER IX
WHEREIN THE “SEVEN SISTERS” ACTS STRANGELY, AND I SIT WAITING FOR THE MANACLES
CHAPTER X
THE STRUGGLE IN THE CABIN, AND AN EERIE SOUND OF RUNNING WATER
CHAPTER XI
THE SCUTTLED SHIP
CHAPTER XII
MAKES PLAIN THE DEEPEST VILLAINY OF RISK AND SETS ME ON A FRENCHMAN
CHAPTER XIII
WHEREIN APPEARS A GENTLEMANLY CORSAIR AND A FRENCH-IRISH LORD
CHAPTER XIV
IN DUNKERQUE—A LADY SPEAKS TO ME IN SCOTS AND A FAT PRIEST SEEMS TO HAVE SOMETHING ON HIS MIND
CHAPTER XV
WHEREIN A SITUATION OFFERS AND I ENGAGE TO GO TRAVELLING WITH THE PRIEST
CHAPTER XVI
RELATES HOW I INDULGED MY CURIOSITY AND HOW LITTLE CAME OF IT
CHAPTER XVII
WITNESSES THE LAST OF A BLATE YOUNG MAN
CHAPTER XIX
A RAP IN THE EARLY MORNING AWAKENS ME AND I START IN A GLASS COACH UPON THE ODDEST OF JOURNEYS
CHAPTER XX
LEADS ME TO THE FRONT OF A COFFEE-HOUSE WHERE I AM STARTLED TO SEE A FACE I KNOW
CHAPTER XXI
THE ATTEMPT ON THE PRINCE
CHAPTER XXII
OF A NIGHT JOURNEY AND BLACK BICETRE AT THE END OF IT
CHAPTER XXIV
PHILOSOPHY IN A FELON'S CELL
CHAPTER XXV
WE ATTEMPT AN ESCAPE
CHAPTER XXVI
A RIMEY NIGHT ON ROOF-TOPS, AND A NEW USE FOR AN OLD KIRK BELL
CHAPTER XXVII
WE ENTER PARIS AND FIND A SANCTUARY THERE
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE MAN WITH THE TARTAN WAISTCOAT
CHAPTER XXIX
WHEREIN THE PRIEST LEAVES ME, AND I MAKE AN INLAND VOYAGE
CHAPTER XXX
A GUID CONCEIT OF MYSELF LEADS ME FAR ASTRAY
=== MISSING PAGES (274-288) ===
CHAPTER XXXI.
THE BARD OF LOVE WHO WROTE WITH OLD MATERIALS
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE DUEL IN THE AUBERGE GARDEN
CHAPTER XXXIII
FAREWELL TO MISS WALKINSHAW
CHAPTER XXXIV
OF MY WINTER CAMPAIGN IN PRUSSIA, AND ANOTHER MEETING WITH MACKELLAR OF KILBRIDE
CHAPTER XXXV
BRINGS ME TO HELVOETSLUYS IN WINTER WEATHER
CHAPTER XXXVI
FATHER HAMILTON IS THREATENED BY THE JESUITS AND WE ARE FORCED TO FLY AGAIN
CHAPTER XXXVII
I OVERHEAR THE PLAN OF BRITAIN'S INVASION
CHAPTER XXXVIII
THUROT'S PRISONER. MY FRIEND THE WATCH
CHAPTER XXXIX
DISCLOSES THE MANNER OF MY ESCAPE AND HOW WE SET SAIL FOR ALBION
CHAPTER XL
MY INTERVIEW WITH PITT
CHAPTER XLI
TREATS OF FATHER HAMILTON'S DEATH
CHAPTER XLII
I DEPART IN THE MIDST OF ILLUMINATION AND COME TO A JAIL, BAD NEWS, AND AN OLD ENEMY
CHAPTER XLIII
BACK TO THE MOORLAND
CHAPTER XLIV
WHEREIN THE SHOES OF FORTUNE BRING ME HOME
THE END
