CHAPTER III.
Next morning Walter and his two sons, and old Nanny, went all over to Chapelhope together, just as the cows came to the loan; and the farmer was sundry times remarking by the way that “day-light had mony een!” The truth was, that the phantoms of superstition had in a measure fled with the shadows of the night, which they seldom fail to do. They, indeed, remain in the bosom, hid, as it were, in embryo, ready to be embodied again at the fall of the long shadow in the moon-light, or the evening tale round the fading embers; but Walter at this time, perhaps, regarded the visions of last night as dreams scarcely remembered, and less believed, and things which in the open day he would have been ashamed to have acknowledged.
Katharine had begun a-milking, but when she beheld her father coming across the meadow, she left her leglen and ran home. Perhaps it was to put his little parlour in order, for no one of the family had set foot within that house but herself for three weeks—or perhaps she did not choose that their meeting should be witnessed by other eyes. In short, she had something of importance to put to rights—for home she ran with great haste; and Walter, putting his sons to some work to detain them, followed her all alone. He stepped into the parlour, but no one being there, he sat down on his elbow chair, and began to look about him. In a few seconds his daughter entered—flung herself on her father’s knee and bosom—clasped her arms about his neck—kissed him, and shed a flood of tears on his breast. At first he felt somewhat startled at her embrace, and his arms made a feeble and involuntary effort to press her away from him; but she grew to him the closer, and welcomed him home with such a burst of filial affection and tenderness, that nature in a short time regained her empire over the father’s heart; and there was to be seen old Walter with his large hands pressing her slender waist, keeping her at a little distance from him on his knee, and looking stedfastly in her face, with the large tear rolling in his eye. It was such a look as one sometimes takes of the corpse of one that was dearly beloved in life. Well did she read this look, for she had the eye of the eagle for discernment; but she hid her face again on his shoulder, and endeavoured, by familiar enquiries, to wean him insensibly from his reserve, and draw him into his wonted freedom of conversation with her.
“Ye ken o’er well,” said he at length, “how deep a haud ye hae o’ this heart, Keatie. Ye’re my ain bairn still, and ye hae done muckle for my life—but”——
“Muckle for your life!” said she, interrupting him—“I have been but too remiss. I have regretted every hour that I was not with you attending you in prison, administering to all my father’s wants, and helping to make the time of bondage and suspense pass over more lightsomely; but grievous circumstances have prevented me. I have had sad doings here since you went away, my dear father—there is not a feeling that can rack the human heart that has not been my share. But I will confess all my errors to my father, fall at his knees, and beg his forgiveness—ay, and I hope to receive it too.”
“The sooner ye do sae the better then, Keatie,” said he—“I was here last night, an’ saw a sight that was enough to turn a father’s heart to stane.”
“You were here last night!” said she emphatically, while her eyes were fixed on the ground—“You were here last night! Oh! what shall become of me!”
“Ay, weel may ye say sae, poor lost and undone creature! I was here last night, though worn back by some o’ your infernals, an’ saw ye in the mids o’ your dreadfu’ game, wi’ a’ your bike o’ hell round about ye. I watna what your confession and explanation may do; but without these I hae sworn to myself, and I’ll keep my aith, that you and I shall never night thegither again in the same house, nor the same part o’ the country—ay, though it should bring down my grey hairs wi’ sorrow to the grave, I’ll keep that aith.”
“I fear it will turn out a rash vow,” said she, “and one that we may all repent to the last day that we have to live. There is danger and jeopardy in the business, and it is connected with the lives and souls of men; therefore, before we proceed farther in it, relate to me all the circumstances of your trial, and by what means you are liberated.”
“I’ll do that cheerfully,” said Walter, “gin it war but to teach you compliance.”
He then went over all the circumstances of his extraordinary trial, and the conditions on which he was discharged; and ended by requiring her positively to give him the promised explanation.
“So you are only then out on bail,” said she, “and liable to be cited again on the same charges?”
“No more,” was the reply.
“It is not then time yet for my disclosure,” said she; “and no power on earth shall wring it from me; therefore, my dear father, let me beg of you to urge your request no farther, that I may not be under the painful necessity of refusing you again.”
“I hae tauld ye my determination, Keatie,” returned he; “an’ ye ken I’m no very apt to alter. If I should bind ye in a cart wi’ my ain hands, ye shall leave Chapelhope the night, unless ye can avert that by explaining your connections to me. An’ why should ye no?—Things can never appear waur to my mind than they are just now—If hell itself had been opened to my e’e, an’ I had seen you ane o’ the inmates, I coudna hae been mair astoundit than I was yestreen. I’ll send ye to Edinburgh, an’ get ye safely put up there, for I canna brook things ony langer in this state. I winna hae my family scattered, an’ made a bye-word and an astonishment to the hale country this gate—Outher tell me the meaning o’t, or lay your account to leave your father’s house this day for ever.”
“You do not know what you ask, father—the thing is impossible. Was ever a poor creature so hard bestead! Will not you allow me a few days to prepare for such a departure?”
“No ae day, nor ae hour either, Kate. Ye see this is a situation o’ things that canna’ be tholed ony langer.”
She sat down as if in deep meditation, but she neither sobbed nor wept. “You are only out on bail,” said she, “and liable to be tried again on the same grounds of charge?”
“Ay, nae mair,” said Walter; “but what need ye harp on that? I’m safe enough. I forgot to tell you that the judges were sae thoroughly convinced of my loyalty and soundness, (as they ca’d it) that they wadna risk me to the vote of a jury; an’ that the bit security they sought was naething but a mere sham to get honourably quit of me. I was likewise tauld by ane that kens unco weel, that the king has gotten ither tow to teaze than persecuting whigs ony langer, an’ that there will soon be an order put out of a very different nature. There is never to be mair blood shed on account of the covenanted reformation in Scotland.”
When Walter began this speech, his daughter lifted up her downcast eyes, and fixed them on his face with a look that manifested a kind of hopeless apathy; but as he advanced, their orbs enlarged, and beamed with a radiance as if she had been some superior intelligence. She did not breathe—or, if she did, it stole imperceptibly from between her parted ruby lips. “What did you say, my dear father?” said she.
“What did I say!” repeated Walter, astonished and nettled at the question—“What the deil was i’ your lugs, that ye didna hear what I said? I’m sure I spake out. Ye are thinking o’ something else, Kate.”
“Be so good as repeat every word that you said over again,” said she, “and tell me whence you drew your intelligence.”
Walter did so; repeating it in still stronger and more energetic language than he had done before, mentioning at the same time how he had his information, which could not be doubted.
“It is enough, my dear father,” said she. “Say not another word about it. I will lay open all my errors to my father this instant—come with me, and I will show you a sight!”
As she said this, she put her arm in her father’s to lead him away; but Walter looked about him with a suspicious and startled eye, and drew somewhat back.
“You must go instantly,” continued she, “there is no time so fit; and whatever you may see or hear, be not alarmed, but follow me, and do as I bid you.”
“Nane o’ your cantrips wi’ me, Kate,” said Walter—“I see your drift weel eneugh, but ye’ll find yoursel disappointit. I hae lang expectit it wad come to this; but I’m determined against it.”
“Determined against what, my dear father?”
“Ye want to mak a warlock o’ me, ye imp o’ mischief,” said Walter; “but I hae taen up my resolution there, an’ a’ the temptations o’ Satan sanna shake it. Nah! Gudefaith, auld Wat o’ the Chapelhope’s no gaun to be led away by the lug an’ the horn to the deil that gate.”
Katharine’s mien had a tint of majesty in it, but it was naturally serious. She scarcely ever laughed, and but seldom smiled; but when she did so, the whole soul of delight beamed in it. Her face was like a dark summer day, when the clouds are high and majestic, and the lights on the valley mellowed into beauty. Her smile was like a fairy blink of the sun shed through these clouds, than which, there is nothing in nature that I know of so enlivening and beautiful. It was irresistible;—and such a smile beamed on her benign countenance, when she heard her father’s wild suspicions expressed in such a blunt and ardent way; but it conquered them all—he went away with her rather abashed, and without uttering another word.
They walked arm in arm up by the side of the burn, and were soon out of sight of Nanny and the boys. Walter was busy all the way trying to form some conjecture what the girl meant, and what was to be the issue of this adventure, and began to suspect that his old friends, the Covenant-men, were some way or other connected with it; that it was they, perhaps, who had the power of raising those spirits by which his dwelling had been so grievously haunted, for he had heard wonderful things of them. Still there was no coindication of circumstances in any of the calculations that he was able to make, for his house had been haunted by Brownie and his tribe long ere he fell in with the fugitive Covenanters. None of them had ever given him the least hint about the matter, or the smallest key to it, which he believed they would have done; nor had he ever mentioned a word of his connection with them to one of his family, or indeed to any one living. Few were the words that past between the father and daughter in the course of that walk, but it was not of long duration.
They soon came to the precipitate linn on the South Grain, where the soldiers had been slain. Katharine being a little way before, began to scramble across the face of the rock by a path that was hardly perceptible. Walter called after her, “Where are ye gaun, Keatie? It’s impossible to win yont there—there’s no outgate for a mouse.”
“We will try,” answered she; “it is perhaps not so bad as it looks—Follow me—you have nothing to fear.”
Walter followed; for however much he was affrighted for brownies, and fairies, and dead corpses, and all these awful kind of things, he was no coward among rocks and precipices. They soon reached a little dass in the middle of the linn, or what an Englishman would call a small landing-place. Here she paused till her father reached her, and pointed out to him the singularity of their situation, with the burn roaring far below their feet, and the rock fairly overhanging them above.
“Is it not a romantic and tremendous spot?” said she.
“It is that!” said Walter, “an’ I believe you and I are the first that ever stood on it.”
“Well, this is the end of our journey,” said she; and, turning about, she began to pull at a bush of heath that grew between two rocks.
“What can she be gaun to do wi’ the heather?” thought Walter to himself, when instantly a door opened, and showed a cavern that led into the hill. It was a door wattled with green heath, with the tops turned outward so exactly, that it was impossible for any living to know but that it was a bush of natural heath growing in the interstice. “Follow me, my dear father,” said she, “you have still nothing to fear;” and so saying she entered swiftly in a stooping posture. Walter followed, but his huge size precluded the possibility of his walking otherwise than on all fours, and in that mode he fairly essayed to follow his mysterious child; but the path winded—his daughter was quite gone—and the door closed behind him, for it was so constructed as to fall to of itself, and as Walter expressed it,—“There was he left gaun boring into the hill like a moudiwort, in utter darkness.” The consequence of all this was, that Walter’s courage fairly gave way, and, by an awkward retrograde motion, he made all the haste he was able back to the light. He stood on the shelve of the rock at the door for several minutes in confused consternation, saying to himself, “What in the wide world is com’d o’ the wench? I believe she is gane away down into the pit bodily, an’ thought to wile me after her; or into the heart o’ the hill, to some enchantit cave, amang her brownies, an’ fairies, an’ hobgoblins. L‑‑d have a care o’ me, gin ever I saw the like o’ this!” Then losing all patience, he opened the door, set in his head, and bellowed out,—“Hollo, lassie!—What’s com’d o’ ye? Keatie Laidlaw—Holloa!” He soon heard footsteps approaching, and took shelter behind the door, with his back leaning to the rock, in case of any sudden surprise, but it was only his daughter, who chided him gently for his timidity and want of confidence in her, and asked how he could be frightened to go where a silly girl, his own child, led the way? adding, that if he desired the mystery that had so long involved her fate and behaviour to be cleared up, he behoved to enter and follow her, or to remain in the dark for ever. Thus admonished, Walter again screwed his courage to the sticking-place, and entered in order to explore this mysterious cave, following close to his daughter, who led him all the way by the collar of the coat as he crept. The entrance was long and irregular, and in one place very narrow, the roof being supported here and there by logs of birch and alder. They came at length into the body of the cave, but it was so dimly lighted from above, the vent being purposely made among rough heath, which in part overhung and hid it from view without, that Walter was almost in the middle of it ere ever he was aware, and still creeping on his hands and knees. His daughter at last stopped short, on which he lifted his eyes, and saw indistinctly the boundaries of the cave, and a number of figures standing all around ready to receive him. The light, as I said, entered straight from above, and striking on the caps and bonnets which they wore on their heads, these shaded their faces, and they appeared to our amazed goodman so many blackamoors, with long shaggy beards and locks, and their garments as it were falling from their bodies piece-meal. On the one side, right over against him, stood a coffin, raised a little on two stones; and on the other side, on a couch of rushes, lay two bodies that seemed already dead, or just in the last stage of existence; and, at the upper end, on a kind of wicker chair, sat another pale emaciated figure, with his feet and legs wrapt up in flannel, a napkin about his head, and his body wrapped in an old duffel cloak that had once belonged to Walter himself. Walter’s vitals were almost frozen up by the sight,—he uttered a hollow exclamation, something like the beginning of a prayer, and attempted again to make his escape, but he mistook the entrance, and groped against the dark corner of the cavern. His daughter pulled him by the arm, intreating him to stay, and addressing the inmates of that horrid den, she desired them to speak to her father, and explain the circumstances of their case, for he was still bewildered, and the scene was too much for him to bear.
“That we will do joyfully,” said one, in a strong intelligent voice.
Walter turned his eyes on the speaker, and who was it but the redoubted Brownie of Bodsbeck, so often mentioned before, in all his native deformity; while the thing in the form of a broad bonnet that he wore on his head, kept his features, grey locks and beard, wholly in the shade; and, as he approached Walter, he appeared a being without any definitive form or feature. The latter was now standing on his feet, with his back leaned against the rock that formed the one side of the cave, and breathing so loud, that every whiff sounded in the caverned arches like the rush of the winter wind whistling through the crevices of the casement.
Brownie approached him, followed by others.
“Be not alarmed, goodman,” said the creature, in the same solemn and powerful voice; “you see none here but fellow-creatures and Christians—none who will not be happy to bestow on you their blessing, and welcome you as a father.”
He stretched forth his hand to take hold of our goodman’s. It was bent to his side as by a spasm, and at the same time a volley of breath came forth from his capacious chest with such a rush, that it was actually like the snort of a horse that is frightened in the dark. The Brownie, however, laid hold of it, stiff as it was, and gave it a squeeze and a hearty shake. “You are welcome, sir!” continued the shapeless mass, “to our dismal habitation. May the God of Heaven particularly bless you in your family and in all your other concerns!”
The naming of this name dispelled Walter’s wild apprehensions like a charm, for though he was no devotee, yet his mind had a strong bias to the superstitions of the country in which he was bred; therefore this benediction, pronounced in such a tone of ardour and sublimity of feeling, had a powerful effect on his mind. But the circumstance that proved the most effective of all, was perhaps the sensible assurance gained by the shaking of hands, that Brownie was really and truly a corporeal being. Walter now held out his hand to all the rest as they came forward one by one, and shook hands heartily with them all, while every one of them blessed him in the name of their Maker or Redeemer. Walter was still involved in mystery, and all this while he had never uttered a word that any man could make meaning of; and after they had all shook hands with him, he looked at the coffin; then at the figures on the couch; then at the pale wretch on the wicker-seat, and then at the coffin again.
“Let us fully understand one another,” said Katharine. “Pray, Brown, be so good as detail the circumstances of this party as shortly as you can to my father, for, as is natural, he is still perplexed and bewildered.”
“You see here before you, sir,” said the little hunchbacked figure, “a wretched remnant of that long persecuted, and now nearly annihilated sect, the covenanted reformers of the west of Scotland. We were expelled from our homes, and at last hunted from our native mountains like wolves, for none of our friends durst shelter any of us on their grounds, on pain of death. Even the rest of the persecuted disowned us, and became our adversaries, because our tenets were more stern and severe than theirs; for we acted on the principle of retaliation as far as it lay in our power, holding that to be in consistency with the laws of God and man; therefore were we expelled from their society, which indeed we disdained.
“We first came to Bodsbeck, where we got shelter for a few weeks. It was there that I was first supposed by the menials, who chanced to see me, to be a Brownie, and that superstitious idea the tenant thought meet to improve for our safety; but on the approach of Lag’s people he dismissed us. We then fled to Leithenhall, from whence in a few days we were again compelled to fly; and at last came to this wild, the only place in the south that soldiers had never searched, nor could search with any degree of success. After much labour we completed this cave, throwing the stuff into the torrent below, so that the most minute investigator could not distinguish the smallest difference in the linn, or face of the precipice; and here we deemed we might live for years without being discovered; and here we determined to live, till God should see fit, in his own good time, to send some relief to his persecuted church in these lands.
“But alas, the worst evil of all awaited us! We subsisted for a considerable time by bringing victuals over night from a great distance, but even the means of obtaining these failed us; so that famine, and the dampness of the air here, we being compelled to lie inactive in the bowels of the earth for days and nights together, brought on us a malignant and pestilential fever. In three days from its first symptoms appearing, one half of our number were lying unable to move, or lift an eye. What could we do? The remnant could not fly, and leave their sick and wounded brethren to perish here unseen. We were unable to carry them away with us, and if we had, we had no place to which we could have conveyed them. We durst not apply to you, for if you had taken pity on us, we knew it would cost you your life, and be the means of bereaving your family of all your well-earned wealth. In this great extremity, as a last resource, I watched an opportunity, and laid our deplorable case before that dear maid your daughter—Forgive these tears, sir; you see every eye around fills at mention of her name—She has been our guardian angel—She has, under Almighty Providence, saved the lives of the whole party before you—has supplied us with food, cordials, and medicines; with beds, and with clothing, all from her own circumscribed resources. For us she has braved every danger, and suffered every privation; the dereliction of her parents, and the obloquy of the whole country. That young man, whom you see sitting on the wicker chair there, is my only surviving son of five—he was past hope when she found him—fast posting to the last gaol—her unwearied care and attentions have restored him; he is again in a state of convalescence—O may the Eternal God reward her for what she has done to him and us!
“Only one out of all the distressed and hopeless party has perished, he whose body lies in that coffin. He was a brave, noble, and pious youth, and the son of a worthy gentleman. When our dear nurse and physician found your house deserted by all but herself, she took him home to a bed in that house, where she attended him for the last seven days of his life with more than filial care. He expired last night at midnight, amid our prayers and supplications to heaven in his behalf, while that dear saint supported his head in his dying moments, and shed the tear of affliction over his lifeless form. She made the grave-clothes from her own scanty stock of linen—tied her best lawn napkin round the head; and”——
Here Walter could contain himself no longer; he burst out a crying, and sobbed like a child.
“An’ has my Keatie done a’ this?” cried he, in a loud broken voice—“Has my woman done a’ this, an’ yet me to suspect her, an’ be harsh till her? I might hae kend her better!” continued he, taking her in his arms, and kissing her cheek again and again. “But she sall hae ten silk gowns, an’ ten satin anes, for the bit linen she has bestowed on sic an occasion, an’ a’ that she has wared on ye I’ll make up to her a hunder an’ fifty fauld.”
“O my dear father,” said she, “you know not what I have suffered for fear of having offended you; for I could not forget that their principles, both civil and religious, were the opposite of yours—that they were on the adverse side to you and my mother, as well as the government of the country.”
“Deil care what side they war on, Kate!” cried Walter, in the same vehement voice; “ye hae taen the side o’ human nature; the suffering and the humble side, an’ the side o’ feeling, my woman, that bodes best in a young unexperienced thing to tak. It is better than to do like yon bits o’ gillflirts about Edinburgh; poor shilly-shally milk-an’-water things! Gin ye but saw how they cock up their noses at a whig, an’ thraw their bits o’ gabs; an’ downa bide to look at aught, or hear tell o’ aught, that isna i’ the top fashion. Ye hae done very right, my good lassie—od, I wadna gie ye for the hale o’ them, an’ they war a’ hung in a strap like ingans.”
“Then, father, since you approve I am happy. I have no care now save for these two poor fellows on that couch, who are yet far from being out of danger.”
“L‑‑d sauf us!” said Walter, turning about, “I thought they had been twa dead corpse. But now, when my een are used to the light o’ the place, I see the chaps are living, an’ no that unlife-like, as a body may say.”
He went up to them, spoke to them kindly, took their wan bleached sinewy hands in his, and said, he feared they were still very ill?
“Better than we have been,” was the reply—“Better than we have been, goodman. Thanks to you and yours.”
“Dear father,” said Katharine, “I think if they were removed down to Chapelhope, to dry comfortable lodgings, and had more regular diet, and better attendance, their health might soon be re-established. Now that you deem the danger over, will you suffer me to have them carried down there?”
“Will I no, Kate? My faith, they shall hae the twa best beds i’ the house, if Maron an’ me should sleep in the barn! An’ ye sal hae naething ado but to attend them, an’ nurse them late an’ aire; an’ I’ll gar Maron Linton attend them too, an’ she’ll rhame o’er bladds o’ scripture to them, an’ they’ll soon get aboon this bit dwam. Od, if outher gude fare or drogs will do it, I’ll hae them playin’ at the pennystane wi’ Davie Tait, an’ prayin’ wi’ him at night, in less than twa weeks.”
“Goodman,” said old Brown, (for this celebrated Brownie was no other than the noted Mr John Brown, the goodman of Caldwell)—“Goodman, well may you be proud this day, and well may you be uplifted in heart on account of your daughter. The more I see and hear of her, the more am I struck with admiration; and I am persuaded of this, that, let your past life have been as it may, the Almighty will bless and prosper you on account of that maid. The sedateness of her counsels, and the qualities of her heart, have utterly astonished me—She has all the strength of mind, and energy of the bravest of men, blent with all the softness, delicacy, and tenderness of femininity—Neither danger nor distress can overpower her mind for a moment—tenderness does it at once. If ever an angel appeared on earth in the form of woman, it is in that of your daughter”—
“I wish ye wad haud your tongue,” said Walter, who stood hanging his head, and sobbing aloud. The large tears were not now dropping from his eyes—they were trickling in torrents. “I wish ye wad haud your tongue, an’ no mak me ower proud o’ her. She’s weel eneugh, puir woman——It’s a—It’s a shame for a great muckle auld fool like me to be booin an’ greetin like a bairn this gate!—but deil tak the doer gin I can help it!—I watna what’s ta’en me the day!—She’s weel eneugh, puir lassie. I daresay I never learned her ony ill, but I little wat where she has gotten a’ the gude qualities ye brag sae muckle o’, unless it hae been frae Heaven in gude earnest; for I wat weel, she has been brought up but in a ramstamphish hamely kind o’ way wi’ Maron an’ me.—But come, come! let us hae done wi’ this fuffing an’ blawing o’ noses, an’ making o’ wry faces. Row the twa puir sick lads weel up, an’ bring them down in the bed-claes to my house. An’ d’ye hear, callants—gudesake get your beards clippit or shaven a wee, an’ be something warld like, an’ come a’ down to Chapelhope; I’ll kill the best wedder on the Hermon-Law, an’ we shall a’ dine heartily thegither for aince; I’ll get ower Davie Tait to say the grace, an’ we’ll be as merry as the times will allow.”
They accepted the invitation, with many expressions of gratitude and thankfulness, and the rays of hope once more enlightened the dejected countenances that had so long been overshadowed with the gloom of despair.
“But there’s ae thing, callants,” said Walter, “that has astonished me, an’ I canna help speering. Where got ye the coffin sae readily for the man that died last night?”
“That coffin,” said Brown, “was brought here one night by the friends of one of the men whom Clavers caused to be shot on the other side of the ridge there, which you saw. The bodies were buried ere they came; it grew day on them, and they left it; so, for the sake of concealment, we brought it into our cave. It has been useful to us; for when the wretched tinker fell down among us from that gap, while we were at evening worship, we pinioned him in the dark, and carried him in that chest to your door, thinking he had belonged to your family. That led to a bloody business, of which you shall hear anon. And in that coffin, too, we carried off your ungrateful curate so far on his journey, disgraced for ever, to come no more within twenty miles of Chapelhope, on pain of a dreadful death in twenty-four hours thereafter; and I stand warrandice that he shall keep his distance. In it we have now deposited the body of a beloved and virtuous friend, who always foretold this, from its first arrival in our cell.—But he rejoiced in the prospect of his dissolution, and died as he had lived, a faithful and true witness; and his memory shall long be revered by all the just and the good.”