Thus, on the morning of the twenty-fourth of September, just one hundred years ago, Patsy was handed into the coach by Earl Raincy, who stood back with bared head to see her ride out of the courtyard of the Castle. Her father was on one side, mounted on his big black horse, and Louis Raincy guarded the left flank on "Honeypot." He was to convoy the party as far as Carlisle and then return.
But at the gate of Ladykirk stood a dainty old lady, equipped for journey. Miss Aline was going to London. She was quite shaking with the excitement, and pulled at her openwork mitts with smiling expectancy.
"My dear," she said, "I am coming with you. I think it is more proper. I shall set you down at the house where you propose to stay, and I have taken a room at Ibbetson's Hotel, which is a well-known house, at very reasonable charges, much frequented by the clergy."
"Oh, Miss Aline," cried Patsy, "I am sure you are giving yourself a great deal of trouble. You would be much better at Ladykirk."
"'Deed then no," said Miss Aline, dropping into the vacant place beside Patsy. "'Tis the only chance I shall ever have to see London before I die, and I have given Tibbie, the cook, all instructions about the plums and the heather honey. The jam has been a great fret to me this year, and I deserve a bit jaunt. So I will e'en ride in this braw carriage all the road to London, and Eelen Young, the lass that does for me, will bring on my kists by the coach. She is a clever wench, and very likely will be at Ibbetson's before me. At any rate I have nothing with me but this bandbox with a night-rail and a change of apparel, such as is suitable for posting-inns. You have, I see, plenty of men-folk to escort you, and, as I jalouse, more to follow—but what you need is a well-born gentlewoman of comfortable means for a duenna! Oh, ye will try to come round me with your 'Miss Aline's,' and your coaxing. But as long as ye are under my care, off to bed ye shall march at a reasonable hour. Then I shall lock the door on ye and keep the key under my pillow. I lost ye once out of Ladykirk when ye slippit out at the back door. But this time ye shall have a better gaoler. Hear ye that, Mistress Patsy?"
There was nothing to be said, and, indeed, it was a great sacrifice which Miss Aline was making in the upturning of all her cherished habits, and the abandoning of her dear Ladykirk in the season of all others which she preferred—the time, as she expressed it, "of the ingathering of the fruits of the earth."
The "more to follow," by which Miss Aline had intimated an addition to Patsy's escort, was in waiting a little farther on at the head of the Long Wood. Stair Garland and twenty-five of his best horsed and most gallant lads stood waiting to fall in behind the carriage. As Patsy came near she put her head out at the window and cried, "Oh, Stair, is it safe?"
But Stair only smiled, and took his broad blue bonnet off with a sweep which caused the eagle's plume in it to touch the dust. The twenty-five behind him uncovered also. They made a gallant show, every man with his carbine slung over his shoulder by the broad bandolier strap which crossed his chest, his cloak and provender rolled on the pommel of his saddle, and his bridle and spurs jingling as the ponies fidgeted restlessly in the narrow space.
Then Stair commanded, "File out there," as the carriage rumbled into the shades of the wood and took the direction of the White Loch, and Patsy remembered that other journey and the dreadful uncertainty of it. She shut her eyes and recalled it till she shuddered so that Miss Aline asked if she were cold. She had never lost faith in her friends even then, and now Louis was riding close to the left window of the carriage, and Stair Garland, with his horsemen, guarding her, sending her forth out of her own country as hardly a Princess had ever left Galloway.