The Grey Man

by S. R. Crockett

'Hear ye, Spurheel, up wi' ye! And if ye so much as set your nose oot o' your window when I am on the rope, it will no be telling you.'

So I climbed up and shut-to the window, and long before I was settled in bed I heard the two sisters talking softly together in the room beneath. So I knew that Nell Kennedy had carried out her mad ploy.

CHAPTER XIV

THE ADVENTURE OF THE GARDEN

I need not tell all the reasons why my well-beloved and kindly master, Sir Thomas Kennedy, had grown to be hated with a deadly feud by all the ill-conditioned of the Bargany faction, saving indeed by Gilbert Kennedy of Bargany himself. For one thing, my master was the man of the best and wisest counsels among all the supporters of Cassillis. He had many virtues, being well-liked wherever he went for kindliness and courteousness. Also he was a man of good principles and religion, so far as the times permitted, and indeed somewhat beyond, as he found to his own bitter cost or all was done.

Still more, my master Culzean was never one to suspect evil of any man, and was ever prone to cover wrack and ruin by over-trust and graciousness.

The first act of a great and wide conspiracy to compass his death was now to be played, for Thomas of Drummurchie, the brother of young Bargany, was not of so lofty a spirit as his chief. Indeed, to speak plainly, he was no better than an assassin and a common bully. He caused all the country-side to lie in terror for fear of him, being great with none, save only with the Lairds of Auchendrayne,—which was a strange thing considering their outward profession of strict honour.

It happened that there was a worthy knight, an indweller in the town of Maybole, Sir Thomas Nisbett by name, who was a crony of my master Culzean. Now, it was the practice for the gentry of the neighbourhood during the winter, to enter in and dwell within the town of Maybole in many pretty and well-built houses of freestone, diverting themselves during the dead time of the year with converse together in each other's houses. These stand for the most part in the chief street of Maybole, and have fine gardens attached to them. Of them all, that of the Earl of Cassillis, is the largest, but the one belonging to my master Culzean is but little behind it in beauty and convenience.

But Sir Thomas Kennedy bode little about his house in Maybole, chiefly because his lads and lasses loved most to remain at Culzean, where the cliffs are and the sea spreads wide, clattering pleasantly on the rocks, and with the birds blithely swirling and diving about it all the year round. And of this I also was glad, for to live in a town is a thing I cannot abide for any long time, being bred to the life of the hills and to the wind in my face.

Now, on this New Year's Day, it so happened that this Sir Thomas Nisbett had invited my master, being, as I say, a crony of his own, and of an age with him, to sit down at supper in his house in Maybole. So Culzean took horse and a small attendance, of whom I was the chief, and rode over to bide the night in Maybole town, meaning to lodge in his own house, and in the morning return to his Castle of Culzean.