The Grey Man

by S. R. Crockett

David, as I say, was my favourite, and continually in my loneliness a comfort to me, though I have not hitherto often mentioned him, seeing that the young lads of Culzean come not into my tale greatly, saving at this time. Though, in the coming day, they may into the tales others shall tell, when we that now prank it so gaily are no better than the broken shards of a drained pottle-pot. But little Davie was a merry lad, and I am glad that there is occasion for me to name him in this history.

Davie was now manfully equipped in doublet and trunk hosen of duffle grey homespun, so thick that his brothers feigned that with a little trouble and propping they stood up very well by themselves, when their daily tenant had untrussed him and gone to bed.

And ever the snow came down. It lay deep on all the face of the country, but more especially it had swirled into the courtyard of Culzean, so that the very steps of the door were sleeked, and great wreaths lay every way about the court. The lads made revel in it, borrowing shovels from the stables and throwing up the snow on either side, so as to make narrow passages between the different doors of the castle and the offices about.

I cannot set down, because that there is press of matters more serious yet to be related, a tithe of the merry pranks the rogues wrought in their madness. They revelled in the smother of the snow like whelps that are turned loose. Yet because there is none too much of merriment in this chronicle, I shall make shift to tell somewhat of their quipsome rascaldom.

It chanced one morning that Alexander, who was of a mirthful mind, stood by a little door which led into the house wherein our peats and turfs were kept for the fires, so that it might not be necessary to bring a supply each day from the peatstacks on the hill where the greater store was.

Whether Sandy's head ached from having eaten too many cakes at the time of the New Year, I know not, but suddenly it came into his mind that it might be a desirable thing and a cooling, to stick his bullet head into a mighty snowdrift which lay in front of the peat-house door. So accordingly, for no particular reason, he bent himself into an arch and thrust his head neck-deep into the snow.

At this moment came his elder brother, James Kennedy, upon the scene, and his mood was also merry.

'Bless the rascal,' quoth he, 'whither hath his tidy lump of a top-knot betaken itself to?'

So without loss of a moment the rogue made him a large ball of snow, well compacted, and caused it to burst upon the stretched trusses of Sandy's breeches, with a noise like the breaking of an egg upon a wall.

Sandy snatched his head from the snow swift as a blade that bends itself to the straight, and stood erect. There was no one in sight save little Davie, who danced at a distance and laughed innocently at the jest. For James, the doer of it, had instantly dropped into a deep snow passage. Whereat Sandy, cured as to his head, but villainously stung in the breech, turned him about in fierce anger, seeking for someone to truncheon. The lad Davie's laugh annoyed him, and Sandy, being an adept at the palm play, sent a snowball at his young brother, which took him smartly upon the cheek.