The Grey Man

So with all respect and speed I went, and stood with my bonnet off to hear their commands. I thought that it was some light matter of having the horses brought. But when I came the Earl was looking keenly at me, and even Sir Thomas paused a little while before he spoke.

'Launcelot, you are a brave lad,' he said, 'and I know that you desire to distinguish yourself even more than you have done, though you have shown your mettle already. Now my lord and I have a matter which it needs a man to perform – one of address and daring. I hear from all about me that you are a ready man with your wits and your tongue. Will you bear my lord's cartel of defiance to his enemy, David Crauford of Kerse?'

'Ay, my lords, that will I, and readily!' I replied, knowing that my good fortune stood on tiptoe.

'I am not eager,' the Earl said, breaking in upon my reply, 'for reasons which I have given to the Tutor, to send one of my own folk. I would rather accredit one more kin to Culzean here, one who is a gentleman of good blood and a brave Kennedy, such as I observed you to be on the day of the tulzie in Edinburgh.'

'I will serve Cassillis till I die,' I replied, making him a little bow – because I wished him to see that, though I was of the moorland house, I had yet manners as good as he had brought back with him from France. Besides, I saw Marjorie looking down upon us from the terrace, which made me glance at my shadow as it lay clearly outlined upon the gravel.

And I was glad to observe that the point of my cloak fell with some grace over the scabbard of my sword. Now this was not vanity, God knows, but only a just desire to appear point device in the presence of the heads of my clan and of the lady of my heart – which is a thing very different. For of all things I am not vain, nor given, after the manner of some, to talking greatly about my own exploits.

'So,' said the Earl, 'you will go to David Crauford of Kerse at his own house as my messenger. You will not give him a written but a spoken message. And in token that you come from us who have power to speak, you must exhibit to him our signet rings, which we now entrust to you to guard with your life.'

So, giving me the rings, which I put under my glove upon the first finger of the left hand, he communicated to me the cartel for the Laird of Kerse, which he made me repeat carefully thrice over in their hearing. Then he dismissed me to go my way.

And as I went, I saw the lads roistering in the garden with the young Sheriff of Wigton, who had married their eldest sister when she was but a lassie. And I smiled as I thought within me, 'Had I been so born to lofty estate, I might even have been playing at golf and pat-ball, instead of riding on the errands of Cassillis and Culzean, with an Earl's message in my mouth and an Earl's signet on my finger.'

And I do not think that the pride was an unworthy one, for since I had none to push my fortune for me, it was the more necessary that I should be able to do it for myself.

I went to get my war-horse, for after the affair of Edinburgh, Sir Thomas had given me 'Dom Nicholas,' a black of mettle and power, well able to carry me even had I been clad in full armour, instead of merely riding light as I now meant to go, with only my sword and pistolets.

At the seaward corner of the White Tower, going by the way of the stables, I met my Lady Marjorie, and my heart gave a bound at the seeing of her. She came gravely forward to give me her hand. Yet not to kiss, as I knew by the downward weighting of it, and by her taking it quickly again to herself.

'Whither go you, grave man of affairs?' she said, smiling with pleasantry.

'I go with an Earl's cartel and defiance,' I replied, telling her, perhaps, more than I ought. But then she was my lady.

Marjorie became very pale and set her hand on the stone parapet of the sea wall where she stood.

'To Bargany?' she asked, breathlessly, for it was natural she should think that the quarrel with the family had broken out again.

'Not to Bargany,' I said, smiling to reassure her. 'I cannot now tell you where, but it is out of Carrick that I ride – Carrick for a man – Kyle for a cow. I ride to the land of sweet milk cheese!'

'God speed you, then,' she said. 'Take care of yourself – beware of the dairymaids. I have heard they are dangerous.'

'For your sweet sake,' cried I, waving my bonnet to her as I ran down the path.

But before I went fairly out of sight I turned and looked back, for, indeed, I could not help it. And Marjorie was still standing under the archway where I had left her, but with so sad and lost a countenance that I had run back to ask her what was her grief. Then she seemed to awake, kissed the tips of her fingers to me, and turning her about, walked slowly within.

When I was fully arrayed, I rode past the front of the house on pretext of knowing if my lords had any further commands for me, but really that the maids might see me upon Dom Nicholas in his fair caparison of beaten silver. She whom I wished most to see I saw not indeed; but there at the great gate, with a foolish spraying branch of hawthorn in her hair, was Nell Kennedy, of whom during these last days I had scarcely so much as thought.

And with her, to my burning shame and amaze, was Kate Allison, the Grieve's daughter. The two girls stood with their arms about one another's waists, as maids that are yet half bairns are wont to do. But neither of them looked at me. Only when I made Dom Nicholas caracole by, they turned disdainfully aside as though they were avoiding the path of some poisonous toad or asp. And so, wholly without word, they passed down one of the leafy avenues that beset the place of Culzean, which thing in a moment rendered all my full, sweet cup empty and bitter.

At this I was much dashed and crestfallen, so that I had no spirit in me. For I was sure, by the attitude of the maids, and their demeanour to me, that they had gotten to the stage of the confiding of secrets. And if that were so, I had a good guess that it would be as well for me to avoid the Grieve's house by the shore for some time to come. Which thing, indeed, last evening's tryst with Marjorie had made me resolve on before. But it was not the matter of Kate Allison's anger that troubled me; it was rather that the clattering minx, Nell Kennedy, would certainly tell her sister of my past boyish affairs with the pretty young lass, and specially of our home-coming from the March fair so late at night.

But the stir of going through the town of Maybole – the lasses running to the doors to admire, the 'prentice lads envying and hating me, so worked on me that, for a space, I forgot the ill-fared memory of the two maids linking down though the greenwood together. Yet the thing came again into my mind and stuck there, before I had o'ertaken half the way to Dalrymple, by which I was behoved to go.

As I rode along I practised pulling at the wicks of my upper lip, where I was persuaded that my moustache was certainly beginning to grow apace. For so I had seen the soldiers of the King's Guard do in Edinburgh, and mightily admired them at it.

The way went pleasantly by, there being many folk of all degrees and qualities on the road. And as many as saw me come, stepped aside and stood respectfully at gaze, if they were on foot; or courteously saluted me as an equal if they were on horseback. Both which things pleased me well.

So I went on smiling to myself for the pleasantness of my thoughts, in spite of the incident of the lasses. Suddenly, however, I came upon a horseman like myself, that rode down a loaning from the muirside. I saw no weapon that he had about him, yet he was no mere landward minister or merchant, by the sober richness of his habit. He was dressed in fine cloth of Flemish blue, with a plain edging of silk, but without lace or any broidery. His face, when I saw it, was pleasant, and there was on it a smile that spoke of good cheer. He seemed to be tall of his person, and, from the manner in which he reined his horse easily with his left hand, I knew him to be strong. A well-appearing, sober, conditionable man of fifty I should have taken him to be, fit to be head of a house or to sit at a king's council table.

But his occupation was the strange part of his sudden appearing. He was employed in reading a little book which he held in his right hand, riding easily all the while with his horse at a brisk walk – a thing which I never saw anyone do before. Then was I sure that he was a man of religion, by his busying himself thus with his devotions. At which I was the better pleased, since religion is a thing I was ever taught to reverence above all else, for that is the habit of the moorland folk who get but little of it. On the other hand, they tell me that in Edinburgh, where there are as many as seven ministers, the folk pay little heed to their privileges; and are, as indeed I have seen, given over to following all manner of wickedness and that with greediness.

As my fellow-traveller came down the loaning he looked up, and seeing me, he wheeled his horse alongside of mine, and very courteously gave me 'Good-day.'

Then, as well he might, he admired Dom Nicholas, letting his eyes stray smilingly over my equipage. Yet even at that moment I marked that it was a set smile, and methought that there was a busy brain behind it.

'You ride like a soldier that hath seen the wars, young sir,' he said.

'Ah,' I replied, lifting my bonnet of steel as to an elder, 'but little enough of these, my Lord, for I am but a youth.'

'You will mend of that last, I warrant,' said my companion, 'and in the end more swiftly than you will care about.'

'You were busy with your book of devotion,' said I, with respect, for I care not to force my conversation on any man; 'let me not interrupt.'

'Nay,' he said, 'I fear I am no great churchman, though for my servants' sake I have reading and worship daily in my own house, and generally I may claim to be very well affected toward the Almighty.'

'Are there no churches in your part of the country,' I asked him, 'for I perceive by your habit you are not a hereaway man?'

'There are indeed kirks there, but I cannot bide to be hampered and taken in a snare within walls, in the present unsettled state of the country. A peaceable man does well to worship in the open. What sense is there in being shut weaponless in a kirk, and shot at through the windows, as happened not long ago?'

I asked how that could be.

'Have you not heard how in the north country the Craufords beset the Kennedies in Dalrymple Kirk, taking them at an advantage without their weapons of war – so that a Kennedy now goes no oftener to kirk than the twenty-ninth of February comes into the calender.'

'How strange it befalls in a small world,' said I, laughing, 'for I am a Kennedy, and I ride to visit the Craufords of Kerse.' Then he looked at me more closely than ever.

'My name,' he said courteously, 'is John Mure of Auchendrayne.'

So I told him my name and style, and also the knight's name to whom I was squire, for after his giving me his own I could not do less.

'You have been in Edinburgh lately?' he said. 'And I doubt not, by your looks, bore yourself well in the sad broil in the High Street. Indeed, I think that I heard as much. Though being a man of good age, and one that is of quiet ways, I neither make nor mell with such tulzies, which are for young, lusty folk at any rate.'

After a little riding in silence and thought, he asked me if I had ever spoken to Gilbert Kennedy of Bargany, and it was with a loath heart that I answered 'No.'

Then he spoke long of him and his noble prowess, comparing him to the Earl of Cassillis, to his great advantage – which I grant it was easy enough to do. But since I could not wear a man's signet ring on my finger and deny him even by my silence, I spoke up for my colours. And that is good enough religion, as I read it.

'I am Cassillis man,' said I, with my hand on my sword, 'and I care not who knows it.'

'Hush you, young sir,' replied the Laird of Auchendrayne, soothingly, 'mind that you are now in an enemy's country. I warrant that Currie of Kelwood has travelled this road not so long before you.'

'I am not one who cares whether folk know my opinions,' I cried. 'See, I wear them on my collar. And I have on my finger a double safe-conduct.'

Whereupon I let him see the rings, drawing off my gauntlet that I might show him the signets.

Then he redoubled his respect and rode nearer to me, which made me glad that I had showed him the seals with their crests.

'You are young to ride so far alone on such great folk's business,' he said softly. 'Even I, that am old and sober, am not so trusted.'

'Laird Auchendrayne,' I replied to him, 'you do jest with me because of my youth. For you yourself are of the great ones, their kinsman and equal at muster and council-board, and but lately, in the Earl's absence, Bailzie of Carrick!'

Then he went on to speak of the Earl, mocking at him as one greedy-tooth for land and siller like his father, and warning me that when he had done with me he would cast me off without fee or reward, like an old glove.

'Nay, worse,' said he, 'for he will save the worn glove to sell over again to Granny Nish of the Luckenbooths.'

'Light-hand or luck-penny,' said I, 'Launcelot Kennedy is not the man to change his colours for goods or gear.'

'And who bids you?' said he. 'Tush, man! you are at the horn and outlaw. Any man may take your life and be the freer for it. The sneckdraw Cassillis and the old wife Culzean are not fit mettle for a gallant like you to ride beside. Hear ye, man; I will tell you a secret which none knoweth yet, but which, if you are wise and bold, will make your fortune with the King. Bargany is to marry one of the Queen's bower-maidens – one too that carries the King's name —and he is to have the Earldom of Carrick!'

Here he hushed his voice and leaned towards me, setting his hand on the arch of Dom Nicholas's neck.

'And that,' he whispered,' will mean knighthood and an estate – besides a fair maid with a tocher, to every good man that can draw a sword and lead a company. What think ye of that? Be not hasty, man. I tell you Bargany will crumple up Cassillis as I crumple this bit of paper.'

And he threw a crushed sheet of writing into Doon Water as we rode beside it.

Then I faced about upon him, and set myself very straight in the saddle.

'Sir,' I said, 'you are an older man, a richer man, a better learned man than I. But let me tell you, sir, that I am an honester man than you; and maybe I shall win though none the worse of that at the long and last. But if what I have said offend you, I am willing to give satisfaction on horse or foot, now or again, either to you or to any younger man of your name. I bid you good-day, sir, for I count you not good company for leal gentlemen.'

And with that I turned my back on him, and rode on my way.

'Go your own gate,' he said, rather regretfully than angrily. 'You have thrown away a kindly offer for an old song and a sounding phrase. You are a mettle lad, but with much wind in your belly.'

So I rode on, thinking that I had done with him – which was very far indeed from being the case.

CHAPTER IX

CARTEL OF CONTUMELY

Now, the place where I took my leave of that pleasant, reputable treason-breeder, John Mure of Auchendrayne, was within a quarter of a mile of Dalrymple Bridge, where it strides across Doon Water. I am persuaded that when I left him a little behind, I saw him heave up his hand, for I got just a waft of it with the tail of my eye. Yet though I could not swear it conscience-clear in any court in the land (unless absolute need were), I am still persuaded in my mind, as much as I was then, that the douce and gracious man intended that I should fall into an ambush, if I proved overly hard-bitten for his projects and temptings.

So as I came near to the bridge-end, I looked very warily about, and methought that I spied the black muzzle of a hackbutt, where there was no need of such like. Now hackbutts do not, even in Carrick, grow on hedges, though in these days a man might somewhat easily make the mistake of thinking so. I judged, therefore, that there would be an ugly face behind the gun, and a finger on the slow match that intended me no good.

As I paused, turning about on my saddle, I saw a fellow rise out of the copse-wood before me, and run like a rabbit to the bridge-end. That was enough for me. Fighting is well enough, and I can be doing with it, for it is the path of glory and of fortune. But black treachery I cannot stomach.

So being mightily angry, but resolved like steel to show John Mure and his butchers that I despised them, I turned Dom Nicholas's head and set him straight at the deeps of Doon Water, where ford there was none. In a moment we were splashing in the pool, and in another Dom Nicholas had thrown back his head and taken to the swimming like a duck. It was but a little way across, but far enough for me, for I saw the fellows running along the bank from the end of the bridge, blowing on their matches and bidding me stop. Now that was not a likely thing for me to do, being, praise the Lord! in my sober senses.

But when I got to the other shore, and set my horse to climb the steep (which was by a mill on the waterside), I was somewhat dashed to find one sitting quiet on his horse, within ten paces of me, with his fingers on his sword and his pistol bended in his hand.

I apprehended in a moment that this must be James Mure the younger of Auchendrayne, and I thought that I was as good as dead. Yet I held up my hand and cried, 'Herald!' and 'Safe-Conduct!' Though I knew that with such men as the Mures I might just as well and usefully have cried 'Bubbly Jock!' or 'Pigeon Pie!'

The young man in war-gear who sat his horse above me, did not move nor lift his weapon to fire.

'Tell me,' he said calmly, 'who may you be that cries "Safe-Conduct!" and "Herald!" on the lands of Kerse?'

I answered him that I was Launcelot Kennedy – and to effectuate something with him I added 'of Kirrieoch.' For I thought it was unlikely that he would know the hill country well enough to remember that my father was still alive. Which I take to have been an innocent enough deception, in that it hurt no one.

And in this I was right, for he answered at once, —

'I am David Crauford the younger of Kerse, but what said you of safe-conducts?'

So I showed him the rings, and told him that my business lay by word of mouth with his father. Thereafter I laid before him the matter of the scoundrels running at me nigh to Dalrymple bridge. Indeed, we could even then see them retiring in a group.

'Let us ride to the bridge head now, and see if they will molest us?'

And this we did, but none stirred nor showed themselves.

'So,' he said, 'let us ride on to Kerse.'

As we went our way we had much excellent discourse of the news of the countryside, and also of Edinburgh and its customs. I found David Crauford a fine and brave fellow, and regretted heartily that he was not on our side of the blanket – a thing which, indeed, I was too apt to do. I considered it an unfair thing that all the shavelings should be ours, and all the paladins theirs. Yet I was comforted by the thought that it was easier to be distinguished among the men of Cassillis than with Bargany – for in the kingdom of the blind the one-eyed man is king, as the saw hath it.

Thus we came at last to the place of Kerse. It was a handsome tower, with additions that made it almost a castle, standing upon a rising ground by a loch, and overlooked at a safe distance by some high rocks and scaurs, which David Crauford told me were called the Craigs of Kyle.

It was the slowest time of the afternoon when we arrived at the ancient strength, and David, saying that his father might not be wakeful, slipped on ahead, in order to assure me a proper reception – so, at least, he said.

And at the doorway I was met by many men-at-arms, with pikes in their hands and feathers in their bonnets. And there came forth to meet me eight of the twelve brothers of Kerse, all bareheaded and with swords at their sides. In the background I could see the cause of my adventuring Currie, the Laird of Kelwood – bowing and smirking like a French dancing-master. But I never so much as looked his way.

'From whom come you, and in peace or war?' said David Crauford, just as though I had not told him – which was quite right and proper, for these commissions of diplomacy should be carried out with decorum and observance.

'I come,' said I, 'from the Earl and also from the Tutor of Cassillis, and am commissioned to speak with the Laird of Kerse in their name and on their behalf.'

With that I was conducted through a lesser into a greater hall, at the upper end of which was a raised platform, two feet or so above the floor. The hall and dais were alike strewed with yellow bent grass, such as grows upon the sides of the hills and on the seashore. On the dais stood a great oaken chair with a hood about it, and in it there sat the noblest old man that ever I saw. He seemed by his beard and hair to be ninety years of age at the least, yet his natural colour was in his cheek, and he was gleg both to hear and to speak.

So they introduced me, and I went up to the old man of Kerse to show my credentials, bending my knee, but not near to the ground, in token of courtesy.

'Come hither, David, and tell me what are the posies on the rings.'

So David came near, and, looking at my hand, he read that motto of the Earl of Cassillis – 'Avise a fin!' it read.

'Ay, ay, that will do. Let the lad speak his message,' said the old man.

Then in the midst of three-score Craufords I set myself, with my shoulders squared and my hand on my hip, to speak the message of my lord. I do not deny that I liked the job well enough, for it was the sort which enables a man to make a figure – thus to stand alone among a host of enemies, and speak a challenge of defiance.

'Master David Crauford, Laird of Kerse and Skeldon,' said I, giving out his titles like a herald, 'I bear you greeting and worship from John, Earl of Cassillis, and Sir Thomas Kennedy of Culzean, Tutor of that ilk.'

The old man bowed in token of respect for the formal courtesy. 'My principals bid me say that they request and demand as their right, that you shall deliver up to them the Laird of Kelwood, their liege vassal, presently rebel and fugitive; and also that you render back the box of treasure and the stones of price which they have good reason to believe their vassal aforesaid hath concealed with you. These things being done, they assure you of their friendship and support in all your undertakings.'

So I gave it out clearly, formally, dispassionately, and without heat, as one that is accustomed to high commissions.

As I spoke I saw the old man grip his staff as though it had been a sword, and ere I had done, he had half risen from his seat as though he would have struck me to the ground.

'And you dare, you beardless birkie, to bring such a message to Crauford of Kerse, in his own hall and among his own folk?'

But I stood still with my hand on my side as before, looking at him with a level brow, knowing that without a weapon in my hand, and with a double safe-conduct on my finger, I had by far the best of it, ay, though there had been a thousand Craufords in the hall.

'Father, father,' said David from behind, as one accustomed to soothe the old man's anger.

'I ken – I ken bravely. The laddie has to bring his message, but Scraping Johnny of Cassillis shall rue this day. Tell him,' he cried, his voice rising to a wild scream, 'that I have seen no doit of the dirty money which he howks out of every dub with his swine's snout. The Laird of Kelwood indeed, I have with me, and here he shall bide while it likes him – not for his own sake, for he is small credit either to Kennedy or Crauford (to his face I say it), but because Kerse is an eagle sitting on high, and it has not yet come to it that he must, forsooth, throw down so much as a well-pyked bone at the bidding of Cassillis.'

I bowed to the ground as having gotten my answer. But I had another part of the piece still to play, and the doing of it liked me even better, for I saw that this time I should anger not only the old man but the young.

'Then,' said I, 'in the name of John, Earl of Cassillis, whom ye call swine's snout, I am charged to tell you that if ye will not deliver the man and the thing that are his just right, then will my master come and gar ye be fain to deliver them – '