Stories by English Authors: Scotland

“Ay,” said Sanders, digging his fingers critically into the grunting animal, “quite so.”

“Grumph,” said the pig, getting reluctantly to his feet.

“Ou, ay, yes,” said Sanders thoughtfully.

Then he sat down on the edge of the sty, and looked long and silently at an empty bucket. But whether his thoughts were of T’nowhead’s Bell, whom he had lost for ever, or of the food the farmer fed his pig on, is not known.

“Lord preserve ‘s! are ye no at the kirk?” cried Bell, nearly dropping the baby as Sam’l broke into the room.

“Bell!” cried Sam’l.

Then T’nowhead’s Bell knew that her hour had come.

“Sam’l,” she faltered.

“Will ye hae ‘s, Bell?” demanded Sam’l, glaring at her sheepishly.

“Ay,” answered Bell.

Sam’l fell into a chair.

“Bring ‘s a drink o’ water, Bell,” he said. But Bell thought the occasion required milk, and there was none in the kitchen. She went out to the byre, still with the baby in her arms, and saw Sanders Elshioner sitting gloomily on the pigsty.

“Weel, Bell,” said Sanders.

“I thocht ye’d been at the kirk, Sanders,” said Bell.

Then there was a silence between them.

“Has Sam’l speered ye, Bell?” asked Sanders, stolidly.

“Ay,” said Bell again, and this time there was a tear in her eye. Sanders was little better than an “orra man,” and Sam’l was a weaver, and yet – But it was too late now. Sanders gave the pig a vicious poke with a stick, and when it had ceased to grunt, Bell was back in the kitchen. She had forgotten about the milk, however, and Sam’l only got water after all.

In after-days, when the story of Bell’s wooing was told, there were some who held that the circumstances would have almost justified the lassie in giving Sam’l the go-by. But these perhaps forgot that her other lover was in the same predicament as the accepted one – that of the two, indeed, he was the more to blame, for he set off to T’nowhead on the Sabbath of his own accord, while Sam’l only ran after him. And then there is no one to say for certain whether Bell heard of her suitors’ delinquencies until Lisbeth’s return from the kirk. Sam’l could never remember whether he told her, and Bell was not sure whether, if he did, she took it in. Sanders was greatly in demand for weeks to tell what he knew of the affair, but though he was twice asked to tea to the manse among the trees, and subjected thereafter to ministerial cross-examinations, this is all he told. He remained at the pigsty until Sam’l left the farm, when he joined him at the top of the brae, and they went home together.

“It’s yersel’, Sanders,” said Sam’l.

“It is so, Sam’l,” said Sanders.

“Very cauld,” said Sam’l.

“Blawy,” assented Sanders.

After a pause —

“Sam’l,” said Sanders.

“Ay.”

“I’m hearing ye’re to be mairit.”

“Ay.”

“Weel, Sam’l, she’s a snod bit lassie.”

“Thank ye,” said Sam’l.

“I had ance a kin o’ notion o’ Bell mysel’,” continued Sanders.

“Ye had?”

“Yes, Sam’l; but I thocht better o’ ‘t.”

“Hoo d’ ye mean?” asked Sam’l, a little anxiously.

“Weel, Sam’l, mairitch is a terrible responsibeelity.”

“It is so,” said Sam’l, wincing.

“An’ no the thing to tak’ up withoot conseederation.”

“But it’s a blessed and honourable state, Sanders; ye’ve heard the minister on ‘t.”

“They say,” continued the relentless Sanders, “‘at the minister doesna get on sair wi’ the wife himsel’.”

“So they do,” cried Sam’l, with a sinking at the heart.

“I’ve been telt,” Sanders went on, “‘at gin ye can get the upper han’ o’ the wife for a while at first, there’s the mair chance o’ a harmonious exeestence.”

“Bell’s no the lassie,” said Sam’l, appealingly, “to thwart her man.”

Sanders smiled.

“D’ ye think she is, Sanders?”

“Weel, Sam’l, I d’na want to fluster ye, but she’s been ower-lang wi’ Lisbeth Fargus no to hae learned her ways. An’ a’body kins what a life T’nowhead has wi’ her.”

“Guid sake, Sanders, hoo did ye no speak o’ this afore?”

“I thocht ye kent o’ ‘t, Sam’l.”

They had now reached the square, and the U. P. kirk was coming out. The Auld Licht kirk would be half an hour yet.

“But, Sanders,” said Sam’l, brightening up, “ye was on yer wy to speer her yersel’.”

“I was, Sam’l,” said Sanders, “and I canna but be thankfu’ ye was ower-quick for ‘s.”

“Gin ‘t hadna been you,” said Sam’l, “I wid never hae thocht o’ ‘t.”

“I’m saying naething agin Bell,” pursued the other, “but, man, Sam’l, a body should be mair deleeberate in a thing o’ the kind.”

“It was michty hurried,” said Sam’l wofully.

“It’s a serious thing to speer a lassie,” said Sanders.

“It’s an awfu’ thing,” said Sam’l.

“But we’ll hope for the best,” added Sanders, in a hopeless voice.

They were close to the tenements now, and Sam’l looked as if he were on his way to be hanged.

“Sam’l!”

“Ay, Sanders.”

“Did ye – did ye kiss her, Sam’l?”

“Na.”

“Hoo?”

“There’s was varra little time, Sanders.”

“Half an ‘oor,” said Sanders.

“Was there? Man Sanders, to tell ye the truth, I never thocht o’ ‘t.”

Then the soul of Sanders Elshioner was filled with contempt for Sam’l Dickie.

The scandal blew over. At first it was expected that the minister would interfere to prevent the union, but beyond intimating from the pulpit that the souls of Sabbath-breakers were beyond praying for, and then praying for Sam’l and Sanders at great length, with a word thrown in for Bell, he let things take their course. Some said it was because he was always frightened lest his young men should intermarry with other denominations, but Sanders explained it differently to Sam’l.

“I hav’na a word to say agin’ the minister,” he said; “they’re gran’ prayers; but, Sam’l, he’s a mairit man himsel’.”

“He’s a’ the better for that, Sanders, isna he?”

“Do ye no see,” asked Sanders, compassionately, “‘at he’s trying to mak’ the best o’ ‘t?”

“O Sanders, man!” said Sam’l.

“Cheer up, Sam’l,” said Sanders; “it’ll sune be ower.”

Their having been rival suitors had not interfered with their friendship. On the contrary, while they had hitherto been mere acquaintances, they became inseparables as the wedding-day drew near. It was noticed that they had much to say to each other, and that when they could not get a room to themselves they wandered about together in the churchyard. When Sam’l had anything to tell Bell he sent Sanders to tell it, and Sanders did as he was bid. There was nothing that he would not have done for Sam’l.

The more obliging Sanders was, however, the sadder Sam’l grew. He never laughed now on Saturdays, and sometimes his loom was silent half the day. Sam’l felt that Sanders’s was the kindness of a friend for a dying man.

It was to be a penny wedding, and Lisbeth Fargus said it was the delicacy that made Sam’l superintend the fitting up of the barn by deputy. Once he came to see it in person, but he looked so ill that Sanders had to see him home. This was on the Thursday afternoon, and the wedding was fixed for Friday.

“Sanders, Sanders,” said Sam’l, in a voice strangely unlike his own, “it’ll a’ be ower by this time the morn.”

“It will,” said Sanders.

“If I had only kent her langer,” continued Sam’l.

“It wid hae been safer,” said Sanders.

“Did ye see the yallow floor in Bell’s bonnet?” asked the accepted swain.

“Ay,” said Sanders, reluctantly.

“I’m dootin’ – I’m sair dootin’ she’s but a flichty, light-hearted crittur after a’.”

“I had aye my suspeecions o’ ‘t,” said Sanders.

“Ye hae kent her langer than me,” said Sam’l.

“Yes,” said Sanders, “but there’s nae getting’ at the heart o’ women. Man Sam’l, they’re desperate cunnin’.”

“I’m dootin’ ‘t; I’m sair dootin’ ‘t.”

“It’ll be a warnin’ to ye, Sam’l, no to be in sic a hurry i’ the futur’,” said Sanders.

Sam’l groaned.

“Ye’ll be gaein’ up to the manse to arrange wi’ the minister the morn’s mornin’,” continued Sanders, in a subdued voice.

Sam’l looked wistfully at his friend.

“I canna do ‘t, Sanders,” he said; “I canna do ‘t.”

“Ye maun,” said Sanders.

“It’s aisy to speak,” retorted Sam’l, bitterly.

“We have a’ oor troubles, Sam’l,” said Sanders, soothingly, “an’ every man maun bear his ain burdens. Johnny Davie’s wife’s dead, an’ he’s no repinin’.”

“Ay,” said Sam’l, “but a death’s no a mairitch. We hae haen deaths in our family too.”

“It may a’ be for the best,” added Sanders, “an’ there wid be a michty talk i’ the hale country-side gin ye didna ging to the minister like a man.”

“I maun hae langer to think o’ ‘t,” said Sam’l.

“Bell’s mairitch is the morn,” said Sanders, decisively.

Sam’l glanced up with a wild look in his eyes.

“Sanders!” he cried.

“Sam’l!”

“Ye hae been a guid friend to me, Sanders, in this sair affliction.”

“Nothing ava,” said Sanders; “doun’t mention ‘d.”

“But, Sanders, ye canna deny but what your rinnin’ oot o’ the kirk that awfu’ day was at the bottom o’ ‘d a’.”

“It was so,” said Sanders, bravely.

“An’ ye used to be fond o’ Bell, Sanders.”

“I dinna deny ‘t.”

“Sanders, laddie,” said Sam’l, bending forward and speaking in a wheedling voice, “I aye thocht it was you she likit.”

“I had some sic idea mysel’,” said Sanders.

“Sanders, I canna think to pairt twa fowk sae weel suited to ane anither as you an’ Bell.”

“Canna ye, Sam’l?”

“She wid mak’ ye a guid wife, Sanders. I hae studied her weel, and she’s a thrifty, douce, clever lassie. Sanders, there’s no the like o’ her. Mony a time, Sanders, I hae said to mysel’, ‘There’s a lass ony man micht be prood to tak’.’ A’body says the same, Sanders. There’s nae risk ava, man – nane to speak o’. Tak’ her, laddie; tak’ her, Sanders; it’s a gran’ chance, Sanders. She’s yours for the speerin’. I’ll gie her up, Sanders.”

“Will ye, though?” said Sanders.

“What d’ ye think?” asked Sam’l.

“If ye wid rayther,” said Sanders, politely.

“There’s my han’ on ‘t,” said Sam’l. “Bless ye, Sanders; ye’ve been a true frien’ to me.”

Then they shook hands for the first time in their lives, and soon afterward Sanders struck up the brae to T’nowhead.

Next morning Sanders Elshioner, who had been very busy the night before, put on his Sabbath clothes and strolled up to the manse.

“But – but where is Sam’l?” asked the minister; “I must see himself.”

“It’s a new arrangement,” said Sanders.

“What do you mean, Sanders?”

“Bell’s to marry me,” explained Sanders.

“But – but what does Sam’l say?”

“He’s willin’,” said Sanders.

“And Bell?”

“She’s willin’ too. She prefers ‘t.”

“It is unusual,” said the minister.

“It’s a’ richt,” said Sanders.

“Well, you know best,” said the minister.

“You see the hoose was taen, at ony rate,” continued Sanders, “an’ I’ll juist ging in til ‘t instead o’ Sam’l.”

“Quite so.”

“An’ I cudna think to disappoint the lassie.”

“Your sentiments do you credit, Sanders,” said the minister; “but I hope you do not enter upon the blessed state of matrimony without full consideration of its responsibilities. It is a serious business, marriage.”

“It’s a’ that,” said Sanders, “but I’m willin’ to stan’ the risk.”

So, as soon as it could be done, Sanders Elshioner took to wife T’nowhead’s Bell, and I remember seeing Sam’l Dickie trying to dance at the penny wedding.

Years afterward it was said in Thrums that Sam’l had treated Bell badly, but he was never sure about it himself.

“It was a near thing – a michty near thing,” he admitted in the square.

“They say,” some other weaver would remark, “‘at it was you Bell liked best.”

“I d’na kin,” Sam’l would reply; “but there’s nae doot the lassie was fell fond o’ me; ou, a mere passin’ fancy, ‘s ye micht say.”

“THE HEATHER LINTIE”, By S. R. Crockett

Janet Balchrystie lived in a little cottage at the back of the Long Wood of Barbrax. She had been a hard-working woman all her days, for her mother died when she was but young, and she had lived on, keeping her father’s house by the side of the single-track railway-line. Gavin Balchrystie was a foreman plate-layer on the P.P.R., and with two men under him, had charge of a section of three miles. He lived just where that distinguished but impecunious line plunges into a moss-covered granite wilderness of moor and bog, where there is not more than a shepherd’s hut to the half-dozen miles, and where the passage of a train is the occasion of commotion among scattered groups of black-faced sheep. Gavin Balchrystie’s three miles of P.P.R. metals gave him little work, but a good deal of healthy exercise. The black-faced sheep breaking down the fences and straying on the line side, and the torrents coming down the granite gullies, foaming white after a water-spout, and tearing into his embankments, undermining his chairs and plates, were the only troubles of his life. There was, however, a little public-house at The Huts, which in the old days of construction had had the license, and which had lingered alone, license and all, when its immediate purpose in life had been fulfilled, because there was nobody but the whaups and the railway officials on the passing trains to object to its continuance. Now it is cold and blowy on the west-land moors, and neither whaups nor dark-blue uniforms object to a little refreshment up there. The mischief was that Gavin Balchrystie did not, like the guards and engine-drivers, go on with the passing train. He was always on the spot, and the path through Barbrax Wood to the Railway Inn was as well trodden as that which led over the bog moss, where the whaups built, to the great white viaduct of Loch Merrick, where his three miles of parallel gleaming responsibility began.

When his wife was but newly dead, and his Janet just a smart elf-locked lassie running to and from the school, Gavin got too much in the way of “slippin’ doon by.” When Janet grew to be woman muckle, Gavin kept the habit, and Janet hardly knew that it was not the use and wont of all fathers to sidle down to a contiguous Railway Arms, and return some hours later with uncertain step, and face pricked out with bright pin-points of red – the sure mark of the confirmed drinker of whisky neat.

They were long days in the cottage at the back of Barbrax Long Wood. The little “but an’ ben” was whitewashed till it dazzled the eyes as you came over the brae to it and found it set against the solemn depths of dark-green firwood. From early morn, when she saw her father off, till the dusk of the day, when he would return for his supper, Janet Balchrystie saw no human being. She heard the muffled roar of the trains through the deep cutting at the back of the wood, but she herself was entirely out of sight of the carriagefuls of travellers whisking past within half a mile of her solitude and meditation.

Janet was what is called a “through-gaun lass,” and her work for the day was often over by eight o’clock in the morning. Janet grew to womanhood without a sweetheart. She was plain, and she looked plainer than she was in the dresses which she made for herself by the light of nature and what she could remember of the current fashions at Merrick Kirk, to which she went every alternate Sunday. Her father and she took day about. Wet or shine, she tramped to Merrick Kirk, even when the rain blattered and the wind raved and bleated alternately among the pines of the Long Wood of Barbrax. Her father had a simpler way of spending his day out. He went down to the Railway Inn and drank “ginger-beer” all day with the landlord. Ginger-beer is an unsteadying beverage when taken the day by the length. Also the man who drinks it steadily and quietly never enters on any inheritance of length of days.

So it came to pass that one night Gavin Balchrystie did not come home at all – at least, not till he was brought lying comfortably on the door of a disused third-class carriage, which was now seeing out its career anchored under the bank at Loch Merrick, where Gavin had used it as a shelter. The driver of the “six-fifty up” train had seen him walking soberly along toward The Huts (and the Railway Inn), letting his long surface-man’s hammer fall against the rail-keys occasionally as he walked. He saw him bend once, as though his keen ear detected a false ring in a loose length between two plates. This was the last that was seen of him till the driver of the “nine-thirty-seven down” express – the “boat-train,” as the employees of the P.P.R. call it, with a touch of respect in their voices – passed Gavin fallen forward on his face just when he was flying down grade under a full head of steam. It was duskily clear, with a great lake of crimson light dying into purple over the hills of midsummer heather. The driver was John Platt, the Englishman from Crewe, who had been brought from the great London and Northwestern Railway, locally known as “The Ell-nen-doubleyou.” In these remote railway circles the talk is as exclusively of matters of the four-foot way as in Crewe or Derby. There is an inspector of traffic, whose portly presence now graces Carlisle Station, who left the P.P.R. in these sad days of amalgamation, because he could not endure to see so many “Sou’west” waggons passing over the sacred metals of the P.P.R. permanent way. From his youth he had been trained in a creed of two articles: “To swear by the P.P.R. through thick and thin, and hate the apple green of the ‘Sou’west.’” It was as much as he could do to put up with the sight of the abominations; to have to hunt for their trucks when they got astray was more than mortal could stand, so he fled the land.

So when they stopped the express for Gavin Balchrystie, every man on the line felt that it was an honour to the dead. John Platt sent a “gurring” thrill through the train as he put his brakes hard down and whistled for the guard. He, thinking that the Merrick Viaduct was down at least, twirled his brake to such purpose that the rear car progressed along the metals by a series of convulsive bounds. Then they softly ran back, and there lay Gavin fallen forward on his knees, as though he had been trying to rise, or had knelt down to pray. Let him have “the benefit of the doubt” in this world. In the next, if all tales be true, there is no such thing.

So Janet Balchrystie dwelt alone in the white “but an’ ben” at the back of the Long Wood of Barbrax. The factor gave her notice, but the laird, who was not accounted by his neighbours to be very wise, because he did needlessly kind things, told the factor to let the lassie bide, and delivered to herself with his own handwriting to the effect that Janet Balchrystie, in consideration of her lonely condition, was to be allowed the house for her lifetime, a cow’s grass, and thirty pound sterling in the year as a charge on the estate. He drove down the cow himself, and having stalled it in the byre, he informed her of the fact over the yard dyke by word of mouth, for he never could be induced to enter her door. He was accounted to be “gey an’ queer,” save by those who had tried making a bargain with him. But his farmers liked him, knowing him to be an easy man with those who had been really unfortunate, for he knew to what the year’s crops of each had amounted, to a single chalder and head of nowt.

Deep in her heart Janet Balchrystie cherished a great ambition. When the earliest blackbird awoke and began to sing, while it was yet gray twilight, Janet would be up and at her work. She had an ambition to be a great poet. No less than this would serve her. But not even her father had known, and no other had any chance of knowing. In the black leather chest, which had been her mother’s, upstairs, there was a slowly growing pile of manuscript, and the editor of the local paper received every other week a poem, longer or shorter, for his Poet’s Corner, in an envelope with the New Dalry postmark. He was an obliging editor, and generally gave the closely written manuscript to the senior office boy, who had passed the sixth standard, to cut down, tinker the rhymes, and lope any superfluity of feet. The senior office boy “just spread himself,” as he said, and delighted to do the job in style. But there was a woman fading into a gray old-maidishness which had hardly ever been girlhood, who did not at all approve of these corrections. She endured them because over the signature of “Heather Bell” it was a joy to see in the rich, close luxury of type her own poetry, even though it might be a trifle tattered and tossed about by hands ruthless and alien – those, in fact, of the senior office boy.

Janet walked every other week to the post-office at New Dalry to post her letters to the editor, but neither the great man nor yet the senior office boy had any conception that the verses of their “esteemed correspondent” were written by a woman too early old who dwelt alone at the back of Barbrax Long Wood.

One day Janet took a sudden but long-meditated journey. She went down by rail from the little station of The Huts to the large town of Drum, thirty miles to the east. Here, with the most perfect courage and dignity of bearing, she interviewed a printer and arranged for the publication of her poems in their own original form, no longer staled and clapper-clawed by the pencil of the senior office boy. When the proof-sheets came to Janet, she had no way of indicating the corrections but by again writing the whole poem out in a neat print hand on the edge of the proof, and underscoring the words which were to be altered. This, when you think of it, is a very good way, when the happiest part of your life is to be spent in such concrete pleasures of hope, as Janet’s were over the crackly sheets of the printer of Drum. Finally the book was produced, a small rather thickish octavo, on sufficiently wretched gray paper which had suffered from want of thorough washing in the original paper-mill. It was bound in a peculiarly deadly blue, of a rectified Reckitt tint, which gave you dazzles in the eye at any distance under ten paces. Janet had selected this as the most appropriate of colours. She had also many years ago decided upon the title, so that Reckitt had printed upon it, back and side, “The Heather Lintie,” while inside there was the acknowledgment of authorship, which Janet felt to be a solemn duty to the world: “Poems by Janet Balchrystie, Barbrax Cottage, by New Dalry.” First she had thought of withholding her name and style; but, on the whole, after the most prolonged consideration, she felt that she was not justified in bringing about such a controversy as divided Scotland concerning that “Great Unknown” who wrote the Waverley Novels.

Almost every second or third day Janet trod that long lochside road to New Dalry for her proof-sheets, and returned them on the morrow corrected in her own way. Sometimes she got a lift from some farmer or carter, for she had worn herself with anxiety to the shadow of what she had once been, and her dry bleached hair became gray and grayer with the fervour of her devotion to letters.

By April the book was published, and at the end of this month, laid aside by sickness of the vague kind called locally “a decline,” she took to her bed, rising only to lay a few sticks upon the fire from her store gathered in the autumn, or to brew herself a cup of tea. She waited for the tokens of her book’s conquests in the great world of thought and men. She had waited so long for her recognition, and now it was coming. She felt that it would not be long before she was recognised as one of the singers of the world. Indeed, had she but known it, her recognition was already on its way.

In a great city of the north a clever young reporter was cutting open the leaves of “The Heather Lintie” with a hand almost feverishly eager.

“This is a perfect treasure. This is a find indeed. Here is my chance ready to my hand.”

His paper was making a specialty of “exposures.” If there was anything weak and erring, anything particularly helpless and foolish which could make no stand for itself, the “Night Hawk” was on the pounce. Hitherto the junior reporter had never had a “two-column chance.” He had read – it was not much that he had read – Macaulay’s too famous article on “Satan” Montgomery, and, not knowing that Macaulay lived to regret the spirit of that assault, he felt that if he could bring down the “Night Hawk” on “The Heather Lintie,” his fortune was made. So he sat down and he wrote, not knowing and not regarding a lonely woman’s heart, to whom his word would be as the word of a God, in the lonely cottage lying in the lee of the Long Wood of Barbrax.