Redgauntlet: A Tale Of The Eighteenth Century

‘Ho – ha – aye – so – so – hum – humph – this is the young man, I suppose – hum – aye – seems sickly. Young gentleman, you may sit down.’

I used the permission given, for I had been much more reduced by my illness than I was aware of, and felt myself really fatigued, even by the few paces I had walked, joined to the agitation I suffered.

‘And your name, young man, is – humph – aye – ha – what is it?’

‘Darsie Latimer.’

‘Right – aye – humph – very right. Darsie Latimer is the very thing – ha – aye – where do you come from?’

‘From Scotland, sir,’ I replied.

‘A native of Scotland – a – humph – eh – how is it?’

‘I am an Englishman by birth, sir.’

‘Right – aye – yes, you are so. But pray, Mr. Darsie Latimer, have you always been called by that name, or have you any other? – Nick, write down his answers, Nick.’

‘As far as I remember, I never bore any other,’ was my answer.

‘How, no? well, I should not have thought so, Hey, neighbour, would you?’

Here he looked towards the other squire, who had thrown himself into a chair; and, with his legs stretched out before him, and his arms folded on his bosom, seemed carelessly attending to what was going forward. He answered the appeal of the Justice by saying, that perhaps the young man’s memory did not go back to a very early period.

‘Ah – eh – ha – you hear the gentleman. Pray, how far may your memory be pleased to run back to? – umph?’

‘Perhaps, sir, to the age of three years, or a little further.’

‘And will you presume to say, sir,’ said the squire, drawing himself suddenly erect in his seat, and exerting the strength of his powerful voice, ‘that you then bore your present name?’

I was startled at the confidence with which this question was put, and in vain rummaged my memory for the means of replying. ‘At least,’ I said, ‘I always remember being called Darsie; children, at that early age, seldom get more than their Christian name.’

‘Oh, I thought so,’ he replied, and again stretched himself on his seat, in the same lounging posture as before.

‘So you were called Darsie in your infancy,’ said the Justice; ‘and – hum – aye – when did you first take the name of Latimer?’

‘I did not take it, sir; it was given to me.’

‘I ask you,’ said the lord of the mansion, but with less severity in his voice than formerly, ‘whether you can remember that you were ever called Latimer, until you had that name given you in Scotland?’

‘I will be candid: I cannot recollect an instance that I was so called when in England, but neither can I recollect when the name was first given me; and if anything is to be founded on these queries and my answers, I desire my early childhood may be taken into consideration.’

‘Hum – aye – yes,’ said the Justice; ‘all that requires consideration shall be duly considered. Young man – eh – I beg to know the name of your father and mother?’

This was galling a wound that has festered for years, and I did not endure the question so patiently as those which preceded it; but replied, ‘I demand, in my turn, to know if I am before an English Justice of the Peace?’

‘His worship, Squire Foxley, of Foxley Hall, has been of the quorum these twenty years,’ said Master Nicholas.

‘Then he ought to know, or you, sir, as his clerk, should inform him,’ said I, ‘that I am the complainer in this case, and that my complaint ought to be heard before I am subjected to cross-examination.’

‘Humph – hoy – what, aye – there is something in that, neighbour,’ said the poor Justice, who, blown about by every wind of doctrine, seemed desirous to attain the sanction of his brother squire.

‘I wonder at you, Foxley,’ said his firm-minded acquaintance; ‘how can you render the young man justice unless you know who he is?’

‘Ha – yes – egad, that’s true,’ said Mr. Justice Foxley; ‘and now – looking into the matter more closely – there is, eh, upon the whole – nothing at all in what he says – so, sir, you must tell your father’s name, and surname.’

‘It is out of my power, sir; they are not known to me, since you must needs know so much of my private affairs.’

The Justice collected a great AFFLATUS in his cheeks, which puffed them up like those of a Dutch cherub, while his eyes seemed flying out of his head, from the effort with which he retained his breath. He then blew it forth with, – ‘Whew! – Hoom – poof – ha! – not know your parents, youngster? – Then I must commit you for a vagrant, I warrant you. OMNE IGNOTUM PRO TERRIBILI, as we used to say at Appleby school; that is, every one that is not known to the Justice; is a rogue and a vagabond. Ha! – aye, you may sneer, sir; but I question if you would have known the meaning of that Latin, unless I had told you.’

I acknowledged myself obliged for a new edition of the adage, and an interpretation which I could never have reached alone and unassisted. I then proceeded to state my case with greater confidence. The Justice was an ass, that was clear; but if was scarcely possible he could be so utterly ignorant as not to know what was necessary in so plain a case as mine. I therefore informed him of the riot which had been committed on the Scottish side of the Solway Firth, explained how I came to be placed in my present situation, and requested of his worship to set me at liberty. I pleaded my cause with as much earnestness as I could, casting an eye from time to time upon the opposite party, who seemed entirely indifferent to all the animation with which I accused him.

As for the Justice, when at length I had ceased, as really not knowing what more to say in a case so very plain, he replied, ‘Ho – aye – aye – yes – wonderful! and so this is all the gratitude you show to this good gentleman for the great charge and trouble he hath had with respect to and concerning of you?’

‘He saved my life, sir, I acknowledge, on one occasion certainly, and most probably on two; but his having done so gives him no right over my person. I am not, however, asking for any punishment or revenge; on the contrary, I am content to part friends with the gentleman, whose motives I am unwilling to suppose are bad, though his actions have been, towards me, unauthorized and violent.’

This moderation, Alan, thou wilt comprehend, was not entirely dictated by my feelings towards the individual of whom I complained; there were other reasons, in which regard for him had little share. It seemed, however, as if the mildness with which I pleaded my cause had more effect upon him than anything I had yet said. We was moved to the point of being almost out of countenance; and took snuff repeatedly, as if to gain time to stifle some degree of emotion.

But on Justice Foxley, on whom my eloquence was particularly designed to make impression, the result was much less favourable. He consulted in a whisper with Mr. Nicholas, his clerk – pshawed, hemmed, and elevated his eyebrows, as if in scorn of my supplication. At length, having apparently made up his mind, he leaned back in his chair, and smoked his pipe with great energy, with a look of defiance, designed to make me aware that all my reasoning was lost on him.

At length, when I stopped, more from lack of breath than want of argument, he opened his oracular jaws, and made the following reply, interrupted by his usual interjectional ejaculations, and by long volumes of smoke: – ‘Hem – aye – eh – poof. And, youngster, do you think Matthew Foxley, who has been one of the quorum for these twenty years, is to be come over with such trash as would hardly cheat an apple-woman? Poof – poof – eh! Why, man – eh – dost thou not know the charge is not a bailable matter – and that – hum – aye – the greatest man – poof – the Baron of Graystock himself, must stand committed? and yet you pretend to have been kidnapped by this gentleman, and robbed of property, and what not; and – eh – poof – you would persuade me all you want is to get away from him? I do believe – eh – that it IS all you want. Therefore, as you are a sort of a slip-string gentleman, and – aye – hum – a kind of idle apprentice, and something cock-brained withal, as the honest folks of the house tell me – why, you must e’en remain under custody of your guardian, till your coming of age, or my Lord Chancellor’s warrant, shall give you the management of your own affairs, which, if you can gather your brains again, you will even then not be – aye – hem – poof – in particular haste to assume.’

The time occupied by his worship’s hums, and haws, and puffs of tobacco smoke, together with the slow and pompous manner in which he spoke, gave me a minute’s space to collect my ideas, dispersed as they were by the extraordinary purport of this annunciation.

‘I cannot conceive, sir,’ I replied, ‘by what singular tenure this person claims my obedience as a guardian; it is a barefaced imposture. I never in my life saw him, until I came unhappily to this country, about four weeks since.’

‘Aye, sir – we – eh – know, and are aware – that – poof – you do not like to hear some folk’s names; and that – eh – you understand me – there are things, and sounds, and matters, conversation about names, and suchlike, which put you off the hooks – which I have no humour to witness. Nevertheless, Mr. Darsie – or – poof – Mr. Darsie Latimer – or – poof, poof – eh – aye, Mr. Darsie without the Latimer – you have acknowledged as much to-day as assures me you will best be disposed of under the honourable care of my friend here – all your confessions – besides that, poof – eh – I know him to be a most responsible person – a – hay – aye – most responsible and honourable person – Can you deny this?’

‘I know nothing of him,’ I repeated; ‘not even his name; and I have not, as I told you, seen him in the course of my whole life, till a few weeks since.’

‘Will you swear to that?’ said the singular man, who seemed to await the result of this debate, secure as a rattle-snake is of the prey which has once felt its fascination. And while he said these words in deep undertone, he withdrew his chair a little behind that of the Justice, so as to be unseen by him or his clerk, who sat upon the same side; while he bent on me a frown so portentous, that no one who has witnessed the look can forget it during the whole of his life. The furrows of the brow above the eyes became livid and almost black, and were bent into a semicircular, or rather elliptical form, above the junction of the eyebrows. I had heard such a look described in an old tale of DIABLERIE, which it was my chance to be entertained with not long since; when this deep and gloomy contortion of the frontal muscles was not unaptly described as forming the representation of a small horseshoe.

The tale, when told, awaked a dreadful vision of infancy, which the withering and blighting look now fixed on me again forced on my recollection, but with much more vivacity. Indeed, I was so much surprised, and, I must add, terrified, at the vague ideas which were awakened in my mind by this fearful sign, that I kept my eyes fixed on the face in which it was exhibited, as on a frightful vision; until, passing his handkerchief a moment across his countenance, this mysterious man relaxed at once the look which had for me something so appalling. ‘The young man will no longer deny that he has seen me before,’ said he to the Justice, in a tone of complacency; ‘and I trust he will now be reconciled to my temporary guardianship, which may end better for him than he expects.’

‘Whatever I expect,’ I replied, summoning my scattered recollections together, ‘I see I am neither to expect justice nor protection from this gentleman, whose office it is to render both to the lieges. For you, sir, how strangely you have wrought yourself into the fate of an unhappy young man or what interest you can pretend in me, you yourself only can explain. That I have seen you before is certain; for none can forget the look with which you seem to have the power of blighting those upon whom you cast it.’

The Justice seemed not very easy under this hint, ‘Ha! – aye,’ he said; ‘it is time to be going, neighbour. I have a many miles to ride, and I care not to ride darkling in these parts. You and I, Mr. Nicholas, must be jogging.’

The Justice fumbled with his gloves, in endeavouring to draw them on hastily, and Mr. Nicholas bustled to get his greatcoat and whip. Their landlord endeavoured to detain them, and spoke of supper and beds. Both, pouring forth many thanks for his invitation, seemed as if they would much rather not, and Mr. Justice Foxley was making a score of apologies, with at least a hundred cautionary hems and eh-ehs, when the girl Dorcas burst into the room, and announced a gentleman on justice business.

‘What gentleman? – and whom does he want?’

‘He is cuome post on his ten toes,’ said the wench; ‘and on justice business to his worship loike. I’se uphald him a gentleman, for he speaks as good Latin as the schule-measter; but, lack-a-day! he has gotten a queer mop of a wig.’

The gentleman, thus announced and described, bounced into the room. But I have already written as much as fills a sheet of my paper, and my singular embarrassments press so hard on me that I have matter to fill another from what followed the intrusion of – my dear Alan – your crazy client – Poor Peter Peebles!

CHAPTER VII

LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION

Sheet 2.

I have rarely in my life, till the last alarming days, known what it was to sustain a moment’s real sorrow. What I called such, was, I am now well convinced, only the weariness of mind which, having nothing actually present to complain of, turns upon itself and becomes anxious about the past and the future; those periods with which human life has so little connexion, that Scripture itself hath said, ‘Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof.’

If, therefore, I have sometimes abused prosperity, by murmuring at my unknown birth and uncertain rank in society, I will make amends by bearing my present real adversity with patience and courage, and, if I can, even with gaiety. What can they – dare they-do to me? Foxley, I am persuaded, is a real Justice of Peace, and country gentleman of estate, though (wonderful to tell!) he is an ass notwithstanding; and his functionary in the drab coat must have a shrewd guess at the consequences of being accessory to an act of murder or kidnapping. Men invite not such witnesses to deeds of darkness. I have also – Alan, I have hopes, arising out of the family of the oppressor himself. I am encouraged to believe that G.M. is likely again to enter on the field. More I dare not here say; nor must I drop a hint which another eye than thine might be able to construe. Enough, my feelings are lighter than they have been; and, though fear and wonder are still around me, they are unable entirely to overcloud the horizon.

Even when I saw the spectral form of the old scarecrow of the Parliament House rush into the apartment where I had undergone so singular an examination, I thought of thy connexion with him, and could almost have parodied Lear —

Death! – nothing could have thus subdued nature

To such a lowness, but his ‘learned lawyers.’

He was e’en as we have seen him of yore, Alan, when, rather to keep thee company than to follow my own bent, I formerly frequented the halls of justice. The only addition to his dress, in the capacity of a traveller, was a pair of boots, that seemed as if they might have seen the field of Sheriffmoor; so large and heavy that, tied as they were to the creature’s wearied hams with large bunches of worsted tape of various colours, they looked as if he had been dragging them along, either for a wager or by way of penance.

Regardless of the surprised looks of the party on whom he thus intruded himself, Peter blundered into the middle of the apartment, with his head charged like a ram’s in the act of butting, and saluted them thus: —

‘Gude day to ye, gude day to your honours. Is’t here they sell the fugie warrants?’

I observed that on his entrance, my friend – or enemy – drew himself back, and placed himself as if he would rather avoid attracting the observation of the new-comer. I did the same myself, as far as I was able; for I thought it likely that Mr. Peebles might recognize me, as indeed I was too frequently among the group of young juridical aspirants who used to amuse themselves by putting cases for Peter’s solution, and playing him worse tricks; yet I was uncertain whether I had better avail myself of our acquaintance to have the advantage, such as it might be, of his evidence before the magistrate, or whether to make him, if possible, bearer of a letter which might procure me more effectual assistance. I resolved, therefore, to be guided by circumstances, and to watch carefully that nothing might escape me. I drew back as far as I could, and even reconnoitred the door and passage, to consider whether absolute escape might not be practicable. But there paraded Cristal Nixon, whose little black eyes, sharp as those of a basilisk, seemed, the instant when they encountered mine, to penetrate my purpose.

I sat down, as much out of sight of all parties as I could, and listened to the dialogue which followed – a dialogue how much more interesting to me than any I could have conceived, in which Peter Peebles was to be one of the dramatis personae!

‘Is it here where ye sell the warrants – the fugies, ye ken?’ said Peter.

‘Hey – eh – what!’ said Justice Foxley; ‘what the devil does the fellow mean? – What would you have a warrant for?’

‘It is to apprehend a young lawyer that is IN MEDITATIONE FUGAE; for he has ta’en my memorial and pleaded my cause, and a good fee I gave him, and as muckle brandy as he could drink that day at his father’s house – he loes the brandy ower weel for sae youthful a creature.’

‘And what has this drunken young dog of a lawyer done to you, that you are come to me – eh – ha? Has he robbed you? Not unlikely if he be a lawyer – eh – Nick – ha?’ said Justice Foxley.

‘He has robbed me of himself, sir,’ answered Peter; ‘of his help, comfort, aid, maintenance, and assistance, whilk, as a counsel to a client, he is bound to yield me RATIONE OFFICII – that is it, ye see. He has pouched my fee, and drucken a mutchkin of brandy, and now he’s ower the march, and left my cause, half won half lost – as dead a heat as e’er was run ower the back-sands. Now, I was advised by some cunning laddies that are used to crack a bit law wi’ me in the House, that the best thing I could do was to take heart o’ grace and set out after him; so I have taken post on my ain shanks, forby a cast in a cart, or the like. I got wind of him in Dumfries, and now I have run him ower to the English side, and I want a fugie warrant against him.’

How did my heart throb at this information, dearest Alan! Thou art near me then, and I well know with what kind purpose; thou hast abandoned all to fly to my assistance; and no wonder that, knowing thy friendship and faith, thy sound sagacity and persevering disposition, ‘my bosom’s lord should now sit lightly on his throne’; that gaiety should almost involuntarily hover on my pen; and that my heart should beat like that of a general, responsive to the drums of his advancing ally, without whose help the battle must have been lost.

I did not suffer myself to be startled by this joyous surprise, but continued to bend my strictest attention to what followed among this singular party. That Poor Peter Peebles had been put on this wildgoose chase by some of his juvenile advisers in the Parliament House, he himself had intimated; but he spoke with much confidence, and the Justice, who seemed to have some secret apprehension of being put to trouble in the matter, and, as sometimes occurs on the English frontier, a jealousy lest the superior acuteness of their northern neighbours might overreach their own simplicity, turned to his clerk with a perplexed countenance.

‘Eh – oh – Nick – d – n thee – Hast thou got nothing to say? This is more Scots law, I take it, and more Scotsmen.’ (Here he cast a side-glance at the owner of the mansion, and winked to his clerk.) ‘I would Solway were as deep as it is wide, and we had then some chance of keeping of them out.’

Nicholas conversed an instant aside with the supplicant, and then reported: —

‘The man wants a border-warrant, I think; but they are only granted for debt – now he wants one to catch a lawyer.’

‘And what for no?’ answered Peter Peebles, doggedly; ‘what for no, I would be glad to ken? If a day’s labourer refuse to work, ye’ll grant a warrant to gar him do out his daurg – if a wench quean rin away from her hairst, ye’ll send her back to her heuck again – if sae mickle as a collier or a salter make a moonlight flitting, ye will cleek him by the back-spaul in a minute of time – and yet the damage canna amount to mair than a creelfu’ of coals, and a forpit or twa of saut; and here is a chield taks leg from his engagement, and damages me to the tune of sax thousand punds sterling; that is, three thousand that I should win, and three thousand mair that I am like to lose; and you that ca’ yourself a justice canna help a poor man to catch the rinaway? A bonny like justice I am like to get amang ye!’

‘The fellow must be drunk,’ said the clerk.

‘Black fasting from all but sin,’ replied the supplicant; ‘I havena had mair than a mouthful of cauld water since I passed the Border, and deil a ane of ye is like to say to me, “Dog, will ye drink?”’

The Justice seemed moved by this appeal. ‘Hem – tush, man,’ replied he; ‘thou speak’st to us as if thou wert in presence of one of thine own beggarly justices – get downstairs – get something to eat, man (with permission of my friend to make so free in his house), and a mouthful to drink, and I warrant we get ye such justice as will please ye.’

‘I winna refuse your neighbourly offer,’ said Poor Peter Peebles, making his bow; ‘muckle grace be wi’ your honour, and wisdom to guide you in this extraordinary cause.’

When I saw Peter Peebles about to retire from the room, I could not forbear an effort to obtain from him such evidence as might give me some credit with the Justice. I stepped forward, therefore, and, saluting him, asked him if he remembered me?

After a stare or two, and a long pinch of snuff, recollection seemed suddenly to dawn on Peter Peebles. ‘Recollect ye!’ he said; ‘by my troth do I. – Haud him a grip, gentlemen! – constables, keep him fast! where that ill-deedie hempy is, ye are sure that Alan Fairford is not far off. Haud him fast, Master Constable; I charge ye wi’ him, for I am mista’en if he is not at the bottom of this rinaway business. He was aye getting the silly callant Alan awa wi’ gigs, and horse, and the like of that, to Roslin, and Prestonpans, and a’ the idle gates he could think of. He’s a rinaway apprentice, that ane.’

‘Mr. Peebles,’ I said, ‘do not do me wrong. I am sure you can say no harm of me justly, but can satisfy these gentlemen, if you will, that I am a student of law in Edinburgh – Darsie Latimer by name.’

‘Me satisfy! how can I satisfy the gentlemen,’ answered Peter, ‘that am sae far from being satisfied mysell? I ken naething about your name, and can only testify, NIHIL NOVIT IN CAUSA.’

‘A pretty witness you have brought forward in your favour,’ said Mr. Foxley. ‘But – ha – aye – I’ll ask him a question or two. Pray, friend, will you take your oath to this youth being a runaway apprentice?’

‘Sir,’ said Peter, ‘I will make oath to onything in reason; when a case comes to my oath it’s a won cause: But I am in some haste to prie your worship’s good cheer;’ for Peter had become much more respectful in his demeanour towards the Justice since he had heard some intimation of dinner.

‘You shall have – eh – hum – aye – a bellyful, if it be possible to fill it. First let me know if this young man be really what he pretends. Nick, make his affidavit.’

‘Ow, he is just a wud harum-scarum creature, that wad never take to his studies; daft, sir, clean daft.’

‘Deft!’ said the Justice; ‘what d’ye mean by deft – eh?’

‘Just Fifish,’ replied Peter; ‘wowf – a wee bit by the East Nook or sae; it’s a common case – the ae half of the warld thinks the tither daft. I have met with folk in my day that thought I was daft mysell; and, for my part, I think our Court of Session clean daft, that have had the great cause of Peebles against Plainstanes before them for this score of years, and have never been able to ding the bottom out of it yet.’

‘I cannot make out a word of his cursed brogue,’ said the Cumbrian justice; ‘can you, neighbour – eh? What can he mean by DEFT?’