The Rose of the Wilderness

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 105, 2 May 1908, Page 17

The Rose of the Wilderness

BY S. R. CROCKETT. (Author of "The Stickit Minister," etc.)'

EtrSOUilY OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS. H-"\ iim<.<! iT- ; Wilderness. Dniißcon.™ In , ' n store for "The «, the effect oTa £rE£I"E V. beauty is vanity. The EM Haven was a curious placehalt old-fashioned low-oountxy Galloway farmhouse-half mansion of rampant bad taete.Tlic dwelling house of the old steading with its windows looking on the ope,, Muare. had been given up to the "grieve" or foreman. A ten-foot-high midden could do mm no harm. But Andro Free ian. his master, though by all accounts reared but-and-ben vrith the pi- had built him a brave mansion of red freestone some distance away, a thin<* as ngl? as even the heart of such a man could conceive. 1 went first to the "steading' where I was informed by a lank hopeless looking man that 'the maister \vasna at name ' bin that 'if onywhere I should find him either at the new stables or in the billiard ruom.' Longshanks was obfiging enough to walk to the big archway, and from thencto point out these objects— to wit, the stables—long brick buildings lying across c field which he called the" 'paddock.' though I saw none of these about. Also equally in brick, but attached to the house, he indicated the ugliest building 1 had ever set eyes upon. It was squat and featureless but spacious, and would have made a rare place for rearing motherless lamb? in. It -was "the billiard room." but as for what billiards were, 1 neither knew nor cared. Some sort of fancy poultry, most likely. I thought. Well. Henry Gordon's daughter was not going to go and look in at the window on the chance of seeing her father's debtor. I -vrent to the front door of the Red Haven, and rang the bell. A smartly dressed, but what we would call among the hills, rather "taverf'-look-ing serving-ma id opened the door and regarded mc with such displeasure. Xo. the master was not at home! Then when would he be—l had come a long way to see him! '•Doubtless!" said she. tossing her head and trying to smirk. 1 think she feared competition, and dimly felt that her bed and board were in danger. However, I used the same trick which had served mc so weli at the manse of Riddlings. I arranged my skirts, got out my Emerson, and sat down to read. If ever murder looked out of woman's eye. it glint-ed nr.ked and unashamed in that of Andro Freelan's house-lass. ""Got away/ she cried, "or I will call the dogs!" "Happy to see them!" said I. For having been born and brought up among ' "tykes." naturally I had no rear of theni. She whistled, putting her lingers awkwardly to her mouth. I gave her a lesson as to the correct manner, which was very badly taken. "See!" 1 said, making the brick walls of the billiard-room resound, and fetching an echo even from the distant stables, •■that is the right way to whistle up , dogs!" Half a dozen came bounding. But seeing mc seated there .so much at my ease, and whistling in the key they knew so ■well, they leaped joyously about mc, instead of devouring mc as the powderyfaced young person evidently desired." Immediately I rendered them sedate. by a motion as if reaching for an imaginary switch, they cowered, and there I s-at to receive the master of the : louse. I had not long to wait. He had been Bomewhpre about the stabies, and heard < the professional whistling, and seen the ' outrush of the dogs. Now in his turn 1 t he came forth to inquire. : "Who are you?"' he said. And as I ( stood on my feet, I saw what I had 1 never before seen on any man's face, ad- ' miration without respect—a very hateful thing to sec. From that moment I was t as set against him as the floury-faced i lady was against mc. I think I could r. have slain him if he had lifted a hand t Upon mc. ] But be did not. He only repeated his question in a somewhat different key, c rather fawning and false. A great, ruddy clatch of a man with a black beard, i ha:r growing as thin on his head as it I was curly and thick on his chin, and a very red lips—that was Andro Freelan, 1 late pig-dealer, from Belfast. The very Eight of him gave mc the "'grews." h '"May I ask." he said, "to what I owe s this honour?" a I think I surprised him. At least so t I natter myself. t "To the fact that you owe my father g eight hundred pounds!" I said. "I am v here to receive payment." ti He stopped, all a-quiver with excite- a ment of the wickedest sort. His eyes c ] grew little and currant-like in his suddenly paJlid face. His red lips paled and shivered like cold shape, n "This is no talk for the front door c of a gentleman's house." he said at last with an effort. '"Come inside if you n . have anything to say to mc." so J went. Everywhere was wax-cloth — m on the walls, on the floor, and, for m aught I kjiow. on the ceiling. After- pl wards I hc-a.rd he was local agent for a j r linoleum firm in the Lang Toun, and EO hao got bij house tapestried for nothing. ' t Such a ii-?.?sr —wo chill, and cold, and ] m comfortless. Corridor after corridor, room after room all glancing frigid with i{ sheeted oilcloth, with little ugly chairs Q Bet eiactly in corners, a.nd yet smaller nc ones at intervals about the tables. And then his study! There were bigger chairs there, and a smell of tobacco ,j e smoke. That was all the difference. | jr c "Will you sit down," said he, civilly j a enough, '"and have the goodness to tell; o t mc who you are?''" I ne "I am the daughter of Henry Gordon! of the Dungren." 1 said; "you owe myi father £800. We arc in. sore need of tfo the money. The storm has harmed us s j, greatly. Wγ !>a?e not enough to pay fr, our rent." is He kept hi', eyes fhred upor. :ae, mov- by ing a little nearer, as if he tboojrht that he had mc fascinated. I conld have eh laughed in his face. J>«, that is not' gr Tfhai I wonid htr» daw: in hit, fact, | lai

' But he kept advancing. j '"Let mc see your proof," he said. _ suppose you have some sort of receipt, forged or genuine?" "1 have your writing, properly stamped and witnessed," I answered. "I have copies of my father's letters " He made two strides and caught mc by the wrist, drawing mc close up to him with a strength 1 had not expected in such a- softish pig-faced man. But he had been accustomed to the training of horses, and knew the tricks. _\ow, I was naturally a strong girl, but I felt at that moment that 1 was in the claws of a brute. However. I did not lose my presence of mind, as I might have done. 1 used my only weapon. ''If you think I would come here with such documents upon mc. you take mc for a fool.*' I said, ''and Henry Gordon's daughter is not a fool !" "Then she does not take after her father," lie sneered brutally, "neither in brains—nor in looks!" Here he made a kind of mocking bow. The words and action gave mc an opportunity to wrench myself free. I fell back upon the rack of guns. Andro Freelan evidently considered himself a sportsman —that is, so far as shooting rabbits was concerned. I saw a doublebarrelled shot-gun at half-cock, with a box of caps on the ledge handy. In an instant, as if it had been my father's old "Slayall." I snatched the grin, fullcocked both barrels, and slipped on a couple of caps. Cartridges were still strange to the Dungeon, save for a few days when the gentry came up to shoot tlie grouse in August, but I understood all about this. I suppose also that Andro Freelan understood his own rabbiting guns. At least he attempted no further advance, and for the rest of my visit I held him in respect. Mark, I did not point the gun at him—that would have been wrong —but at the ceiling. And that, in a one-storied house, can hurt nobody except the spiders. '•Now," said I, "you lave chosen to

deny your debt —you have tried to get tlie receipt, from mc by violence " "Nothing was farther from my thought." he exclaimed. And now I am rather of the opinion that for once he spoke the truth. "At any rate the papers, receipt, copies of letters and all are in the hands of Mr. Kenmore at the Manse!" ■"Absalom!" sneered the master of Red Haven. And then, adopting a preaching ton?, he cried. "Absalom—what have I to do with thee? Absalom, who didst steal the hearts of Israel?" And from that I knew that the man, though evil in his heart's core, had been decently brought up and with some knowledge of his Bible. "\Yill you pay the debt?'' I said. "Bonnie Lassie," he said mockingly, "thy servant is but a Philistine and an Edomite in comparison with Absalom of the golden locks —go to him and he will pay thee!"' Then giving aTTother turn to the mockery he had adopted, he bade ine sternly. "'Be off with you. Lucky it is for you that you are only a girl. 1 owe your father nothing! And many is the gallon of good stuff he has had from mc without the payment of a penny!" This also I knew to be false, my father being ever a man most temperate. But I saw it was useless to remain. So 1 shouldered the gun and made for the door. "■\Yhat would you do with that?" he cried in astonishment. "Maybe."' said I, "it will serve mc for a shot at a rabbit—maybe at a rat! But I will restore it at your outer gate— not before!" He followed mc. since from fear he declined to go before. But 1 walked sideways, as one does on a lull-slope, following a little-used sheep-track—so that 1 could keep my eyes both on Andro and on the "tavert"' personage in the white apron with pink bows. Neither, however, really attempted to molest me—which, in the circumstances, was perhaps as well. In this order we arrived at the gate, over which Andro had his arms engraved. These had recently been found for him by the Ulster Herald—a pig rampant above the five strawberry leaves of the OTreelans and the motto "Ich bin"— -which in the German tongue, signifies '"1 am!" I took the caps off the nipples, put them in my pocket, let down the hammers to half-cock, and leaned the weapon against the armorialed gateway of the representative of the ancient kings of Ballyfreelin. Then, at once triumphant and discouraged, I took my way to the Manse. I _he minister heard what I had to say j with a sympathetic expression enough. But a.t the corners of his mouth I could at times divine the saving twitch of humour. "Miss Rose," he said, gently, when 1 had finished, "there is uo use in your staying longer here. In fact I should advise the contrary. If you can trust the papers with mc, I will warrant that they shall be kept in safety. I have a I good stieve beast in my stable, and it will be a pleasure to mc to drive you to your friends in Cairn Edward. Bein°a bachelor and a minister, 1 am precluded from offering you hospitality!" ! "But Muckle Tamson?" I cried. I thought that a shade came across the minister's face, but he answered readily enough. "I know nothing of any person of that name — of his whereabouts, I mean," said Mr. Kenmore. '•Tamson is a common surname in these parts—none commoner —and the most part might appropriately he styled "Muckle." Is your friend a man or a woman?" ; I had told hini before, but he must have forgotten, which struck mc as strange. However, he went out, murmuring that if he saw the aforesaid Muckle Tamson, he would get him to help with the "yoking of his pony" —• a job at which ministers, as a rule, are not so clever as at reading their 6ermons. But I said that I would come and help him. Which tiling 1 accordingly did. indeed I practically completed it myself. For on his side the Reverend Absalom tangled and twisted the breeching and other things in such a marvellous manner, and it was easy to see that he was t_ii__-ing of something else. ~"I have often thought," he said, "that the irarnessment of horses could be much simplified. The load ought to be pulled from the centre of animal gravity, ■_____ is in the chest, and not as is the custom by a collar from the neck?" My centre of gravity was also in mv chest or thereabouts, and in spite of my griefs of the day I could hardly help laughing. He gazed at mc, astonished

He had apparently never met anyone able to do that. That anyone should laugh while he decanted his wisdom, drop by drop, like some rare liqueur, struck him as something new. However, I do not think he disliked mc for it. I told him how that I had read that in America they had introduced the Russion fashion of harnessing, just as he described. "Ah," he sighed, "I had thought the i_isa original. It is always so. I have an idea that seems to have "risen from the blue deeps of my soul—and lo! it is as the scum which floats on the surface o* the truck-and-barter of nations. I was born to search for hidden wisdom and to discover commonplaces!" "-Such as that you have forgotten your whip?" said I, pertly. "Whip?" cried he, startled, "why, wha. need is there of a wjr.ip?" '"The usual one," said I, "your brown mare has been walking at a "snail's pace this last half hour, and if we want to be in Cairn Edward to-night, we must make haste. Shall I jump off and cut a switch from the hedge?" "These thing, are barbarous inventions," he said, "they deepen the gulf between man and his fellow-creatures— falsely called the brutes. Ail that is needed is to appeal to their higher intelligence, which is latent in every living thing! But, it is true, the feminine four'legged thing lags!" Then all at once he cried out to his mare with an astonishing power of voieo —not loud, but with a certain thrill of command in it, quite new to me— "MARTHA!" I had never heard that name applied to a horse before, and I asked him why his beast was so called. He seemed unwilling to tell mc, but at last he said, "It may seem that 1 am giving you right in the matter oi your suggestion of the whip or scourge. Nevertheless 1 will tell you that Martha of old —by the makers of the Genevan Bible, at least, the greatest men the world ever saw—was taken to mean "bitter" or "provoking." Such, however, is not my own opinion, and you will observe how the poor thing has quickened her pace at the very sound of my voice!" I had as a matter of fact observed it. I had watched the flexible ears of the pony cocked alternately fore and aft, as if to find out how soon it would be safe to relapse into a walk. This happened in about five minutes. But after the third calling upon "Martha" and a third relapse, I took the reins out of the hands of tbe Minister of Riddlings without his appearing to be aware of it. Shortening my grip on them I leaned forward and brought the edges of solid leather smartly down on Martlia's rump, to that lady's vast astonishment. She had not been accustomed to moorland customs witli ponies. But she recognised at once a new hand on the tiller and trotted on, without for the rest of the day, deserving her curious name. Mr Kenmore paused for a moment, to look down from the heights of his great argument and speculate upon my action. But, perhaps feeling obscurely that after all reins were not wliips or scourges, but something natural to the equine race, and having scriptural authority, he only quoted the quaint old verse of Francis Roos in the Scots psalmody: "Then be not Uke the horse or mule. Which do not understand: Whose mouth, lesi they come near to thee, A bridle must comuiaml." Martha, after a further application or two, which her master did not deign to notice, got up quite a decent p aC e, and (what is more) kept it all the way till the long High Street of Cairn Edward took us in, and the low gables of whitewashed houses began to hound the horizon. Then, and not till then. Mr. Kenmore suddenly stopped his " wrapt oration flowing free." He remarked thut. he had never known so rapid a transit between his Manse of Ridd'ings and Cairn Edward, adxling that 1 was a most intelligent young lady, and that mv father must be a singularly well-instructed man to have brought mc up so well! lie would be proud to make his acquaintance! He wns, of course, quite right. And 1 told him so. Though (I suggested in addition) how he could possibly know was a mar vol--seeing that J. had hardly spoken tlu-ee words the whole way! At this he looked l staggered lor v minute, and then remarked that 1 must surely be mistaken. He himself was a man of few words, and l certainly my argument with regard to the necessity ot v whip had much matter in it. He would think over the desirability of procuring one. In the meantime he would take my affairs to his friend Mr. Clelland, the lawyer, and see what there was to be done- Later in the evening he would call at Mrs. Paterson's —or perhaps—for Mr. Clelland was a man full of hospitality, In the morning, if I could content myself so long! I answered' that, having no hopes of the money, I must c'en think of something else to help my father. Then he let mc out of the gig at the Paterson's door. As I did so 1 caught tie murmur of Absalom Kenmore, minister of Riddling's, while he was reluettantly taking the reins, and 1 springing lightly to the ground as one who in our country would jump a dyke with lifted kirtle. I did not understand his words at the time. They were evidently not meant for mc. It was an act of self-commu-nion, and in reality Absalom was warning himself against himself. Perhaps against mc at the same time —who knows? it was a verse out of the Proverbs that he quoted. I looked it out after as soon as I got a minute to myself at our old Genevan version, which is still so common in the wilds of Gallowa3% thanks to Andro Hart's versions, lv this form it read l : Favour is deceitful aud beatific Is vanltic, But the woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be nralscd. I stood and thought. What right had this man thus to judge and assign? What did he mean? Was 1 the "beautie tnat 13 vanities," or " the woman to be pralsea?" There was no reason (that I could see) why 1 should not be both. But if 1 had to choose —well, being only twenty-one, and a girl, I voted strongly and unanimously for the " beautie that is vanitie! " And I fear I went to sleep that night in _>a Paterson's bed thinking more of what Absalom Kenmore, Clerk of Presbytery, meant by his text, than of all my father's loss and l the dread rent-day looming in the near future like a hill spectre seen/against the mist. (Tc- be continued next Wednesday.)