The Rose of the Wilderness

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 114, 13 May 1908, Page 11

The Rose of the Wilderness

Till. V-"TFTE HOME-COMING OF ROSE. ■ "'Deed, and it's brave and kind o' ye. ilaister Kenmore. to come a' the road ' across the street to do us honour ot this time i" the mornin*!" 1 It was. of course, my aunt who spoke, , J'i 'arid I was bidding farewell to Cairn Ed.l ward with a cheque-book and the assur- ] '"aifee that Hr. Clelland would be pleased to honour my father's draft to the ex— ■ * tent of £800, sterling coin of the realm. The minister had not much to say. ; Perhaps lie was thinking of his sermon ■ ' still to be written, perhaps of the grey 1 \skies, perhaps ot" the reception that was Waiting for him down in the parish of Biddling*. For there, as elsewhere, 'Andro Freelan had his backers and disk....lickers. 1• ' But the Reverend Absalom Kenmore ...lad no fear of man or devil.. On the ■ "other hand Rod and woman struck him .with an almost equal awe. Probably, ' because of this fact, lie represented the .hest t;.pe of good man. Strength, reverence, self-control (and the amiable weakness of liking mc), made him a good ; aian i was nor. likely soon to see the I '•■.■. make of again. ~ • But still, when I said "pood-bye," thanking him with tears (restrained only --by my aunt's sence of family honour) hi my eyes. 1 hardly expected ever to see Absalom Kenmore again. There were a several things 1 should have liked to dis■""cuss t ith him —things. I mean, of real interest, that had nothing to do with •the shape of my head or the way my hair was curled in the nape of my neck— r which formerly had seemed to "interest Jinn most! And considering his profesi.. sion—"'the more shame to htm," as my aunt would have said. Well, it had.to be done. And done it was. 1 sft out for Xevr Galloway Station on the Porlpatrick line, from which a neighbour's gig would take mc to Ciaigencailzie, a lonely little farm (but one highly to be desired) set gallantly, like a forepost of civilization, in a wilderness 6f heather. From thence I must "' push, my way alone to the Dungeon. There was no time to send messages. If there had been, who was there to .tarry them? The penny post had not yet reached the Dungeon, or, save at intervals, the herd"s house—our nearest neighbour—on the Back Hill of the Buss. . My mission was accomplished. My lather ■svas delivered.yet in a way it was wae— and the tears were ready to flow, save only out of respect for the jet beads •on my aunt's bonnet. These kept all taut. I had met a good man who had done much for mc. Never should I forget him, and now he was going back to meetperhaps bodily harm, certainly ill-will, ..■for our sakes. It was on my tonguetip to ask him to be sure and come up 'to see us at the Dungeon. But this I • did not do, for no very well-defined reason —save perhaps a feeling that if Ab- -.■ saJoni Kenmore was very anxious, Ab- • salom Kenmore could find out the way .thither for himself. * • . It is no policy to make any man's way , too easy, and in matters "of love and liking it is absolutely fatal. This I did not know at the time. 1 only learned X 'it later, as tho knife of experience opened up the world's oyster. Even then, . however, I possessed the instinct. .. My aunt furnished mc with a little ■TjasKet for my journeyings. This contained, besides the ordinary provender, '". i medicines and bandages lest I should be . injured in a railway accident, about ■ which she had read every day in the papers. Marsh-Mallows salve was a ~.. good thing for bruises. Also, if not needed for disasters, it made an excellent tea for certain weaknesses of the Stomach, which she described in detail. All the time Mr Kenmore stood rigid and stern by the carriage door, while Aunt Paterson fussed and buzzed to and fro like a motherly bumble unable to find the mouth of her nest. Isa and stood back and conferred in whispers with their favourite porter as to low many stations it would be before ■ 1 got out. Then they informed mc, each ; contradicting the other and proceeding to the very verge of a quarrel. The guard had whistled. The station- . pinaster had held up his hand. My aunt had shouted her last parting counsel as to the dangers of wet feet, when the minister's hand shot out as if seeking something. I felt the tug of the moving { train at the same time as his fingers dosed on mine. He said nothing, not even "Good-bye." . - He only took off his hat hastily to my ' aunt and cousins, and stalked out of the - station like a man who had suddenly remembered another and more important engagement. ' But in my heart of hearts I knew it , was not that. It could not be that. He .' , was going back to Eiddlings parish to face no pleasant task. As for mc. I sat staring at the landScape running back on both sides of the tram like two green streams. I saw the ■vrell-kenned places —a flash of broadly mirrored sky .with the white splash of flat-boat upon it. which was the Boat o' TUione. Then came the windings of the Black Water through the Hensol woods, the rocky fords I knew so well, the - broad brown face of the moorlands — ■ farther beyond the opening of the deep •Stron cutting, lochans and lochs scattered everywhere, the change from blue slate to grey granite, from comfortable .. f fheviot ewes on lowland pastures to my •■ own brave far-dimbing black-faces knee■deep among the heather. Then, at the station, and in the "machine," sitting greatly at his ease —who but Muckle .Tamson. serene and content with him;..;self, while at the horse's head, looking k as- if he had never done anything else all his life. I saw "Stoor." And all our long way by Clattering Shaws to the house of Craigencailzie, > Muckle Tamson told mc in short crisp sentences, the words of a man of action, -the_marvellous tale of the lost horse. .J. .-••■. "Stoor it was—" (he said) —"I gie the p -Wee gipsy wastrel that credit. It couldna liae been dune but for him. He J;, .had the gipsy word. He kenned auld , ffifll Bachelfor's whisper. For mc I juist sent a case o , improved speerits addressed to Acdro Freelan at the Red -■>Ba"en. It was sent up frae the Station. 1 Erery bottle was warranted to send a :', Wan to sleep for a week. It was Jock Malcolm the groom that fetched it frae ' the Goods'. Shed at Cairn Edward, and it : . X*s Gib Doan, the 'Pride o' Solway's' . caretaker, that handed it doon, sniffin' ■ -' a t the case, for 1 had been carefu' to E PiJI some. .".'Stoor saw them. He was hidden in a haystack— so he heard them too. Says Gl " to Jock, 'What's this, think ye? .

BY S. R. CROCKETT. /Author of "The Stickit Minister/ etc.)

" 'Quid Dew 6' Ben Xevis.' by the smell o't!' says Jock. 'It-has been makin' my mouth water a' the. road frae Cairn Edward. Read what's written on it!' "For ye see, owin' to his mither runnin' awa wi' a sodjer. his education had been arrested at an early age. *' 'A present to the Red Haven from a friend just sailing for Australia.' " "That's what it says,' remarked Gib Doan, the horse-guard, rubbin' his hands hopefully. "it doesna say for Andro Freelan—but for the E?d Ha'en! Man, it's for us!' " 'Man, Gib,' groaned Jock, 'that wad be line—oh, miraclous! But when Andro cam back, he wad be askiu'—and the baith o" us wad get the grand heave oot o' this —forbye oor banes mishandled mais.t shamefu'!. , " "Xa. na. dinna be feared.' said Gib, | "we can tell him that there has been a i mistak'—lt was addressed to the Red Haven, and we thoct (seem' that he wasna at hame) that it micht be frae some o' oor auld comrades. But—maist ; likely, he will ken nocht aboot it. For. ye I see. the man that sent it will lie on his way to Australly. and it's an unco lang road to send back word. Even if the man that sent the case wrote to say, sac. Andro wad only think he was leein'!' "So Jock allowed himself to be persuaded. It was none too difficult. His throat was wide and deep and dcs- J perate dry like that man the minister is j sac fond o' tellin' aboot in the kirk —• him that was sac keen to get into Abraham's bosom aside the beggar man. "Weel," Muckle Tamson gave his characteristic short chuckle, "they were really ower saft game—thae twa. Folk that ken aboot horses are clever wi' horses. Trickery is nae name for the- devilment they are up to. But for everything else, they are saft—new-mixed putty is fair flint to them! "Weel, Miss Rose, to cut the story short, by nine that nicht Gib and Jock] Malcolm were weel into their fourth bot-! tie. Oh, they had quid heids to hae gotten sac far, after the wee bit o' Chemist-an'-Druggistry that mc and Stoor had done. And barrin' us twa. there wasna a man aboot the stables —only Gib and Jock Malcolm and the empty bottles'. "As ye may think it wasn't lang afore Gib and Jock were snorin' on the strae. Stoor and mc put the 'hosliens- on the great beasts—waterproof railway sheetin' stuffed wi' felt —never a sound— never a mark. And the twa—the 'Pride' and the 'Reid Macgregor'—followed like lambs because Wee Stoor had said the gipsy word in their lugs! "Ye hae heard o' the Reid Ha'en Port? If ye haena, Miss Rose, being heatherbred, my grandad kenned it weel —nane better. For he was a noted smuggler, as bauld, though no sac muckle spoken aboot, as Captain Yawkins —him leevin' in the country as it were and it no bein' healthy.;to,.misname Auld Muckle Tamson b'*Trorimacanny, my forbear.-' - "Mony is the cargo he had hidden awa in the auld 'vault' o ? Blue Hills, a wee bit farm-toon no half a mile frae Andro Freelan's stables. Brawly I minded him tellin' mc that,- though the farm was only a pickle ruins, the 'vaut , underneath, being built o' grand auld masonry an' solid shell-lime, wad stand" till the day o' judgment. The door was a. kind o' arch that had the look o , being roughly rilled- up wi' grey dyke-stanes. There was a mark where there had been a peat-stack set against the gable. Noo it was a' grass-grown, withe bonny wee ferns -haudin' on like grim death amang the nooks and crannies. "Aweel, Stoor an' mc, we made the horses comfortable in the auld 'Vaut' o' Blue Hills that my grandfaither had ridden his smuggling cattle in a hunder year syne! We set up the wall again, and daubit it a wi' glaur and etuck in the wee sprouts o' fern and bracken. You see, that by liftin' the auld hearthstane in the kitchen, there was an easy road with hewn steps doon into the Jiidie-hole. "But of coorse, it was neither the 'Pride o' Solway' nor yet the hardly smugglin' rouncies o' my grandfather that could gang doon through a lifted hearthstone. "But for feedin", and seem' that Andro's graund stud-stock was brave and comfortable, naething could hae been mair convenient." "Stoor was at the awakening o' Jock and Gib. Andro Freelan did it himsel', withe tae o' his boot. Indeed they say that he trampled them baith underfoot, swearing that he wad stamp the verra life oot o' them. Oh, a man's no canny when he is roused as your Belfast Irishman —especially a pig-dealer! '•'And the noise there was—and the running, and the police wi' their noses to the roads whaur neither 'The Pride' nor the 'Red Mcgregor' had ever set a foot! Oeh, it was bonny to see. But nane cam' near the ruins o' Blue Hills, nor fashed us in the least. And Stoor himsel' delivered the letter to the pig-deal-er, did ye no, Stoor? "And after that I sent a hit line to Maister Clelland for him no to chase awa Stoor, if he saw him aboot the Bank, only just to come to the window on Friday and rub the side o' his nose if Andro had payed the siller. Then I was to tak' back the horses at the double. But if he rubbed his chin —the. siller wasna payed. And. dod. I'm feared that, if the decent man had scarted his chin by mistak' the 'Pride , and the 'Mcgregor , micht hae dee-ed an unnatural death!" "Oh, Tamson!" I cried, "but at least the poor beasts had done no wrong!" '"Maybes no,' , said Tamson calmly, "but their maister had—heaps! And if it is just an' richt that bairns should suffer for their faithers' and mitiiers' ill-doings unto the third and fourth generations —what wad hae been the maitter wi* twa dumb brutes lyin' doon never ' to rise mair, and neither o' them kennin' what had struck them? At ony rate that is what wad hae happened, had I no gotten the telegraph frae that wee Devil there! "Sac as soon as I had it, I took oot the horses and let them in to the 'paddock' as they caa it. They made straight for the stables. The doors were open. I saw them gang in, looking for their corn, and waited for nae mair. For weel kenned I that the place wad be watched. Muekle Tamson took the heather, and wee Stoor the train for it! And so, here we are, baith the twa, and the decent man in the bank at Cairn Edward lias the siller. . . . "Owe aye. I'm no saym but I wad hae likit fine'to hae brocht the hale myseP to put into your faithers hands. Jkit he's sin awesome wan that Andro Freelar. He sticks at naetbin!" 1 h.

- I laughed at Muckle Tamson's sudden conclusion, so lame after what had gone before. '•Tamson." I said, "that's surely the pot miscalling the kettle. It skeins to mc that you don't stick at much yourself!" "Oh that," he said, "that's different! I was only renderin' unto Caesar-—that's your faither—what was Caesar's. But Andro Freelan was keepin' what wasna his. Besides the man was a rank Eerishman, that says 'pates' when he means 'peats'! Wha wad keep the moral law wi' a craitur like that —no even your wonderfu' minister!" He sajd this with a quaint sidelong look at mc. "What do you mean?" I demanded indignantly. He laughed with that curious chuckling laugh which, so far as my experience goes, only Muckle Tamson and the common green talking parrot possess of all.animated nature. "Ob." said he, "maybe Maister Kenmore kenned more than ye think." Then the three of us struck right across the hills. When I got fairly away from the little steading of Craigencailzie, and saw the lilac bloom on the real hill heather, I declare I dropped down and hugged a bush of it. Muekle Tamson took Stoor by the collar of his coat— the only one he possessed—and led him to a distance, where the two of them viewed the scenery all round, except in ray direction. There was a knoll a little way off, from which I could see the reeking chimney of the Dungeon—the whole house still a mere speck on the face of the Wilderness. My heart—ah, my heart bounded within mc. But I had other thoughts too. I saw the minister of Iciddlings in his lonesome manse .with the severe-faced woman lording it over him —that is, so far as he was a man to be lorded over at all. Yet I could not give up the heritage of the heather. But I own I 1 did wish that he had been there to i share it with mc, I do not mean with any j thought of foolishness. But just to walk out together, so that he. could tell mc about the customs of swallows and the stars in their courses, and mc to find him plovers' eggs and fruits in their seasons, blackberry, and cranberry and the rare little strawberries at the copsewood edges. But still, for the present this mete thought was enough for me—that yonder was the house of the Dungeon, with I my father better in mind and body, and I here were the three of us, each of whom \ had done something. And—oh, the news that would bring the joy to his heart, even mere than his daughter's return— of the eight hundred pounds safe in the i bank, and the certainty that we would not now have to quit the Bitiigeon either for landlord or factor. Yes, yonder was my father at the door! How white and frail he appeared! He and the sun had not looked each other in the face for long. And there, too, was Will Gillespie—who, when a little herd boy, had always declared that he would marry mc. I was grateful to him, I remember at the time. For he told mc that all girls had to be married, or else be for ever disgraced. Indeed, if 1 remember- rightly, so far had matters gone that at the age of five I was already we.ddec to Will with a curtainpole ring and a crown of green rushes! Somehow this did not hold afterwards. My father taught mc too much, and too well. I read too many books, and women were too commodity in the Wilderness. But Will held to his side of the bargain, and with commendable regularity asked mc to marry him about once a week, never disappointed or discouraged at my refusal, but saying only, "Maybe the next time ye will have changed your mind!" In vain I told him no —that I should never change. Because of course I knew how foolish it is to suppose that girls ever do. Only men are fickle. A girl does just as she likes, so long as she is true to herself. That is the new way of it, or at least so I read in the books that father got for mc from the Cairn Edward circulating library. Now, of course you think that I threw myself into my father's arms weeping 1 passionate tears, that Muckle Tamson waved the letter from the banker about his head, and that we all hugged "Stoor" and promised to send him to college. As a matter of fact I said to- my father, "Come indoors —you know very, well you should not bestanding out in that sun without your hat!" My fathersaid nothing at all. Muckle Tamson was ascertaining roughly the probable profit and loss account of the "yowes" since he left from Will Gillespie. I shook hands with Will, and said that, thanks to him. my father was doing won. derfully, and that apparently they could get on better without mc at the Dungeon. "Oh. Rose!" was all that poor Will could say, and blushing deeply, he turned from mc ostentatiously, and plunged into the discussion of the best date for dipping the lambs on the Glints of the Dass. As for Stoor, he was already deep in a game in a corner of the farmyard with Tweed and Tusker. The fight was a free one, and which was boy and which - dog, it would have been hard to distinguish. Such was our homecoming. But when I got my father indoors the first words 1 said to him were these: "Andro Freelan has paid his debt!" I saw him turn pa'e and stumble. X caught his arm and set him down gently on the sofa. "It was all Muckle Tamson!" said I, "you must thank him!" Henry Gordon got up and .with one hand on my shoulder he went painfully to the window. '•Tamson —" he cried, "Tamson!" "I ken what ye want —I'm no coming a fut!" rejoined Tamson from across the yard. "I did naething but what was a pleasure. It was Miss Rose that fettled the job!' , "Come here, you and Stoor!" commanded my father in a firmer tone. "Well, then. 1 juist, winna," cried Tamson. "an' if that young loon dares to set his nose within the hoose —I'll break . his back!" - But Stoor had no such intention. He disappeared round the corner of the barn in a fresh tumble of fighting dogs, waving brushes and joyous backings. Only Will Gillespie leaned his elbow on the gatepost and looked , across the brown Wilderness of the Dungeon about whose peak the mists hung grey and sad. Then suddenly lifting himself up, he squared his shoulders, and strode away down the glen to his solitary house of the Oullarg. like one who has done liis day's work and of whom no more can be expected. The Rose had come back to the wilderness, but perha-ps she had shed a petal or two by the way. (To be continued next Saturday.) , Qrent Peppermlut Cur.c lor fcv.yiis and Colds uever fails. 1/a and 2/6. J WOLFE'S SCHXAPPS stimulates .the organs of urination.