CHAPTER XXIX
THE QUEEN OF THE CADGERS TAKES THE ROAD
THE next day broke cold and stormy and driving rain sped past the windows of the Stirks’ cottage. In the morning Jimmy set out, having decided to go afoot and to return with Gilbert in whatever vehicle he should accomplish the last stage of his way home. As the day went on the old woman’s restlessness grew, and, by afternoon, her inaction, while so much was pending, grew intolerable to her. She opened the back door and looked out seawards to where a patch of ragged light broke the flying clouds. This deceitful suggestion of mending weather decided her on the action for which she was hankering. To Kaims she would go. Captain Somerville might, even now, have received some word from Cecilia, and in any case, the sight of his face would soothe her agitated mind. Her heart was so deep in what was going on that she was at the mercy of her own nerves so long as she was unable to act; and to-day, there was not even her grandson to distract her mind. The man’s more enviable part was his.
It was seldom, now, that she drove herself, and it was years since she had harnessed a horse. She wrapped her body in her thick, gray plaid, pinning it tightly round head and shoulders, and went out to the shed where Rob Roy was dozing peacefully in the straw, in false expectation of a holiday. Almost before he had time to realize what she wanted, she got him on his legs, pushed the collar over his astonished face, and led him out across the windy yard, to where the cart stood in a sheltered corner. In a few minutes she was turning his head towards Kaims.
The rain held off as she splashed down the road, and, at the bridge, the North Lour ran hard and heavy under her; the beeches round Whanland House were swaying their upper branches when she passed, as seaweeds sway in a pool at the in-running tide. She drove straight to the Black Horse in the High Street, for, behind the inn-yard, was a tumbledown shanty, where carriers, cadgers, and such of the lower classes as went on wheels, might stable their carts when they came to the town. The grander accommodation, which had the honour of harbouring the chaises and phaetons of the gentry, was on the inner side of the wall. When she had left Rob Roy she walked to the Inspector’s house and was admitted. She was ushered straight into the Captain’s presence; he sat in his study, dressed for the road, for he had duty near Garviekirk. The expression he wore was one unusual to him.
‘I have made a discovery, Mrs. Stirk,’ he said, abruptly. ‘The letter I wrote to Miss Raeburn never reached her. She has not received it.’
Her eyes seemed to pierce him through; he turned his face away.
‘I am a good deal distressed,’ he continued—‘I did not suppose that—those one associated with—did such things.’
‘It’s Barclay!’ exclaimed Granny.
‘We cannot be quite certain,’ he went on, ‘so the less we say about it the better. He was asked to carry it to Fullarton and I have reason to know that it never reached Miss Raeburn. I have spoken quite freely to you; as you have identified yourself with this affair, I felt I should not keep anything back from you. I am sick at heart, Mrs. Stirk—sick at heart.’
His expression was blurred by a dull suffering.
‘Fegs! ye needna fash about the likes o’ him, sir! I warrant ye it’s no the first clortie[1] job he’s done!’
There was more than the Queen of the Cadgers could fathom in the honest man’s trouble; more lying on his heart, as he drove away down the street, than she, looking after him, could guess. The sordid knowledge of his wife’s nature had been with him for years, shut behind bars through which he would not glance, like some ignoble Caliban. That morning he had been forced to look the hateful thing in the face.
A letter had come to Mrs. Somerville from Cecilia, directing her to the private entrance at Morphie Kirk. ‘I hope Captain Somerville is well,’ was its conclusion; ‘with the exception of a note of congratulation from Mr. Barclay I have heard nothing of anyone at Kaims since I left Fullarton.’
Mrs. Somerville had read it aloud, stopping suddenly in the middle of the last sentence, remembering Barclay’s semi-jocular suggestion of delaying the letter, and turned scarlet. She was apt, in difficulties, to lose her head.
‘I’m sure it is no fault of Mr. Barclay’s!’ she exclaimed. ‘I told him how urgent it was.’
‘What?’ exclaimed the Inspector, turning in his chair.
Then, seeing how she had incriminated herself, she had plunged into explanations. The door had been ajar—she had been unable to help hearing what Mrs. Stirk had said on the day when he had written to Miss Raeburn—the words had forced themselves on her. It was not her fault. She had never moved from where he had left her sitting at the breakfast-table.
Somerville looked squarely at his wife. The door had not been ajar, for he had fastened it carefully, as he always did before hearing private business. He remembered doing so, perfectly.
‘It was not ajar,’ he said, in a voice she had rarely heard; ‘it was shut. And it is impossible to hear between the two rooms.’
‘I always did hate that old woman!’ cried Mrs. Somerville, her face in a flame, ‘and why you ever let her into the house I never did know! I’m sure if Lucilla were here she would take my part. And now to be accused of——’
‘What have I accused you of?’ asked her husband. ‘I have not accused you yet. But I will. I accuse you of telling that hound, Barclay, what you heard, and, if I sit here till to-morrow, I will have every word you have betrayed.’
Piece by piece he dragged from her her treachery; evasions, tears, lies, he waded through them all. Furious and frightened, what confidences of Barclay’s she had, she divulged also. At the end he had risen painfully and left the room.
The sailor was a hot-headed, hot-hearted man. He had no proof against the lawyer and he knew it; but he believed him capable of anything and was prepared to maintain his belief.
‘You may tell Barclay,’ he said, as he paused at the door, ‘that I have no proof against him but my own conviction. If he can prove me wrong I will apologize humbly—publicly, if he pleases. But, until that day, if he ventures to enter my house while I can stand, I will turn him out of it with my cane.’
When Granny Stirk had done a few matters of business in Kaims, she went down the side-street to the back premises of the Black Horse. Before her, a figure battled with the wind that rushed down the tunnel of houses, and, as he turned into the yard gate, she saw that this person was none other than Barclay. He went in without observing her, and called to a man who was idling among the few vehicles which stood empty about the place. She continued her way round the outside wall to the spot where she had left Rob Roy, and untied the rope by which he was tethered. Above, a large hole in the stonework let out a strong stable smell from the row of dark stalls built against its inner face. The occasional movement of horses mixed with the voices of two people who were walking along the line of animals together.
‘Yon’s them,’ said one of the unseen individuals, as a scraping of boots on the flags suggested that the pair had come to a standstill under the aperture.
‘Now, how many are there exactly?’ inquired the voice of Barclay.
‘That’ll be sax frae the Crown an’ four frae the Boniton Arms—they’ve just got the four in now. Them’s the twa grays at the end; an’ other twa’s up yonder, the brown, an’ yon brute wi’ the rat-tail.’
‘Are you quite certain that these are all that can be had? Mind you, I want every single beast secured that is for hire in Blackport.’
His companion made a small, semi-contemptuous sound.
‘That michtna be sae easy,’ he replied. ‘Whiles there may be a naig I dinna ken i’ the toun—what are ye wantin’ wi’ sic a lot, sir?’
His tone implied more of the practical than the inquisitive, but the lawyer cut him short.
‘That’s my affair,’ he replied. ‘My order is plain enough, surely. I want every horse that is for hire in the town secured and brought here—every horse, mind you. And by eight o’clock to-night they must be out of Blackport—here, that is.’
The trace which Granny was hooking slipped through her fingers, and she stood, open-mouthed, while the footsteps of the speakers died away. It did not take her a moment to draw the right inference; if the lawyer had mentioned Fordyce’s name she might not have understood so easily what was going forward; but he had spoken as though the order had emanated from himself, and Granny, on the other side of the wall, had a burning lamp of wrath in her soul which illuminated his deed.
It was almost half-past five, and, in less than three hours, Gilbert would arrive at Blackport to find that there was no available means of getting further. She knew him well enough to be sure he would start on foot, if need be, so soon as he should learn from Jimmy of what was to happen on the morrow; but, meanwhile, here was Rob Roy, at the end of the reins she held, and what belonged to the Stirk family belonged also to the Laird of Whanland so long as she had breath to say so. She got into her place and drove carefully out of the narrow gate into the street. It was scarcely time for the light to fail, but the sky was dark with rain-cloud and the weather rolling in from a wild sea that was booming up the coast. She cared for none of these things; inland, eight miles off, lay Blackport, and, in less than an hour, she would be there with a horse.
Where the side-street met the High Street, an archway joined the inn buildings to the opposite houses, and, under it, she observed Barclay taking shelter from the sudden squall of rain which had come up in the last few minutes. Beneath its further end, across the way, stood two loafers, one of whom she recognised as a cadger whose cart was now unharnessed in the yard. Though his days in the trade had begun long after her own had ended she knew something about him; principally, that rumour connected him with a Blackport poaching gang which had been active in the preceding year. He looked at her as she approached and sent an obscene word to meet her, but she neither heard nor heeded, for her attention was set on the lawyer whom she was about to pass.
‘Where are you bound for?’ called Barclay.
Her eyes flamed.
‘Ah! ye deevil!’ she cried, ‘a’ heard ye! Look! Here’s a horse that’ll be in Blackport the nicht!’
Before she was through the arch Barclay realized that she must have been near him in the yard. By what chance she had understood his business there he knew not—had not time to guess. He turned livid.
‘Stop her!’ he shouted to the two men as he made a futile dash after the cart.
The cadger on the opposite pavement sprang forward.
‘Go on!’ roared the lawyer, ‘go on, man! Stop her! Stop her!’
Granny struck Rob Roy sharply and he plunged into his collar. The cadger sprang at his head, but the horse swerved, and his hand fell on the rein just behind the rings of the pad. There was a curse and a rattle; like a snake the whip-thong curled in the air and came down across his face, with a hissing cut that Barclay could hear where he stood, and, as the man fell back, his hands to his eyes, the gallant old woman swung out into the middle of the street.
‘Go on! Go after her! Five pounds if you can stop her! Ten!’ yelled Barclay.
‘Awa’ ye go and get yer cairt!’ cried the friend who had been standing with the cadger.
At the mention of money the man took his hands from his face; a red wale lay across it and the water poured from his eyes.
‘He’s got a cairt yonder i’ the yaird!’ cried the friend again.
‘Quick then!’ shouted Barclay, seizing him. ‘If you stop that hell-cat getting to Blackport to-night you shall get ten pounds and I’ll see you come to no harm. Run!’
At this moment Granny, going at a smart trot, turned to look back, for she was not yet out of sight; she saw the cadger pushed towards the inn by Barclay, she saw him run back under the arch, and she understood. She sat down in her place, her heel against the footboard, and let the lash float out on Rob Roy’s shoulder. She knew the value of a good start.
Showers of mud flew behind her as the little horse’s hoofs smote the earth in the fast, steady trot to which she kept him. The east wind almost hurled her out of her seat as she passed the fringe of the town, for she was going north, and it came in from the sea, not half a mile off, with a violence that blew Rob Roy’s mane stiffly out from his neck. At the further side of Kaims flowed the South Lour, making a large tidal lake west of it; along the north side of this estuary the Blackport road ran, straight, but for certain indecisive bends; practically level for eight miles. As she turned along it and found the blast at her back she increased her pace. Not far in front the way dipped, and a sluggish stream which drained the fields on her right hand ran under a low, stone bridge into the marsh which edged the ‘Basin of Kaims,’ as the semi-salt lake was called. The wind had whipped the water into small waves, for it was high tide and the swirl almost invaded her path; a couple of gulls, tilted sideways on outspread wings, were driven over her head. The sound of the crawling water was drowned in the gale which was growing steadily. She pressed on, the horse well in hand, till she reached the summit of the rise half a mile ahead and pulled up for a moment in the shelter of a broken wall. Turning, she strained her eyes into the dusk, and, remote from the undercurrent of the water’s voice, on the following wind there came to her the distant beat of hoofs.
She was old, her body’s strength was on the wane, but the fire of her spirit was untouched, as it would be until Death’s hand, which alone could destroy it, should find her out. Though she knew herself face to face with a task which needed more than the force she could bring to it, though her body was cold in the rain and the hands which steered her were aching, her heart leaped in her as she pulled Rob Roy together and cried to him in the wind. The Queen of the Cadgers was on the road again.
O faithful hands that have wrought here; that have held sword, or plough or helm! O fighters, with souls rising to the heavy odds, nerves steadying to the shock whose force you dare, unrecking of its weight! What will you do in the Eternity when there will be no cause to fight for, no Goliath of Gath, twice your size, to sally forth against with sling and stone? In that Paradise that we are promised, where will be your place? We cannot tell. But, if there be a just God who made your high hearts, He will answer the question whose solution is not for us.
The next three miles were almost level and she drove on steadily; she had seen her pursuer’s nag in the Black Horse yard, a hairy-heeled bay with a white nose who looked as if he had already travelled some distance. Rob Roy had been little out of late and the cart was empty; indeed, it was light enough to be a precarious seat for a woman of her age. By the time she had done half her journey it had become dark enough to make caution necessary, for few country travellers carried lights in those days, and she was on the highroad which took an eastward sweep to the coast between Perth and Aberdeen. She stopped once more to listen and give Rob Roy his wind; for the last half mile they had come up a gradual ascent whose length made up for its gentle slope. He did not seem distressed and the gale had helped him, for it was almost strong enough behind him to blow the cart forward without his efforts.
On again, this time a little faster; the solid blackness of the fields slid by and she passed a clump of trees, creaking and swaying over a patch of light which she knew to be a mill-pond. Three miles more, and she might climb down from her place to rest her stiffened limbs, before the Laird should be due and she should go to the door of the Crown to wait for his coming. She almost wondered whether it were her imagination which had seen the cadger run back at Barclay’s instigation, whether she had dreamed of the horse’s feet pursuing her near the Basin of Kaims. She let Rob Roy walk.
Her hair was blowing over her face and she pushed back her soaking plaid to twist it behind her ears. In a momentary lull, a clatter of hoofs broke upon her and voices answered each other, shouting. Either her enemy was behind with some companion of his own kidney, or there were others abroad to-night with whom time was precious; she could hear the wheels grind on a newly-mended piece of road she had crossed. A cottage, passed in blind darkness, suddenly showed a lamp across the way, and, as the driver behind her crossed the glaring stream which it laid over his path, she saw the hairy-heeled bay’s white nose swing into the strong light to be swallowed again by the dark. She took up her whip.
Hitherto, she had saved her horse, but, now that there were only three miles to be covered, she would not spare for pace. How the white-nosed beast had crept so close she could not imagine, until it occurred to her that the evil short-cut taken by herself on a memorable occasion, years ago, must have served his driver too. She laid the whip remorselessly on Rob Roy.
Fortunately for her aching bones, the road improved with its proximity to the town, or she could scarce have kept her seat. As it was, she could not see the stones and irregularities in her way and it might well be that some sudden jerk would hurl her headlong into the gaping dark. But she dared not slacken speed; she must elude her pursuer before reaching the first outlying houses, for, were her haven in Blackport discovered, she knew not what foul play he might set afoot. She resolved that she would not leave Rob Roy until he was in Gilbert’s hands, could she but get the cart into the tumbledown premises of the friend whom she trusted, and for whose little backyard behind River Street she determined to make. Blackport was a low place, and her friend, who kept a small provision-shop, was a widow living alone. Suppose she should be discovered! Suppose, after all, she should fail! What Barclay had said to the cadger whose wheels she could now hear racing behind she did not know, but his action in securing the post-horses and in sending such a character after her showed that he was prepared to go to most lengths to frustrate Speid. She had known of men who lamed horses when it suited them; the thought of what might happen made her set her teeth. She remembered that there was a long knife inside the cart, used by her grandson for cleaning and cutting up fish; if she could reach her destination it should not leave her hand; and, while Rob Roy had a rest and a mouthful in the hour or two she might have to wait for Gilbert, her friend should run to the Crown and tell Jimmy where she was to be found. With a pang she renounced the joy of meeting the Laird; her place would be behind the locked door with her horse.
Past hedge and field they went, by gates and stone-heaps. Her head was whirling and she was growing exhausted. She could no more hear the wheels behind for the roaring of the wind and the rattle of her own cart. She had never driven behind Rob Roy on any errand but a slow one and it was long years since she had been supreme on the road; but old practice told her that it would take a better than the hairy-heeled bay to have lived with them for the last two miles. A crooked tree that stood over the first milestone out of Blackport was far behind them and the gable end of the turnpike cottage cut the sky not twenty yards ahead.
She had forgotten the toll, and, for one moment, her stout heart failed. But for one moment only; for the gate stood open. She could faintly distinguish the white bars thrust back. A lantern was moving slowly towards them; probably some vehicle had just gone by, and the toll-keeper was about to close them. With a frantic effort, she leaned forward and brought the whip down with all her strength on Rob Roy’s straining back. Their rush carried them between the posts, just before the lantern-bearer, from whom the wind’s noise had concealed their approach, had time to slam the gate, shouting, behind them.
In a couple of minutes her pursuer drove up, to find the swearing toll-keeper threatening him and all his kind from behind the closed bars. In half an hour Rob Roy stood in a rough shed, while the owner of it was hurrying through the wet streets to the Crown with a message to Jimmy. Inside its locked door, leaning her aching back against the wall, sat the Queen of the Cadgers, fierce, worn, vigilant; with a long knife across her knee.
And Gilbert, his eyes on the wind-tormented sky, lay fuming in the shelter of the disabled coach in the heart of Monrummon Moor.