am glad she is gane, the dour carline,” said Mrs. Baby, “though she has left that piece of gowd to be an everlasting shame to us.”
“Whisht, mistress, for the love of heaven!” said Tronda Dronsdaughter; “wha kens where she may be this moment? – we are no sure but she may hear us, though we cannot see her.”
Mistress Baby cast a startled eye around, and instantly recovering herself, for she was naturally courageous as well as violent, said, “I bade her aroint before, and I bid her aroint again, whether she sees me or hears me, or whether she’s ower the cairn and awa. – And you, ye silly sumph,” she said to poor Yellowley, “what do ye stand glowering there for? —You a Saunt Andrew’s student! —you studied lair and Latin humanities, as ye ca’ them, and daunted wi’ the clavers of an auld randie wife! Say your best college grace, man, and witch, or nae witch, we’ll eat our dinner, and defy her. And for the value of the gowden piece, it shall never be said I pouched her siller. I will gie it to some poor body – that is, I will test23 upon it at my death, and keep it for a purse-penny till that day comes, and that’s no using it in the way of spending siller. Say your best college grace, man, and let us eat and drink in the meantime.”
“Ye had muckle better say an oraamus to Saint Ronald, and fling a saxpence ower your left shouther, master,” said Tronda.24
“That ye may pick it up, ye jaud,” said the implacable Mistress Baby; “it will be lang or ye win the worth of it ony other gate. – Sit down, Triptolemus, and mindna the words of a daft wife.”
“Daft or wise,” replied Yellowley, very much disconcerted, “she kens more than I would wish she kend. It was awfu’ to see sic a wind fa’ at the voice of flesh and blood like oursells – and then yon about the hearth-stane – I cannot but think” —
“If ye cannot but think,” said Mrs. Baby, very sharply, “at least ye can haud your tongue?”
The agriculturist made no reply, but sate down to their scanty meal, and did the honours of it with unusual heartiness to his new guest, the first of the intruders who had arrived, and the last who left them. The sillocks speedily disappeared, and the smoked goose, with its appendages, took wing so effectually, that Tronda, to whom the polishing of the bones had been destined, found the task accomplished, or nearly so, to her hand. After dinner, the host produced his bottle of brandy; but Mordaunt, whose general habits were as abstinent almost as those of his father, laid a very light tax upon this unusual exertion of hospitality.
During the meal, they learned so much of young Mordaunt, and of his father, that even Baby resisted his wish to reassume his wet garments, and pressed him (at the risk of an expensive supper being added to the charges of the day) to tarry with them till the next morning. But what Norna had said excited the youth’s wish to reach home, nor, however far the hospitality of Stourburgh was extended in his behalf, did the house present any particular temptations to induce him to remain there longer. He therefore accepted the loan of the factor’s clothes, promising to return them, and send for his own; and took a civil leave of his host and Mistress Baby, the latter of whom, however affected by the loss of her goose, could not but think the cost well bestowed (since it was to be expended at all) upon so handsome and cheerful a youth.
CHAPTER VII
She does no work by halves, yon raving ocean;
Engulfing those she strangles, her wild womb
Affords the mariners whom she hath dealt on,
Their death at once, and sepulchre.
There were ten “lang Scots miles” betwixt Stourburgh and Jarlshof; and though the pedestrian did not number all the impediments which crossed Tam o’ Shanter’s path, – for in a country where there are neither hedges nor stone enclosures, there can be neither “slaps nor stiles,” – yet the number and nature of the “mosses and waters” which he had to cross in his peregrination, was fully sufficient to balance the account, and to render his journey as toilsome and dangerous as Tam o’ Shanter’s celebrated retreat from Ayr. Neither witch nor warlock crossed Mordaunt’s path, however. The length of the day was already considerable, and he arrived safe at Jarlshof by eleven o’clock at night. All was still and dark round the mansion, and it was not till he had whistled twice or thrice beneath Swertha’s window, that she replied to the signal.
At the first sound, Swertha fell into an agreeable dream of a young whale-fisher, who some forty years before used to make such a signal beneath the window of her hut; at the second, she waked to remember that Johnnie Fea had slept sound among the frozen waves of Greenland for this many a year, and that she was Mr. Mertoun’s governante at Jarlshof; at the third, she arose and opened the window.
“Whae is that,” she demanded, “at sic an hour of the night?”
“It is I,” said the youth.
“And what for comena ye in? The door’s on the latch, and there is a gathering peat on the kitchen fire, and a spunk beside it – ye can light your ain candle.”
“All well,” replied Mordaunt; “but I want to know how my father is?”
“Just in his ordinary, gude gentleman – asking for you, Maister Mordaunt; ye are ower far and ower late in your walks, young gentleman.”
“Then the dark hour has passed, Swertha?”
“In troth has it, Maister Mordaunt,” answered the governante; “and your father is very reasonably good-natured for him, poor gentleman. I spake to him twice yesterday without his speaking first; and the first time he answered me as civil as you could do, and the neist time he bade me no plague him; and then, thought I, three times were aye canny, so I spake to him again for luck’s-sake, and he called me a chattering old devil; but it was quite and clean in a civil sort of way.”
“Enough, enough, Swertha,” answered Mordaunt; “and now get up, and find me something to eat, for I have dined but poorly.”
“Then you have been at the new folk’s at Stourburgh; for there is no another house in a’ the Isles but they wad hae gi’en ye the best share of the best they had. Saw ye aught of Norna of the Fitful-head? She went to Stourburgh this morning, and returned to the town at night.”
“Returned! – then she is here? How could she travel three leagues and better in so short a time?”
“Wha kens how she travels?” replied Swertha; “but I heard her tell the Ranzelman wi’ my ain lugs, that she intended that day to have gone on to Burgh-Westra, to speak with Minna Troil, but she had seen that at Stourburgh, (indeed she said at Harfra, for she never calls it by the other name of Stourburgh,) that sent her back to our town. But gang your ways round, and ye shall have plenty of supper – ours is nae toom pantry, and still less a locked ane, though my master be a stranger, and no just that tight in the upper rigging, as the Ranzelman says.”
Mordaunt walked round to the kitchen accordingly, where Swertha’s care speedily accommodated him with a plentiful, though coarse meal, which indemnified him for the scanty hospitality he had experienced at Stourburgh.
In the morning, some feelings of fatigue made young Mertoun later than usual in leaving his bed; so that, contrary to what was the ordinary case, he found his father in the apartment where they eat, and which served them indeed for every common purpose, save that of a bedchamber or of a kitchen. The son greeted the father in mute reverence, and waited until he should address him.
“You were absent yesterday, Mordaunt?” said his father. Mordaunt’s absence had lasted a week and more; but he had often observed that his father never seemed to notice how time passed during the period when he was affected with his sullen vapours. He assented to what the elder Mr. Mertoun had said.
“And you were at Burgh-Westra, as I think?” continued his father.
“Yes, sir,” replied Mordaunt.
The elder Mertoun was then silent for some time, and paced the floor in deep silence, with