Malcom, George MacDonald [good novels to read in english TXT] 📗

"I dinna ken;" but when he attempted the whaur, his jaw fell and hung as before. Malcolm sought to lead him away, but he held back, moaning dreadfully; then Malcolm would have him sit down where they were, but he caught his hand and pulled him away, stopping instantly, however, as if not knowing whither to turn from the fears on every side. At length the prostrate enemy began to move, when the laird, who had been unaware of his presence, gave a shriek, and took to his heels. Anxious not to lose sight of him, Malcolm left the wounded man to take care of himself; and followed him up the steep side of the little valley.

They had not gone many steps from the top of the ascent, however, before the fugitive threw himself on the ground exhausted, and it was all Malcolm could do to get him to the town, where, unable to go a pace further, he sank down on Mrs Catanach's doorstep. A light was burning in the cottage, but Malcolm would seek shelter for him anywhere rather than with her, and, in terror of her quick ears, caught him up in his arms like a child, and hurried away with him to Miss Horn s.

"Eh sirs!" exclaimed Miss Horn, when she opened the door-for Jean was among the merrymakers-"wha 's this 'at 's killt noo?"

"It's the laird-Mr Stewart," returned Malcolm. "He's no freely killt, but nigh han'."

"Na! weel I wat! Come in an' set him doon till we see," said Miss Horn, turning and leading the way up to her little parlour.

There Malcolm laid his burden on the sofa, and gave a brief account of the rescue.

"Lord preserve 's, Ma'colm!" cried Miss Horn, as soon as he had ended his tale, to which she had listened in silence, with fierce eyes and threatening nose; "isna 't a mercy I wasna made like some fowk, or I couldna ha' bidden to see the puir fallow misguidet that gait! It's a special mercy, Ma'colm MacPhail, to be made wantin' ony sic thing as feelin's."

She was leaving the room as she spoke-to return instantly with brandy. The laird swallowed some with an effort, and began to revive.

"Eh, sirs!" exclaimed Miss Horn, regarding him now more narrowly -"but he's in an awfu' state o' dirt! I maun wash his face an' han's, an' pit him till 's bed. Could ye help aff wi' 's claes, Ma'colm? Though I haena ony feelin's, I 'm jist some eerie-like at the puir body's back."

The last words were uttered in what she judged a safe aside.

As if she had been his mother, she washed his face and hands, and dried them tenderly, the laird submitting like a child. He spoke but one word-when she took him by the hand to lead him to the room where her cousin used to sleep: "Father o' lichts!" he said, and no more. Malcolm put him to bed, where he lay perfectly still, whether awake or asleep they could not tell.

He then set out to go back to Lossie House, promising to return after he had taken his grandfather home, and seen him also safe in bed.


CHAPTER XXV: THE NIGHT WATCH


When Malcolm returned, Jean had retired for the night, and again it was Miss Horn who admitted him, and led him to her parlour. It was a low ceiled room, with lean spider legged furniture and dingy curtains. Everything in it was suggestive of a comfort slowly vanishing. An odour of withered rose leaves pervaded the air. A Japanese cabinet stood in one corner, and on the mantelpiece a pair of Chinese fans with painted figures whose faces were embossed in silk, between which ticked an old French clock, whose supporters were a shepherd and shepherdess in prettily painted china. Long faded as was everything in it, the room was yet very rich in the eyes of Malcolm, whose home was bare even in comparison with that of the poorest of the fisher women, they had a passion for ornamenting their chimneypieces with china ornaments, and their dressers with the most gorgeous crockery that their money could buy-a certain metallic orange being the prevailing hue; while in Duncan's cottage, where woman had never initiated the taste, there was not even a china poodle to represent the finished development of luxury in the combination of the ugly and the useless.

Miss Horn had made a little fire in the old fashioned grate, whose bars bellied out like a sail almost beyond the narrow chimney shelf, and a tea kettle was singing on the hob, while a decanter, a sugar basin, a nutmeg grater, and other needful things on a tray, suggested negus, beyond which Miss Horn never went in the matter of stimulants, asserting that, as she had no feelings, she never required anything stronger. She made Malcolm sit down at the opposite side of the fire, and mixing him a tumbler of her favourite drink, began to question him about the day, and how things had gone.

Miss Horn had the just repute of discretion, for, gladly hearing all the news, she had the rare virtue of not repeating things to the prejudice of others without some good reason for so doing; Malcolm therefore, seated thus alone with her in the dead of the night, and bound to her by the bond of a common well doing, had no hesitation in unfolding to her all his adventures of the evening. She sat with her big hands in her lap, making no remark, not even an exclamation, while he went on with the tale of the garret; but her listening eyes grew-not larger-darker and fiercer as he spoke; the space between her nostrils and mouth widened visibly; the muscles knotted on the sides of her neck; and her nose curved more and more to the shape of a beak.

"There's some deevilry there!" she said at length after he had finished, breaking a silence of some moments, during which she had been staring into the fire. "Whaur twa ill women come thegither, there maun be the auld man himsel' atween them."

"I dinna doobt it," returned Malcolm. "An' ane o' them 's an ill wuman, sure eneuch; but I ken naething aboot the tither-only 'at she maun be a leddy, by the w'y the howdy wife spak till her."

"The waur token, when a leddy collogues wi' a wuman aneth her ain station, an' ane 'at has keppit (caught in passing) mony a secret in her day, an' by her callin' has had mair opportunity-no to say farther-than ither fowk o' duin' ill things! An' gien ye dinna ken her, that's no rizzon 'at I sudna hae a groff guiss at her by the marks ye read aff o' her. I'll jist hae to tell ye a story sic as an auld wife like me seldom tells till a young man like yersel'."

"Yer ain bridle sail rule my tongue, mem," said Malcolm.

"I s' lippen to yer discretion," said Miss Horn, and straightway began.-"Some years ago-an' I s' warran' it's weel ower twinty -that same wuman, Bawby Cat'nach,-wha was nae hame born wuman, nor had been lang aboot the toon-comin' as she did frae naebody kent whaur, 'cep maybe it was the markis 'at than was, preshumed to mak up to me i' the w'y o' frien'ly acquantance-sic as a maiden leddy micht hae wi' a howdy-an' no 'at she forgot her proaper behaviour to ane like mysel'. But I cudna hae bidden (endured) the jaud, 'cep 'at I had rizzons for lattin' her jaw wag. She was cunnin', the auld vratch,-no that auld-maybe aboot forty,- but I was ower mony for her. She had the design to win at something she thoucht I kent, an' sae, to enteece me to open my pock, she opent hers, an' tellt me story efter story about this neebour an' that-a' o' them things 'at ouchtna to ha' been true, an 'at she ouchtna to ha' loot pass her lips gien they war true, seein' she cam by the knowledge o' them so as she said she did. But she gat naething o' me-the fat braint cat!-an' she hates me like the verra mischeef."

Miss Horn paused and took a sip of her negus.

"Ae day, I cam upon her sittin' by the ingleneuk i' my ain kitchen, haudin' a close an' a laich confab wi' Jean. I had Jean than, an' hoo I hae keepit the hizzy, I hardly ken. I think it maun be that, haein' nae feelin's o' my ain, I hae ower muckle regaird to ither fowk's, an' sae I never likit to pit her awa' wi'oot doonricht provocation. But dinna ye lippen to Jean, Malcolm-na, na! At that time, my cousin, Miss Grizel Cammell-my third cousin, she was-had come to bide wi' me-a bonny yoong thing as ye wad see, but in sair ill health; an' maybe she had het freits (whims), an' maybe no, but she cudna bide to see the wuman Cat'nach aboot the place. An' in verra trowth, she was to mysel' like ane o' thae ill faured birds, I dinna min' upo' the name them, 'at hings ower an airmy; for wharever there was onybody nae weel, or onybody deid, there was Bawby Cat'nach. I hae hard o' creepin' things 'at veesits fowk 'at 's no weel-an' Bawby was, an' is, ane sic like! Sae I was angert at seein' her colloguin' wi' Jean, an' I cried Jean to me to the door o' the kitchie. But wi' that up jumps Bawby, an' comin' efter her, says to me-says she, 'Eh, Miss Horn! there's terrible news: Leddy Lossie's deid;-she 's been three ooks deid!'-'Weel,' says I, 'what's sae terrible aboot that?' For ye ken I never had ony feelin's, an' I cud see naething sae awfu' aboot a body deem' i' the ord'nar' w'y o natur like. 'We'll no miss her muckle doon here,' says I, 'for I never hard o' her bein' at the Hoose sin' ever I can.' 'But that's no a',' says she; 'only I wad be laith to speyk aboot it i' the transe (passage). Lat me up the stair wi' ye, an' I'll tell ye mair.' Weel, pairtly 'at I was ta'en by surprise like, an' pairtly 'at I wasna sae auld as I am noo, an' pairtly that I was keerious to hear-ill 'at I likit her-what neist the wuman wad say, I did as I ouchtna, an' turned an' gaed up the stair, an' loot her follow me. Whan she cam' in, she pat tu the door ahint her, an' turnt to me, an' said -says she: 'An wha 's deid forbye, think ye?'-'I hae hard o' naebody,' I answered. 'Wha but the laird o' Gersefell!' says she. 'I'm sorry to hear that, honest ma!' says I; for a'body likit Mr Stewart. 'An' what think ye o' 't?' says she, wi' a runklin o' her broos, an' a shak o' her heid, an' a settin o' her roon' nieves upo' the fat hips o' her. 'Think o' 't?' says I ; 'what sud I think o' 't, but that it's the wull o' Providence?' Wi' that she leuch till she wabblet a' ower like cauld skink, an' says she-'Weel, that's jist what it is no, an' that lat me tell ye, Miss Horn!' I glowert at her, maist frichtit into believin' she was the witch fowk ca'd her. 'Wha's son 's the hump backit cratur',' says she, ''at comes in i' the gig whiles wi' the groom lad, think ye?'-'Wha's but the puir man's 'at 's deid?' says I. 'Deil a bit o' 't!' says she, 'an' I beg yer pardon for mentionin' o' him,' says she. An'