gtbrar^ of














Watcher by
Threshold


"Among idle men there be some who tarry in the outer
courts, speeding the days joyfully with dance and song.
But the other sort dwell near the portals of the House,
and are ever anxious and ill at ease that they may see something of the Shadows ,which come and go. Wherefore
night and day they are found watching by the threshold,
in fearfulness and joy, not without tears."—Extract from the
Writing! of Donisarius of Padua, circa 1810.


The Watcher by the
Threshold
And Other Tales
BY
JOHN BUCHAN
AUTHOR or 'JOHN BURNET OF BARNB,' 'HARDHEARTED,' 1 A LOST LADY OF OLD YEARS,' ETC. SECOND IMPRESSION
WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
HCHII
All Rightsreserved





TO
STAIR AGNEW GILLON.
MY DEAR STAIR,
We have travelled so many roads together,
highland and lowland, pleasant and dreary, that I ask
you to accept this book of travellers' tales. For Scot-
land is a wide place to travel in for those who believe
that it is not bounded strictly by kirk and market-place,
and who have an ear for old songs and lost romances.
It is of the back-world of Scotland that I write, the
land behind the mist and over the seven bens, a place
hard of access for the foot-passenger but easy for the
maker of stories. Meantime, to you, who have chosen
the better part, I wish many bright days by hill and
loch in the summers to come.
J. B.
t.i. Briton, at tea.


CONTENTS.
I. NO-MAN's-LAND
cHAP. PAOK
I. THE SHIELDING OF FARAWAY ... 3
II. TELLS OF AN EVENING'S TALK . 16
III. THE SCARTS OF THE MUNERAW . . 30
IV. THE DARKNESS THAT IS UNDER THE EARTH 41
V. THE TROUBLES OF A CONSCIENCE . . 59
VI. SUMMER ON THE MOORS .... 71
VII. IN TUAS MANUS, DOMINE! ... 81
VIII. NOTE IN CONCLUSION BY THE EDITOR . 95
II. THE FAR ISLANDS 103
III. THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD
CHAP.
I. THE HOUSE OF MORE . . . .149
II. THE MINISTER INTERVENES . . .188
III. EVENTS ON THE UPLANDS . . . 209
IV. THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE .... 225
V. FOUNTAINBLUE ...... 265


I
NO-MAN'S-LAND


-4


NO-MAN'S-LAND.
CHAPTER L
THE SHIELDING OF FARAWAY. IT was with a light heart and a pleasing
consciousness of holiday that I set out
from the inn at Allermuir to tramp my fif-
teen miles into the unknown. I walked
slowly, for I carried my equipment on my
back — my basket, fly-books and rods, my
plaid of Grant tartan (for I boast myself a
distant kinsman of that house), and my great
staff, which had tried ere then the front of
the steeper Alps. A small valise with books
and some changes of linen clothing had been
sent on ahead in the shepherd's own hands.
It was yet early April, and before me lay
four weeks of freedom—twenty-eight blessed


4 no-man's-land.
days in which to take fish and smoke the
pipe of idleness. The Lent term had pulled
me down, a week of modest enjoyment there-
after in town had finished the work; and
I drank in the sharp moorish air like a
thirsty man who has been forwandered
among deserts.
I am a man of varied tastes and a score
of interests. As an undergraduate I had
been filled with the old mania for the com-
plete life. I distinguished myself in the
Schools, rowed in my college eight, and
reached the distinction of practising for
three weeks in the Trials. I had dabbled
in a score of learned activities, and when
the time came that I won the inevitable St
Chad's fellowship on my chaotic acquire-
ments, and I found myself compelled to
select if I would pursue a scholar's life, I
had some toil in finding my vocation. In
the end I resolved that the ancient life of
the North, of the Celts and the Northmen
and the unknown Pictish tribes, held for
me the chief fascination. I had acquired a
smattering of Gaelic, having been brought
up as a boy in Lochaber, and now I set
myself to increase my store of languages. I


no-man's-land.
5
mastered Erse and Icelandic, and my first
book—a monograph on the probable Celtic
elements in the Eddie songs — brought me
the praise of scholars and the deputy - pro-
fessor's chair of Northern Antiquities. So
much for Oxford. My vacations had been
spent mainly in the North — in Ireland,
Scotland and the Isles, in Scandinavia and
Iceland, once even in the far limits of Fin-
land. I was a keen sportsman of a sort,
an old - experienced fisher, a fair shot with
gun and rifle, and in my hillcraft I might
well stand comparison with most men. April
has ever seemed to me the finest season of
the year even in our cold northern altitudes,
and the memory of many bright Aprils had
brought me up from the South on the night
before to Allerfoot, whence a dogcart had
taken me up Glen Aller to the inn at
Allermuir; and now the same desire had set
me on the heather with my face to the cold
brown hills.
You ate to picture a sort of plateau, benty
and rock-strewn, running ridge-wise above a
chain of little peaty lochs and a vast tract
of inexorable bog. In a mile the ridge
ceased in a shoulder of hill, and over this


6 no-man's-land.
I
lay the head of another glen, with the
same doleful accompaniment of sunless lochs,
mosses, and a shining and resolute water.
East and west and north, in every direction
save the south, rose walls of gashed and
serrated hills. It was a grey day with
blinks of sun, and when a ray chanced to
fall on one of the great dark faces, lines of
light and colour sprang into being which
told of mica and granite. I was in high
spirits, as on the eve of holiday; I had
breakfasted excellently on eggs and salmon-
steaks; I had no cares to speak of, and my
prospects were not uninviting. But in spite
of myself the landscape began to take me in
thrall and crush me. The silent vanished
peoples of the hills seemed to be stirring;
dark primeval faces seemed to stare at me
from behind boulders and jags of rock. The
place was so still, so free from the cheerful
clamour of nesting birds, that it seemed a
temenos sacred to some old-world god. At
my feet the lochs lapped ceaselessly; but
the waters were so dark that one could not
see bottom a foot from the edge. On my
right the links of green told of snake-like
mires waiting to crush the unwary wanderer.


no-man's-land.
1
It seemed to me for the moment a land of
death, where the tongues of the dead cried
aloud for recognition.
My whole morning's walk was full of such
fancies. I lit a pipe to cheer me, but the
things would not be got rid of. I thought
of the Gaels who had held those fastnesses;
I thought of the Britons before them, who
yielded to their advent. They were all
strong peoples in their day, and now they
had gone the way of the earth. They had
left their mark on the levels of the glens
and on the more habitable uplands, both in
names and in actual forts, and graves where
men might still dig curios. But the hills—
that black stony amphitheatre before me—
it seemed strange that the hills bore no
traces of them. And then with some un-
easiness I reflected on that older and stranger
race who were said to have held the hill-
tops. The Picts, the Picture — what in the
name of goodness were they? They had
troubled me in all my studies, a sort of
blank wall to put an end to speculation.
We knew nothing of them save certain
strange names which men called Pictish,
the names of those hills in front of me—


8
no-man's-land.
the Muneraw, the Yirnie, the Calmarton.
They were the corpus vile for learned ex-
periment; but Heaven alone knew what
dark abyss of savagery once yawned in the
midst of the desert.
And then I remembered the crazy theories
of a pupil of mine at St Chad's, the son of a
small landowner on the Aller, a young gentle-
man who had spent his substance too freely at
Oxford, and was now dreeing his weird in the
Backwoods. He had been no scholar; but a
certain imagination marked all his doings, and
of a Sunday night he would come and talk to
me of the North. The Picts were his special
subject, and his ideas were mad. "Listen to
me," he would say, when I had mixed him
toddy and given him one of my cigars; "I
believe there are traces—ay, and more than
traces—of an old culture lurking in those hills
and waiting to be discovered. We never hear
of the Picts being driven from the hills. The
Britons drove them from the lowlands, the
Gaels from Ireland did the same for the
Britons; but the hills were left unmolested.
We hear of no one going near them except
outlaws and tinklers. And in that very place
you have the strangest mythology. Take the


no-man's-land.
9
story of the Brownie. What is that but the
story of a little swart man of uncommon
strength and cleverness, who does good and
ill indiscriminately, and then disappears?
There are many scholars, as you yourself con-
fess, who think that the origin of the Brownie
was in some mad belief in the old race of the
Picts, which still survived somewhere in the
hills. And do we not hear of the Brownie in
authentic records right down to the year
1756? After that, when people grew more
incredulous, it is natural that the belief should
have begun to die out; but I do not see why
stray traces should not have survived till late."
"Do you not see what that means ?" I had
said in mock gravity. "Those same hills are,
if anything, less known now than they were a
hundred years ago. Why should not your
Picts or Brownies be living to this day?"
"Why not, indeed?" he had rejoined, in all
seriousness.
I laughed, and he went to his rooms and
returned with a large leather-bound book. It
was lettered, in the rococo style of a young
man's taste, 'Glimpses of the Unknown,' and
some of the said glimpses he proceeded to
impart to me. It was not pleasant reading;


10
no-man's-land.
indeed, I had rarely heard anything so well
fitted to shatter sensitive nerves. The early
part consisted of folk-tales and folk-sayings,
some of them wholly obscure, some of them
with a glint of meaning, but all of them with
some hint of a mystery in the hills. I heard
the Brownie story in countless versions. Now
the thing was a friendly little man, who wore
grey breeches and lived on brose; now he was
a twisted being, the sight of which made the
ewes miscarry in the lambing-time. But the
second part was the stranger, for it was made
up of actual tales, most of them with date and
place appended. It was a most Bedlamite
catalogue of horrors, which, if true, made the
wholesome moors a place instinct with tragedy.
Some told of children carried away from vil-
lages, even from towns, on the verge of the
uplands. In almost every case they were
girls, and the strange fact was their utter dis-
appearance. Two little girls would be coming
home from school, would be seen last by a
neighbour just where the road crossed a patch
of heath or entered a wood and then—no human
eye ever saw them again. Children's cries
had startled outlying shepherds in the night,
and when they had rushed to the door they


no-man's-land.
11
could hear nothing but the night wind. The
instances of such disappearances were not very
common—perhaps once in twenty years—but
they were confined to this one tract of country,
and came in a sort of fixed progression from
the middle of last century, when the record
began. But this was only one side of the
history. The latter part was all devoted to a
chronicle of crimes which had gone unpunished,
seeing that no hand had ever been traced.
The list was fuller in last century;1 in the
earlier years of the present it had dwindled;
then came a revival about the 'Fifties; and
now again in our own time it had sunk low.
At the little cottage of Auchterbrean, on the
roadside in Glen Aller, a labourer's wife had
been found pierced to the heart. It was
thought to be a case of a woman's jealousy,
and her neighbour was accused, convicted, and
hanged. The woman, to be sure, denied the
charge with her last breath; but circum-
stantial evidence seemed sufficiently strong
against her. Yet some people in the glen
believed her guiltless. In particular, the
carrier who had found the dead woman de-
clared that the way in which her neighbour
1 The narrative of Mr Graves was written in the year 1898.


12
no-man's-land.
received the news was a sufficient proof of
innocence; and the doctor who was first sum-
moned professed himself unable to tell with
what instrument the wound had been given.
But this was all before the days of expert
evidence, so the woman had been hanged
without scruple. Then there had been an-
other story of peculiar horror, telling of the
death of an old man at some little lonely
shieling called Carrickfey. But at this point
I had risen in protest, and made to drive the
young idiot from my room.
"It was my grandfather who collected most
of them," he said. "He had theories,1 but
1 In the light of subsequent events, I have jotted down the
materials to which I refer. The last authentic record of the
Brownie is in the narrative of the shepherd of Clachlands,
taken down towards the close of last century by the Rev-
erend Mr Gillespie, minister of Allerkirk, and included by
him in his ' Songs and Legends of Glen Aller.' The authori-
ties on the strange carrying-away of children are to be found
in a series of articles in a local paper, the 'Allerfoot Adver-
tiser,' September and October 1878, and a curious book pub-
lished anonymously at Edinburgh in 1848, entitled 'The
Weathergaw.' The records of the unexplained murders in
the same neighbourhood are all contained in Mr Fordoun's
'Theory of Expert Evidence,' and an attack on the book in
the 'Law Review' for June 1881. The Carrickfey case has
a pamphlet to itself—now extremely rare—a copy of which
was recently obtained in a bookseller's shop in Dumfries by
a well-known antiquary, and presented to the library of the
Supreme Court in Edinburgh.


no-man's-land.
13
people called him mad, so he was wise enough
to hold his tongue. My father declares the
whole thing mania; but I rescued the book,
had it bound, and added to the collection.
It is a queer hobby; but, as I say, I have
theories, and there are more things in heaven
and earth"
But at this he heard a friend's voice in
the Quad., and dived out, leaving the banal
quotation unfinished.
Strange though it may seem, this madness
kept coming back to me as I crossed the last
few miles of moor. I was now on a rough
tableland, the watershed between two lochs,
and beyond and above me rose the stony
backs of the hills. The burns fell down in
a chaos of granite boulders, and huge slabs
of grey stone lay flat and tumbled in the
heather. The full waters looked prosper-
ously for my fishing, and I began to forget
all fancies in anticipation of sport.
Then suddenly in a hollow of land I came
on a ruined cottage. It had been a very
small place, but the walls were still half-erect,
and the little moorland garden was outlined
on the turf. A lonely apple-tree, twisted and
gnarled with winds, stood in the midst.


14
no-man's-land.
From higher up on the hill I heard a loud
roar, and I knew my excellent friend the
shepherd of Farawa, who had come thus far
to meet me. He greeted me with the bois-
terous embarrassment which was his way of
prefacing hospitality. A grave reserved man
at other times, on such occasions he thought
it proper to relapse into hilarity. I fell into
step with him, and we set off for his dwelling.
But first I had the curiosity to look back to
the tumble-down cottage and ask him its
name.
A queer look came into his eyes. "They
ca' the place Carrickfey," he said. "Naebody
has daured to bide there this twenty year sin'
—but I see ye ken the story." And, as if
glad to leave the subject, he hastened to
discourse on fishing.


15
CHAPTER IL
TELLS OF AN EVENING'S TALK.
The shepherd was a masterful man; tall,
save for the stoop which belongs to all moor-
land folk, and active as a wild goat. He was
not a new importation, nor did he belong to
the place; for his people had lived in the
remote Borders, and he had come as a boy
to this shieling of Faraway. He was un-
married, but an elderly sister lived with him
and cooked his meals. He was reputed to
be extraordinarily Bkilful in his trade; I
know for a fact that he was in his way a
keen sportsman; and his few neighbours
gave him credit for a sincere piety. Doubt-
less this last report was due in part to his
silence, for after his first greeting he was
wont to relapse into a singular taciturnity.
As we strode across the heather he gave me
a short outline of his year's lambing. "Five


16
no-man's-land.
pair o' twins yestreen, twae this morn; that
makes thirty-five yowes that hae lambed
since the Sabbath. I'll dae weel if God's
willin'." Then, as I looked towards the hill-
tops whence the thin mist of morn was trail-
ing, he followed my gaze. "See," he said
with uplifted crook —" see that sicht. Is
that no what is written of in the Bible when
it says, 1 The mountains do smoke.'" And
with this piece of apologetics he finished his
talk, and in a little we were at the cottage.
It was a small enough dwelling in truth,
and yet large for a moorland house, for it
had a garret below the thatch, which was
given up to my sole enjoyment. Below was
the wide kitchen with box-beds, and next to
it the inevitable second room, also with its
cupboard sleeping-places. The interior was
very clean, and yet I remember to have been
struck with the faint musty smell which is
inseparable from moorland dwellings. The
kitchen pleased me best, for there the great
rafters were black with peat-reek, and the
uncovered stone floor, on which the fire
gleamed dully, gave an air of primeval sim-
plicity. But the walls spoiled all, for tawdry
things of to-day had penetrated even there.


no-man's-land.
17
Some grocers' almanacs—years old—hung in
places of honour, and an extraordinary litho-
graph of the Royal Family in its youth. And
this, mind you, between crooks and fishing-
rods and old guns, and horns of sheep and
deer.
The life for the first day or two was regular
and placid. I was up early, breakfasted on
porridge (a dish which I detest), and then off
to the lochs and streams. At first my sport
prospered mightily. With a drake-wing I
killed a salmon of seventeen pounds, and the
next day had a fine basket of trout from a
hill-burn. Then for no earthly reason the
weather changed. A bitter wind came out
of the north-east, bringing showers of snow
and stinging hail, and lashing the waters
into storm. It was now farewell to fly-
fishing. For a day or two I tried trolling
with the minnow on the lochs, but it was
poor sport, for I had no boat, and the edges
were soft and mossy. Then in disgust I
gave up the attempt, went back to the cot-
tage, lit my biggest pipe, and sat down with
a book to await the turn of the weather.
The shepherd was out from morning till
night at his work, and when he came in at
i
i


18 no-man's-la_nd.
last, dog-tired, his face would be set and
hard, and his eyes heavy with sleep. The
strangeness of the man grew upon me. He
had a shrewd brain beneath his thatch of
hair, for I had tried him once or twice, and
found him abundantly intelligent. He had
some smattering of an education, like all
Scottish peasants, and, as I have said, he
was deeply religious. I set him down as a
fine type of his class, sober, serious, keenly
critical, free from the bondage of supersti-
tion. But I rarely saw him, and our talk
was chiefly in monosyllables — short inter-
jected accounts of the number of lambs dead
or alive on the hill. Then he would produce
a pencil and note-book, and be immersed in
some calculation; and finally he would be
revealed sleeping heavily in his chair, till
his sister wakened him, and he stumbled off
to bed.
So much for the ordinary course of life;
but one day—the second I think of the bad
weather—the extraordinary happened. The
storm had passed in the afternoon into a
resolute and blinding snow, and the shepherd,
finding it hopeless on the hill, came home
about three o'clock, I could make out from


no-man's-land.
19
his way of entering that he was in a great
temper. He kicked his feet savagely against
the door-post. Then he swore at his dogs,
a thing I had never heard him do before.
"Hell!" he cried, "can ye no keep out o'
my road, ye britts?" Then he came sullenly
into the kitchen, thawed his numbed hands
at the fire, and sat down to his meal.
I made some aimless remark about the
weather.
"Death to man and beast," he grunted.
"I hae got the sheep doun frae the hill,
but the lambs will never thole this. We
maun pray that it will no last."
His sister came in with some dish. "Mar-
git," he cried, "three lambs away this morn-
ing, and three deid wi' the hole in the throat."
The woman's face visibly paled. "Guid
help us, Adam; that hasna happened this
three year."
"It has happened noo," he said, surlily.
"But, by God! if it happens again I'll gang
mysel' to the Scarts o' the Muneraw."
"O Adam!" the woman cried shrilly,
"haud your tongue. Ye kenna wha hears
ye." And with a frightened glance at me
she left the room.


20
no-man's-land.
I asked no questions, but waited till the
shepherd's anger should cool. But the cloud
did not pass so lightly. When he had finished
his dinner he pulled his chair to the fire
and sat staring moodily. He made some
sort of apology to me for his conduct. "I'm
sore troubled, sir; but I'm vexed ye should
see me like this. Maybe things will be
better the morn." And then, lighting his
short black pipe, he resigned himself to his
meditations.
But he could not keep quiet. Some nervous
unrest seemed to have possessed the man.
He got up with a start and went to the
window, where the snow was drifting un-
steadily past. As he stared out into the
storm I heard him mutter to himself, "Three
away, God help me, and three wi' the hole
in the throat."
Then he turned round to me abruptly. I
was jotting down notes for an article I con-
templated in the 'Revue Celtique,' so my
thoughts were far away from the present.
The man recalled me by demanding fiercely,
"Do ye believe in God?"
I gave him some sort of answer in the
affirmative.


22
no-man's-land.
brought tea and wakened him, he seemed to
have got the better of his excitement.
When the window was shuttered and the
lamp lit, I set myself again to the completion
of my notes. The shepherd had got out his
Bible, and was solemnly reading with one
great finger travelling down the lines. He
was smoking, and whenever some text came
home to him with power he would make
pretence to underline it with the end of
the stem. Soon I had finished the work I
desired, and, my mind being full of my pet
hobby, I fell into an inquisitive frame of
mind, and began to question the solemn man
opposite on the antiquities of the place.
He stared stupidly at me when I asked him
concerning monuments or ancient weapons.
"I kenna," said he. "There's a heap o'
queer things in the hills."
"This place should be a centre for such
relics. You know that the name of the hill
behind the house, as far as I can make it
out, means the 'Place of the Little Men.'
It is a good Gaelic word, though there is
some doubt about its exact interpretation.
But clearly the Gaelic peoples did not speak
of themselves when they gave the name;


no-man's-land.
23
they must have referred to some older and
stranger population."
The shepherd looked at me dully, as not
understanding.
"It is partly this fact—besides the fish-
ing, of course—which interests me in this
countryside," said I, gaily.
Again he cast the same queer frightened
glance towards the window. "If ye'll tak
the advice of an aulder man," he said, slowly,
"ye'll let well alane and no meddle wi' un-
canny things."
I laughed pleasantly, for at last I had
found out my hard-headed host in a piece
of childishness. "Why, I thought that you
of all men would be free from superstition."
"What do ye call supersteetion?" he
asked.
"A belief in old wives' tales," said I, "a
trust in the crude supernatural and the
patently impossible."
He looked at me beneath his shaggy brows.
"How do ye ken what is impossible? Mind
ye, sir, ye're no in the toun just now, but
in the thick of the wild hills."
"But, hang it all, man," I cried, "you
don't mean to say that you believe in that


24
no-man's-land.
sort of thing? I am prepared for many
things up here, but not for the Brownie,—
though, to be sure, if one could meet him
in the flesh, it would be rather pleasant than
otherwise, for he was a companionable sort of fellow."
"When a thing pits the fear o' death on
a man he aye speaks well of it."
It was true—the Eumenides and the Good
Folk over again; and I awoke with interest
to the fact that the conversation was getting
into strange channels.
The shepherd moved uneasily in his chair, "I am a man that fears God, and has nae
time for daft stories; but I havena traivelled
the hills for twenty years wi' my een shut.
If I say that I could tell ye stories o' faces
seen in the mist, and queer things that have
knocked against me in the snow, wad ye
believe me? I wager ye wadna. Ye wad
say I had been drunk, and yet I am a God-
fearing temperate man."
He rose and went to a cupboard, unlocked
it, and brought out something in his hand,
which he held out to me. I took it with
some curiosity, and found that it was a flint
arrow-head.


no-man's-land.
25
Clearly a flint arrow-head, and yet like
none that I had ever seen in any collection.
For one thing it was larger, and the barb
less clumsily thick. More, the chipping was
new, or comparatively so; this thing had
not stood the wear of fifteen hundred years
among the stones of the hillside. Now there
are, I regret to say, institutions which manu-
facture primitive relics; but it is not hard
for a practised eye to see the difference. The
chipping has either a regularity and a balance
which is unknown in the real thing, or the
rudeness has been overdone, and the result
is an implement incapable of harming a mortal
creature. But this was the real thing if it
ever existed; and yet—I was prepared to
swear on my reputation that it was not
half a century old.
"Where did you get this?" I asked with
some nervousness.
"I hae a story about that," said the
shepherd. "Outside the door there ye can
see a muckle flat stane aside the buchts.
One simmer nicht I was sitting there smoking
till the dark, and I wager there was naething
on the stage then. But that same nicht I
awoke wi' a queer thocht, as if there were


26
no-man's-land.
folk moving around the hoose — folk that
didna mak' muckle noise. I mind o' lookin'
out o' the windy, and I could hae sworn I
saw something black movin' amang the
heather and intil the buchts. Now I had
maybe threescore o' lambs there that nicht,
for I had to tak' them many miles off in
the early morning. Weel, when I gets up
about four o'clock and gangs out, as I am
passing the muckle stane I finds this bit
errow. 1 That's come here in the nicht,' says
I, and I wunnered a wee and put it in my
pouch. But when I came to my faulds what
did I see? Five o' my best hoggs were away,
and three mair were lying deid wi' a hole
in their throat."
"Who in the world ?" I began.
"Dinna ask," said he. "If I aince sterted
to speir about thae maitters, I wadna keep
my reason."
"Then that was what happened on the hill
this morning?"
"Even sae, and it has happened mair than
since sin' that time. It's the most uncanny
slaughter, for sheep - stealing I can under-
stand, but no this pricking o' the puir
beasts' wizands. I kenna how they dae't


no-man's-land.
27
either, for it's no wi' a knife or ony common
tool."
"Have you never tried to follow the
thieves?"
"Have I no?" he asked, grimly. "If it
had been common sheep-stealers I wad hae
had them by the heels, though I had followed
them a hundred miles. But this is no com-
mon. I've tracked them, and it's ill they
are to track; but I never got beyond ae
place, and that was the Scarts o' the Mune-
raw that ye've heard me speak o'."
"But who in Heaven's name are the
people? Tinklers or poachers or what?"
"Ay," said he, drily. "Even so. Tinklers
and poachers whae wark wi' stane errows and
kill sheep by a hole in their throat. Lord, I
kenna what they are, unless the Muckle Deil
himsel'."
The conversation had passed beyond my
comprehension. In this prosaic hard-headed
man I had come on the dead-rock of supersti-
tion and blind fear.
"That is only the story of the Brownie
over again, and he is an exploded myth," I
said, laughing.
"Are ye the man that exploded it?" said


28
no-man's-land.
the shepherd, rudely. "I trow no, neither
you nor ony ither. My bonny man, if ye
lived a twalmonth in thae hills, ye wad sing
safter about exploded myths, as ye call
them."
"I tell you what I would do," said I . "If
I lost sheep as you lose them, I would go up
the Scarts of the Muneraw and never rest till
I had settled the question once and for all."
I spoke hotly, for I was vexed by the man's
childish fear.
"I daresay ye wad," he said, slowly. "But
then I am no you, and maybe I ken mair o'
what is in the Scarts o' the Muneraw. Maybe
I ken that whilk, if ye kenned it, wad send
ye back to the South Country wi' your hert
in your mouth. But, as I say, I am no sae
brave as you, for I saw something in the first
year o' my herding here which put the terror
o' God on me, and makes me a fearfu' man
to this day. Ye ken the story o' the gudeman
o' Carrickfey?"
I nodded.
"Weel, I was the man that fand him. I
had seen the deid afore and I've seen them
since. But never have I seen aught like the
look in that man's een. What he saw at his


no-man's-land.
2'J
death I may see the morn, so I walk before
the Lord in fear."
"Then he rose and stretched himself. "It's
bedding-time, for I maun be up at three," and
with a short good night he left the room.


30
CHAPTER III.
THE SCARTS OF THE MUNERAW.
The next morning was fine, for the snow
had been intermittent, and had soon melted
except in the high corries. True, it was
deceptive weather, for the wind had gone
to the rainy south-west, and the masses of
cloud on that horizon boded ill for the
afternoon. But some days' inaction had
made me keen for a chance of sport, so I
rose with the shepherd and set out for
the day.
He asked me where I proposed to begin.
I told him the tarn called the Loch o' the
Threshes, which lies over the back of the
Muneraw on another watershed. It is on
the ground of the Rhynns Forest, and I
had fished it of old from the Forest
House. I knew the merits of the trout,
and I knew its virtues in a south-west


no-man's-land.
31
wind, so I had resolved to go thus far
afield.
The shepherd heard the name in silence.
"Your best road will be ower that rig, and
syne on to the water o' Caulds. Keep
abune the moss till ye come to the place
they ca' the Nick o' the Threshers. That
will take ye to the very lochside, but it's
a lang road and a sair."
The morning was breaking over the bleak
hills. Little clouds drifted athwart the
corries, and wisps of haze fluttered from
the peaks. A great rosy flush lay over
one side of the glen, which caught the
edge of the sluggish bog-pools and turned
them to fire. Never before had I seen the
mountain-land so clear, for far back into
the east and west I saw mountain-tops set
as close as flowers in a border, black crags
seamed with silver lines which I knew for
mighty waterfalls, and below at my feet
the lower slopes fresh with the dewy green
of spring. A name stuck in my memory
from the last night's talk.
"Where are the Scarts of the Muneraw?"
I asked.
The shepherd pointed to the great hill


it
no-man's-land.
which bears the name, and which lies, a
huge mass, above the watershed.
"D'ye see yon corrie at the east that
runs straucht up the side? It looks a bit
scary, but it's sae deep that it's aye derk
at the bottom o't. Weel, at the tap o'
the rig it meets anither corrie that runs
doun the ither side, and that one they
ca' the Scarts. There is a sort o' burn
in it that flows intil the Dule and sae
intil the Aller, and, indeed, if ye were
gaun there it wad be from Aller Glen
that your best road wad lie. But it's an
ill bit, and ye'll be sair guidit if ye try't."
There he left me and went across the
glen, while I struck upwards over the
ridge. At the top I halted and looked
down on the wide glen of the Caulds,
which there is little better than a bog,
but lower down grows into a green pastoral
valley. The great Muneraw still dominated
the landscape, and the black scaur on its
side seemed blacker than before. The place
fascinated me, for in that fresh morning
air the shepherd's fears seemed monstrous.
"Some day," said I to myself, "I will go
and explore the whole of that mighty hill."


34
no-man's-land.
road in mist before, and could do it
again.
Before I got to the top of the hill I
had repented my decision; when I got
there I repented it more. For below me
was a dizzy chaos of grey; there was no
landmark visible; and before me I knew
was the bog through which the Caulds
Water twined. I had crossed it with some
trouble in the morning, but then I had light
to pick my steps. Now I could only stumble
on, and in five minutes I might be in a
bog-hole, and in five more in a better world.
But there was no help to be got from
hesitation, so with a rueful courage I set
off. The place was if possible worse than
I had feared. Wading up to the knees
with nothing before you but a blank wall
of mist and the cheerful consciousness that
your next step may be your last — such
was my state for one weary mile. The
stream itself was high, and rose to my
armpits, and once and again I only saved
myself by a violent leap backwards from
a pitiless green slough. But at last it was
past, and I was once more on the solid
ground of the hillside.


36
no-man's-land.
tain, without any certainty where my road
lay. I was lost with a vengeance, and at the
thought I began to be acutely afraid.
I took what seemed to me the way I had
come, and began to descend steeply. Then
something made me halt, and the next instant
I was lying on my face trying painfully to
retrace my steps. For I had found myself
slipping, and before I could stop, my feet
were dangling over a precipice with Heaven
alone knows how many yards of sheer mist
between me and the bottom. Then I tried
keeping the ridge, and took that to the right,
which I thought would bring me nearer home.
It was no good trying to think out a direc-
tion, for in the fog my brain was running
round, and I seemed to stand on a pin-point
of space where the laws of the compass had
ceased to hold.
It was the roughest sort of walking, now
stepping warily over acres of loose stones, now
crawling down the face of some battered rock,
and now wading in the long dripping heather.
The soft rain had begun to fall again, which
completed my discomfort. I was now seri-
ously tired, and, like all men who in their day
have bent too much over books, I began to


no-man's-land.
37
feel it in my back. My spine ached, and my
breath came in short broken pants. It was a
pitiable state of affairs for an honest man who
had never encountered much grave discomfort.
To ease myself I was compelled to leave my
basket behind me, trusting to return and find
it, if I should ever reach safety and discover
on what pathless hill I had been strayed.
My rod I used as a staff, but it was of little
use, for my fingers were getting too numb to
hold it.
Suddenly from the blankness I heard a
sound as of human speech. At first I thought
it mere craziness—the cry of a weasel or a
hill-bird distorted by my ears. But again it
came, thick and faint, as through acres of
mist, and yet clearly the sound of " articulate-
speaking men." In a moment I lost my de-
spair and cried out in answer. This was some
forwandered traveller like myself, and between
us we could surely find some road to safety.
So I yelled back at the pitch of my voice and
waited intently.
But the sound ceased, and there was utter
silence again. Still I waited, and then from
some place much nearer came the same soft
mumbling speech. I could make nothing of


38
no-man's-land.
it. Heard in that drear place it made the
nerves tense and the heart timorous. It was
the strangest jumble of vowels and consonants
I had ever met.
A dozen solutions flashed through my brain.
It was some maniac talking Jabberwock to
himself. It was some belated traveller whose
wits had given out in fear. Perhaps it was
only some shepherd who was amusing himself
thus, and whiling the way with nonsense.
Once again I cried out and waited.
Then suddenly in the hollow trough of mist
before me, where things could still be half dis-
cerned, there appeared a figure. It was little
and squat and dark; naked, apparently, but
so rough with hair that it wore the appear-
ance of a skin-covered being. It crossed my
line of vision, not staying for a moment, but
in its face and eyes there seemed to lurk an
elder world of mystery and barbarism, a troll-
like life which was too horrible for words.
The shepherd's fear came back on me like a
thunderclap. For one awful instant my legs
failed me, and I had almost fallen. The next
I had turned and ran shrieking up the hill.
If he who may read this narrative has
never felt the force of an overmastering


no-man's-land.
39
terror, then let him thank his Maker and
pray that he never may. I am no weak
child, but a strong grown man, accredited
in general with sound sense and little sus-
pected of hysterics. And yet I went up that
brae-face with my heart fluttering like a bird
and my throat aching with fear. I screamed
in short dry gasps; involuntarily, for my mind
was beyond any purpose. I felt that beast-
like clutch at my throat; those red eyes
seemed to be staring at me from the mist; I
heard ever behind and before and on all sides
the patter of those inhuman feet.
Before I knew I was down, slipping over a
rock and falling some dozen feet into a soft
marshy hollow. I was conscious of lying still
for a second and whimpering like a child.
But as I lay there I awoke to the silence of
the place. There was no sound of pursuit;
perhaps they had lost my track and given up.
My courage began to return, and from this it
was an easy step to hope. Perhaps after all
it had been merely an illusion, for folk do not
see clearly in the mist, and I was already
done with weariness.
But even as I lay in the green moss and
began to hope, the faces of my pursuers grew


40
no-man's-land.
up through the mist. I stumbled madly to
my feet; but I was hemmed in, the rock
behind and my enemies before. With a cry
I rushed forward, and struck wildly with my
rod at the first dark body. It was as if I had
struck an animal, and the next second the
thing was wrenched from my grasp. But
still they came no nearer. I stood trembling
there in the centre of those malignant devils,
my brain a mere weathercock, and my heart
crushed shapeless with horror. At last the
end came, for with the vigour of madness I
flung myself on the nearest, and we rolled
on the ground. Then the monstrous things
seemed to close over me, and with a choking
cry I passed into unconsciousness.


41
CHAPTER IV.
THE DARKNESS THAT IS UNDER THE EARTH.
There is an unconsciousness that is not
wholly dead, where a man feels numbly and
the body lives without the brain. I was
beyond speech or thought, and yet I felt
the upward or downward motion as the way
lay in hill or glen, and I most assuredly
knew when the open air was changed for
the close underground. I could feel dimly
that lights were flared in my face, and that
I was laid in some bed on the earth. Then
with the stopping of movement the real sleep
of weakness seized me, and for long I knew
nothing of this mad world.
Morning came over the moors with bird-
song and the glory of fine weather. The
streams were still rolling in spate, but the
hill-pastures were alight with dawn, and the


42
no-man's-land.
little seams of snow glistened like white fire.
A ray from the sunrise cleft its path somehow
into the abyss, and danced on the wall above
my couch. It caught my eye as I wakened,
and for long I lay crazily wondering what
it meant. My head was splitting with pain,
and in my heart was the same fluttering
nameless fear. I did not wake to full con-
sciousness; not till the twinkle of sun from
the clean bright out - of - doors caught my
senses did I realise that I lay in a great
dark place with a glow of dull firelight in
the middle.
In time things rose and moved around
me, a few ragged shapes of men, without
clothing, shambling with their huge feet and
looking towards me with curved beast-like
glances. I tried to marshal my thoughts,
and slowly, bit by bit, I built up the present.
There was no question to my mind of dream-
ing; the past hours had scored reality upon
my brain. Yet I cannot say that fear was
my chief feeling. The first crazy terror had
subsided, and now I felt mainly a sickened
disgust with just a tinge of curiosity. I
found that my knife, watch, flask, and money
had gone, but they had left me a map of


no-man's-land. 43
the countryside. It seemed strange to look
at the calico, with the name of a London
printer stamped on the back, and lines of
railway and highroad running through every
shire. Decent and comfortable civilisation!
And here was I a prisoner in this den of
nameless folk, and in the midst of a life
which history knew not.
Courage is a virtue which grows with re-
flection and the absence of the immediate
peril. I thought myself into some sort of
resolution, and lo! when the Folk approached
me and bound my feet I was back at once
in the most miserable terror. They tied me
all but my hands with some strong cord,
and carried me to the centre, where the fire
was glowing. Their soft touch was the
acutest torture to my nerves, but I stifled
my cries lest some one should lay his hand
on my mouth. Had that happened, I am
convinced my reason would have failed me.
So there I lay in the shine of the fire,
with the circle of unknown things around
me. There seemed but three or four, but
I took no note of number. They talked
huskily among themselves in a tongue which
sounded all gutturals. Slowly my fear be-


44
no-man's-land.
came less an emotion than a habit, and I
had room for the smallest shade of curiosity.
I strained my ear to catch a word, but it
was a mere chaos of sound. The thing ran
and thundered in my brain as I stared
dumbly into the vacant air. Then I thought
that unless I spoke I should certainly go
crazy, for my head was beginning to swim
at the strange cooing noise.
I spoke a word or two in my best Gaelic,
and they closed round me inquiringly. Then
I was sorry I had spoken, for my words had
brought them nearer, and I shrank at the
thought. But as the faint echoes of my
speech hummed in the rock-chamber, I was
struck by a curious kinship of sound. Mine
was sharper, more distinct, and staccato;
theirs was blurred, formless, but still with
a certain root-resemblance.
Then from the back there came an older
being, who seemed to have heard my words.
He was like some foul grey badger, his red
eyes sightless, and his hands trembling on
a stump of bog-oak. The others made way
for him with such deference as they were
capable of, and the thing squatted down by
me and spoke.


no-man's-land.
45
To my amazement his words were familiar.
It was some manner of speech akin to the
Gaelic, but broadened, lengthened, coarsened.
I remembered an old book-tongue, commonly
supposed to be an impure dialect once used
in Brittany, which I had met in the course
of my researches. The words recalled it,
and as far as I could remember the thing, I
asked him who he was and where the place
might be.
He answered me in the same speech—still
more broadened, lengthened, coarsened. I
lay back with sheer amazement. I had found
the key to this unearthly life.
For a little an insatiable curiosity, the
ardour of the scholar, prevailed. I forgot the
horror of the place, and thought only of the
fact that here before me was the greatest find
that scholarship had ever made. I was pre-
cipitated into the heart of the past. Here
must be the fountainhead of all legends, the
chrysalis of all beliefs. I actually grew light-
hearted. This strange folk around me were
now no more shapeless things of terror, but
objects of research and experiment. I almost
came to think them not unfriendly.
For an hour I enjoyed the highest of earthly


46
NO-MAN'S-LAND.
pleasures. In that strange conversation I
heard — in fragments and suggestions — the
history of the craziest survival the world has
ever seen. I heard of the struggles with
invaders, preserved as it were in a sort of
shapeless poetry. There were bitter words
against the Gaelic oppressor, bitterer words
against the Saxon stranger, and for a moment
ancient hatreds flared into life. Then there
came the tale of the hill-refuge, the morbid
hideous existence preserved for centuries amid
a changing world. I heard fragments of old
religions, primeval names of god and goddess,
half-understood by the Folk, but to me the
key to a hundred puzzles. Tales which sur-
vive to us in broken disjointed riddles were
intact here in living form. I lay on my elbow
and questioned feverishly. At any moment
they might become morose and refuse to
speak. Clearly it was my duty to make the
most of a brief good fortune.
And then the tale they told me grew more
hideous. I heard of the circumstances of the
life itself and their daily shifts for existence.
It was a murderous chronicle—a history of
lust and rapine and unmentionable deeds in
the darkness. One thing they had early


no-man's-land.
47
recognised—that the race could not be main-
tained within itself; so that ghoulish carrying
away of little girls from the lowlands began,
which I had heard of but never credited.
Shut up in those dismal holes, the girls soon
died, and when the new race had grown up
the plunder had been repeated. Then there
were bestial murders in lonely cottages, done
for God knows what purpose. Sometimes the
occupant had seen more than was safe, some-
times the deed was the mere exuberance of a
lust of slaying. As they gabbled their tales
my heart's blood froze, and I lay back in the
agonies of fear. If they had used the others
thus, what way of escape was open for my-
self? I had been brought to this place, and
not murdered on the spot. Clearly there was
torture before death in store for me, and I
confess I quailed at the thought.
But none molested me. The elders con-
tinued to jabber out their stories, while I lay
tense and deaf. Then to my amazement food
was brought and placed beside me—almost
with respect. Clearly my murder was not a
thing of the immediate future. The meal was
some form of mutton—perhaps the shepherd's
lost ewes—and a little smoking was all the


48
no-man's-land.
cooking it had got. I strove to eat, but the
tasteless morsels choked me. Then they set
drink before me in a curious cup, which I
seized on eagerly, for my mouth was dry with
thirst. The vessel was of gold, rudely formed,
but of the pure metal, and a coarse design in
circles ran round the middle. This surprised
me enough, but a greater wonder awaited me.
The liquor was not water, as I had guessed,
but a sort of sweet ale, a miracle of flavour.
The taste was curious, but somehow familiar;
it was like no wine I had ever drunk, and yet
I had known that flavour all my life. I
sniffed at the brim, and there rose a faint
fragrance of thyme and heather honey and
the sweet things of the moorland. I almost
dropped it in my surprise; for here in this
rude place I had stumbled upon that lost
delicacy of the North, the heather ale.
For a second I was entranced with my dis-
covery, and then the wonder of the cup
claimed my attention. Was it a mere relic
of pillage, or had this folk some hidden mine
of the precious metal? Gold had once been
common in these hills. There were the traces
of mines on Cairnsmore; shepherds had found
it in the gravel of the Gled Water; and the


no-man's-land.
49
name of a house at the head of the Clachlands
meant the "Home of Gold."
Once more I began my questions, and they
answered them willingly. There and then I
heard that secret for which many had died
in old time, the secret of the heather ale.
They told of the gold in the hills, of corries
where the sand gleamed and abysses where
the rocks were veined. All this they told me,
freely, without a scruple. And then, like a
clap, came the awful thought that this, too,
spelled death. These were secrets which this
race aforetime had guarded with their lives;
they told them generously to me because there
was no fear of betrayal. I should go no more
out from this place.
The thought put me into a new sweat of
terror—not at death, mind you, but at the
unknown horrors which might precede the
final suffering. I lay silent, and after binding
my hands they began to leave me and go off
to other parts of the cave. I dozed in the
horrible half-swoon of fear, conscious only of
my shaking limbs, and the great dull glow
of the fire in the centre. Then I became
calmer. After all, they had treated me with
tolerable kindness: I had spoken their lan-
D


50
no-man's-land.
guage, which few of their victims could have
done for many a century; it might be that I
had found favour in their eyes. For a little
I comforted myself with this delusion, till I
caught sight of a wooden box in a corner. It
was of modern make, one such as grocers use
to pack provisions in. It had some address
nailed on it, and an aimless curiosity com-
pelled me to creep thither and read it. A
torn and weather - stained scrap of paper,
with the nails at the corner rusty with age;
but something of the address might still
be made out. Amid the stains my feverish
eyes read, "To Mr M , Carrickfey, by
Allerfoot Station."
The ruined cottage in the hollow of the
waste with the single gnarled apple-tree
was before me in a twinkling. I remem-
bered the shepherd's shrinking from the
place and the name, and his wild eyes
when he told me of the thing that had
happened there. I seemed to see the old
man in his moorland cottage, thinking no
evil; the sudden entry of the nameless
things; and then the eyes glazed in un-
speakable terror. I felt my lips dry and
burning. Above me was the vault of


no-man's-land.
51
rock; in the distance I saw the fire-glow
and the shadows of shapes moving around
it. My fright was too great for inaction,
so I crept from the couch, and silently,
stealthily, with tottering steps and bursting
heart, I began to reconnoitre.
But I was still bound, my arms tightly,
my legs more loosely, but yet firm enough
to hinder flight. I could not get my hands
at my leg-straps, still less could I undo the
manacles. I rolled on the floor, seeking
some sharp edge of rock, but all had been
worn smooth by the use of centuries. Then
suddenly an idea came upon me like an
inspiration. The sounds from the fire
seemed to have ceased, and I could hear
them repeated from another and more dis-
tant part of the cave. The Folk had left
their orgy round the blaze, and at the end
of the long tunnel I saw its glow fall un-
impeded upon the floor. Once there, I
might burn off my fetters and be free to
turn my thoughts to escape.
I crawled a little way with much labour.
Then suddenly I came abreast an opening
in the wall, through which a path went.
It was a long straight rock-cutting, and at


52
no-man's-land.
the end I saw a gleam of pale light. It
must be the open air; the way of escape
was prepared for me; and with a prayer I
made what speed I could towards the fire.
I rolled on the verge, but the fuel was
peat, and the warm ashes would not burn
the cords. In desperation I went farther,
and my clothes began to singe, while my
face ached beyond endurance. But yet I
got no nearer my object. The strips of
hide warped and cracked, but did not burn.
Then in a last effort I thrust my wrists
bodily into the glow and held them there.
In an instant I drew them out with a
groan of pain, scarring and sore, but to my
joy with the band snapped in one place.
Weak as I was, it was now easy to free
myself, and then came the untying of my
legs. My hands trembled, my eyes were
dazed with hurry, and I was longer over
the job than need have been. But at
length I had loosed my cramped knees
and stood on my feet, a free man once
more.
I kicked off my boots, and fled noise-
lessly down the passage to the tunnel
mouth. Apparently it was close on even-


NO-MAN'S-LAND.
63
ing, for the white light had faded to a
pale yellow. But it was daylight, and that
was all I sought, and I ran for it as
eagerly as ever runner ran to a goal. I
came out on a rock-shelf, beneath which a
moraine of boulders fell away in a chasm
to a dark loch. It was all but night, but
I could see the gnarled and fortressed rocks
rise in ramparts above, and below the un-
known screes and cliffs which make the
side of the Muneraw a place only for foxes
and the fowls of the air.
The first taste of liberty is an intoxi-
cation, and assuredly I was mad when I
leaped down among the boulders. Happily
at the top of the gully the stones were
large and stable, else the noise would
certainly have discovered me. Down I went, slipping, praying, my charred wrists
aching, and my stockinged feet wet with
blood. Soon I was in the jaws of the
cleft, and a pale star rose before me. I
have always been timid in the face of
great rocks, and now, had not an awful
terror been dogging my footsteps, no power
on earth could have driven me to that
descent. Soon I left the boulders behind,


54
no-man's-land.
and came to long spouts of little stones,
which moved with me till the hillside
seemed sinking under my feet. Sometimes
I was face downwards, once and again I
must have fallen for yards. Had there
been a cliff at the foot, I should have
gone over it without resistance; but by the
providence of God the spout ended in a
long curve into the heather of the bog.
When I found my feet once more on
soft boggy earth, my strength was renewed
within me. A great hope of escape sprang
up in my heart. For a second I looked
back. There was a great line of shingle
with the cliffs beyond, and above all the
unknown blackness of the cleft. There lay
my terror, and I set off running across the
bog for dear life. My mind was clear
enough to know my road. If I held round
the loch in front I should come to a burn
which fed the Farawa stream, on whose
banks stood the shepherd's cottage. The
loch could not be far; once at the Farawa
I would have the light of the shieling
clear before me.
Suddenly I heard behind me, as if coming
from the hillside, the patter of feet. It was


no-man's-land.
55
the sound which white hares make in the
winter-time on a noiseless frosty day as
they patter over the snow. I have heard
the same soft noise from a herd of deer
when they changed their pastures. Strange
that so kindly a sound should put the very
fear of death in my heart. I ran madly,
blindly, yet thinking shrewdly. The loch
was before me. Somewhere I had read or
heard, I do not know where, that the
brutish aboriginal races of the North could
not swim. I myself swam powerfully; could
I but cross the loch I should save two miles
of a desperate country.
There was no time to lose, for the patter
was coming nearer, and I was almost at the
loch's edge. I tore off my coat and rushed
in. The bottom was mossy, and I had to
struggle far before I found any depth. Some-
thing plashed in the water before me, and
then something else a little behind. The
thought that I was a mark for unknown
missiles made me crazy with fright, and I
struck fiercely out for the other shore. A
gleam of moonlight was on the water at
the burn's exit, and thither I guided myself.
I found the thing difficult enough in itself,


56
no-man's-land.
for my hands ached, and I was numb with
my bonds. But my fancy raised a thousand
phantoms to vex me. Swimming in that
black bog water, pursued by those nameless
things, I seemed to be in a world of horror
far removed from the kindly world of men.
My strength seemed inexhaustible from my
terror. Monsters at the bottom of the
water seemed to bite at my feet, and the
pain of my wrists made me believe that
the loch was boiling hot, and that I was
in some hellish place of torment.
I came out on a spit of gravel above the
burn mouth, and set off down the ravine of
the burn. It was a strait place, strewn with
rocks; but now and then the hill turf came
in stretches, and eased my wounded feet.
Soon the fall became more abrupt, and I
was slipping down a hillside, with the water
on my left making great cascades in the
granite. And then I was out in the wider
vale where the Farawa water flowed among
links of moss.
Far in front, a speck in the blue darkness,
shone the light of the cottage. I panted
forward, my breath coming in gasps and my
back shot with fiery pains. Happily the


no-man's-land.
67
land was easier for the feet as long as I
kept on the skirts of the bog. My ears
were sharp as a wild beast's with fear, as I
listened for the noise of pursuit. Nothing
came but the rustle of the gentlest hill-wind
and the chatter of the falling streams.
Then suddenly the light began to waver
and move athwart the window. I knew what
it meant. In a minute or two the household
at the cottage would retire to rest, and the
lamp would be put out. True, I might find
the place in the dark, for there was a moon
of sorts and the road was not desperate.
But somehow in that hour the lamplight
gave a promise of safety which I clung to
despairingly.
And then the last straw was added to my
misery. Behind me came the pad of feet,
the pat-patter, soft, eerie, incredibly swift.
I choked with fear, and flung myself forward
in a last effort. I give my word it was sheer
mechanical shrinking that drove me on. God
knows I would have lain down to die in
the heather, had the things behind me been
a common terror of life.
I ran as man never ran before, leaping
hags, scrambling through green well-heads,


58
no-man's-land.
straining towards the fast-dying light. A
quarter of a mile and the patter sounded
nearer. Soon I was not two hundred yards
off, and the noise seemed almost at my
elbow. The light went out, and the black
mass of the cottage loomed in the dark.
Then, before I knew, I was at the door,
battering it wearily and yelling for help.
I heard steps within and a hand on the
bolt. Then something shot past me with
lightning force and buried itself in the wood.
The dreadful hands were almost at my
throat, when the door was opened and I
stumbled in, hearing with a gulp of joy
the key turn and the bar fall behind me.


59
CHAPTER V.
THE TROUBLES OF A CONSCIENCE.
My body and senses slept, for I was utterly
tired, but my brain all the night was on fire
with horrid fancies. Again I was in that
accursed cave; I was torturing my hands in
the fire; I was slipping barefoot among jagged
boulders; and then with bursting heart I
was toiling the last mile with the cottage
light — now grown to a great fire in the
heavens—blazing before me.
It was broad daylight when I awoke, and
I thanked God for the comfortable rays of
the sun. I had been laid in a box-bed off
the inner room, and my first sight was the
shepherd sitting with folded arms in a chair
regarding me solemnly. I rose and began
to dress, feeling my legs and arms still
tremble with weariness. The shepherd's sis-
ter bound up my scarred wrists and put


60
no-man's-land.
an ointment on my burns; and, limping like
an old man, I went into the kitchen.
I could eat little breakfast, for my throat
seemed dry and narrow; but they gave me
some brandy-and-milk, which put strength
into my body. All the time the brother
and sister sat in silence, regarding me with
covert glances.
"Ye have been delivered from the jaws o'
the Pit," said the man at length. "See
that," and he held out to me a thin shaft
of flint. "I fand that in the door this
morning."
I took it, let it drop, and stared vacantly
at the window. My nerves had been too
much tried to be roused by any new terror.
Out of doors it was fair weather, flying
gleams of April sunlight and the soft colours
of spring. I felt dazed, isolated, cut off from
my easy past and pleasing future, a com-
panion of horrors and the sport of nameless
things. Then suddenly my eye fell on my
books heaped on a table, and the old dis-
tant civilisation seemed for the moment
inexpressibly dear.
"I must go—at once. And you must come
too. You cannot stay here. I tell you it


no-man's-land.
61
is death. If you knew what I know you
would be crying out with fear. How far
is it to Allermuir? Eight, fifteen miles; and
then ten down Glen Aller to Allerfoot, and
then the railway. We must go together
while it is daylight, and perhaps we may
be untouched. But quick, there is not a
moment to lose." And I was on my shaky
feet, and bustling among my possessions.
"I'll gang wi' ye to the station," said the
shepherd, "for ye're clearly no fit to look
after yourself. My sister will bide and keep
the house. If naething has touched us this
ten year, naething will touch us the day."
"But you cannot stay. You are mad," I
began; but he cut me short with the words,
"I trust in God."
"In any case let your sister come with us.
I dare not think of a woman alone in this
place."
"I'll bide," said she. "I'm no feared as
lang as I'm indoors and there's steeks on the
windies."
So I packed my few belongings as best I
could, tumbled my books into a haversack,
and, gripping the shepherd's arm nervously,
crossed the threshold. The glen was full of


62
no-man's-land.
sunlight. There lay the long shining links
of the Farawa burn, the rough hills tumbled
beyond, and far over all the scarred and dis-
tant forehead of the Muneraw. I had always
looked on moorland country as the freshest on
earth—clean, wholesome, and homely. But
now the fresh uplands seemed like a hor-
rible pit. When I looked to the hills my
breath choked in my throat, and the feel
of soft heather below my feet set my heart
trembling.
It was a slow journey to the inn at Aller-
muir. For one thing, no power on earth
would draw me within sight of the shieling
of Carrickfey, so we had to cross a shoulder of
hill and make our way down a difficult glen,
and then over a treacherous moss. The lochs
were now gleaming like fretted silver; but to
me, in my dreadful knowledge, they seemed
more eerie than on that grey day when I
came. At last my eyes were cheered by the
sight of a meadow and a fence; then we were
on a little byroad; and soon the fir-woods and
corn-lands of Allercleuch were plain before us.
The shepherd came no farther, but with
brief good-bye turned his solemn face hill-
wards. I hired a trap and a man to drive,


no-man's-land.
63
and down the ten miles of Glen Aller I
struggled to keep my thoughts from the past.
I thought of the kindly South Country, of
Oxford, of anything comfortable and civilised.
My driver pointed out the objects of interest
as in duty bound, but his words fell on un-
heeding ears. At last he said something
which roused me indeed to interest — the
interest of the man who hears the word he
fears most in the world. On the left side of
the river there suddenly sprang into view a
long gloomy cleft in the hills, with a vista of
dark mountains behind, down which a stream
of considerable size poured its waters.
"That is the Water o' Dule," said the man
in a reverent voice. "A graund water to fish,
but dangerous to life, for it's a' linns. Awa'
at the heid they say there's a terrible wild
place called the Scarts o' Muneraw,—that's a
shouther o' the muckle hill itsel' that ye see,
—but I've never been there, and I never kent
ony man that had either."
At the station, which is a mile from the
village of Allerfoot, I found I had some hours
to wait on my train for the south. I dared
not trust myself for one moment alone, so I
hung about the goods-shed, talked vacantly


64
no-man's-land.
to the porters, and when one went to the
village for tea I accompanied him, and to his
wonder entertained him at the inn. When
I returned I found on the platform a stray
bagman who was that evening going to
London. If there is one class of men in the
world which I heartily detest it is this; but
such was my state that I hailed him as a
brother, and besought his company. I paid
the difference for a first-class fare, and had
him in the carriage with me. He must have
thought me an amiable maniac, for I talked
in fits and starts, and when he fell asleep I
would wake him up and beseech him to speak
to me. At wayside stations I would pull
down the blinds in case of recognition, for
to my unquiet mind the world seemed full
of spies sent by that terrible Folk of the
Hills. When the train crossed a stretch of
moor I would lie down on the seat in case
of shafts fired from the heather. And then
at last with utter weariness I fell asleep, and
woke screaming about midnight to find myself
well down in the cheerful English midlands,
and red blast-furnaces blinking by the railway-
side.
In the morning I breakfasted in my rooms


NO-MAN'S LAND.
G5
at St Chad's with a dawning sense of safety.
I was in a different and calmer world. The
lawn-like quadrangles, the great trees, the
cawing of rooks, and the homely twitter of
sparrows—all seemed decent and settled and
pleasing. Indoors the oak-panelled walls, the
shelves of books, the pictures, the faint fra-
grance of tobacco, were very different from
the gimcrack adornments and the accursed
smell of peat and heather in that deplorable
cottage. It was still vacation-time, so most
of my friends were down; but I spent the
day hunting out the few cheerful pedants to
whom term and vacation were the same. It
delighted me to hear again their precise talk,
to hear them make a boast of their work, and
narrate the childish little accidents of their
life. I yearned for the childish once more;
I craved for women's drawing - rooms, and
women's chatter, and everything which makes
life an elegant game. God knows I had had
enough of the other thing for a lifetime!
That night I shut myself in my rooms,
barred my windows, drew my curtains, and
made a great destruction. All books or pic-
tures which recalled to me the moorlands were
ruthlessly doomed. Novels, poems, treatises
£


66
no-man's-land.
I flung into an old box, for sale to the second-
hand bookseller. Some prints and water-
colour sketches I tore to pieces with my own
hands. I ransacked my fishing-book, and
condemned all tackle for moorland waters to
the flames. I wrote a letter to my solicitors,
bidding them go no further in the purchase of
a place in Lome I had long been thinking of.
Then, and not till then, did I feel the bondage
of the past a little loosed from my shoulders.
I made myself a night-cap of rum-punch in-
stead of my usual whisky - toddy, that all
associations with that dismal land might be
forgotten, and to complete the renunciation I
returned to cigars and flung my pipe into a
drawer.
But when I woke in the morning I found
that it is hard to get rid of memories. My
feet were still sore and wounded, and when
I felt my arms cramped and reflected on the
causes, there was that black memory always
near to vex me.
In a little term began, and my duties—
as deputy-professor of Northern Antiquities
—were once more clamorous. I can well
believe that my hearers found my lectures
strange, for instead of dealing with my


no-man's-land.
67
favourite subjects and matters, which I might
modestly say I had made my own, I confined
myself to recondite and distant themes, treat-
ing even these cursorily and dully. For the
truth is, my heart was no more in my subject.
I hated — or I thought that I hated—all
things Northern with the virulence of utter
fear. My reading was confined to science of
the most recent kind, to abstruse philosophy,
and to foreign classics. Anything which
savoured of romance or mystery was abhor-
rent; I pined for sharp outlines and the
tangibility of a high civilisation.
All the term I threw myself into the most
frivolous life of the place. My Harrow school-
days seemed to have come back to me. I
had once been a fair cricketer, so I played
again for my college, and made decent scores.
I coached an indifferent crew on the river.
I fell into the slang of the place, which I
had hitherto detested. My former friends
looked on me askance, as if some freakish
changeling had possessed me. Formerly I
had been ready for pedantic discussion, I
had been absorbed in my work, men had
spoken of me as a rising scholar. Now I
fled the very mention of things I had once


68
no-man's-land.
delighted in. The Professor of Northern An-
tiquities, a scholar of European reputation,
meeting me once in the Parks, embarked on
an account of certain novel rings recently
found in Scotland, and to his horror found
that, when he had got well under weigh,
I had slipped off unnoticed. I heard after-
wards that the good old man was found by
a friend walking disconsolately with bowed
head in the middle of the High Street.
Being rescued from among the horses' feet,
he could only murmur, "I am thinking of
Graves, poor man! And a year ago he was
as sane as I am!"
» • • • • • •
But a man may not long deceive himself.
I kept up the illusion valiantly for the term;
but I felt instinctively that the fresh school-
boy life, which seemed to me the extreme
opposite to the ghoulish North, and as such
the most desirable of things, was eternally
cut off from me. No cunning affectation
could ever dispel my real nature or efface
the memory of a week. I realised miserably
that sooner or later I must fight it out with
my conscience, I began to call myself a
coward. The chief thoughts of my mind 


no-man's-land.
69
began to centre themselves more and more
round that unknown life waiting to be ex-
plored among the unfathomable wilds.
One day I met a friend—an official in the
British Museum—who was full of some new
theory about primitive habitations. To me
it seemed inconceivably absurd; but he was
strong in his confidence, and without flaw
in his evidence. The man irritated me, and
I burned to prove him wrong, but I could
think of no argument which was final against
his. Then it flashed upon me that my own
experience held the disproof; and without
more words I left him, hot, angry with my-
self, and tantalised by the unattainable.
I might relate my bona-Jide experience,
but would men believe me? I must bring
proofs, I must complete my researches, so
as to make them incapable of disbelief. And
there in those deserts was waiting the key.
There lay the greatest discovery of the
century—nay, of the millennium. There, too,
lay the road to wealth such as I had never
dreamed of. Could I succeed, I should be
famous for ever. I would revolutionise history
and anthropology; I would systematise folk-
lore; I would show the world of men the


70
no-man's-land.
pit whence they were digged and the rock
whence they were hewn.
And then began a game of battledore be-
tween myself and my conscience.
"You are a coward," said my conscience.
"I am sufficiently brave," I would answer, "I have seen things and yet lived. The
terror is more than mortal, and I cannot
face it."
"You are a coward," said my conscience.
"I am not bound to go there again. It
would be purely for my own aggrandisement
if I went, and not for any matter of duty."
"Nevertheless you are a coward," said my
conscience.
"In any case the matter can wait."
"You are a coward."
• . • • • • •
Then came one awful midsummer night,
when I lay sleepless and fought the thing
out with myself. I knew that the strife was
hopeless, that I should have no peace in this
world again unless I made the attempt. The
dawn was breaking when I came to the final
resolution; and when I rose and looked at
my face in a mirror, lo! it was white and
lined and drawn like a man of sixty.


71
CHAPTER VI.
SUMMER ON THE MOORS.
The next morning I packed a bag with some
changes of clothing and a collection of note-
books, and went up to town. The first thing
I did was to pay a visit to my solicitors.
"I am about to travel," said I, "and I wish
to have all things settled in case any accident
should happen to me." So I arranged for
the disposal of my property in case of death,
and added a codicil which puzzled the
lawyers. If I did not return within six
months, communications were to be entered
into with the shepherd at the shieling of
Farawa — post-town Allerfoot. If he could
produce any papers, they were to be put
into the hands of certain friends, published,
and the cost charged to my estate. From
my solicitors I went to a gunmaker's in
Regent Street and bought an ordinary six-


72 no-man's-land.
•
chambered revolver, feeling much as a man
must feel who proposed to cross the Atlantic
in a skiff and purchased a small life-belt as
a precaution.
I took the night express to the North, and,
for a marvel, I slept. When I awoke about
four we were on the verge of Westmoreland,
and stony hills blocked the horizon. At first
I hailed the mountain-land gladly; sleep for
the moment had caused forgetfulness of my
terrors. But soon a turn of the line brought
me in full view of a heathery moor, running
far to a confusion of distant peaks. I re-
membered my mission and my fate, and if ever
condemned criminal felt a more bitter regret I
pity his case. Why should I alone among the
millions of this happy isle be singled out as
the repository of a ghastly secret, and be
cursed by a conscience which would not let it
rest?
I came to Allerfoot early in the forenoon,
and got a trap to drive me up the valley. It
was a lowering grey day, hot and yet sunless.
A sort of heat-haze cloaked the hills, and every
now and then a smurf of rain would meet us
on the road, and in a minute be over. I felt
wretchedly dispirited; and when at last the


no-man's-land.
white - washed kirk of Allermuir came into
sight and the broken-backed bridge of Aller,
man's eyes seemed to have looked on no
drearier scene since time began.
I ate what meal I could get, for, fears or no,
I was voraciously hungry. Then I asked the
landlord to find me some man who would show
me the road to Farawa. I demanded company,
not for protection—for what could two men
do against such brutish strength ?—but to
keep my mind from its own thoughts.
The man looked at me anxiously.
"Are ye acquaint wi' the folks, then?" he
asked.
I said I was, that I had often stayed in the
cottage.
"Ye ken that they've a name for being
queer. The man never comes here for bye once
or twice a-year, and he has few dealings wi'
other herds. He's got an ill name, too, for
losing sheep. I dinna like the country ava.
Up by yon Muneraw — no that I've ever been
there, but I've seen it afar off—is enough to
put a man daft for the rest o' his days. What's
taking ye thereaways? It's no the time for
the fishing?"
I told him that I was a botanist going to


74
no-man's-land.
explore certain hill-crevices for rare ferns. He
shook his head, and then after some delay
found me an ostler who would accompany me
to the cottage.
The man was a shock-headed, long-limbed
fellow, with fierce red hair and a humorous
eye. He talked sociably about his life, answered
my hasty questions with deftness, and beguiled
me for the moment out of myself. I passed
the melancholy lochs, and came in sight of the
great stony hills without the trepidation I had
expected. Here at my side was one who found
some humour even in those uplands. But one
thing I noted which brought back the old
uneasiness. He took the road which led us
farthest from Carrickfey, and when to try
him I proposed the other, he vetoed it with
emphasis.
After this his good spirits departed, and he
grew distrustful.
"What mak's ye a freend o' the herd at
Farawa?" he demanded a dozen times.
Finally, I asked him if he knew the man,
and had seen him lately.
"I dinna ken him, and I hadna seen him
for years till a fortnight syne, when a' Aller-
muir saw him. He cam doun one afternoon


no-man's-land.
75
to the public-hoose, and begood to drink. He
had aye been kenned for a terrible godly kind
o' a man, so ye may believe folk wondered at
this. But when he had stuck to the drink
for twae days, and filled himsel' blind-fou half-
a-dozen o' times, he took a fit o' repentance,
and raved and blethered about siccan a life as
he led in the muirs. There was some said he
was speakin' serious, but maist thocht it was
juist daftness."
"And what did he speak about?" I asked
sharply.
"I canna verra weel tell ye. It was about
some kind o' bogle that lived in the Muneraw
—that's the shouthers o't ye see yonder—and
it seems that the bogle killed his sheep and
frichted himsel'. He was aye bletherin', too,
about something or somebody ca'd Grave; but
oh! the man wasna wise." And my com-
panion shook a contemptuous head.
And then below us in the valley we saw the
shieling, with a thin shaft of smoke rising into
the rainy grey weather. The man left me,
sturdily refusing any fee. "I wantit my legs
stretched as weel as you. A walk in the hills
is neither here nor there to a stoot man.
When will ye be back, sir?"


76
no-man's-land.
The question was well-timed. "To-morrow
fortnight," I said, "and I want somebody
from Allernuiir to come out here in the morn-
ing and carry some baggage. Will you see to
that?"
He said "Ay," and went off, while I scrambled
down the hill to the cottage. Nervousness
possessed me, and though it was broad day-
light and the whole place lay plain before me,
I ran pell-mell, and did not stop till I reached
the door.
The place was utterly empty. Unmade
beds, unwashed dishes, a hearth strewn with
the ashes of peat, and dust thick on every-
thing, proclaimed the absence of inmates. I
began to be horribly frightened. Had the
shepherd and his sister, also, disappeared?
Was I left alone in the bleak place, with a
dozen lonely miles between me and human
dwellings? I could not return alone; better
this horrible place than the unknown perils of
the out-of-doors. Hastily I barricaded the
door, and to the best of my power shuttered
the windows; and then with dreary forebod-
ings I sat down to wait on fortune.
In a little I heard a long swinging step out-
side and the sound of dogs. Joyfully I opened


no-man's-land.
11
the latch, and there was the shepherd's grim
face waiting stolidly on what might appear.
At the sight of me he stepped back.
"What in the Lord's name are ye daein'
here?" he asked. "Didna ye get enough
afore?"
"Come in," I said, sharply. "I want to
talk."
In he came with those blessed dogs,—what
a comfort it was to look on their great honest
faces! He sat down on the untidy bed and
waited.
"I came because I could not stay away. I
saw too much to give me any peace elsewhere.
I must go back, even though I risk my life for
it. The cause of scholarship demands it as
well as the cause of humanity."
"Is that a' the news ye hae?" he said.
"Weel, I've mair to tell ye. Three weeks
syne my sister Margit was lost, and I've
never seen her mair."
My jaw fell, and I could only stare at
him.
"I cam hame from the hill at nightfa' and she
was gone. I lookit for her up hill and doun,
but I couldna find her. Syne I think I went
daft. I went to the Scarts and huntit them


78
no-man's-land.
up and doun, but no sign could I see. The
Folk can bide quiet enough when they want.
Syne I went to Allermuir and drank mysel'
blind,—me, that's a God-fearing man and a
saved soul; but the Lord help me, I didna
ken what I was at. That's my news, and day
and nicht I wander thae hills, seeking for what
I canna find."
"But, man, are you mad?" I cried, "Surely there are neighbours to help you.
There is a law in the land, and you had
only to find the nearest police - office and
compel them to assist you."
"What guid can man dae?" he asked.
"An army o' sodgers couldna find that hidy-
hole. Forby, when I went into Allermuir wi'
my story the folk thocht me daft. It was
that set me drinking, for—the Lord forgive
me !—I wasna my ain maister. I threepit till
I was hairse, but the bodies just laughed." And he lay back on the bed like a man mor-
tally tired.
Grim though the tidings were, I can only
say that my chief feeling was of comfort.
Pity for the new tragedy had swallowed up
my fear. I had now a purpose, and a pur-
pose, too, not of curiosity but of mercy.


no-man's-land.
79
"I go to-morrow morning to the Muneraw.
But first I want to give you something to do."
And I drew roughly a chart of the place on
the back of a letter. "Go into Allermuir to-
morrow, and give this paper to the landlord
at the inn. The letter will tell him what to
do. He is to raise at once all the men he can
get, and come to the place on the chart marked
with a cross. Tell him life depends on his
hurry."
The shepherd nodded. "D'ye ken the Folk
are watching for you? They let me pass
without trouble, for they've nae use for me,
but I see fine they're seeking you. Ye'll no
gang half a mile the morn afore they
grip ye."
"So much the better," I said. "That will
take me quicker to the place I want to
be at."
"And I'm to gang to Allermuir the morn,"
he repeated, with the air of a child conning
a lesson. "But what if they'll no believe
me f
"They'll believe the letter."
"Maybe," he said, and relapsed into a
dose.
I set myself to put that house in order, to


80
no-man's-land.
rouse the fire, and prepare some food. It was
dismal work; and meantime outside the night
darkened, and a great wind rose, which howled
round the walls and lashed the rain on the
windows.


81
CHAPTER VII.
IN WAS MANUS, DOMINEI -
I had not gone twenty yards from the
cottage door ere I knew I was watched.
I had left the shepherd still dozing, in the
half - conscious state of a dazed and broken
man. All night the wind had wakened me
at intervals, and now in the half-light of
morn the weather seemed more vicious than
ever. The wind cut my ears, the whole fir-
mament was full of the rendings and thunders
of the storm. Rain fell in blinding sheets,
the heath was a marsh, and it was the most
I could do to struggle against the hurricane
which stopped my breath. And all the while
I knew I was not alone in the desert.
All men know—in imagination or in ex-
perience— the sensation of being spied on.
The nerves tingle, the skin grows hot and
prickly, and there is a queer sinking of the
F


82
no-man's-land.
heart. Intensify this common feeling a
hundredfold, and you get a tenth part of
what I suffered. I am telling a plain tale,
and record bare physical facts. My lips stood
out from my teeth as I heard, or felt, a rustle
in the heather, a scraping among stones.
Some subtle magnetic link seemed estab-
lished between my body and the mysterious
world around. I became sick—acutely sick—
with the ceaseless apprehension.
My fright became so complete that when I
turned a corner of rock, or stepped in deep
heather, I seemed to feel a body rub against
me. This continued all the way up the Far-
awa water, and then up its feeder to the little
lonely loch. It kept me from looking for-
ward; but it likewise kept me in such a
sweat of fright that I was ready to faint.
Then the notion came upon me to test this
fancy of mine. If I was tracked thus closely,
clearly the trackers would bar my way if I
turned back. So I wheeled round and walked
a dozen paces down the glen.
Nothing stopped me. I was about to turn
again, when something made me take six more
paces. At the fourth something rustled in the
heather, and my neck was gripped as in a vica


no-man's-land.
83
I had already made up my mind on what I
would do. I would be perfectly still, I would
conquer my fear, and let them do as they
pleased with me so long as they took me to
their dwelling. But at the touch of the
hands my resolutions fled. I struggled and
screamed. Then something was clapped on
my mouth, speech and strength went from
me, and once more I was back in the maudlin
childhood of terror.
In the cave it was always a dusky twilight.
I seemed to be lying in the same place, with
the same dull glare of firelight far off, and the
same close stupefying smell. One of the crea-
tures was standing silently at my side, and I
asked him some trivial question. He turned
and shambled down the passage, leaving me
alone.
Then he returned with another, and they
talked their guttural talk to me. I scarcely
listened till I remembered that in a sense I
was here of my own accord, and on a definite
mission. The purport of their speech seemed
to be that, now I had returned, I must beware
of a second flight. Once I had been spared ; a
second time I should be killed without mercy.


84
no-man's-land.
I assented gladly. The Folk, then, had
some use for me. I felt my errand prosper-
ing.
Then the old creature which I had seen
before crept out of some corner and squatted
beside me. He put a claw on my shoulder,
a horrible, corrugated, skeleton thing, hairy
to the finger-tips and nailless. He grinned,
too, with toothless gums, and his hideous
old voice was like a file on sandstone.
I asked questions, but he would only grin
and jabber, looking now and then furtively
over his shoulder towards the fire.
I coaxed and humoured him, till he
launched into a narrative of which I could
make nothing. It seemed a mere string of
names, with certain words repeated at fixed
intervals. Then it flashed on me that this
might be a religious incantation. I had
discovered remnants of a ritual and a
mythology among them. It was possible
that these were sacred days, and that I
had stumbled upon some rude celebration.
I caught a word or two and repeated
them. He looked at me curiously. Then
I asked him some leading question, and he
replied with clearness. My guess was right.


no-man's-land.
85
The midsummer week was the holy season
of the year, when sacrifices were offered to
the gods.
The notion of sacrifices disquieted me, and
I would fain have asked further. But the
creature would speak no more. He hobbled
off, and left me alone in the rock-chamber
to listen to a strange sound which hung
ceaselessly about me. It must be the storm
without, like a park of artillery rattling
among the crags. A storm of storms surely,
for the place echoed and hummed, and to
my unquiet eye the very rock of the roof
seemed to shake!
Apparently my existence was forgotten,
for I lay long before any one returned.
Then it was merely one who brought food,
the same strange meal as before, and left
hastily. When I had eaten I rose and
stretched myself. My hands and knees still
quivered nervously; but I was strong and
perfectly well in body. The empty, desolate,
tomb-like place was eerie enough to scare
any one; but its emptiness was comfort when
I thought of its inmates. Then I wandered
down the passage towards the fire which
was burning in loneliness. Where had the


86
no-man's-land.
Folk gone? I puzzled over their disappear-
ance.
Suddenly sounds began to break on my ear,
coming from some inner chamber at the end
of that in which the fire burned. I could
scarcely see for the smoke; but I began
to make my way towards the noise, feeling
along the sides of rock. Then a second
gleam of light seemed to rise before me,
and I came to an aperture in the wall
which gave entrance to another room.
This in turn was full of smoke and glow
—a murky orange glow, as if from some
strange flame of roots. There were the
squat moving figures, running in wild antics
round the fire. I crouched in the entrance,
terrified and yet curious, till I saw some-
thing beyond the blaze which held me dumb.
Apart from the others and tied to some
stake in the wall was a woman's figure,
and the face was the face of the shepherd's
sister.
My first impulse was flight. I must get
away and think,—plan, achieve some des-
perate way of escape. I sped back to the
silent chamber as if the gang were at my
heels. It was still empty, and I stood


88
no-man's-land.
to some devilish god, and by the hand of
one of the stranger race. I said nothing,
but my whitening face must have told them
a tale, though I strove hard to keep my
composure. I asked if they had found the
victims. "She is in this place," they said;
"and as for the man, thou art he." And
with this they left me.
I had still some hours; so much I gathered
from their talk, for the sacrifice was at sunset.
Escape was cut off for ever. I have always
been something of a fatalist, and at the pros-
pect of the irrevocable end my cheerfulness
returned. I had my pistol, for they had
taken nothing from me. I took out the
little weapon and fingered it lovingly. Hope
of the lost, refuge of the vanquished, ease
to the coward,—blessed be he who first con-
ceived it!
The time dragged on, the minutes grew
to hours, and still I was left solitary. Only
the mad violence of the storm broke the quiet.
It had increased in violence, for the stones at
the mouth of the exit by which I had for-
merly escaped seemed to rock with some ex-
ternal pressure, and cutting shafts of wind
slipped past and cleft the heat of the passage.


90
no-man's-land.
back, and apart from the rest, I saw the
dazed eyes and the white old drawn face
of the woman.
They led me up beside her to a place
where there was a rude flat stone, hollowed
in the centre, and on it a rusty iron knife,
which seemed once to have formed part of
a scythe-blade. Then I saw the ceremonial
which was marked out for me. It was the
very rite which I had dimly figured as
current among a rude people, and even in
that moment I had something of the
scholar's satisfaction.
The oldest of the Folk, who seemed to
be a sort of priest, came to my side and
mumbled a form of words. His fetid breath
sickened me; his dull eyes, glassy like a
brute's with age, brought my knees together.
He put the knife in my hands, dragged the"
terror-stricken woman forward to the altar,
and bade me begin.
I began by sawing her bonds through.
When she felt herself free she would have
fled back, but stopped when I bade her.
At that moment there came a noise of
rending and crashing as if the hills were
falling, and for one second the eyes of the


no-man's-land.
91
Folk were averted from the frustrated
sacrifice.
Only for a moment. The next they saw
what I had done, and with one impulse
rushed towards me. Then began the last
scene in the play. I sent a bullet through
the right eye of the first thing that came
on. The second shot went wide; but the
third shattered the hand of an elderly
ruffian with a cruel club. Never for an
instant did they stop, and now they were
clutching at me. I pushed the woman
behind, and fired three rapid shots in blind
panic, and then, clutching the scythe, I
struck right and left like a madman.
Suddenly I saw the foreground sink before
my eyes. The roof sloped down, and with
a sickening hiss a mountain of rock and
earth seemed to precipitate itself on the
foremost of my assailants. One, nipped in
the middle by a rock, caught my eye by
his hideous writhings. Two only remained
in what was now a little suffocating
chamber, with embers from the fire still
smoking on the floor.
The woman caught me by the hand and
drew me with her, while the two seemed


92
NO-MAN S-LAND.
mute with fear. "There's a road at the
back," she screamed, "I ken it. I fand
it out." And she pulled me up a narrow
hole in the rock.
How long we climbed I do not know.
We were both fighting for air, with the
tightness of throat and chest, and the
craziness of limb which mean suffocation.
I cannot tell when we first came to the
surface, but I remember the woman, who
seemed to have the strength of extreme
terror, pulling me from the edge of a
crevasse and laying me on a flat rock. It
seemed to be the depth of winter, with
sheer-falling rain and a wind that shook
the hills.
Then I was once more myself and could
look about me. From my feet yawned a
sheer abyss, where once had been a hill-
shoulder. Some great mass of rock on the
brow of the mountain had been loosened
by the storm, and in its fall had caught
the lips of the ravine and blocked the
upper outlet from the nest of dwellings.
For a moment I feared that all had been
destroyed.


no-man's-land.
93
My feeling—Heaven help me !—was not
thankfulness for God's mercy and my escape,
but a bitter mad regret. I rushed franti-
cally to the edge, and when I saw only
the blackness of darkness I wept weak
tears. All the time the storm was tearing
at my body, and I had to grip hard by
hand and foot to keep my place.
Suddenly on the brink of the ravine I
saw a third figure. We two were not the
only fugitives. One of the Folk had
escaped.
I ran to it, and to my surprise the thing
as soon as it saw me rushed to meet me.
At first I thought it was with some instinct
of self - preservation, but when I saw its
eyes, I knew the purpose of fight. Clearly
one or other should go no more from the
place.
We were some ten yards from the brink
when I grappled with it. Dimly I heard
the woman scream with fright, and saw
her scramble across the hillside. Then we
were tugging in a death-throe, the hideous
smell of the thing in my face, its red eyes
burning into mine, and its hoarse voice
muttering. Its strength seemed incredible;


94
no-man's-land.
but I, too, am no weakling. We tugged
and strained, its nails biting into my flesh,
while I choked its throat unsparingly.
Every second I dreaded lest we should
plunge together over the ledge, for it was
thither my adversary tried to draw me.
I caught my heel in a nick of rock, and
pulled madly against it.
And then, while I was beginning to glory
with the pride of conquest, my hope was
dashed in pieces. The thing seemed to
break from my arms, and, as if in despair,
cast itself headlong into the impenetrable
darkness. I stumbled blindly after it, saved
myself on the brink, and fell back, sick and
ill, into a merciful swoon.


95
CHAPTER VIII.
NOTE IN CONCLUSION BY THE EDITOR.
At this point the narrative of my unfortunate
friend, Mr Graves of St Chad's, breaks off
abruptly. He wrote it shortly before his
death, and was prevented from completing it
by the shock of apoplexy which carried him
off. In accordance with the instructions in
his will, I have prepared it for publication, and
now in much fear and hesitation give it to the
world. First, however, I must supplement it
by such facts as fall within my knowledge.
The shepherd seems to have gone to Aller-
muir and by the help of the letter convinced
the inhabitants. A body of men was collected
under the landlord, and during the afternoon
set out for the hills. But unfortunately the
great midsummer storm—the most terrible of
recent climatic disturbances—had filled the
mosses and streams, and they found them-


96
no-man's-land.
selves unable to proceed by any direct road.
Ultimately late in the evening they arrived
at the cottage of Farawa, only to find there
a raving woman, the shepherd's sister, who
seemed crazy with brain - fever. She told
some rambling story about her escape, but
her narrative said nothing of Mr Graves.
So they treated her with what skill they
possessed, and sheltered for the night in and
around the cottage. Next morning the storm
had abated a little, and the woman had re-
covered something of her wits. From her
they learned that Mr Graves was lying in a
ravine on the side of the Muneraw in im-
minent danger of his life. A body set out to
find him; but so immense was the landslip,
and so dangerous the whole mountain, that it
was nearly evening when they recovered him
from the ledge of rock. He was alive, but
unconscious, and on bringing him back to the
cottage it was clear that he was, indeed, very
ill. There he lay for three months, while the
best skill that could be got was procured for
him. By dint of an uncommon toughness of
constitution he survived; but it was an old
and feeble man who returned to Oxford in the
early winter.


no-man's-land.
97
The shepherd and his sister immediately
left the countryside, and were never more
heard of, unless they are the pair of unfor-
tunates who are at present in a Scottish
pauper asylum, incapable of remembering even
their names. The people who last spoke with
them declared that their minds seemed weak-
ened by a great shock, and that it was hope-
less to try to get any connected or rational
statement.
The career of my poor friend from that hour
was little short of a tragedy. He awoke from
his illness to find the world incredulous; even
the country-folk of Allermuir set down the
story to the shepherd's craziness and my
friend's credulity. In Oxford his argument
was received with polite scorn. An account
of his experiences which he drew up for the
'Times' was refused by the editor; and an
article on "Primitive Peoples of the North,"
embodying what he believed to be the result
of his discoveries, was unanimously rejected
by every responsible journal in Europe. At
first he bore the treatment bravely. Eeflec-
tion convinced him that the colony had not
been destroyed. Proofs were still awaiting
his hand, and with courage and caution he
Q


98
N0-MAN8-LA.ND.
might yet triumph over his enemies. But
unfortunately, though the ardour of the
scholar burned more fiercely than ever and
all fear seemed to have been purged from his
soul, the last adventure had grievously sapped
his bodily strength. In the spring following
his accident he made an effort to reach the
spot—alone, for no one could be persuaded to
follow him in what was regarded as a childish
madness. He slept at the now deserted
cottage of Farawa, but in the morning found
himself unable to continue, and with difficulty
struggled back to the shepherd's cottage at
Allercleuch, where he was confined to bed for
a fortnight. Then it became necessary for
him to seek health abroad, and it was not till
the following autumn that he attempted the
journey again. He fell sick a second time at
the inn of Allermuir, and during his con-
valescence had himself carried to a knoll in
the inn garden, whence a glimpse can be
obtained of the shoulder of the Muneraw.
There he would sit for hours with his eyes
fixed on the horizon, and at times he would
be found weeping with weakness and vexa-
tion. The last attempt was made but two
months before his last illness. On this


no-man's-land.
99
occasion he got no farther than Carlisle,
where he was taken ill with what proved
to be a premonition of death. After that he
shut his lips tightly, as though recognising
the futility of his hopes. Whether he had
been soured by the treatment he received, or
whether his brain had already been weakened,
he had become a morose silent man, and for
the two years before his death had few friends
and no society. From the obituary notice in
the 'Times' I take the following paragraph,
which shows in what light the world had
come to look upon him:—
"At the outset of his career he was re-
garded as a rising scholar in one department
of archaeology, and his Taffert lectures were a
real contribution to an obscure subject. But
in after-life he was led into fantastic specula-
tions; and when he found himself unable to
convince his colleagues, he gradually retired
into himself, and lived practically a hermit's
life till his death. His career, thus broken
short, is a sad instance of the fascination
which the recondite and the quack can ex-
ercise even over men of approved ability."
And now his own narrative is published,
and the world can judge as it pleases about


100
no-man's-land.
the amazing romance. The view which will
doubtless find general acceptance is that the
whole is a figment of the brain, begotten of
some harmless moorland adventure and the
company of such religious maniacs as the
shepherd and his sister. But some who knew
the former sobriety and calmness of my
friend's mind may be disposed timorously
and with deep hesitation to another verdict.
They may accept the narrative, and believe
that somewhere in those moorlands he met
with a horrible primitive survival, passed
through the strangest adventure, and had
his fingers on an epoch - making discovery.
In this case they will be inclined to sym-
pathise with the loneliness and misunder-
standing of his latter days. It is not for
me to decide the question. Though a fellow-
historian, the Picts are outside my period,
and I dare not advance an opinion on a
matter with which I am not fully familiar.
But I would point out that the means of
settling the question are still extant, and I
would call upon some young archfeologist,
with a reputation to make, to seize upon
the chance of the century. Most of the ex-
presses for the North stop at Allerfoot; a ten-


no-man's-land.
101
miles' drive will bring him to Allermuir; and
then with a fifteen - miles' walk he is at
Farawa and on the threshold of discovery.
Let him follow the burn and cross the ridge
and ascend the Scarts of the Muneraw, and,
if he return at all, it may be with a more
charitable judgment of my unfortunate friend.





n.
THE FAR ISLANDS
"Lady Alice, Lady Louise,
Between the wash of the tumbling seas- J





106
THE FAR ISLANDS.
word in his ear and laying a finger on his
eyelids. Yet Colin was satisfied, and he alone
of the three, after their master's going, re-
mained on that coast of rock and heather.
In the third generation from Colin, as our
elders counted years, came one Colin the Red,
who built his keep on the cliffs of Acharra
and was a mighty sea-rover in his day. Five
times he sailed to the rich parts of France,
and a good score of times he carried his flag
of three stars against the easterly vikings.
A mere name in story, but a sounding piece
of nomenclature well garnished with tales.
A master-mind by all accounts, but cursed
with a habit of fantasy; for, hearing in his
old age of a land to the westward, he forth-
with sailed into the sunset, and three days
later was washed up, a twisted body, on one
of the outer isles.
So far it is but legend, but with his
grandson, Colin the Red, we fall into the
safer hands of the chroniclers. To him God
gave the unnumbered sorrows of story-telling,
for he was a bard, cursed with a bard's
fervours, and none the less a mighty warrior
among his own folk. He it was who wrote
the lament called 'The White Waters of


THE FAR ISLANDS.
107
Usna,' and the exquisite chain of romances,
'Glede-red Gold and Grey Silver.' His tales
were told by many fires, down to our grand-
fathers' time, and you will find them still
pounded at by the folk-lorists. But his airs
—they are eternal. On harp and pipe they
have lived through the centuries; twisted
and tortured, they survive in many song-
books; and I declare that the other day
I heard the most beautiful of them all
murdered by a band at a German watering-
place. This Colin led the wanderer's life,
for he disappeared at middle - age, no one
knew whither, and his return was long looked
for by his people. Some thought that he
became a Christian monk, the holy man
living in the sea-girt isle of Cuna, who was
found dead in extreme old age, kneeling on
the beach, with his arms, contrary to the
fashion of the Church, stretched to the
westward.
As history narrowed into bonds and forms
the descendants of Colin took Raden for their
surname, and settled more firmly on their
lands in the long peninsula of crag and inlets
which runs west to the Atlantic. Under
Donald of the Isles they harried the Kings


THE FAR ISLANDS.
109
archers at Flodden, and was slain himself in
the steel circle around the king.
But the years brought peace and a greater
wealth, and soon the cold stone tower was left
solitary on the headland, and the new house
of Kinlochuna rose by the green links of the
stream. The family changed its faith, and an
Episcopal chaplain took the place of the old
mass-priest in the tutoring of the sons. Radens
were in the '15 and the '45. They rose with
Bute to power, and they long disputed the
pride of Dundas in the northern capital. They
intermarried with great English houses till the
sons of the family were Scots only in name,
living much abroad or in London, many of
them English landowners by virtue of a
mother's blood. Soon the race was of the
common over - civilised type, graceful, well-
mannered, with abundant good looks, but only
once in a generation reverting to the rugged
northern strength. Eton and Oxford had in
turn displaced the family chaplain, and the
house by the windy headland grew emptier
and emptier save when grouse and deer
brought home its fickle masters.


110
II
.
A childish illness brought Colin to Kinlochuna
when he had reached the mature age of five,
and delicate health kept him there for the
greater part of the next six years. During
the winter he lived in London, but from the
late northern spring, through all the long
bright summers, he lived in the great tenant-
less place without company—for he was an
only child. A French nurse had the charge
of his doings, and when he had passed through
the formality of lessons there were the long
pinewoods at his disposal, the rough moor, the
wonderful black holes with the rich black mud
in them, and best of all the bay of Acharra,
below the headland, with Cuna lying in the
waves a mile to the west. At such times his
father was busy elsewhere; his mother was
dead; the family had few near relatives; so
he passed a solitary childhood in the company
of seagulls and the birds of the moor.


THE FAR ISLANDS.
Ill
His time for the beach was the afternoon.
On the left as you go down through the woods
from the house there runs out the great head-
land of Acharra, red and grey with mosses,
and with a nimbus always of screaming sea-
fowl. To the right runs a low beach of sand,
passing into rough limestone boulders and then
into the heather of the wood. This in turn is
bounded by a reef of low rocks falling by gentle
breaks to the water's edge. It is crowned
with a tangle of heath and fern, bright at
most seasons with flowers, and dwarf pine-
trees straggle on its crest till one sees the
meaning of its Gaelic name, "The Ragged
Cock's-Comb." This place was Colin's play-
ground in fine weather. When it blew rain or
snow from the north he dwelt indoors among
dogs and books, puzzling his way through
great volumes from his father's shelves. But
when the mild west-wind weather fell on the
sea, then he would lie on the hot sand—
Amelie the nurse reading a novel on the
nearest rock—and kick his small heels as he
followed his fancy. He built great sand castles
to the shape of Acharra old tower, and peopled
them with preposterous knights and ladies;
he drew great moats and rivers for the tide to


112
THE FAR ISLANDS.
fill; he fought battles innumerable with crack-
ling seaweed, till Amelie, with her sharp cry
of " Colin, Colin," would carry him houseward
for tea.
Two fancies remained in his mind through
those boyish years. One was about the mys-
terious shining sea before him. In certain
weathers it seemed to him a solid pathway.
Cuna, the little ragged isle, ceased to block
the horizon, and his own white road ran away
down into the west, till suddenly it stopped
and he saw no farther. He knew he ought
to see more, but always at one place, just
when his thoughts were pacing the white
road most gallantly, there came a baffling
mist to his sight, and he found himself look-
ing at a commonplace sea with Cuna lying
very real and palpable in the offing. It was
a vexatious limitation, for all his dreams were
about this pathway. One day in June, when
the waters slept in a deep heat, he came down
the sands barefoot, and lo! there was his
pathway. For one moment things seemed
clear, the mist had not gathered on the road,
and with a cry he ran down to the tide's edge
and waded in. The touch of water dispelled
the illusion, and almost in tears he saw the


THE FAR ISLANDS.
113
cruel back of Cuna blotting out his own magic
way.
The other fancy was about the low ridge of
rocks which bounded the bay on the right.
His walks had never extended beyond it,
either on the sands or inland, for that way
lay a steep hillside and a perilous bog. But
often on the sands he had come to its foot
and wondered what country lay beyond. He
made many efforts to explore it, difficult
efforts, for the vigilant Amelie had first to
be avoided. Once he was almost at the top
when some seaweed to which he clung gave
way, and he rolled back again to the soft
warm sand. By - and - by he found that he
knew what was beyond. A clear picture had
built itself up in his brain of a mile of reefs,
with sand in bars between them, and beyond
all a sea-wood of alders slipping from the hill's
skirts to the water's edge. This was not what
he wanted in his explorations, so he stopped
till one day it struck him that the westward
view might reveal something beyond the hog-
backed Cuna. One day, pioneering alone, he
scaled the steepest heights of the sea-weed
and pulled his chin over the crest of the
ridge. There, sure enough, was his picture
H


114
THE FAR ISLANDS.
—a mile of reefs and the tattered sea-wood.
He turned eagerly seawards. Cuna still lay
humped on the waters, but beyond it he
seemed to see his shining pathway running
far to a speck which might be an island.
Crazy with pleasure he stared at the vision,
till slowly it melted into the waves, and Cuna
the inexorable once more blocked the sky-
line. He climbed down, his heart in a doubt
between despondency and hope.
It was the last day of such fancies, for on
the morrow he had to face the new world of
school.
At Cecil's Colin found a new life and a
thousand new interests. His early delicacy
had been driven away by the sea - winds of
Acharra, and he was rapidly growing up a
tall, strong child, straight of limb like all his
house, but sinewy and alert beyond his years.
He learned new games with astonishing fa-
cility, became a fast bowler with a genius for
twists, and a Rugby three-quarters full of
pluck and cunning. He soon attained to the
modified popularity of a private school, and,
being essentially clean, strong, and healthy,
found himself a mark for his juniors' worship


THE FAR ISLANDS.
115
and a favourite with masters. The homage
the football - field he was a leader, but in
private he had the nervous, sensitive manners
of the would-be recluse. No one ever accused
him of " side "—his polite, halting address was
the same to junior and senior; and the result
was that wild affection which simplicity in the
great is wont to inspire. He spoke with a
pure accent, in which lurked no northern
trace; in a little he had forgotten all about
his birthplace and his origin. His name had
at first acquired for him the sobriquet of
"Scottie," but the title was soon dropped
from its manifest inaptness.
In his second year at Cecil's he caught a
prevalent fever, and for days lay very near
the brink of death. At his worst he was
wildly delirious, crying ceaselessly for Acharra
and the beach at Kinlochuna. But as he grew
convalescent the absorption remained, and for
the moment he seemed to have forgotten his
southern life. He found himself playing on
the sands, always with the boundary ridge
before him, and the hump of Cuna rising in
the sea. When dragged back to his environ-


116
THE FAR ISLANDS.
uient by the inquiries of Bellew, his special
friend, who came to sit with him, he was so
abstracted and forgetful that the good Bellew
was seriously grieved. "The chap's a bit
cracked, you know," he announced in hall.
"Didn't know me. Asked me what 'footer'
meant when I told him about the Bayswick
match, and talked about nothing but a lot of
heathen Scotch names."
One dream haunted Colin throughout the
days of his recovery. He was tormented
with a furious thirst, poorly assuaged at long
intervals by watered milk. So when he
crossed the borders of dreamland his first
search was always for a well. He tried the
brushwood inland from the beach, but it was
dry as stone. Then he climbed with difficulty
the boundary ridge, and found little pools of
salt water, while far on the other side gleamed
the dark black bog-holes. Here was not what
he sought, and he was in deep despair, till
suddenly over the sea he caught a glimpse of
his old path running beyond Cuna to a bank
of mist. He rushed down to the tide's edge,
and to his amazement found solid ground.
Now was the chance for which he had long
looked, and he ran happily westwards, till of


THE FAR ISLANDS.
117
a sudden the solid earth seemed to sink with
him, and he was in the waters struggling.
But two curious things he noted. One was
that the far bank of mist seemed to open for
a pin-point of time, and he had a gleam of
land. He saw nothing distinctly, only a line
which was not mist and was not water. The
second was that the water was fresh, and as
he was drinking from this curious new fresh
sea he awoke. The dream was repeated three
times before he left the sick-room. Always
he wakened at the same place, always he
quenched his thirst in the fresh sea, but never
again did the mist open for him and show him
the strange country.
• • • • • •
From Cecil's he went to the famous school
which was the tradition in his family. The
Head spoke to his house-master of his coming.
"We are to have another Raden here," he
said, "and I am glad of it, if the young one
turns out to be anything like the others.
There's a good deal of dry-rot among the boys
just now. They are all too old for their years
and too wise in the wrong way. They haven't
anything like the enthusiasm in sports they
had twenty years ago when I first came here.


118
THE FAR ISLANDS.
I hope this young Raden will stir them up."
The house-master agreed, and when he first
caught sight of Colin's slim, well-knit figure,
looked into the handsome kindly eyes, and
heard his curiously diffident speech, his doubts
vanished. "We have got the right stuff
now," he told himself, and the senior for
whom the new boy fagged made the same
comment.
From the anomalous insignificance of fag-
dom Colin climbed up the School, leaving
everywhere a record of honest good-nature.
He was allowed to forget his cricket and foot-
ball, but in return he was initiated into the
mysteries of the river. Water had always
been his delight, so he went through the
dreary preliminaries of being coached in a
tub - pair till he learned to swing steadily
and get his arms quickly forward. Then
came the stages of scratch fours and scratch
eights, till after a long apprenticeship he
was promoted to the dignity of a thwart in
the Eight itself. In his last year he was
Captain of Boats, a position which joins the
responsibility of a Cabinet Minister to the
rapturous popular applause of a successful
warrior. Nor was he the least distinguished


THE FAR ISLANDS.
119
of a great band. With Colin at seven the
School won the Ladies' after the closest race
on record.
The Head's prophecy fell true, for Colin
was a born leader. For all his good-humour
and diffidence of speech, he had a trick of
shutting his teeth which all respected. As
captain he was the idol of the school, and
he ruled it well and justly. For the rest,
he was a curious boy with none of the
ordinary young enthusiasms, reserved for all
his kindliness. At house "shouters" his was
not the voice which led the stirring strains of
"Stroke it all you know," though his position
demanded it. He cared little about work,
and the School - house scholar, who fancied
him from his manner a devotee of things in-
tellectual, found in Colin but an affected
interest. He read a certain amount of
modern poetry with considerable boredom;
fiction he never opened. The truth was that
he had a romance in his own brain which,
willy nilly, would play itself out, and which
left him small relish for the pale second-hand
inanities of art. Often, when with others he
would lie in the deep meadows by the river
on some hot summer's day, his fancies would


120
THE FAR ISLANDS.
take a curious colour. He adored the soft
English landscape, the lush grasses, the slow
streams, the ancient secular trees. But as he
looked into the hazy green distance a colder
air would blow on his cheek, a pungent smell
of salt and pines would be for a moment in
his nostrils, and he would be gazing at a line
of waves on a beach, a ridge of low rocks, and
a shining sea-path running out to—ah, that
he could not tell! The envious Cuna would
suddenly block all the vistas. He had con-
stantly the vision before his eyes, and he
strove to strain into the distance before Cuna
should intervene. Once or twice he seemed
almost to achieve it. He found that by keep-
ing on the top of the low rock-ridge he could
cheat Cuna by a second or two, and get a
glimpse of a misty something out in the west.
The vision took odd times for recurring,—once
or twice in lecture, once on the cricket-ground,
many times in the fields of a Sunday, and
once while he paddled down to the start in
a Trials race. It gave him a keen pleasure:
it was his private domain, where at any mo-
ment he might make some enchanting dis-
covery.
At this time he began to spend his vaca-


THE FAR ISLANDS.
121
tions at Kinlochuna. His father, an elderly
ex-diplomat, had permanently taken up his
abode there, and was rapidly settling into the
easy life of the Scotch laird. Colin returned
to his native place without enthusiasm. His
childhood there had been full of lonely hours,
and he had come to like the warm south
country. He found the house full of people,
for his father entertained hugely, and the
talk was of sport and sport alone. As a
rule, your very great athlete is bored by
Scotch shooting. Long hours of tramping
and crouching among heather cramp with-
out fully exercising the body; and unless
he has the love of the thing ingrained in
him, the odds are that he will wish himself home. The father, in his new-found admira-
tion for his lot, was content to face all
weathers; the son found it an effort to
keep pace with such vigour. He thought
upon the sunlit fields and reedy water-
courses with regret, and saw little in the
hills but a rough waste scarred with rock
and sour with mosses.
He read widely throughout these days, for
his father had a taste for modern letters, and
new books lay littered about the rooms. He


122
THE FAR ISLANDS.
read queer Celtic tales which he thought
"sickening rot," and mild Celtic poetry
which he failed to understand. Among the
guests was a noted manufacturer of fiction,
whom the elder Baden had met somewhere
and bidden to Kinlochuna. He had heard
the tale of Colin's ancestors and the sea head-
land of Acharra, and one day he asked the
boy to show him the place, as he wished to
make a story of it. Colin assented un-
willingly, for he had been slow to visit this
place of memories, and he did not care to
make his first experiment in such company.
But the gentleman would not be gainsaid, so
the two scrambled through the sea-wood and
climbed the low ridge which looked over the
bay. The weather was mist and drizzle;
Cuna had wholly hidden herself, and the bluff
Acharra loomed hazy and far. Colin was
oddly disappointed: this reality was a poor
place compared with his fancies. His com-
panion stroked his peaked beard, talked non-
sense about Colin the Red and rhetoric about
"the spirit of the misty grey weather having
entered into the old tale." "Think," he cried;
"to those old warriors beyond that bank of
mist was the whole desire of life, the Golden


THE FAR ISLANDS. 123
City, the Far Islands, whatever you care to
call it." Colin shivered, as if his holy places
had been profaned, set down the man in his
mind most unjustly as an "awful little cad,"
and hurried him back to the house.
Oxford received the boy with open arms,
for his reputation had long preceded him. To
the majority of men he was the one freshman
of his year, and gossip was busy with his
prospects. Nor was gossip disappointed. In
his first year he rowed seven in the Eight.
The next year he was captain of his college
boats, and a year later the O.U.B.C. made
him its president. For three years he rowed
in the winning Eight, and old coaches agreed
that in him the perfect seven had been found.
It was he who in the famous race of 18—
caught up in the last three hundred yards the
quickened stroke which gave Oxford victory.
As he grew to his full strength he became a
splendid figure of a man—tall, supple, deep-
chested for all his elegance. His quick dark
eyes and his kindly hesitating manners made
people think his face extraordinarily handsome,
when really it was in no way above the com-
mon. But his whole figure, as he stood in his


124
THE FAR ISLANDS.
shorts and sweater on the raft at Putney, was
so full of youth and strength that people in-
voluntarily smiled when they saw him — a
smile of pleasure in so proper a piece of man-
hood.
Colin enjoyed life hugely at Oxford, for to
one so frank and well equipped the place gave
of its best. He was the most distinguished
personage of his day there, but, save to school
friends and the men he met officially on the
river, he was little known. * His diffidence
and his very real exclusiveness kept him from
being the centre of a host of friends. His
own countrymen in the place were utterly
nonplussed by him. They claimed him
eagerly as a fellow, but he had none of the
ordinary characteristics of the race. There
were Scots of every description around him
—pale-faced Scots who worked incessantly,
metaphysical Scots who talked in the Union,
robustious Scots who played football. They
were all men of hearty manners and many
enthusiasms,—who quoted Burns and dined
to the immortal bard's honour every 25th
of January; who told interminable Scotch
stories, and fell into fervours over national
sports, dishes, drinks, and religions. To the


THE FAE ISLANDS.
125
poor Colin it was all inexplicable. At the
remote house of Kinlochuna he had never
heard of a Free Kirk or a haggis. He had
never read a line of Burns, Scott bored him
exceedingly, and in all honesty he thought
Scots games inferior to southern sports. He
had no great love for the bleak country, he
cared nothing for the traditions of his house,
so he was promptly set down by his com-
patriots as "denationalised and degenerate."
He was idle, too, during these years as far
as his "schools" were concerned, but he was
always very intent upon his own private
business. Whenever he sat down to read,
when he sprawled on the grass at river
picnics, in chapel, in lecture—in short, at
any moment when his body was at rest and
his mind at leisure—his fancies were off on
the same old path. Things had changed,
however, in that country. The boyish device
of a hard road running over the waters had
gone, and now it was invariably a boat which
he saw beached on the shingle. It differed
in shape. At first it was an ugly salmon-
cable, such as the fishermen used for the
nets at Kinlochuna. Then it passed, by
rapid transitions, through a canvas skiff


126
THE FAR ISLANDS.
which it took good watermanship to sit, a
whiff, an ordinary dinghey, till at last it
settled itself into a long rough boat, pointed
at both ends, with oar-holes in the sides
instead of row-locks. It was the devil's own
business to launch it, and launch it anew he
was compelled to for every journey; for
though he left it bound in a little rock
hollow below the ridge after landing, yet
when he returned, lo! there was the clumsy
thing high and dry upon the beach.
The odd point about the new venture was
that Cuna had ceased to trouble him. As
soon as he had pulled his first stroke the
island disappeared, and nothing lay before
him but the sea-fog. Yet, try as he might,
he could come little nearer. The shores be-
hind him might sink and lessen, but the
impenetrable mist was still miles to the
westward. Sometimes he rowed so far that
the shore was a thin line upon the horizon,
but when he turned the boat it seemed to
ground in a second on the beach. The long
laboured journey out and the instantaneous
return puzzled him at first, but soon he
became used to them. His one grief was
the mist, which seemed to grow denser as


THE FAR ISLANDS.
127
he neared it. The sudden glimpse of land
which he had got from the ridge of rock in
the old boyish days was now denied him,
and with the denial came a keener exulta-
tion in the quest. Somewhere in the west,
he knew, must be land, and in this land a
well of sweet water — for so he had in-
terpreted his feverish dream. Sometimes,
when the wind blew against him, he caught
scents from it—generally the scent of pines,
as on the little ridge on the shore behind
him.
One day on his college barge, while he
was waiting for a picnic party to start, he
seemed to get nearer than before. Out on
that western sea, as he saw it, it was fresh,
blowing weather, with a clear hot sky above.
It was hard work rowing, for the wind was
against him, and the sun scorched his fore-
head. The air seemed full of scents — and
sounds, too, sounds of far-away surf and wind
in trees. He rested for a moment on his
oars and turned his head. His heart beat
quickly, for there was a rift in the mist, and
far through a line of sand ringed with snow-
white foam.
Somebody shook him roughly,—" Come on,


128
THE FAR ISLANDS.
Colin, old man. They're all waiting for you.
Do you know you've been half asleep?"
Colin rose and followed silently, with drowsy
eyes. His mind was curiously excited. He
had looked inside the veil of mist. Now he
knew what was the land he sought.
He made the voyage often, now that the
spell was broken. It was short work to
launch the boat, and, whereas it had been
a long pull formerly, now it needed only a
few strokes to bring him to the Rim of the
Mist. There was no chance of getting farther,
and he scarcely tried. He was content to
rest there, in a world of curious scents and
sounds, till the mist drew down and he was
driven back to shore.
The change in his environment troubled
him little. For a man who has been an idol
at the University to fall suddenly into the
comparative insignificance of town is often a
bitter experience; but Colin, whose thoughts
were not ambitious, scarcely noticed it. He
found that he was less his own master than
before, but he humbled himself to his new
duties without complaint. Many of his old
friends were about him; he had plenty of


THE FAR ISLANDS. 129
acquaintances; and, being "sufficient unto
himself," he was unaccustomed to ennui. In-
vitations showered upon him thick and fast.
Match-making mothers, knowing his birth and
his father's income, and reflecting that he was
the only child of his house, desired him as a
son-in-law. He was bidden welcome every-
where, and the young girls, for whose sake he
was thus courted, found in him an attractive
mystery. The tall good-looking athlete, with
the kind eyes and the preposterously nervous
manner, wakened their maidenly sympathies.
As they danced with him or sat next to him
at dinner, they talked fervently of Oxford, of
the north, of the army, of his friends.
"Stupid, but nice, my dear," was Lady
Afflint's comment; and Miss Clara Etheridge,
the beauty of the year, declared to her friends
that he was a "dear boy, but so awk-
ward." He was always forgetful, and ever
apologetic; and when he forgot the Shand-
wicks' theatre - party, the Herapaths' dance,
and at least a dozen minor matters, he began
to acquire the reputation of a cynic and a
recluse.
"You're a queer chap, Col," Lieutenant
Bellew said in expostulation.
I


130
THE FAR ISLANDS.
Colin shrugged his shoulders; he was used
to the description.
"Do you know that Clara Etheridge was
trying all she knew to please you this after-
noon, and you looked as if you weren't
listening? Most men would have given thei#
ears to be in your place."
"I'm awfully sorry, but I thought I was
very polite to her."
"And why weren't you at the Marshams'
garden-party?"
"Oh, I went to polo with Collinson and
another man. And, I say, old chap, I'm not
coming to the Logans to-morrow. I've got
a fence on with Adair at the school."
Little Bellew, who was a tremendous
mirror of fashion and chevalier in general,
looked up curiously at his tall friend.
"Why don't you like the women, Col,
when they're so fond of you?"
"They aren't," said Colin hotly, "and I
don't dislike 'em. But, Lord! they bore me.
I might be doing twenty things when I talk
nonsense to one of 'em for an hour. I come
back as stupid as an owl, and besides there's
heaps of things better sport."
The truth was that, while among men he


THE FAR ISLANDS.
131
was a leader and at his ease, among women
his psychic balance was so oddly upset that
he grew nervous and returned unhappy. The
boat on the beach, ready in general to appear
at the slightest call, would delay long after
such experiences, and its place would be taken
by some woman's face, for which he cared not
a straw. For the boat, on the other hand, he
cared a very great deal. In all his frank
wholesome existence there was this enchanting
background, this pleasure - garden which he
cherished more than anything in life. He
had come of late to look at it with somewhat
different eyes. The eager desire to search
behind the mist was ever with him, but now
he had also some curiosity about the details
of the picture. As he pulled out to the Rim
of the Mist sounds seemed to shape them-
selves on his lips, which by-and-by grew into
actual words in his memory. He wrote them
down in scraps, and after some sorting they
seemed to him a kind of Latin. He remem-
bered a college friend of his, one Medway,
now reading for the Bar, who had been the
foremost scholar of his acquaintance; so with
the scrap of paper in his pocket he climbed one
evening to Medway's rooms in the Temple.


132
THE FAR ISLANDS.
The man read the words curiously, and
puzzled for a bit. "What's made you take
to Latin comps so late in life, Colin? It's
baddish, you know, even for you. I thought
they'd have licked more into you at Eton."
Colin grinned with amusement. "I'll tell
you about it later," he said. "Can you
make out what it means?"
"It seems to be a kind of dog-Latin or
monkish Latin or something of the sort," said
Medway. "It reads like this: 'Soles occidere
solent' (that's cribbed from Catullus, and be-
sides it's the regular monkish pun) . . . qua
. . . then blandula something. Then there's
a lot of Choctaw, and then ilia insulcs dileetce
in quas festinant somnia animulce gaudia.
That's pretty fair rot. Hullo, by George!
here's something better — Insula pomorum
insula vita.That's Geoffrey of Monmouth."
He made a dive to a bookcase and pulled
out a battered little calf-bound duodecimo.
"Here's all about your Isle of Apple-trees.
Listen. 'Situate far out in the Western
ocean, beyond the Utmost Islands, beyond
even the little Isle of Sheep where the cairns
of dead men are, lies the Island of Apple-
trees where the heroes and princes of the


134
THE FAR ISLANDS.
good. Ton my word, now I think of it,
there's always been a scent of apples."
"Sort of cider-press? Well, I must be
off. You'd better come round to the club
and see the telegrams about the war. You
should be keen about it."
One evening, a week later, Medway met
a friend called Tillotson at the club, and,
being lonely, they dined together. Tillotson
was a man of some note in science, a
dabbler in psychology, an amateur historian,
a ripe genealogist. They talked of politics
and the war, of a new book, of Mrs Runny-
mede, and finally of their hobbies.
"I am writing an article," said Tillotson.
"Craikes asked me to do it for the
'Monthly.' It's on a nice point in psychics.
I call it 'The Transmission of Fallacies,' but
I do not mean the logical kind. The ques-
tion is, Can a particular form of halluci-
nation run in a family for generations?
The proof must, of course, come from my
genealogical studies. I maintain it can. I
instance the Douglas-Ernotts, not one of
whom can see straight with the left eye.
That is one side. In another class of
examples I take the Drapiers, who hate


THE FAR ISLANDS.
135
salt water and never go on board ship if
they can help it. Then you remember the
Durwards? Old Lady Balcrynie used to
tell me that no one of the lot could ever
stand the sight of a green frock. There's
a chance for the romancer. The Manor-
waters have the same madness, only their
colour is red."
A vague remembrance haunted Medway's
brain.
"I know a man who might give you
points from his own case. Did you ever
meet a chap Eaden—Colin Baden?"
Tillotson nodded. "Long chap — in the
Guards? 'Varsity oar, and used to be a crack
bowler? No, I don't know him. I know
him well by sight, and I should like to meet
him tremendously—as a genealogist, of course."
"Why?" asked Medway.
"Why? Because the man's family is
unique. You never hear much about them
nowadays, but away up in that north-west
corner of Scotland they have ruled since
the days of Noah. Why, man, they were
aristocrats when our Howards and Nevilles
were greengrocers. I wish you would get
this Baden to meet me some night."


136
THE FAR ISLANDS.
"I am afraid there's no chance of it just
at present," said Medway, taking up an
evening paper. "I see that his regiment
has been ordered to the front. But remind
me when he comes back, and I'll be
delighted."


137
III
And now there began for Colin a curious
divided life,—without, a constant shifting of
scene, days of heat and bustle and toil,—
within, a slow, tantalizing, yet exquisite
adventure. The Rim of the Mist was now
no more the goal of his journeys, but the
starting-point. Lying there, amid cool,
fragrant sea-winds, his fanciful ear was
subtly alert for the sounds of the dim land
before him. Sleeping and waking the quest
haunted him. As he flung himself on his
bed the kerosene-filled air would change to
an ocean freshness, the old boat would rock
beneath him, and with clear eyes and a boy-
ish hope he would be waiting and watching.
And then suddenly he would be back
on shore, Cuna and the Acharra headland
shining grey in the morning light, and with
gritty mouth and sand-filled eyes he would
awaken to the heat of the desert camp.


138
THE FAR ISLANDS.
He was kept busy, for his good-humour
and energy made him a willing slave, and
he was ready enough for volunteer work
when others were weak with heat and
despair. A thirty-mile ride left him un-
tired; more, he followed the campaign with
a sharp intelligence and found a new en-
thusiasm for his profession. Discomforts
there might be, but the days were happy;
and then—the cool land, the bright land,
which was his for the thinking of it.
Soon they gave him reconnoitring work
to do, and his wits were put to the trial.
He came well out of the thing, and earned
golden praise from the silent colonel in
command. He enjoyed it as he had en-
joyed a hard race on the river or a good
cricket match, and when his worried com-
panions marvelled at his zeal he stammered
and grew uncomfortable.
"How the deuce do you keep it up, Colin?"
the major asked him. "I'm an old hand at
the job, and yet I've got a temper like devilled
bones. You seem as chirpy as if you were
going out to fish a chalk-stream on a June
morning."
"Well, the fact is "and Colin pulled


THE FAR ISLANDS.
139
himself up short, knowing that he could never
explain. He felt miserably that he had an
unfair advantage of the others. Poor Bellew,
who groaned and swore in the heat at his side,
knew nothing of the Rim of the Mist. It was
really rough luck on the poor beggars, and
who but himself was the fortunate man?
As the days passed a curious thing hap-
pened. He found fragments of the Other
world straying into his common life. The
barriers of the two domains were falling, and
more than once he caught himself looking at
a steel-blue sea when his eyes should have
found a mustard-coloured desert. One day,
on a reconnoitring expedition, they stopped
for a little on a hillock above a jungle of scrub,
and, being hot and tired, scanned listlessly the
endless yellow distances.
"I suppose yon hill is about ten miles off,"
said Bellew with dry lips. Colin looked vaguely. "I should say five."
"And what's that below it — the black
patch? Stones or scrub 1"
Colin was in a day-dream. "Why do you
call it black? It's blue, quite blue."
"Rot," said the other. "It's grey-black."
"No, it's water with the sun shining on it.


140
THE FAR ISLANDS.
It's blue, but just at the edges it's very near
sea-green."
Bellew rose excitedly. "Hullo, Col, you're
seeing the mirage! And you the fittest of
the lot of us 1 You've got the sun in your
head, old man!"
"Mirage!" Colin cried in contempt. He
was awake now, but the thought of confusing
his own bright western sea with a mirage
gave him a curious pain. For a moment he
felt the gulf of separation between his two
worlds, but only for a moment. As the party
remounted he gave his fancies the rein, and
ere he reached camp he had felt the oars in
his hand and sniffed the apple-tree blossom
from the distant beaches.
The major came to him after supper.
"Bellew told me you saw the mirage to-
day, Colin," he said. "I expect your eyes
are getting a bit bad. Better get your sand-
spectacles out."
Colin laughed. "Thanks. It's awfully
good of you to bother, but I think Bellew
took me up wrong. I never was fitter in my
life."
By-and-by the turn came for pride to be


THE FAR ISLANDS.
141
humbled. A low desert fever took him, and
though he went through the day as usual, it
was with dreary lassitude; and at night, with
hot hands clasped above his damp hair, he
found sleep a hard goddess to conquer.
It was the normal condition of the others,
so he had small cause to complain, but it
worked havoc with his fancies. He had never
been ill since his childish days, and this little
fever meant much to one whose nature was
poised on a needle-point. He found himself
confronted with a hard bare world, with the
gilt rubbed from its corners. The Rim of the
Mist seemed a place of vague horrors; when
he reached it his soul was consumed with
terror; he struggled im potently to advance;
behind him Cuna and the Acharra coast
seemed a place of evil dreams. Again, as in
his old fever, he was tormented with a de-
vouring thirst, but the sea beside him was
not fresh, but brackish as a rock-pool. He
yearned for the apple-tree beaches in front;
there, he knew, were cold springs of water;
the fresh smell of it was blown towards him
in his nightmare.
But as the days passed and the misery for
all grew more intense, an odd hope began to


142
THE FAR ISLANDS.
rise in his mind. It could not last, coolness
and health were waiting near, and his reason for
the hope came from the odd events at the Rim
of the Mist. The haze was clearing from the
foreground, the surf-lined coast seemed nearer,
and though all was obscure save the milk-
white sand and the foam, yet here was earnest
enough for him. Once more he became cheer-
ful; weak and light-headed he rode out again;
and the major, who was recovering from sun-
stroke, found envy take the place of pity in
his soul.
The hope was near fulfilment. One evening
when the heat was changing into the cooler
twilight, Colin and Bellew were sent with a
small picked body to scour the foot-hills above
the river in case of a flank attack during the
night-march. It was work they had done
regularly for weeks, and it is possible that
precautions were relaxed. At any rate, as
they turned a corner of hill, in a sandy pass
where barren rocks looked down on more bar-
ren thorn thickets, a couple of rifle-shots rang
out from the scarp, and above them appeared
a line of dark faces and white steel. A mere
handful, taken at a disadvantage, they could
not hope to disperse numbers, so Colin gave


THE FAR ISLANDS.
143
the word to wheel about and return. Again
shots rang out, and little Bellew had only
time to catch at his friend's arm to save him
from falling from the saddle.
The word of command had scarcely left
Colin's mouth when a sharp pain went through
his chest, and his breath seemed to catch and
stop. He felt as in a condensed moment of
time the heat, the desert smell, the dust in
his eyes and throat, while he leaned helplessly
forward on his horse's mane. Then the world
vanished for him. . . . The boat was rocking
under him, the oars in his hand. He pulled
and it moved, straight, arrow-like towards
the forbidden shore. As if under a great wind
the mist furled up and fled. Scents of pines,
of apple-trees, of great fields of thyme and
heather, hung about him; the sound of wind
in a forest, of cool waters falling in showers,
of old moorland music, came thin and faint
with an exquisite clearness. A second and
the boat was among the surf, its gunwale
ringed with white foam, as it leaped to the
still waters beyond. Clear and deep and still
the water lay, and then the white beaches
shelved downward, and the boat grated on the
sand. He turned, every limb alert with a


144
THE FAR ISLANDS.
strange new life, crying out words which had
shaped themselves on his lips and which an
echo seemed to catch and answer. There was
the green forest before him, the hills of peace,
the cold white waters. With a passionate joy
he leaped on the beach, his arms outstretched
to this new earth, this light of the world,
this old desire of the heart—youth, rapture,
immortality.
• ••••••
Bellew brought the body back to camp,
himself half-dead with fatigue and whimper-
ing like a child. He almost fell from his
horse, and when others took his burden
from him and laid it reverently in his
tent, he stood beside it, rubbing sand and
sweat from his poor purblind eyes, his teeth
chattering with fever. He was given some-
thing to drink, but he swallowed barely a
mouthful.
"It was some d-d-damned sharpshooter," he
said. "Right through the breast, and he
never spoke to me again. My poor old Col!
He was the best chap God ever created, and
I do-don't care a dash what becomes of me
now. I was at school with him, you know,
you men."


THE FAIt ISLANDS.
145
"Was he killed outright?" asked the major
hoarsely.
"N-no. He lived for about five minutes.
But I think the sun had got into his head or
he was mad with pain, for he d-d-didn't know
where he was. He kept crying out about the
smell, of pine-trees and heather and a lot of
pure nonsense about water."
"Et dulces reminiscitur Argos," somebody
quoted mournfully, as they went out to the
desert evening.
K


i


III.
THE WATCHER BY
THE THRESHOLD





THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
CHAPTER I.
THE HOUSE OF MORE.
L
IHAVE told this story to many audiences
with diverse results, and once again I
take my reputation in my hands and brave
the perils. To. the common circle of my
friends it was a romance for a winter's
fire, and I, the most prosaic of men, was
credited with a fancy. Once I repeated it
to an acquaintance, who, scenting mystery,
transcribed it in a note - book, and, with
feigned names, it figured in the publica-
tions of a Learned Society. One man only
heard me with true appreciation; but he
was a wandering spirit with an ear open


150 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
to marvels, and I hesitate to advance his
security. He received it simply, saying
that God was great, and I cannot improve
upon his comment.
A chill evening in the early October of
the year 189- found me driving in a dog-
cart through the belts of antique woodland
which form the lowland limits of the hilly
parish of More. The Highland express,
which brought me from the north, took
me no' farther than Perth. Thence it had
been a slow journey in a disjointed local
train, till I emerged on the platform at
Morefoot, with a bleak prospect of pit-
stalks, coal-heaps, certain sour corn-lands,
and far to the west a line of moor where
the sun was setting. A neat groom and
a respectable trap took the edge off my
discomfort, and soon I had forgotten my
sacrifice and found eyes for the darkening
landscape. We were driving through a land
of thick woods, cut at rare intervals by old
long-frequented highways. The More, which
at Morefoot is an open sewer, became a
sullen woodland stream, where the brown
leaves of the season drifted. At times we
would pass an ancient lodge, and through


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 151
a gap in the trees would come a glimpse
of chipped crow-step gable. The names of
such houses, as told me by my companion,
were all famous. This one had been the
home of a drunken Jacobite laird, and a
kind of north-country Medmenham. Unholy
revels had waked the old halls, and the
devil had been toasted at many a hell-fire
dinner. The next was the property of a
great Scots law family, and there the old
Lord of Session who built the place,* in his
frowsy wig and carpet slippers, had laid
down the canons of Taste for his day and
society. The whole country had the air of
faded and bygone gentility. The mossy
roadside walls had stood for two hundred
years, the few wayside houses were toll-bars
or defunct hostelries. The names, too, were
great — Scots baronial with a smack of
France — Chatelray and Reiverslaw, Black
Holm and Champertoun. The place had a
cunning charm, mystery dwelt in every
cranny, and yet it did not please me. The
earth smelt heavy and raw, the roads were
red underfoot, all was old, sorrowful, and
uncanny. Compared with the fresh High-
land glen I had left, where wind and sun


152 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
and flying showers were never absent, all
was chilly and dull and dead. Even when
the sun sent a shiver of crimson over the
crests of certain firs, I felt no delight in
the prospect. I admitted shamefacedly to
myself that I was in a very bad temper.
I had been staying at Glenaicill with the
Clanroydens, and for a week had found, the
proper pleasure in life. You know the
house with its old rooms and gardens, and
the miles of heather which defend it from
the world. The shooting had been extra-
ordinary for a wild place far on in the
season, for there are few partridges and
the woodcock are notoriously late. I had
done respectably in my stalking, more than
respectably on the river, and creditably on
the moors. Moreover, there were pleasant
people in the house — and there were the
Clanroydens. I had had a hard year's work,
sustained to the last moment of term, and
a fortnight in Norway had been disastrous.
It was therefore with real comfort that I
had settled myself down for another ten
days in Glenaicill, when all my plans were
shattered by Sybil's letter. Sybil is my
cousin and my very good friend, and in


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 153
old days when I was briefless I had fallen
in love with her many times. But she very
sensibly chose otherwise, and married a
man Ladlaw — Robert John Ladlaw — who
had been at school with me. He was a
cheery, good-humoured fellow, a great
sportsman, a justice of the peace and
deputy-lieutenant for his county, and some-
thing of an antiquary in a mild way. He
had a box in Leicestershire to which he
went in the hunting season; but from
February till October he lived in his moor-
land home. The place was called the House
of More, and I had shot at it once or twice
in recent years. I remembered its loneli-
ness and its comfort, the charming diffident
Sybil and Ladlaw's genial welcome. And
my recollections set me puzzling again over
the letter which that morning had broken
into my comfort. "You promised us a
visit this autumn," Sybil had written, "and
I wish you would come as soon as you
can." So far common politeness. But she
had gone on to reveal the fact that Ladlaw
was ill, she did not know how exactly, but
something, she thought, about his heart.
Then she had signed herself my affec-


154 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
tionate cousin, and then had come a short
violent postscript, in which, as it were, the
fences of convention had been laid low.
"For Heaven's sake come and see us!" she
scrawled below. "Bob is terribly ill, and
I am crazy. Come at once." And then she
finished with an afterthought, "Don't bother
about bringing doctors. It is not their
business."
She had assumed that I would come, and
dutifully I set out. I could not regret my
decision, but I took leave to upbraid my luck.
The thought of Glenaicill with the woodcock
beginning to arrive, and the Clanroydens im-
ploring me to stay, saddened my journey in
the morning, and the murky, coally midland
country of the afternoon completed my de-
pression. The drive through the woodlands
of More failed to raise my spirits. I was
anxious about Sybil and Ladlaw, and the
accursed country had always given me a
certain eeriness on my first approaching it.
You may call it silly; but I have no nerves,
and am little susceptible to vague sentiment.
It was sheer physical dislike of the rich, deep
soil, the woody and antique smells, the melan-
choly roads and trees, and the flavour of old


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 155
mystery. I am aggressively healthy and
wholly Philistine. I love clear outlines and
strong colours, and More, with its half-tints
and hazy distances, depressed me miserably.
Even when the road crept uphill and the
trees ended, I found nothing to hearten me
in the moorland which succeeded. It was
genuine moorland, close on 800 feet above
the sea, and through it ran this old grass-
grown coach-road. Low hills rose to the left,
and to the right after some miles of peat
flared the chimneys of pits and oil-works.
Straight in front the moor ran out into the
horizon, and there in the centre was the last
dying spark of the sun. The place was as
still as the grave save for the crunch of our
wheels on the grassy road; but the flaring
lights to the north seemed to endow it with
life. I have rarely felt so keenly the feeling
of movement in the inanimate world. It was
an unquiet place, and I shivered nervously.
Little gleams of loch came from the hollows,
the burns were brown with peat, and every
now and then there rose in the moor jags of
sickening red stone. I remembered that
Ladlaw had talked about the place as the
old Manann, the holy land of the ancient


156 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
races. I had paid little attention at the
time, but now it struck me that the old
peoples had been wise in their choice. There
was something uncanny in this soil and air.
Framed in dank mysterious woods, and a
country of coal and ironstone, no great dis-
tance, too, from the capital city, it was a
sullen relic of a lost barbarism. Over the
low hills lay a green pastoral country with
bright streams and valleys, but here in this
peaty desert there were few sheep and little
cultivation. The House of More was the only
dwelling, and, save for the ragged village,
the wilderness was given over to the wild
things of the hills. The shooting was good;
but the best shooting on earth would not
persuade me to make my abode in such a
place. Ladlaw was ill; well, I did not
wonder. You can have uplands without air,
moors that are not health - giving, and a
country life which is more arduous than a
townsman's. I shivered again, for I seemed
to have passed in a few hours from the open
noon to a kind of dank twilight.
We passed the village and entered the
lodge-gates. Here there were trees again,
little innocent new-planted firs, which flour-


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 157
ished badly. Some large plane-trees grew
near the house, and there were thickets upon
thickets of the ugly elder. Even in the half-
darkness I could see that the lawns were
trim and the flower-beds respectable for the
season; doubtless Sybil looked after the
gardeners. The oblong whitewashed house,
more like a barrack than ever, opened sud-
denly on my sight, and I experienced my
first sense of comfort since I left Glenaicill.
Here I should find warmth and company,
and, sure enough, the hall - door was wide
open, and in the great flood of light which
poured from it Sybil stood to welcome me.
She ran down the steps as I dismounted,
and, with a word to the groom, caught my
arm and drew me into the shadow. "Oh,
Henry, it was so good of you to come. You
mustn't let Bob think that you know he is
ill. We don't talk about it. I'll tell you
afterwards. I want you to cheer him up.
Now we must go in, for he is in the hall
expecting you."
While I stood blinking in the light, Lad-
law came forward with outstretched hand and
his usual cheery greeting. I looked at him
and saw nothing unnatural in his appearance:


158 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
a little drawn at the lips, perhaps, and heavy
below the eyes, but still fresh-coloured and
healthy. It was Sybil who showed change.
She was very pale, her pretty eyes were
deplorably mournful, and in place of her de-
lightful shyness there was the self-confidence
and composure of pain. I was honestly
shocked, and as I dressed my heart was full
of hard thoughts about Ladlaw. What
could his illness mean? He seemed well and
cheerful, while Sybil was pale, and yet it was
Sybil who had written the postscript. As I
warmed myself by the fire, I resolved that
this particular family difficulty was my proper
business.
IL
The Ladlaws were waiting for me in the
drawing-room. I noticed something new and
strange in Sybil's demeanour. She looked to
her husband with a motherly protective air,
while Ladlaw, who had been the extreme of
masculine independence, seemed to cling to
his wife with a curious appealing fidelity.
In conversation he did little more than echo
her words. Till dinner was announced he
spoke of the weather, the shooting, and


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 159'
Mabel Clanroyden. Then he did a queer
thing, for, when I was about to offer my
arm to Sybil, he forestalled me, and, clutch-
ing her right arm with his left hand, led the
way to the dining-room, leaving me to follow
in some bewilderment.
I have rarely taken part in a more dismal
meal. The House of More has a pretty
Georgian panelling through most of the
rooms; but in the dining-room the walls are
level, and painted a dull stone colour.
Abraham offered up Isaac in a ghastly
picture in front of me. Some photographs
of the Quorn hung over the mantelpiece, and
five or six drab ancestors filled up the re-
maining space. But one thing was new and
startling. A great marble bust, a genuine
antique, frowned on me from a pedestal.
The head was in the late Roman style,
clearly of some emperor, and in its com-
monplace environment the great brows, the
massive neck, and the mysterious, solemn lips
had a surprising effect. I nodded towards the
thing, and asked what it represented.
Ladlaw grunted something which I took
for "Justinian," but he never raised his eyes
from his plate. By accident I caught Sybil's


160 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
glance. She looked towards the bust, and
laid a finger on her lips.
The meal grew more doleful as it advanced.
Sybil scarcely touched a dish, but her hus-
band ate ravenously of everything. He was
a strong, thick-set man, with a square, kindly
face, burned brown by the sun. Now he
seemed to have suddenly coarsened. He
gobbled with undignified haste, and his eye
was extraordinarily vacant. A question made
him start, and he would turn on me a face
so strange and inert that I repented the
interruption.
I asked him about the autumn's sport,
and he collected his wits with difficulty. He
thought it had been good on the whole, but
he had shot badly. He had not been quite
so fit as usual. No, he had had nobody
staying with him—Sybil had wanted to be
alone. He was afraid the moor might have
been under-shot, but he would make a big
day with keepers and farmers before the
winter.
"Bob has done pretty well," Sybil said.
"He hasn't been out often, for the weather
has been very bad here. You can have no
idea, Henry, how horrible this moorland place


162 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
"It's a queer name," he said oracularly;
"but the thing it stood for was queerer.
Manann, Manaw," he repeated, rolling the
words on his tongue. As he spoke, he glanced
sharply, and, as it seemed to me, fearfully, at
his left side.
The movement of his body made his nap-
kin slip from his left knee and fall on the
floor. It leaned against his leg, and he started
from its touch as if he had been stung by
a snake. I have never seen a more sheer
and transparent terror on a man's face. He
got to his feet, his strong frame shaking like
a rush. Sybil ran round to his side, picked
up the napkin, and flung it on a sideboard.
Then she stroked his hair as one would stroke
a frightened horse. She called him by his old
boy's name of Robin, and at her touch and
voice he became quiet. But the particular
course then in progress was removed un-
tasted.
In a few minutes he seemed to have for-
gotten his behaviour, for he took up the
former conversation. For a time he spoke
well and briskly.
"You lawyers," he said, "understand only
the dry framework of the past. You cannot


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 163
conceive the rapture, which only the anti-
quary can feel, of constructing in every detail
an old culture. Take this Manann. If I
could explore the secret of these moors, I
would write the world's greatest book. I
would write of that prehistoric life when man
was knit close to nature. I would describe
the people who were brothers of the red earth
and the red rock and the red streams of the
hills. Oh, it would be horrible, but superb,
tremendous! It would be more than a piece
of history; it would be a new gospel, a new
theory of life. It would kill materialism once
and for all. Why, man, all the poets who
have deified and personified nature would
not do an eighth part of my work. I would
show you the unknown, the hideous, shriek-
ing mystery at the back of this simple nature.
Men would see the profundity of the old
crude faiths which they affect to despise. I
would make a picture of our shaggy, sombre-
eyed forefather, who heard strange things in
the hill-silences. I would show him brutal
and terror-stricken, but wise, wise, God alone
knows how wise! The Romans knew it, and
they learned what they could from him, but
he did not tell them much. But we have


164 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
some of his blood in us, and we may go
deeper. Manann! A queer land nowadays!
I sometimes love it and sometimes hate it,
but I always fear it. It is like that statue,
inscrutable."
I would have told him that he was talking
mystical nonsense; but I had looked towards
the bust, and my rudeness was checked on
my lips. The moor might be a common piece
of ugly waste land, but the statue was in-
scrutable—of that there was no doubt. I
hate your cruel, heavy-mouthed Roman busts;
to me they have none of the beauty of life,
and little of the interest of art. But my eyes
were fastened on this as they had never
before looked on marble. The oppression
of the heavy woodlands, the mystery of the
silent moor, seemed to be caught and held
in this face. It was the intangible mystery
of culture on the verge of savagery, a cruel,
lustful wisdom, and yet a kind of bitter
austerity which laughed at the game of life
and stood aloof. There was no weakness in
the heavy-veined brow and slumbrous eye-
lids. It was the face of one who had con-
quered the world and found it dust and
ashes, one who had eaten of the tree of


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 165
the knowledge of good and evil and scorned
human wisdom. And at the same time it
was the face of one who knew uncanny
things, a man who was the intimate of the
half-world and the dim background of life.
Why on earth I should connect the Roman
grandee1 with the moorland parish of More,
I cannot say; but the fact remains, that there
was that in the face which I knew had
haunted me through the woodlands and bogs
of the place, a sleepless, dismal, incoherent
melancholy.
"I bought that at Colenzo's," Ladlaw said,
"because it took my fancy. It matches well
with this place."
I thought it matched very ill with his drab
walls and Quorn photographs, but I held my
peace.
"Do you know who it is?" he asked. "It
is the head of the greatest man the world
has ever seen. You are a lawyer and know
your Justinian."
1I have identified the bust, which, when seen under other
circumstances, had little power to affect me. It was a copy of
the head of Justinian in the Tesci Museum at Venice, and
several duplicates exist, dating apparently from the seventh
century, and showing traces of Byzantine decadence in the
scrollwork on the hair. It is engraved in M. Delacroix's ' By-
zantium,' and, I think, in Windscheid's 'Pandektenlehrbuch.'


166 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
The Pandects are scarcely part of the daily
work of a common-law barrister. I had not
looked into them since I left college.
"I know that he married an actress," I
said, "and was a sort of all-round genius.
He made law and fought battles and had
rows with the Church. A curious man!
And wasn't there some story about his
selling his soul to the Devil and getting
law in exchange? Rather a poor bargain I"
I chattered away sillily enough, to dispel
the gloom of that dinner-table. The result
of my words was unhappy. Ladlaw gasped,
and caught at his left side as if in pain.
Sybil, with tragic eyes, had been making
signs to me to hold my peace. Now she
ran round to her husband's side and com-
forted him like a child. As she passed me
she managed to whisper in my ear to talk
to her only and let her husband alone.
For the rest of dinner I obeyed my orders
to the letter. Ladlaw ate his food in gloomy
silence, while I spoke to Sybil of our relatives
• and friends, of London, Glenaicill, and any
random subject. The poor girl was dismally
forgetful, and her eye would wander to her
husband with wifely anxiety. I remember


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 167
being suddenly overcome by the comic aspect
of it all. Here were we three fools alone in
this dank upland, one of us sick and nervous,
talking out-of-the-way nonsense about Manann
and Justinian, gobbling his food and getting
scared at his napkin, another gravely anxious,
and myself at my wits' end for a solution.
It was a Mad Tea-party with a vengeance,
Sybil the melancholy little Dormouse, and
Ladlaw the incomprehensible Hatter. I
laughed aloud, but checked myself when I
caught my cousin's eye. It was really no
case for finding humour. Ladlaw was very
ill, and Sybil's face was getting deplorably
thin.
I welcomed the end of that meal with un-
mannerly joy, for I wanted to speak seriously
with my host. Sybil told the butler to have
the lamps lit in the library. Then she leaned
over to me and spoke low and rapidly: "I
want you to talk with Bob. I'm sure you
can do him good. You'll have to be very
patient with him and very gentle. Oh
please try and find out what is wrong with
him. He won't tell me, and I can only
guess."
The butler returned with word that the


168 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
library was ready to receive us, and Sybil
rose to go. Ladlaw half rose, protesting,
making the most curious, feeble clutches at
his side. His wife quieted him. "Henry
will look after you, dear," she said. "You
are going into the library to smoke." Then
she slipped from the room, and we were
left alone.
He caught my arm fiercely with his left
hand, and his grip nearly made me cry out.
As we walked down the hall I could feel
his arm twitching from the elbow to the
shoulder. Clearly he was in pain, and I
set it down to some form of cardiac affection,
which might possibly issue in paralysis.
I settled him in the biggest arm-chair, and
took one of his cigars. The library is the
pleasantest room in the house, and at night,
when a peat-fire burned on the old hearth
and the great red curtains were drawn, it
used to be the place for comfort and good
talk. Now I noticed changes. Ladlaw's
book-shelves had been filled with the pro-
ceedings of antiquarian societies and many
light - hearted works in belles - lettres. But
now the Badminton Library had been cleared
out of a shelf where it stood most convenient


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 169
to the hand, and its place taken by an old
Leyden reprint of Justinian. There were
books on Byzantine subjects of which I never
dreamed he had heard the names. There
were volumes of history and speculation, all
of a slightly bizarre kind; and to crown
everything, there were several bulky medical
works with gaudily coloured plates. The old
atmosphere of sport and travel had gone from
the room, with the medley of rods, whips, and
gun-cases which used to cumber the tables.
Now the place was moderately tidy and
slightly learned—and I did not like it.
Ladlaw refused to smoke, and sat for a
little while in silence. Then of his own accord
he broke the tension,—
"It was devilish good of you to come,
Harry. This is a lonely place for a man who
is a bit seedy."
"I thought you might be alone," I said,
"so I looked you up on my way down from
Glenaicill. I'm sorry to find you looking
ill."
"Do you notice it?" he asked sharply.
"It's tolerably patent," I said, "Have you
seen a doctor?"
He said something uncomplimentary about


170 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
doctors, and kept looking at me with his
curious dull eyes.
I remarked the strange posture in which
he sat—his head screwed round to his right
shoulder, and his whole body a protest against
something at his left hand.
"It looks like your heart," I said. "You
seem to have pains in your left side."
Again a spasm of fear. I went over to
him and stood at the back of his chair.
"Now, for goodness' sake, my dear fellow,
tell me what is wrong? You're scaring Sybil
to death. It's lonely work for the poor girl,
and I wish you would let me help you."
He was lying back in his chair now, with
his eyes half shut, and shivering like a
frightened colt. The extraordinary change
in one who had been the strongest of the
strong kept me from realising its gravity.
I put a hand on his shoulder, but he flung
it off.
"For God's sake sit down!" he said
hoarsely. "I'm going to tell you; but I'll
never make you understand."
I sat down promptly opposite him.
"It's the Devil," he said very solemnly.
I am afraid that I was rude enough to


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 171
laugh. He took no notice, but sat with the
same tense, miserable air, staring over my head.
"Right," said I. "Then it is the Devil.
It's a new complaint, so it's as well I did
not bring a doctor. How does it affect you?"
He made the old impotent clutch at the
air with his left hand. I had the sense to
become grave at once. Clearly this was
some mental affection, some hallucination
born of physical pain.
Then he began to talk in a low voice,
very rapidly, with his head bent forward
like a hunted animal's. I am not going to
set down what he told me in his own words,
for they were incoherent often, and there
was much repetition. But I am going to
write the gist of the odd story which took
my sleep away on that autumn night, with
such explanations and additions as I think
needful. The fire died down, the wind arose,
the hour grew late, and still he went on in
his mumbling recitative. I forgot to smoke,
forgot my comfort,—everything but the odd
figure of my friend and his inconceivable
romance. And the night before I had been
in cheerful Glenaicill!


172 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. He had returned to the House of More, he
said, in the latter part of May, and shortly
after he fell ill. It was a trifling sickness—
influenza or something — but he had never
quite recovered. The rainy weather of June
depressed him, and the extreme heat of
July made him listless and weary. A kind
of insistent sleepiness hung over him, and he
suffered much from nightmare. Towards the
end of July his former health returned; but
he was haunted with a curious oppression.
He seemed to himself to have lost the art
of being alone. There was a perpetual sound
in his left ear, a kind of moving and rustling
at his left side, which never left him by
night or day. In addition he had become
the prey of nerves and an insensate dread
of the unknown.
Ladlaw, as I have explained, was a common-
place man, with fair talents, a mediocre culture,
honest instincts, and the beliefs and incredu-
lities of his class. On abstract grounds I
should have declared him an unlikely man
to be the victim of a hallucination. He had
a kind of dull, bourgeois rationalism, which
used to find reasons for all things in heaven
and earth. At first he controlled his dread


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 173
with proverbs. He told himself it was the
sequel of his illness, or the light - headed-
ness of summer heat on the moors. But it
soon outgrew his comfort. It became a living
second presence, an alter ego which dogged
his footsteps. He became acutely afraid of
it. He dared not be alone for a moment, and
clung to Sybil's company despairingly. She
went off for a week's visit in the beginning
of August, and he endured for seven days
the tortures of the lost. His malady advanced
upon him with swift steps. The presence
became more real daily. In the early dawn-
ing, in the twilight, and in the first hours of
the morning it seemed at times to take a
visible bodily form. A kind of amorphous
featureless shadow would run from his side
into the darkness, and he would sit palsied
with terror. Sometimes in lonely places his
footsteps sounded double, and something
would brush elbows with him. Human
society alone exorcised it. With Sybil at his
side he was happy; but as soon as she left
him the thing came slinking back from the
unknown to watch by him. Company might
have saved him, but joined to his affliction
was a crazy dread of his fellows. He would


174 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
not leave his moorland home, but must bear
his burden alone among the wild streams and
mosses of that dismal place.
The Twelfth came, and he shot wretchedly,
for his nerve had gone to pieces. He stood
exhaustion badly, and became a dweller about
the doors. But with this bodily inertness
came an extraordinary intellectual revival.
He read widely in a blundering way, and he
speculated unceasingly. It was characteristic
of the man that, as soon as he left the paths
of the prosaic, he should seek his supernatural
in a very concrete form. He assumed that
he was haunted by the Devil—the visible,
personal Devil in whom our fathers believed.
He waited hourly for the shape at his side
to speak, but no words came. The Accuser
of the Brethren in all but tangible form was
his ever-present companion. He felt, he de-
clared, the spirit of old evil entering subtly
into his blood. He sold his soul many times
over, and yet there was no possibility of re-
sistance. It was a Visitation more undeserved
than Job's, and a thousandfold more awful.
For a week or more he was tortured
with a kind of religious mania. When a
man of a healthy, secular mind finds him-


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 175
self adrift on the terrible ocean of religious
troubles, he is peculiarly helpless, for he
has not the most rudimentary knowledge
of the winds and tides. It was useless
to call up his old carelessness; he had
suddenly dropped into a new world where
old proverbs did not apply. And all the
while, mind you, there was the shrieking
terror of it — an intellect all alive to the
torture and the most unceasing physical
fear. For a little he was on the near edge
of idiocy.
Then by accident it took a new form.
While sitting with Sybil one day in the
library, he began listlessly to turn over
the leaves of an old book. He read a few
pages, and found the hint of a story like
his own. It was some French life of Jus-
tinian, one of the unscholarly productions
of last century, made up of stories from
Procopius and tags of Roman law. Here
was his own case written down in black
and white; and the man had been a king
of kings! This was a new comfort, and
for a little—strange though it may seem—
he took a sort of pride in his affliction.
He worshipped the great emperor and read


176 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
every scrap he could find on him, not
excepting the Pandects and the Digest.
He sent for the bust in the dining-room,
paying a fabulous price. Then he settled
himself to study his imperial prototype, and
the study became an idolatry. As I have
said, Ladlaw was a man of ordinary talents
and certainly of meagre imaginative power.
And yet from the lies of the 'Secret
History' and the crudities of German
legalists he had constructed a marvellous
portrait of a man. Sitting there in the
half-lit room, he drew the picture, — the
quiet, cold king with his inheritance of
Dacian mysticism, holding the great world
in fee, giving it law and religion, fighting
its wars, building its churches, and yet all
the while intent upon his own private work
of making his peace with his soul. The
churchman and warrior whom all the world
worshipped, and yet one going through life
with his lip quivering, the Watcher by the
Threshold ever at his left side. Sometimes
at night in the great Brazen Palace,
warders heard the emperor walking in the
dark corridors, alone and yet not alone;
for once, when a servant entered with a


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 177
lamp, he saw his master with a face as of
another world, and something beside him
which had no face or shape, but which he
knew to be that hoary Evil which is older
than the stars. Crazy nonsense! I had
to rub my eyes to assure myself that I
was not sleeping. No! There was my
friend with his suffering face, and it was
the library of More.
And then he spoke of Theodora—actress,
harlot, devote, empress. For him the lady
was but another part of the uttermost
horror, a form of the shapeless thing at
his side. I felt myself falling under the
fascination. I have no nerves and little
imagination, but in a flash I seemed to
realise something of that awful featureless
face, crouching ever at a man's hand, till
darkness and loneliness comes and it rises
to its mastery. I shivered as I looked at
the man in the chair before me. Those
dull eyes of his were looking upon things
I could not see, and I saw their terror.
I realised that it was grim earnest for him.
Nonsense or no, some devilish fancy had
usurped the place of sanity, and he was
being slowly broken upon the wheel. And
M


178 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
then, when his left hand twitched, I
almost cried out. I had thought it comic
before; now it seemed the last proof of
tragedy.
He stopped, and I got up with loose
knees and went to the window. Better
the black night than the intangible horror
within. I flung up the sash and looked
out across the moor. There was no light,
nothing but an inky darkness and the
uncanny rustle of elder-bushes. The sound
chilled me, and I closed the window.
"The land is the old Manann," Ladlaw
was saying. "We are beyond the pale here.
Do you hear the wind?"
I forced myself back into sanity and looked
at my watch. It was nearly one o'clock.
"What ghastly idiots we are!" I said, "I am off to bed."
Ladlaw looked at me helplessly. "For
God's sake don't leave me alone!" he
moaned. "Get Sybil."
We went together back to the hall, while
he kept the same feverish grip on my arm.
Some one was sleeping in a chair by the
hall-fire, and to my distress I recognised
my hostess. The poor child must have been


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 179
sadly wearied. She came forward with her
anxious face.
"I'm afraid Bob has kept you very late,
Henry," she said. "I hope you will sleep
well. Breakfast at nine, you know." And
then I left them.
Over my bed there was a little picture,
a reproduction of some Italian work of
Christ and the Demoniac. Some impulse
made me hold my candle up to it. The
madman's face was torn with passion and
suffering, and his eye ha/1 the pained
furtive look which I had come to know.
And by his left side there was a dim
shape crouching.
I got into bed hastily, but not to sleep.
I felt that my reason must be going. I
had been pitchforked from our clear and
cheerful modern life into the mists of old
superstition. Old tragic stories of my Cal-
vinist upbringing returned to haunt me.
The man dwelt in by a devil was no new
fancy; but I believed that Science had
docketed and analysed and explained the
Devil out of the world. I remembered my
dabblings in the occult before I settled


180 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
down to law—the story of Donisarius the
monk of Padua, the unholy legend of the
Face of Proserpina, the tales of succubi
and incubi, the Leannain Sith and the
Hidden Presence. But here was something
stranger still. I had stumbled upon that
very possession which fifteen hundred years
ago had made the monks of New Rome
tremble and cross themselves. Some devilish
occult force, lingering through the ages, had
come to life after a long sleep. God knows
what earthly connection there was between
the splendid Emperor of the World and
my prosaic friend, or between the glittering
shores of the Bosphorus and this moorland
parish! But the land was the old Manann!
The spirit may have lingered in the earth
and air, a deadly legacy from Pict and
Roman. I had felt the uncanniness of the
place; I had augured ill of it from the
first. And then in sheer disgust I rose and
splashed my face with cold water.
I lay down again, laughing miserably at
my credulity. That I, the sober and rational,
should believe in this crazy fable, was too
palpably absurd. I would steel my mind
resolutely against such harebrained theories.


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 181
It was a mere bodily ailment,—liver out of
order, weak heart, bad circulation, or some-
thing of that sort. At the worst it might
be some affection of the brain to be treated
by a specialist. I vowed to myself that next
morning the best doctor in Edinburgh should
be brought to More.
The worst of it was that my duty com-
pelled me to stand my ground. I foresaw
the few remaining weeks of my holiday
blighted. I should be tied to this moorland
prison, a sort of keeper and nurse in one,
tormented by silly fancies. It was a charm-
ing prospect, and the thought of Glenaicill
and the woodcock made me bitter against
Ladlaw. But there was no way out of it.
I might do Ladlaw good, and I could not
have Sybil worn to death by his vagaries.
My ill-nature comforted me, and I forgot
the horror of the thing in its vexation. After
that, I think I fell asleep and dozed uneasily
till morning. When I awoke I was in a
better frame of mind. The early sun had
worked wonders with the moorland. The
low hills stood out fresh-coloured and clear
against the pale October sky, the elders
sparkled with frost, the raw film of morn


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 183
limited the possible occupations. Fishing
there was none, and hill-climbing was out
of the question. He proposed a game at
billiards, and I pointed to the glory of the
morning. It would have been sacrilege
to waste such sunshine in knocking balls
about. Finally we agreed to drive some-
where and have lunch, and he ordered the
dog-cart.
In spite of all forebodings I enjoyed the
day. We drove in the opposite direction
from the woodland parts, right away across
the moor to the coal-country beyond. We
lunched at the little mining town of Borrow-
muir, in a small and noisy public-house. The
roads made bad going, the country was far
from pretty, and yet the drive did not bore
me. Ladlaw talked incessantly, talked as I
had never heard man talk before. There
was something indescribable in all he said,
—a different point of view, a lost groove of
thought, a kind of innocence and archaic
shrewdness in one. I can only give you a
hint of it by saying that it was like the
mind of an early ancestor placed suddenly
among modern surroundings. It was wise
with a remote wisdom, and silly (now and


184 THE WATCHEtt BY THE THRESHOLD.
then) with a quite antique and distant silli-
ness.
I will give you instances of both. He pro-
vided me with a theory of certain early
fortifications, which must be true, which
commends itself to the mind with over-
whelming conviction, and yet which is so
out of the way of common speculation that
no man could have guessed it. I do not
propose to set down the details, for I am
working at it on my own account. Again,
he told me the story of an old marriage
custom, which till recently survived in this
district,—told it with full circumstantial de-
tail and constant allusions to other customs
which he could not possibly have known of.
Now for the other side. He explained why
well - water is in winter warmer than a
running stream, and this was his explan-
ation. At the Antipodes our winter is
summer; consequently the water of a well
which comes through from the other side
of the earth must be warm in winter and
cold in summer, since in our summer it is
winter there. You perceive what this is.
It is no mere silliness, but a genuine effort
of an early mind which had just grasped


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 185
the fact of the Antipodes, to use it in
explanation.
Gradually I was forced to the belief that
it was not Ladlaw who was talking to me,
but something speaking through him, some-
thing at once wiser and simpler. My old fear
of the Devil began to depart. This spirit,
this exhalation, whatever it was, was in-
genuous in its way, at least in its daylight
aspect. For a moment I had an idea that
it was a real reflex of Byzantine thought,
and that by cross-examining I might make
marvellous discoveries. The ardour of the
scholar began to rise in me, and I asked a
question about that much-debated point, the
legal status of the apocrisiarii. To my
vexation he gave no response. Clearly the
intelligence of this familiar had its limits.
It was about three in the afternoon, and
we had gone half of our homeward journey,
when signs of the old terror began to appear.
I was driving, and Ladlaw sat on my left.
I noticed him growing nervous and silent,
shivering at the flick of the whip, and turn-
ing half-way round towards me. Then he
asked me to change places, and I had the
unpleasant work of driving from the wrong


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 187
Suddenly the harmless elderly cob fell into a
very panic of fright, reared upright, and all
but succeeded in killing its master. I was
in time to pluck Ladlaw from under its
feet, but the beast had become perfectly un-
manageable, and we left a groom struggling
to quiet it.
In the hall the butler gave me a telegram.
It was from my clerk, summoning me back
at once to an important consultation.


188
CHAPTER II.
THE MINISTER INTERVENES.
Here was a prompt removal of my scruples!
There could be no question of my remaining,
for the case was one of the first importance,
which I had feared might break up my
holiday. The consultation fell in vacation-
time to meet the convenience of certain
people who were going abroad, and there
was the most instant demand for my presence.
I must go and at once; and, as I hunted in
the time-table, I found that in five hours'
time a night-train for the South would pass
Borrowmuir, which might be stopped by
special wire. This would give me time for
dinner and a comfortable departure.
But I had no pleasure in my freedom, for
I was in despair about Sybil. I must return
to More—that was clear; and I must find
some one to look after Ladlaw. I found my


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 189
cousin in the drawing-room alone and told
her my plans.
She was very pale and fragile, and she
seemed to shiver as the prospect of solitude
returned to her. I spoke with all the care-
lessness I could muster. "I am coming
back," I said. "Don't think you have got
rid of me so easily. It is most unpleasant
to have to travel eight hundred miles in
thirty-six hours, but there is no help for it.
I ought to be back again by Friday morning.
And you know Bob is much better. He was
quite like his old self driving to-day."
My words comforted the poor child, and I
went away with the novel feeling of a good
conscience. Frankly, I hate the sordid and
unpleasant. I am honestly a sun-worshipper;
I have small taste for arduous duty, and the
quixotic is my abhorrence. My professional
success is an accident, for Lord knows I had
no impulse to contend and little ambition.
But somewhere or other I have the rudiments
of an austere conscience. It gives me no
peace, and as I love a quiet life, I do its
bidding with a grumble. Now I grumbled
fiercely in spirit, but outwardly I was a
model of virtuous cheerfulness.


190 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
But to find somebody to keep Ladlaw
company—there was the rub. I racked my
brains to think of a substitute. It must be
a man of some education and not a mere
servant, and it must be somebody in the
parish of More; the conjunction seemed for
the moment impossible. Then a brilliant
idea struck me. There was the minister of
Morebrig, the ugly village by the roadside.
I remembered him on previous visits. He
was a burly young man, with a high com-
plexion and a drooping blonde moustache,
who smoked cheap cigarettes incessantly,
and spat. He had been what they call a
"brilliant student," and he was reported to
be something of an orator, eagerly sought
after by city congregations, but at present
hiding his light under the bushel of More-
brig to allow him time to prepare some
great theological work. Ladlaw had liked
him in a half-amused and tolerant way, and
he used to come sometimes to dine. His
name was Bruce Oliphant, and he inhabited
a dark manse at the outskirts of the village.
I had an hour before dinner, and I set out
for Mr Oliphant's dwelling. I remember the
curious dull village street, without colour or


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 191
life, drab women looking out of dingy door-
ways, and a solitary child playing in the
red mud. The manse stood at the back of
the usual elder thicket, a little place with
small windows and a weather-stained front
door. A gaunt old servant ushered me into
Mr Oliphant's study, where I found that
young man smoking and reading a weekly
paper. It was a room well stocked with
books in the popular religious vein, and the
Poets in gilt editions adorned his shelves.
Mr Oliphant greeted me with the nervous
ease of one who would fain cultivate a good
manner. The first sight of him sent my
hopes down. He had a large calf-like face,
mildly arrogant eyes, and a chin which fell
sharply away beneath the eaves of his mous-
tache. This was not one to do Ladlaw
much good; indeed I questioned if I could
ever make him understand, for the man
before me had an impenetrable air of om-
niscience.
"I have come to ask you a great favour
on behalf of the Ladlaws," said I. "You
are the only other gentleman in the parish
of More, and it is your duty to help your
neighbours."


192 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
He bowed, with pleased eyes. "Anything,"
he said. "I'll be very glad."
"I am staying there just now, you know,
and as it happens I must go back to town
by the night-train. I'll only be gone a day,
but you know that Ladlaw is a melancholy
beggar and gets low-spirited. Now I want
you to go up and stay at the House for a
couple of nights while I am away."
It was an odd request, and he stared at
me. "Why, what's wrong with Mr Ladlaw?"
he asked. "I should never have called him
melancholy. Now, his lady is different. She
always looks a little pale. Did she send you
to ask me?" Mr Oliphant was a stickler for
the usages of polite society.
I sat down in a chair and took one of his
cigarettes. "Now, look here, Oliphant," I
said. "You are a man of education and
common-sense, and I am going to do you
the honour to tell you a story which I would
not tell to a stupid man. A stupid man
would laugh at me. I hope you will see the
gravity of the thing."
I told him briefly the points in Ladlaw's
case. His eyes grew very round as I went
on, and when I finished he laughed nervously.


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 193
He was clearly impressed; but he was too
ignorant and unimaginative to understand
fully, and he had his credit as a representative
of modern thought to support. "Oh, come
now! You don't mean all that; I never
heard the like of it You can't expect me
as a Christian man to believe in a Pagan
spirit. I might as well believe in ghosts
at once. What has the familiar of a heathen
emperor to do with this parish?"
"Justinian was a Christian," I said.
He looked puzzled. "It's all preposterous.
Meaning no disrespect to you, I must decline
to believe it. My profession compels me to
discourage such nonsense."
"So does mine," I said wearily. "Good
Lord! man, do you think I came here to tell
you a fairy tale? It's the most terrible earn-
est. Now I want you to give me an answer,
for I have very little time."
He was still incredulous, and inclined to
argue. "Do you know if Mr Ladlaw has been
—eh—a strictly temperate man ?" he asked.
With this my patience departed. I got
up to go, with rude thoughts on the stupidity
of the clergy. But Mr Oliphant was far
from a refusal. He had no objection to ex-
N


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 195
express or transacting dreary business in my
chambers, are known only from the narrative
of the minister. He wrote it out some weeks
after at my request, for I wished to have
all the links in the tale, I propose to give
the gist of it, as he wrote it, stripped of
certain reflections on human life and an in-
scrutable Providence, with which he had
garnished it.
Narrative of the Reverend Mr Oliphant.
I arrived at the House of More at a quarter-
past eight on the Wednesday evening. The
family had dined early, as Mr Grey was
leaving for London, and when I arrived I
was taken to the library, where I found Mr
Ladlaw. I had not seen him for some time,
and thought him looking pale and a little
haggard. He seemed glad to see me, and
made me sit down in a chair on his left and
draw it up close to him. I wondered at his
manner, for though we had always been on
good terms he had never admitted me to
any close intimacy. But now he was more
than amiable. He made me ring for toddy,
and though he refused to taste it himself,


196 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
he pressed the beverage on me. Then he
gave me a large cigar, at which I trembled,
and finally he said that we should play at
picquet. I declined resolutely, for it is part
of my conscience to refuse to join in any card
games; but he made no trouble, and indeed
in a moment seemed to have forgotten his
proposition.
The next thing he did startled my
composure. For he asked abruptly, "Do
you believe in a living personal Devil,
Oliphant?"
I was taken aback, but answered that to
the best of my light I did not.
"And why not?" he asked sharply.
I explained that it was an old, false,
anthropomorphic fiction, and that the modern
belief was infinitely more impressive. I
quoted the words of Dr Rintoul, one of
our Church leaders. I am sorry to say
that Mr Ladlaw's words were, "Dr Rintoul
be d-- d!"
"Who the deuce are you to change the
belief of centuries?" he cried, "Our fore-
fathers believed in him. They saw him at
evening slinking about the folds and peat-
stacks, or wrapped up in a black gown


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 197
standing in the pulpits of the Kirk. Are
we wiser men than they?"
I answered that culture had undoubtedly
advanced in our day.
Mr Ladlaw replied with blasphemous
words on modern culture. I had imagined
him to be a gentleman of considerable
refinement, and I knew he had taken a
good degree at college. Consequently, I was
disagreeably surprised at his new manner.
"You are nothing better than an ignorant
parson,"—these were his words,—"and you
haven't even the merits of your stupid pro-
fession. The old Scots ministers were Cal-
vinists to the backbone, and they were
strong men—strong men, do you hear?—
^ and they left their mark upon the nation.
But your new tea-meeting kind of person, who has nothing but a smattering of bad
German to commend him, is a nuisance to
God and man. And they don't believe in
the Devil! Well, he'll get them safe
enough some day."
I implored him to remember my cloth,
and curb his bad language.
"I say the Devil will get you all safe
enough some day," he repeated.


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 199
Grey's singular hypothesis. I did not ask
him bluntly, as an ordinary man would
have done, what was his malady, but tact-
fully, as I thought then, I led the conver-
sation to demoniacal possession in the olden
time, and quoted Pellinger's theory on the
Scriptural cases. He answered with extra-
ordinary vehemence, showing a childish
credulity I little expected from an educated
man.
"I see that you hold to the old inter-
pretation," I said pleasantly. "Nowadays,
we tend to find the solution in natural
causes."
"Heavens, man!" he cried, "What do
you mean by natural? You haven't the
most rudimentary knowledge of nature.
Listen to me, and I will tell you some-
thing."
And with this he began a long rambling
account of something which I could not
understand. He talked much about a name
which sounded like Canaan, and then he
wandered to another subject and talked
about Proserpina, whom I remembered from
Mr Matthew Arnold's poem. I would have
thought him trying to ridicule me, if I


200 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
had not seen his face, which was white
and drawn with pain; and, again, I would
have thought him drunk, but for his well-
known temperate habits. By-and-by even
my nerves, which are very strong, began
to suffer. I understood fragments of his
talk, and the understanding did not re-
assure me. It was poisonous nonsense, but
it had a terrible air of realism. He had a
queer habit of catching at his heart like a
man with the heart disease, and his eyes
were like a mad dog's I once saw, the
pupil drawn to a pin-point with fear. I
could not bear it, so I tried to break the
spell. I offered, against my conscience, to
play a card game, but his face showed
that he did not understand me. I began
to feel a sort of languor of terror. I could
hardly rise from my chair, and when at
last I got up the whole room seemed
haunted. I rushed to the bell and rang it
violently, and then tried to open the door.
But he was before me again, and gripped
my arm so fiercely that I cried out between
the pain and my dread of him.
"Come back !" he cried hoarsely. "Don't
leave me alone. For God's sake, Oliphant!"


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 201
Just then the man-servant opened the
door, and found the two of us standing
like lunatics. I had the sense to save the
situation, and I asked him to bring more
coals for the fire. Then as soon as he
turned to go, I stepped out of the open
door before Mr Ladlaw could prevent me.
The hall seemed empty, but to my surprise
I found Mrs Ladlaw sleeping in a chair by
the fire. I did not like to waken her, but
I was at my wits' end with fright. If I
had known the way to the kitchen, I should
have sought the servants' company. I ran
down a passage, but it seemed to end in a
blind wall, and in a great fear I turned
and ran upstairs. But the upper lobbies
seemed to be unlit, and I was turning back
when I heard Ladlaw's voice behind me.
It was muffled and queer, and the sound
drove me into the darkness. When I turned
a corner, to my relief I saw a lamp burning
on a table and recognised my bedroom door.
Here was sanctuary at last, and I ran in
and shut it behind me.
My nerves were so shaken by the evening's
performances that I found it impossible to get
to sleep. I sat up the better part of the


202 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
night by the fire, and smoked several cigar-
ettes, which in ordinary circumstances I
should never have dared to do in a strange
bedroom. About four o'clock, I think, I
dozed off in my chair, and awoke about
nine, very stiff and cold, to find Ladlaw
laughing at me in the doorway.
I was at first so confused that I did not
remember what had scared me the night
before. Then, as it came back to me, I was
amazed at my host's appearance. He looked
fresh and well, and in excellent spirits. He
laughed immoderately when he found I had
not gone to bed.
"You do look cheap," he said. "Break-
fast's in half an hour. You will feel better
when you have had a tub."
I bathed reluctantly, feeling ill and bitterly
cold; but I was comforted by a good break-
fast. Then I had an opportunity of talking
to Mrs Ladlaw. As I remembered her, she
had been full of gaiety, and even, I thought,
a little frivolous; but now she was so pale
and silent that I pitied her sincerely. I
began to feel an intense dislike of her hus-
band, partly for the fright he had given
me the night before, and partly for the


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 203
effect his silliness seemed to be having on
his wife. The day was a fine one, but after
breakfast he showed no intention of going
out. I expected to be asked to shoot, a
sport which I sometimes try; but he never
spoke of it, and insisted on my coming to
the billiard-room. As we were leaving the
table Mrs Ladlaw touched my arm, and asked
me in a low tone if I would promise to stay
all day with her husband. "I want to go
down to Morefoot," she said, "and you know
he cannot be left alone." I promised will-
ingly, for in the daylight Mr Ladlaw had
no terrors for me. I thought that Mrs
Ladlaw looked relieved. Poor thing! she
badly needed a respite.
We hung aimlessly about the place till
lunch, playing a few games of billiards, and
in the intervals looking at stables and
harness-rooms and the now barren gardens.
At lunch Mrs Ladlaw appeared, but immed-
iately after I heard wheels on the gravel
and knew that she had gone to Morefoot.
Then I began to feel nervous again. I was
the only responsible person left in the place,
and Mr Ladlaw might at any moment re-
lapse into craziness. I watched his moods


204 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
anxiously, and talked all the nonsense I
knew to keep him in good humour. I told
him stories, I talked wildly of sport, I made
ridiculous jokes at which I felt myself blush-
ing. At first he seemed amused, but soon I
felt that my words were falling on deaf
ears. He himself began to talk, violently,
incessantly, and, I may say, brilliantly. If
my memory had been better and my balance
less upset, I might have made my reputation,
though it would have been a reputation,
perhaps, that a minister of the Gospel might
well look askance at, I could have written
a terrible romance from that man's babbling.
Nay, I could have done more: I could have
composed a new philosophy which would have
cast Nietzsche in the shade for ever. I do
not wish to exaggerate, but I have never been
so impressed with a sense of a crazy intel-
lectual acumen. This Mr Ladlaw, whom I
had known as a good landlord and a respect-
able country gentleman, now appeared as a
kind of horrible genius, a brilliant and malig-
nant satyr. I was shocked and confounded,
and at the same time filled with admiration.
I remember that we passed through the
dining-room, where there was a great marble


206 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
Ladlaw's return. I suggested that the lamps
should be lit. He rose and tried to light
the hanging central one, and I noticed how
his hands trembled. His awkwardness up-
set the thing, and it fell with a crash on
the floor. He jumped back with a curious
scream like an animal.
I was so miserably scared that I had not
the heart to do the work for him, so we
sat on in the darkness. Any sound from
the out-of-doors would have comforted me,
but the whole world was as silent as death.
I felt that a little more would drive me
mad, and the thought roused me to make
a final effort after safety. In spite of all
my promises I must get away. A man's
first duty was to himself, and the hour
had come for me. I thought with longing
of my little bare manse and my solemn
housekeeper. And yet how was I to escape,
for this man was the stronger, and he would
never let me go.
I begged him to come into the hall, but
he refused. Then I became very cunning.
I suggested that we should go to the door
and receive Mrs Ladlaw. He did not know
that she had gone, and the news made


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 207
him so nervous that he accepted my pro-
posal. He caught my arm as before, and,
leaning heavily upon me, went into the
hall. There was no one about, and the fire
had died down; but at the far end there
was a pale glimmer from the glass door.
We opened it and stood on the top step,
looking over the dark lawns. Now was the
time for an effort for freedom. If I could
only get rid of his hand I might escape
across the fields. I believed him to be too
weak on his legs to follow me, and in any
case I was a respectable runner. Out of
doors he seemed less formidable: it was
only in that haunted room that I shuddered.
I took the only way of escape which
presented itself. There was a flowering-shrub
in a pot on the top of the parapet. I caught
this with my elbow and knocked it over,
so that it broke with a clatter on the stone.
As I expected, he screamed and jumped
aside, letting go my arm for one instant.
The next I was down the steps and running
hard across the lawns to the park beyond.
For a little I heard him stumbling after
me, breathing heavily and with little short
cries. I ran with the speed of fear, for till


209
CHAPTER III.
EVENTS ON THE UPLANDS.
I returned from town by the night express,
which landed me at Borrowmuir about seven
on the Friday morning. To my surprise
there was no dog-cart to meet me, as had
been arranged, and I was compelled to hire
from the inn. The omission filled me with
forebodings. Things must have gone badly
at More in my absence, or the careful Sybil
would never have forgotten. I grudged the
time occupied in that weary drive. The
horse seemed intolerably slow, the roads
unaccountably steep. It was a sharp morn-
ing, with haze on the fields and promise of
bright sunshine at midday; but, tired as I
was with my two days' journey, I was in the
humour to see little good in my case, I was
thankful when we drew up at the house-door,
and, cold and stiff, I hobbled up the steps.
0


210 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
The door was open, and I entered. The
hall was empty, there was no sign of any
servant, and all the doors were wide to
the wall. I tried one room after another
without success. Then I made my voice
heard in that place. I shouted for Ladlaw,
and then I shouted for Sybil. There came
no answer, and in despair I rushed to the
kitchen wing. There I found a cluster of
frightened maids, and by dint of much ques-
tioning learned the truth.
Ladlaw, it seemed, had disappeared from
the house about a quarter-past six on the
previous night. The minister had decamped
and found sanctuary in the manse; but there
was no trace of the other. Sybil had gone
to Morefoot in the afternoon, and, returning
about half-past six, found her husband gone.
She had been distracted with anxiety, had
gone to the manse, where she found Mr
Oliphant in a state of nervous collapse and
quite unable to make any coherent statement,
and had then roused some of the neighbour-
ing shepherds and organised a search-party.
They had searched all night, but so far no
word had come of the result. Meanwhile,
Sybil, utterly wearied and a little hysterical,


212 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
ber thinking how oddly unsuited was our
dress for this stalking-game. I was wretch-
edly anxious, for I liked Ladlaw, and God
alone knew where he might have got to in
the night. There were deep bogs and ugly
old pit-shafts on the moor, and there were
ravines with sheer red sides. At any moment
we might find tragedy, and I dreaded the
report of the searchers at Mossrigging.
When we left the road, we followed an old
cart - track up a shallow glen, where stood
some curious old stone chimneys, which had
been built by a speculator who hoped to
make a fortune from peat. The sun was
beginning to break through the haze, and
miles of low moorland were disclosed to left
and right. But the hills in front were still
cloudy, and we were close on the cottage
before we knew its whereabouts. It stood
high in a twinkle of hill, with a wide
prospect north and east to the sea, and as
I turned I saw Morebrig smoking clear in
the autumn light, and the chimneys of the
House above the fir - trees. Out on the
waters three ships were sailing like toy-
boats, a reminder of the bustling modern
life beyond this antique place of horrors.


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 213
The house was full of men, devouring
their morning porridge. They were shep-
herds of the neighbourhood, and two boys
from the village, as well as John Ker, the
head-keeper from More. One man, Robert
Tod by name, answered my unspoken ques-
tion. "We havena gotten him, but we've
gotten his whereabouts. We got a glisk
o' him about six this mornin' on the back-
side o' the Lowe Moss. I kent him fine by
the way he ran. Lord, but he was souple!
Nane o' us could come within a hunner yairds
o' him. We'll hae to wyse him gently, sir,
and some o' us 'll hae to tak a lang cast
round the hill."
I had no ambition to "tak a lang cast
round the hill"; but these men had been
abroad all night, and I and the minister
must undertake the duty. Tod agreed to
come with us, and the shaggy silent men
of the party expounded the plan of cam-
paign. The Lowe Moss was impassable on
one side, on another bounded by a steep
hill-shoulder, and on the others by two
narrow glens. They would watch the glens;
we three should make a circuit and come
back over the hill, driving the fugitive be 


214 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
fore us. Once enclosed between the moss
and our three parties, he should be an easy
capture. I implored them to go to work
gently, for I feared that he might be driven
into the bog. They shook their heads and
laughed: it was all a kind of crazy sport to
them, and their one idea was to carry out
their orders.
I confess I was desperately tired before
we had forded the upper waters of the More,
crossed the Redscaurhead, and looked over
the green pasture - lands to the south. It
was a most curious sight; for whereas one
side of the range was rough and messy and
hideous with red scars, the other was a
gentle slope with sweet hill-grass and bright
shallow waters. It was a new country where
the old curse could not reign, and an idea
took possession of me that if once Ladlaw
came into the place he would be healed of
his malady. The air seemed clearer, the
sky softer, the whole world simple and
clean. We fetched a circuit down one of
the little streams till we came to the back
of the hill which on its face is called
Mossrigging. I was abominably tired, but
in better spirits. As for the minister, he


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 215
groaned occasionally, but never spoke a
word.
At the foot we separated to the distance
of half a mile, and began the ascent. So far
there was no sign of our man. Tod was on
the far east, I was in the centre, and Mr
Oliphant took the west. I cannot profess
to remember exactly all the incidents of
that climb, I was too stupid with sleep
and exertion, and the little distant figures
of my companions danced in a kind of haze.
The ascent was simple,—short grass, varied
by short heather, with at wide intervals a
patch of shingle. The shepherd walked with
an easy swing, the minister stumbled and
groaned, while I, in sheer bravado and irri-
tation at my weakness, kept up a kind of
despairing trot. The Devil and Ladlaw com-
bined might confront me, but I was too tired
to care. Indeed, in a little I had forgotten
all about the purpose of our quest.
Then, quite suddenly, almost at the sum-
mit, in a little hollow of the ridge, I saw
our man. He was sitting on the ground,
directly in the minister's line, and his head
was sunk on his breast. I remember being
taken with a horrid thought that he was


216 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
dead, and quickened my trot to a run.
Meanwhile the minister was approaching very
near, but apparently quite unconscious of
his presence. His eyes were in the ends of
the earth, and he ambled along with no
purpose in the world.
What happened rests mainly on my author-
ity; but Robert Tod, shepherd in Nether
Mossrigging, is ready to swear to the essen-
tials. Mr Oliphant stumbled on into the
hollow till he was within ten yards of the
sitting figure. Ladlaw never moved; but
the subtle influence which tells of human
presence came suddenly upon the minister's
senses, for he lifted his eyes and started.
The man was still scared to death, and he
naturally turned to run away, when some-
thing happened which I cannot well explain.
Ladlaw was still sitting with his head on
his breast, and yet it was clear to my mind
that Ladlaw had somehow risen and was
struggling with the minister. I could see
the man's wrists strained and twisted as if
in a death-grapple, and his white face red-
dening with exertion. He seemed to be
held round the middle, for his feet tottered
several times, and once he lurched to the


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 217
left side, so that I thought he was thrown.
And yet he was only battling with the air,
for there was Ladlaw sitting quietly some
yards from him.
And then suddenly the contest seemed to
cease. Mr Oliphant ran straight past the
sitting man and over the brow of the hill.
Surprise had held Tod and myself motion-
less. Now the spell was broken, and from
our several places we ran towards Ladlaw.
I heard the shepherd's loud voice crying,
"Look at Oliphant! Oliphant's no wise!"
and I thought I heard a note of sardonic
mirth. In any case, it was the minister he
was after, for a moment later he disappeared
down the further slope.
Mr Oliphant might go where he pleased,
but my business was with my friend. I
caught Ladlaw by the shoulder and shook
him fiercely. Then I pulled him to his feet,
let him go, and he rolled over. The sight
was so comic that I went into a fit of
nervous laughter; but the shock seemed to
have restored his wits, for he opened sleepy
eyes and regarded me solemnly. I do not
propose to analyse my reasons, but I was
conscious that it was the old Ladlaw who


218 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
was looking at me. I knew he was healed
of his malady, but how I knew it I do not
know. He stuck both fists into his eyes
like a sleepy child. Then he yawned, and
looked down ruefully at soaked, soiled, and
ragged clothing. Then he looked reproach-
fully at me.
"What's up?" he asked. "Stop that
hideous row and tell me what has happened.
Have I had an accident?"
Then I spoke cunningly. "Nothing much.
A little bit of a fall, but you'll be all right
soon. Why, you look better already." And
again I went into a fit of laughter.
He grew wholesomely cross. "Oh, don't
be a confounded jackass !" he cried, "I feel
as if I hadn't slept for a week, and I'm
hungry and thirsty."
He swallowed the contents of my flask,
and wolfed my sandwiches in a disgusting
way. Then he proposed that we should go
home. "I'm tired, and I'm sick of shoot-
ing for the day. By the bye, where's my
gun f
"Broken," I said, "broken in the fall.
The keeper is going to look after it." And


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 219
with the aid of my arm he began with
feeble steps his homeward journey.
• • t ■ • • a
The minister—this is the tale of Robert
Tod and his colleagues—ran down the pre-
cipitous part of Mossrigging like a thing
inspired. Tod, labouring heavily in his wake,
declared that he went down the hillside like
a loose stone, slipping, stumbling, yet never
altogether losing his feet, and clearing
dangers solely by the grace of God. As he
went, said the men, he made clutches at the
air, and his face was the face of one dis-
traught. They ran together from their dif-
ferent places to intercept him on the edge
of the bog, for at first they thought he was
Ladlaw. When they saw their mistake they
did not stop, for Tod was making frantic
signals for pursuit. John Ker, the More
keeper, was nearest, and he declared after-
wards that he never approached a business
so unwillingly. "I wad hae grippit a wild
stot or a daft staig suner nor yon man," he
said. But the business was too public for
sheer cowardice. John assaulted him on the
left flank while the other attacked in front,


220 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
and John was bowled over like a ninepin.
It was not the minister, he said, but some-
thing else, something with an arm two yards
long, which flew out like a steam-hammer.
But the others were more fortunate. One
caught Mr Oliphant's right arm, another
hung on to the flaps of his coat, while a
third tripped him up gallantly, till the whole
body of them rolled on the ground. Then
ensued an indescribable fray. Tod got a
black eye from some unknown source, and
one of the boys lost several front teeth.
Howls of rage filled the moorland air, and
all the while, they declared, the minister
was praying with an unction which was
never heard in the kirk. "Lord, give me
peace!" he cried, "Lord, take the thing
away!" and then again, "Get thee behind
me, Satan!"
The end came very suddenly, for the
company rolled into the bog. The minister,
being lowest, saved the others, but he
floundered in the green slime up to his
middle. The accident seemed to inspire
sobriety. He ceased his prayers, his face
lost its horror, and took on a common
human fear. Then Tod and his friends


THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD. 221
laboured heroically to rescue him, and all the
while, they declared, something was pornmelling them and bruising them, and they
showed for long black marks on their bodies.
Slowly they raised Mr Oliphant from the
slough, and on a bridge of coats he crept
back to solid land. And then something
happened which was the crowning marvel of
the business. It was a still sharp day; but
suddenly there came a wind, hot and harsh,
and like nothing they had ever known. It
stung them like nettles, played for a moment
in their midst, and then in a kind of visible
cloud passed away from them over the bog
in the direction of the Red Loch. And with
the wind went the Thing which had so long
played havoc in the place; and the men
were left with an unkempt figure, coated
with slime and shivering with fright, but
once more the sane and prosaic Mr Oliphant,
the minister of the parish of More.
• • • • •
We got Ladlaw and the minister back to
the house with much trouble, for both were
weak on their legs, and one was still in a
pitiable fright. The two kept eyeing each
other, one with a sort of disgusted amuse-


222 THE WATCHER BY THE THRESHOLD.
ment, the other with a wondering fear. The
shepherds were mystified; but they were
matter-of-fact beings, who, having fulfilled
their orders, gave no more thought to the
business. The wounded nursed their bruises
and swore cheerfully, and the boy with the
broken teeth whistled his complaints. A
good dinner restored them to humour, and
the last I saw was Ker and Tod going over
the Odyssey of their adventures to a circle
of critical spectators.
When Ladlaw and the minister had washed
and fed, and sat smoking in the library, I
went to talk to Sybil. I have often
wondered how much she understood. At
any rate she took my word that the trouble
had passed, and in a fit of tears thanked me
for my labours. Then she said she would go
to her husband, and I led her to the library,
where the two heroes were smoking the pipe
of peace.
Ladlaw greeted her cheerily as if nothing
had happened. "I feel a bit shaken," he
said, "but I'll be all right after a night's
rest. You needn't be nervous, Sib. By the
bye, Harry, where's that gun?"
Then he wandered round the room, cast-





IV.
THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE





THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.1
"Between the hours of twelve and one, even at the
turning of the tide."
rN come from distant parts to admire
the tides of Solloway, which race in
at flood and retreat at ebb with a greater
speed than a horse can follow. But nowhere
are there queerer waters than in our own
parish of Caulds at the place called the
Sker Bay, where between two horns of land
a shallow estuary receives the stream of the
Sker. I never daunder by its shores, and
see the waters hurrying like messengers from
the great deep, without solemn thoughts and
a memory of Scripture words on the terror
of the sea. The vast Atlantic may be fear-
1 From the unpublished Remains of the Reverend John
Dennistoun, sometime minister of the Gospel in the parish
of Caulds, and author of 'Satan's Artifices against the
Elect.'


228 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
ful in its wrath, but with us it is no clean
open rage, but the deceit of the creature,
the unholy ways of quicksands when the
waters are gone, and their stealthy return
like a thief in the night-watches. But in
the times of which I write there were more
awful fears than any from the violence of
nature. It was before the day of my ministry
in Caulds, for then I was a bit callant in
short clothes in my native parish of Lesma-
hagow; but the worthy Doctor Chrystal, who
had charge of spiritual things, has told me
often of the power of Satan and his emis-
saries in that lonely place. It was the day
of warlocks and apparitions, now happily
driven out by the zeal of the General
Assembly. Witches pursued their wanchancy
calling, bairns were spirited away, young
lassies selled their souls to the evil one, and
the accuser of the brethren in the shape of
a black tyke was seen about cottage-doors
in the gloaming. Many and earnest were
the prayers of good Doctor Chrystal, but
the evil thing, in spite of his wrestling, grew
and flourished in his midst. The parish stank
of idolatry, abominable rites were practised
in secret, and in all the bounds there was no


230 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
new preen, the yaird better delved than the
manse garden; and there was routh of fowls
and doos about the small steading, forbye a
wheen sheep and milk-kye in the fields. No
man ever saw Alison at any market in the
countryside, and yet the Skerburnfoot was
plenished yearly in all proper order. One
man only worked on the place, a doited lad
who had long been a charge to the parish,
and who had not the sense to fear danger
or the wit to understand it. Upon all other
the sight of Alison, were it but for a moment,
cast a cold grue, not to be remembered with-
out terror. It seems she was not ordinarily
ill-faured, as men use the word. She was
maybe sixty years in age, small and trig,
with her grey hair folded neatly under her
mutch. But the sight of her eyes was not
a thing to forget. John Dodds said they
were the een of a deer with the devil ahint
them, and indeed they would so appal an
onlooker that a sudden unreasoning terror
came into his heart, while his feet would impel
him to flight. Once John, being overtaken
in drink on the roadside by the cottage, and
dreaming that he was burning in hell, woke,
and saw the old wife hobbling towards him.


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 231
Thereupon he fled soberly to the hills, and
from that day became a quiet-living humble-
minded Christian. She moved about the
country like a wraith, gathering herbs in
dark leanings, lingering in kirkyairds, and
casting a blight on innocent bairns. Once
Robert Smillie found her in a ruinous kirk
on the Lang Muir where of old the idolatrous
rites of Rome were practised. It was a hot
day, and in the quiet place the flies buzzed
in crowds, and he noted that she sat clothed
in them as with a garment, yet suffering no
discomfort. Then he, having mind of Beel-
zebub, the god of flies, fled without a halt
homewards; but, falling in the Coo's Loan,
broke two ribs and a collar-bone, the whilk
misfortune was much blessed to his soul. And
there were darker tales in the countryside,
of weans stolen, of lassies misguided, of in-
nocent beasts cruelly tortured, and in one
and all there came in the name of the wife
of the Skerburnfoot. It was noted by them
that kenned best that her cantrips were at
their worst when the tides in the Sker Bay
ebbed between the hours of twelve and one.
At this season of the night the tides of
mortality run lowest, and when the outgoing


232 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
of these unco waters fell in with the setting
of the current of life, then indeed was the
hour for unholy revels. While honest men
slept in their beds, the auld rudas carlines
took their pleasure. That there is a delight
in sin no man denies, but to most it is but a
broken glint in the pauses of their conscience.
But what must be the hellish joy of those lost
beings who have forsworn God and trysted
with the Prince of Darkness, it is not for a
Christian to say. Certain it is that it must
be great, though their master waits at the end
of the road to claim the wizened things they
call their souls. Serious men, notably Gidden
Scott in the Back of the Hill and Simon
Waugh in the Sheiling of Chasehope, have
seen Alison wandering on the wet sands, danc-
ing to no earthly music, while the heavens,
they said, were full of lights and sounds which
betokened the presence of the prince of the
powers of the air. It was a season of heart-
searching for God's saints in Caulds, and the
dispensation was blessed to not a few.
It will seem strange that in all this time
the presbytery was idle, and no effort was
made to rid the place of so fell an influence.
But there was a reason, and the reason, as


234 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
the lass grew up in the nurture and admonition
of the Lord. I have heard Doctor Chrystal
say that he never had a communicant more
full of the things of the Spirit. From the
day when she first declared her wish to come
forward to the hour when she broke bread
at the table, she walked like one in a dream.
The lads of the parish might cast admiring
eyes on her bright cheeks and yellow hair as
she sat in her white gown in the kirk, but
well they knew she was not for them. To
be the bride of Christ was the thought that
filled her heart; and when at the fencing of
the tables Doctor Chrystal preached from
Matthew nine and fifteen, " Can the children of
the bride-chamber mourn, as long as the bride-
groom is with them?" it was remarked by
sundry that Ailie's face was liker the coun-
tenance of an angel than of a mortal lass.
It is with the day of her first communion
that this narrative of mine begins. As she
walked home after the morning table she
communed in secret and her heart sang
within her. She had mind of God's mercies
in the past, how He had kept her feet
from the snares of evil-doers which had
been spread around her youth. She had


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 235
been told unholy charms like the seven
south streams and the nine rowan berries,
and it was noted when she went first to
the catechising that she prayed " Our Father
which wert in heaven," the prayer which
the ill wife Alison had taught her, meaning
by it Lucifer who had been in heaven and
had been cast out therefrom. But when
she had come to years of discretion she
had freely chosen the better part, and evil
had ever been repelled from her soul like
Gled water from the stones of Gled brig.
Now she was in a rapture of holy content.
The drucken bell—for the ungodly fashion
lingered in Caulds — was ringing in her
ears as she left the village, but to her it
was but a kirk-bell and a goodly sound.
As she went through the woods where the
primroses and the whitethorn were blossom-
ing, the place seemed as the land of Elam,
wherein there were twelve wells and three-
score and ten palm-trees. And then, as it
might be, another thought came into her
head, for it is ordained that frail mortality
cannot long continue in holy joy. In the
kirk she had been only the bride of Christ;
but as she came through the wood, with


236 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
the birds lilting and the winds of the
world blowing, she had mind of another
lover. For this class, though so cold to
men, had not escaped the common fate. It
seemed that the young Heriotside, riding
by one day, stopped to speir something or
other, and got a glisk of Ailie's face,
which caught his fancy. He passed the
road again many times, and then he would
meet her in the gloaming or of a morning
in the field as she went to fetch the kye.
"Blue are the hills that are far away" is
an owercome in the countryside, and while
at first on his side it may have been but
a young man's fancy, to her he was like
the god Apollo descending from the skies.
He was good to look on, brawly dressed,
and with a tongue in his head that would
have wiled the bird from the tree. More-
over, he was of gentle kin, and she was
a poor lass biding in a cot-house with an
ill-reputed mother. It seems that in time
the young man, who had begun the affair
with no good intentions, fell honestly in
love, while she went singing about the
doors as innocent as a bairn, thinking of
him when her thoughts were not on higher


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 237
things. So it came about that long ere
Ailie reached home it was on young Heriot-
side that her mind dwelt, and it was the
love of him that made her eyes glow and
her cheeks redden.
Now it chanced that at that very hour
her master had been with Alison, and the
pair of them were preparing a deadly pit.
Let no man say that the devil is not a
cruel tyrant. He may give his folk some
scrapings of unhallowed pleasure; but he
will exact tithes, yea of anise and cummin,
in return, and there is aye the reckoning
to pay at the hinder end. It seems that
now he was driving Alison hard. She had
been remiss of late, fewer souls sent to
hell, less zeal in quenching the Spirit, and
above all the crowning offence that her
bairn had communicated in Christ's kirk.
She had waited overlong, and now it was
like that Ailie would escape her toils. I
have no skill of fancy to tell of that dark
collogue, but the upshot was that Alison
swore by her lost soul and the pride of
sin to bring the lass into thrall to her
master. The fiend had bare departed
when Ailie came over the threshold to


238 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
find the auld carline glunching by the
fire.
It was plain she was in the worst of
tempers. She flyted on the lass till the
poor thing's cheek paled. "There you
gang," she cried, "troking wi' thae wearifu'
Pharisees o' Caulds, whae daurna darken
your mither's door. A bonnie dutiful child,
quotha! Wumman, hae ye nae pride ?—no
even the mense o' a tinkler-lass?" And
then she changed her voice, and would be
as soft as honey. "My puir wee Ailie!
was I thrawn till ye? Never mind, my
bonnie. You and me are a' that's left, and
we maunna be ill to ither." And then the
two had their dinner, and all the while
the auld wife was crooning over the lass.
"We maun 'gree weel," she says, "for
we're like to be our lee-lane for the rest
o' our days. They tell me Heriotside is
seeking Joan o' the Croft, and they're sune
to be cried in Gledsmuir kirk."
It was the first the lass had heard of
it, and you may fancy she was struck
dumb. And so with one thing and other •
the auld witch raised the fiends of jealousy
in that innocent heart. She would cry out


240 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
runes and philters, though her soul cried
out for them. Always when she was most
disposed to listen some merciful power
stayed her consent. Alison grew thrawner
as the hours passed. She kenned of Heriot-
side's broken arm, and she feared that any
day he might recover and put her strata-
gems to shame. And then it seems that
she collogued with her master and heard
word of a subtler device. For it was ap-
proaching that uncanny time of year, the
festival of Beltane, when the auld pagans
were wont to sacrifice to their god Baal.
In this season warlocks and carlines have
a special dispensation to do evil, and Alison
waited on its coming with graceless joy.
As it happened, the tides in the Sker Bay
ebbed at this time between the hours of
twelve and one, and, as I have said, this
was the hour above all others when the
powers of darkness were most potent.
Would the lass but consent to go abroad
in the unhallowed place at this awful
season and hour of the night, she was as
firmly handfasted to the devil as if she
had signed a bond with her own blood.
For there, it seemed, the forces of good


242 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
had mended. He had been to the supper
of the Forest Club at the Cross Keys in
Gledsmuir, a clamjamfry of wild young
blades who passed the wine and played
at cartes once a-fortnight. It seems he
had drunk well, so that the world ran
round about and he was in the best of
tempers. The moon came down and bowed
to him, and he took off his hat to it.
For every step he travelled miles, so that
in a little he was beyond Scotland alto-
gether and pacing the Arabian desert. He
thought he was the Pope of Rome, so he
held out his foot to be kissed, and rolled
twenty yards to the bottom of a small
brae. Syne he was the King of France,
and fought hard with a whin-bush till he
had banged it to pieces. After that nothing
would content him but he must be a bogle,
for he found his head dunting on the stars, and his legs were knocking the hills together.
He thought of the mischief he was doing to
the auld earth, and sat down and cried at
his wickedness. Then he went on, and
maybe the steep road to the Moss Rig
helped him, for he began to get soberer
and ken his whereabouts.


244 "THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
broke silence. "Ye're thinkin' o' the maid
Ailie Sempill," says he.
"How ken ye that?" asked Heriotside.
"It is my business to read the herts o'
men," said the other.
"And who may ye be 1" said Heriotside,
growing eerie.
"Just an auld packman," said he—" nae
name ye wad ken, but kin to mony gentle
houses."
"And what about Ailie, you that ken sae
muckle?" asked the young man.
"Naething," was the answer—" naething
that concerns you, for ye'll never get the
lass."
"By God, and I will!" says Heriotside
for he was a profane swearer.
"That's the wrong name to seek her in,
any way," said the man.
At this the young laird struck a great blow
at him with his stick, but found nothing to
resist him but the hill-wind.
When they had gone on a bit the dark man
spoke again. "The lassie is thirled to holy
things," says he. "She has nae care for flesh
and blood, only for devout contemplation."
"She loves me," says Heriotside.


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 245
"Not you," says the other, "but a shadow
in your stead."
At this the young man's heart began to
tremble, for it seemed that there was truth
in what his companion said, and he was ower
drunk to think gravely.
"I kenna whatna man ye are," he says,
"but ye have the skill of lassies' hearts. Tell
me truly, is there no way to win her to
common love?"
"One way there is," said the man, "and
for our friendship's sake I will tell you it.
If ye can ever tryst wi' her on Beltane's Eve
on the Sker sands, at the green link o' the
burn where the sands begin, on the ebb o'
the tide when the midnight is bye but afore
cockcrow, she'll be yours, body and soul, for
this world and for ever."
And then it appeared to the young man
that he was walking his lone up the grass
walk of Heriotside with the house close by
him. He thought no more of the stranger
he had met, but the word stuck in his
heart.
It seems that about this very time Alison
was telling the same tale to poor Ailie. She
cast up to her every idle gossip she could


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 247
horse was a mettle beast that well set off
his figure. Ailie was standing by the door-
step as he came down the road, and her heart
stood still with joy. But a second thought
gave her anguish. This man, so gallant and
braw, would never be for her; doubtless the
fine suit and the capering horse were for
Joan o' the Croft's pleasure. And he in turn,
when he remarked her wan cheek and dowie
eyes, had mind of what the dark man said
on the muir, and saw in her a maid sworn
to no mortal love. Yet the passion for her
had grown fiercer than ever, and he swore
to himself that he would win her back from
her phantasies. She, one may believe, was
ready enough to listen. As she walked with
him by the Sker water his words were like
music to her ears, and Alison within-doors
laughed to herself and saw her devices
prosper.
He spoke to her of love and his own heart,
and the girl hearkened gladly. Syne he re-
buked her coldness and cast scorn upon her
piety, and so far was she beguiled that she
had no answer. Then from one thing and
another he spoke of some true token of their
love. He said he was jealous and craved,


248 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
something to ease his care. "It's but a small
thing I ask," says he; "but it will make me
a happy man, and nothing ever shall come
atween us. Tryst wi' me for Beltane's Eve on
the Sker sands, at the green link o' the burn
where the sands begin, on the ebb o' the tide
when midnight is bye but afore cockcrow.
For," said he, "that was our forebears' tryst
for true lovers, and wherefore no for you and
me?"
The lassie had grace given her to refuse,
but with a woful heart, and Heriotside rode
off in black discontent, leaving poor Ailie to
sigh her lone. He came back the next day
and the next, but aye he got the same
answer. A season of great doubt fell upon
her soul. She had no clearness in her hope,
nor any sense of God's promises. The Scrip-
tures were an idle tale to her, prayer brought
her no refreshment, and she was convicted
in her conscience of the unpardonable sin.
Had she been less full of pride she would
have taken her troubles to good Doctor
Chrystal and got comfort; but her grief
made her silent and timorous, and she found
no help anywhere. Her mother was ever
at her side, seeking with coaxings and evil


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 249
advice to drive her to the irrevocable step.
And all the while there was her love for the
man riving in her bosom and giving her no
ease by night or day. She believed she had
driven him away and repented her denial.
Only her pride held her back from going to
Heriotside and seeking him herself. She
watched the road hourly for a sight of his
face, and when the darkness came she would
fit in a corner brooding over her sorrows.
At last he came, speiring the old question.
He sought the same tryst, but now he had
a further tale. It seemed he was eager to
get her away from the Skerburnside and
auld Alison. His aunt, Lady Balcrynie,
would receive her gladly at his request till
the day of their marriage. Let her but tryst
with him at the hour and place he named,
and he would carry her straight to Balcrynie,
where she would be safe and happy. He
named that hour, he said, to escape men's
observation for the sake of her own good name.
He named that place, for it was near her
dwelling, and on the road between Balcrynie
and Heriotside, which fords the Sker Burn.
The temptation was more than mortal heart
could resist. She gave him the promise he


250 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
sought, stifling the voice of conscience; and
as she clung to his neck it seemed to her
that heaven was a poor thing compared with
a man's love.
Three days remained till Beltane's Eve,
and throughout the time it was noted that
Heriotside behaved like one possessed. It
may be that his conscience pricked him, or
that he had a glimpse of his sin and its
coming punishment. Certain it is that, if
he had been daft before, he now ran wild
in his pranks, and an evil report of him
was in every mouth. He drank deep at the
Cross Keys, and fought two battles with
young lads that had angered him. One he
let off with a touch on the shoulder, the other
goes lame to this day from a wound he got
in the groin. There was word of the pro-
curator-fiscal taking note of his doings, and
troth, if they had continued long he must
have fled the country. For a wager he rode
his horse down the Dow Craig, wherefore the
name of the place has been the Horseman's
Craig ever since. He laid a hundred guineas
with the laird of Slipperfield that he would
drive four horses through the Slipperfield loch,
and in the prank he had his bit chariot dung


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 253
meet with the great waters of the sea.
But Heriotside recked nothing of it, for his
heart had but one thought and the eye of
his fancy one figure. Never had he been
so filled with love of the lass, and yet it
was not happiness but a deadly secret fear.
As he came to the Lang Muir it was
geyan dark, though there was a moon some-
where behind the clouds. It was little he
could see of the road, and ere long he had
tried many moss - pools and sloughs, as his
braw new coat bare witness. Aye in front
of him was the great hill of Mucklewhan,
where the road turned down by the Mire.
The noise of the Heriot had not long1
fallen behind him ere another began, the
same eerie sound of burns crying to ither
in the darkness. It seemed that the whole
earth was overrun with waters. Every
little runnel in the bog was astir, and yet
the land around him was as dry as flax,
and no drop of rain had fallen. As he rode
on the din grew louder, and as he came
over the top of Mirehope he kenned by the
mighty rushing noise that something un-
common was happening with the Mire Burn.
The light from Mirehope sheiling twinkled


254 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
on his left, and had the man not been
dozened with his fancies he might have
observed that the steading was deserted and
men were crying below in the fields. But
he rode on, thinking of but one thing, till
he came to the cot - house of Cockmalane,
which is nigh the fords of the Mire.
John Dodds, the herd who bode in
the place, was standing at the door, and
he looked to see who was on the road so
late.
"Stop," says he, "stop, Laird Heriotside.
I kenna what your errand is, but it is to
no holy purpose that ye're out on Beltane
Eve. D'ye no hear the warning o' the
waters?"
And then in the still night came the
sound of Mire like the clash of armies.
"I must win over the ford," says the
laird quietly, thinking of another thing.
"Ford!" cried John in scorn. "There'll
be nae ford for you the nicht unless it be
the ford o' the river Jordan. The burns
are up, and bigger than man ever saw them.
It'll be a Beltane's Eve that a' folk will
remember. They tell me that Gled valley
is like a loch, and that there's an awesome


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 257
like a corp for an hour or more till the
rain aroused him. The other was one Sim
Doolittle, the fish - hawker from Allerfoot,
jogging home in his fish - cart from Gleds-
muir fair. He had drunk more than was
fit for him, and he was singing some light
song, when he saw approaching, as he
said, the pale horse mentioned in the Reve-
lations, with Death seated as the rider.
Thoughts of his sins came on him like a
thunder - clap, fear loosened his knees, he
leaped from the cart to the road, and from
the road to the back of a dyke. Thence he
flew to the hills, and was found the next
morning far up among the Mire Craigs,
while his horse and cart were gotten on the
Aller sands, the horse lamed and the cart
without the wheels.
At the tollhouse the road turns inland to
Gledsmuir, and he who goes to Sker Bay
must leave it and cross the wild land called
the Whinny Knowes, a place rough with
bracken and foxes' holes and old stone
cairns. The tollman, John Gilzean, was
opening his window to get a breath of air
in the lown night when he heard or saw
the approaching horse. He kenned the
K


258 THE ODTGOING OF THE TIDE.
beast for Heriotside's, and, being a friend
of the laird's, he ran down in all haste to
open the yett, wondering to himself about
the laird's errand on this night. A voice
came down the road to him bidding him
hurry; but John's old fingers were slow with
the keys, and so it happened that the horse
had to stop, and John had time to look up
at the gash and woful face.
"Where away the nicht sae late, laird?"
says John.
"I go to save a soul from hell," was the
answer.
And then it seems that through the open
door there came the chapping of a clock.
"Whatna hour is that?" asks Heriotside.
"Midnight," says John, trembling, for he
did not like the look of things.
There was no answer but a groan, and
horse and man went racing down the dark
hollows of the Whinny Knowes.
How he escaped a broken neck in that
dreadful place no human being will ever
tell. The sweat, he has told me, stood in
cold drops upon his forehead; he scarcely
was aware of the saddle in which he sat;
and his eyes were stelled in his head, so


260 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
natural fear. He stepped his beast a few
feet in, still staring afore him like a daft
man. And then something in the sound
or the feel of the waters made him look
down, and he perceived that the ebb had
begun and the tide was flowing out to
sea.
He kenned that all was lost, and the know-
ledge drove him to stark despair. His sins
came in his face like birds of night, and his
heart shrank like a pea. He knew himself
for a lost soul, and all that he loved in the
world was out in the tides. There, at any
rate, he could go too, and give back that
gift of life he had so blackly misused. He
cried small and soft like a bairn, and drove
the grey out into the waters. And aye as
he spurred it the foam should have been
flying as high as his head; but in that un-
canny hour there was no foam, only the
waves running sleek like oil. It was not
long ere he had come to the Sker channel,
where the red moss-waters were roaring to
the sea, an ill place to ford in midsummer
heat, and certain death, as folks reputed it,
at the smallest spate. The grey was swim-
ming, but it seemed the Lord had other pur-


THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE. 261
poses for him than death, for neither man
nor horse could drown. He tried to leave
the saddle, but he could not; he flung the
bridle from him, but the grey held on, as if
some strong hand were guiding. He cried
out upon the devil to help his own, he re-
nounced his Maker and his God ; but whatever
his punishment, he was not to be drowned.
And then he was silent, for something was
coming down the tide.
It came down as quiet as a sleeping bairn,
straight for him as he sat with his horse
breasting the waters, and as it came the
moon crept out of a cloud and he saw a
glint of yellow hair. And then his madness
died away and he was himself again, a weary
and stricken man. He hung down over the
tides and caught the body in his arms, and
then let the grey make for the shallows.
He cared no more for the devil and all his
myrmidons, for he kenned brawly he was
damned. It seemed to him that his soul
had gone from him and he was as toom as
a hazel-shell. His breath rattled in his
throat, the tears were dried up in his head,
his body had lost its strength, and yet he
clung to the drowned maid as to a hope of


262 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
salvation. And then he noted something at
which he marvelled dumbly. Her hair was
drookit back from her clay-cold brow, her
eyes were shut, but in her face there was
the peace of a child. It seemed even that
her lips were smiling. Here, certes, was no
lost soul, but one who had gone joyfully to
meet her Lord. It may be in that dark
hour at the burn-foot, before the spate caught
her, she had been given grace to resist her
adversary and flung herself upon God's mercy.
And it would seem that it had been granted,
for when he came to the Skerburnfoot there
in the corner sat the weird - wife Alison
dead as a stone and shrivelled like a heather-
birn.
For days Heriotside wandered the country
or sat in his own house with vacant eye and
trembling hands. Conviction of sin held him
like a vice: he saw the lassie's death laid at
his door, her face haunted him by day and
night, and the word of the Lord dirled in
his ears telling of wrath and punishment.
The greatness of his anguish wore him to a
shadow, and at last he was stretched on his
bed and like to perish. In his extremity
worthy Doctor Chrystal went to him unasked


264 THE OUTGOING OF THE TIDE.
crucifier of the body. It seems that this
severity weakened his frame, for three years
syne come Martinmas he was taken ill with
a fever, and after a week's sickness, he went
to his account, where I trust he is accepted.





FOUNTAINBLUE.
—»—
L
ONCE upon a time, as the story-books say, a
boy came over a ridge of hill, from which
a shallow vale ran out into the sunset. It
was a high, wind-blown country, where the
pines had a crook in their backs and the
rocks were scarred and bitten with winter
storms. But below was the beginning of
pastoral. Soft birch-woods, shady beeches,
meadows where cattle had browsed for gen-
erations, fringed the little brown river as it
twined to the sea. Farther, and the waves
broke on white sands, the wonderful billows
of the West which cannot bear to be silent.
And between, in a garden wilderness, with
the evening flaming in its windows, stood
Fountainblue, my little four - square castle
which guards the valley and the beaches.


268
FOUNTAINBLUE.
The boy had torn his clothes, scratched
his face, cut one finger deeply, and soaked
himself with bog - water, but he whistled
cheerfully and his eyes were happy. He
had had an afternoon of adventure, startling
emprises achieved in solitude; assuredly a
day to remember and mark with a white
stone. And the beginning had been most
unpromising. After lunch he had been at-
tired in his best raiment, and, in the misery
of a broad white collar, despatched with his
cousins to take tea with the small lady who
domineered in Fountainblue. The prospect
had pleased him greatly, the gardens fed
his fancy, the hostess was an old confederate,
and there were sure to be excellent things
to eat. But his curious temper had arisen
to torment him. On the way he quarrelled
with his party, and in a moment found him-
self out of sympathy with the future. The
enjoyment crept out of the prospect. He
knew that he did not shine in society, he
foresaw an afternoon when he would be left
out in the cold and his hilarious cousins
treated as the favoured guests. He reflected
that tea was a short meal at the best, and
that games on a lawn were a poor form of


FOUNTAINBLUE.
269
sport. Above all, he felt the torture of his
collar and the strait ness of his clothes. He
pictured the dreary return in the twilight,
when the afternoon, which had proved, after
all, such a dismal failure, had come to a
weary end. So, being a person of impulses,
he mutinied at the gates of Fountainblue
and made for the hills. He knew he should
get into trouble, but trouble, he had long
ago found out, was his destiny, and he
scorned to avoid it. And now, having cast
off the fear of God and man, he would for
some short hours do exactly as he pleased.
Half-crying with regret for the delights
he had forsworn, he ran over the moor to
the craggy hills which had always been
forbidden him. When he had climbed
among the rocks awe fell upon the deso-
late little adventurer, and he bewailed his
choice. But soon he found a blue hawk's
nest, and the possession of a coveted egg
inspired him to advance. By-and-by he
had climbed so high that he could not
return, but must needs scale Stob Ghabhar
itself. With a quaking heart he achieved
it, and then, in the pride of his heroism,
he must venture down the Grey Correi


270
FOUNTAINBLUE.
where the wild goats lived. He saw a
bearded ruffian, and pursued him with
stones, stalking him cunningly till he was
out of breath. Then he found odd little
spleenwort ferns, which he pocketed, and
high up in the rocks a friendly raven
croaked his encouragement. And then,
when the shadows lengthened, he set off
cheerily homewards, hungry, triumphant,
and very weary.
All the way home he flattered his soul.
In one afternoon he had been hunter and
trapper, and what to him were girls' games
and pleasant things to eat? He pictured
himself the hardy outlaw, feeding on oat-
meal and goat's-flesh, the terror and pride
of his neighbourhood. Could the little
mistress of Fountainblue but see him now,
how she would despise his prosaic cousins!
And then, as he descended on the high-
way, he fell in with his forsaken party.
For a wonder they were in good spirits
—so good that they forgot to remind him,
in their usual way, of the domestic terrors
awaiting him. A man had been there who
had told them stories and shown them
tricks, and there had been cocoa-nut cake,


FOUNT AINBLUE. 273
the sole outlook of the morning. The
western sea lay like a thin line of gold
beyond the moorland, and down in the
valley in a bower of trees lights began to
twinkle from the little castle. The remote
mountains, hiding deep corries and woods
in their bosom, were blurred by twilight
to a single wall of hazy purple, which shut
off this fairy glen impenetrably from the
world. Fountainblue—the name rang witch-
ingly in his ears. Fountainblue, the last
home of the Good Folk, the last hold of
the vanished kings, where the last wolf in
Scotland was slain, and, as stories go, the
last saint of the Great Ages taught the
people,—what had Fountainblue to do with
his hard world of facts and figures? The
thought woke him to a sense of the present,
and for a little he relished the paradox.
He had left it long ago, an adventurous
child; now he was returning with success
behind him and a portion of life's good
things his own. He was rich, very rich
and famous. Few men of forty had his
power, and he had won it all in fair
struggle with enemies and rivals and a
niggardly world. He had been feared and
s


274
FOUNTAINBLUE.
hated, as he had been extravagantly ad-
mired; he had been rudely buffeted by
fortune, and had met the blows with a
fighter's joy. And out of it all something
hard and austere had shaped itself, some-
thing very much a man, but a man with
little heart and a lack of kindly human
failings. He was master of himself in a
curious degree, but the mastery absorbed
his interests. Nor had he ever regretted
it, when suddenly in this outlandish place
the past swept over him, and he had a
vision of a long avenue of vanished hopes.
It pleased and disquieted him, and as the
road dipped into the valley he remembered
the prime cause of this mood of vagaries.
He had come up into the north with
one purpose in view, he frankly told him-
self. The Etheridges were in Fountainblue,
and ever since, eight months before, he had
met Clara Etheridge, he had forgotten his
ambitions. A casual neighbour at a dinner-
party, a chance partner at a ball,—and then
he had to confess that this slim, dark,
bright-eyed girl had broken in irrevocably
upon his contentment. At first he hated
it for a weakness, then he welcomed the


FOUNTAINBLUE.
275
weakness with feverish ecstasy. He did
nothing by halves, so he sought her com-
pany eagerly, and, being a great man in
his way, found things made easy for him.
But the girl remained shy and distant, flat-
tered doubtless by his attention, but watch-
ing him curiously as an intruder from an
alien world. It was characteristic of the
man that he never thought of a rival.
His whole aim was to win her love; for
rivalry with other men he had the contempt
of a habitual conqueror. And so the un-
easy wooing went on till the Etheridges left
town, and he found himself a fortnight later
with his work done and a visit before him
to which he looked forward with all the
vehemence of a nature whose strong point
had always been its hope. As the road
wound among the fir-trees, he tried to
forecast the life at Fountainblue, and map
out the future in his usual business-like
way. But now the future refused to be
thus shorn and parcelled: there was an un-
known quantity in it which defied his
efforts.
The house-party were sitting round the
hall-fire when he entered. The high-roofed


276
FOUNTAINBLUE.
place, the flagged floor strewn with rugs,
and its walls bright with the glow of fire
on armour, gave him a boyish sense of com-
fort. Two men in knickerbockers were
lounging on a settle, and at his entrance
came forward to greet him. One was Sir
Hugh Clanroyden, a follower of his own;
the other he recognized as a lawyer named
Durward. From the circle of women Miss
Etheridge rose and welcomed him. Her
mother was out, but would be back for
dinner; meantime he should be shown his
room. He noticed that her face was browner,
her hair a little less neat, and there seemed
something franker and kindlier in her smile.
So in a very good humour he went to rid
himself of the dust of the roads.
Durward watched him curiously, and then
turned, laughing, to his companion, as the
girl came back to her friends with a
heightened colour in her cheeks.
"Romeo the second," he said, "We are
going to be spectators of a comedy. And
yet, heaven knows! Maitland is not cast
for comedy."
The other shook his head. "It will never
come off. I've known Clara Etheridge most


FOUNTAINBLUE.
211
of my life, and I would as soon think of
marrying a dancing - girl to a bishop. She
is a delightful person, and my very good
friend, but how on earth is she ever to
understand Maitland? And how on earth
can he see anything in her? Besides, there's
another man."
Durward laughed. "Despencer! I sup-
pose he will be a serious rival with a
woman; but imagine him Maitland's rival
in anything else! He'd break him like a
rotten stick in half an hour. I like little
Despencer, and I don't care about Maitland;
but all the same it is absurd to compare the
two, except in love-making."
"Lord, it will be comic," and Clanroyden
stretched his long legs and lay back on a
cushion. The girls were still chattering
beside the fire, and the twilight was fast
darkening into evening.
"You dislike Maitland?" he asked, look-
ing up. "Now, I wonder why?"
Durward smiled comically at the ceiling.
"Oh, I know I oughtn't to. I know he's
supposed to be a man's man, and that it's
bad form for a man to say he dislikes him,
But I'm honest enough to own to detesting


FOUNTAINBLUE.
perience nearly killed him. He said that
the fellow was tireless, and as mad and
reckless as a boy with nothing to lose."
"Well, that simply bears out what I say
of him. He does not understand the mean-
ing of sport. When he gets keen about
anything he pursues it as carefully and
relentlessly as if it were something on the
Stock Exchange. Now little Despencer is a
genuine sportsman in his canary - like way.
He loves the art of the thing and the being
out of doors. Maitland, I don't suppose,
ever thinks whether it is a ceiling or the sky
above his august head. Despencer"
But at the moment Clanroyden uncrossed
his legs, bringing his right foot down heavily
upon his companion's left. Durward looked
up and saw a young man coming towards
him, smiling.
The newcomer turned aside to say some-
thing to the girls round the fire, and then
came and sat on an arm of the settle. He
was a straight, elegant person, with a well-
tanned, regular face, and very pleasant brown
eyes.
"I've had such an afternoon," he said.
"You never saw a place like Cairnlora. It's


282
FOUNTAINBLUE.
from that side of the family. She disapproves
of him strongly, so of course I had to defend
him. And what do you think she said? 'He
has betrayed his tradition. He has sold his
birthright for a mess of pottage, and I wish
him joy of his bargain!' Nice one for your
party, Hugh."
Miss Etheridge had left the group at the
fire and was standing at Despencer's side.
She listened to him with a curious air of
solicitude, like an affectionate sister. At the
mention of Maitland's name Clanroyden had
watched her narrowly, but her face did not
change. And when Despencer asked, " Where
is the new arrival 1" she talked of him with
the utmost nonchalance.
• ••••••
Maitland came down to dinner, ravenously
hungry and in high spirits. Nothing was
changed in this house since he had stared
at the pictures and imagined terrible things
about the armour and broken teacups with
childish impartiality. His own favourite seat
was still there, where, hidden by a tapestry
screen, he had quarrelled with Sylvia while
their elders gossiped. This sudden flood of
memories mellowed him towards the world.


FOUNTAINBLUE.
283
He was cordial to Despencer, forbore to think
Durward a fool, and answered every one of
Mr Etheridge's many questions. For the first
time he felt the success of his life. The old
house recalled his childhood, and the sight
of Clanroyden, his devoted follower, reminded
him of his power. Somehow the weariful
crying for the moon, which had always tor-
tured him, was exchanged for a glow of
comfort, a shade of complacency in his hag-
gard soul. . . . And then the sight of Clara
dispelled his satisfaction.
Here in this cheerful homely party of friends
he found himself out of place. On state oc-
casions he could acquit himself with credit,
for the man had a mind. He could make the
world listen to him when he chose, and the
choice was habitual. But now his loneliness
claimed its lawful consequences, and he longed
for the little friendly graces which he had
so often despised. Despencer talked of
scenery and weather with a tenderness to
which this man, who loved nature as he loved
little else, was an utter stranger. This
elegant and appropriate sentiment would
have worried him past endurance, if Miss
Clara had not shared it. It was she who


284
FOUNTAINBLUE.
told some folk-tale about the Grey Correi with
the prettiest hesitancy which showed her
feeling. And then the talk drifted to books
and people, flitting airily about their petty
world. Maitland felt himself choked by their
accomplishments. Most of the subjects were
ones no sane man would trouble to think of,
and yet here were men talking keenly about
trifles and disputing with nimble - witted
cleverness on the niceties of the trivial. Feel-
ing miserably that he was the only silent
one, he plunged desperately into the stream,
found himself pulled up by Despencer and
deftly turned. The event gave him the feel-
ing of having been foiled by a kitten.
Angry with the world, angrier with his
own angularity, he waited for the end of the
meal. Times had not changed in this house
since he had been saved by Sylvia from social
disgrace. But when the women left the
room he found life easier. His host talked
of sport, and he could tell him more about
Stob Ghabhar than any keeper. Despencer,
victorious at dinner, now listened like a docile
pupil. Durward asked a political question,
and the answer came sharp and definite.
Despencer demurred gently, after his fashion.


286
FOUNTAINBLUE.
too well. Wild nature is an excellent back-
ground, but give me civilisation in front."
Maitland was looking into the wood. "You
will find it creep far into civilisation if you
look for it. There is a very narrow line be-
tween the warm room and the savage out-
of-doors."
"There are miles of luxuries," the girl
cried, laughing. "People who are born in
the wrong century have to hunt over half
the world before they find their savagery.
It is all very tame, but I love the tameness.
You may call yourself primitive, Mr Maitland,
but you are the most complex and modern
of us all. What would Donald of the Isles
have said to politics and the Stock Ex-
change?"
They had strolled back to the house, "Nevertheless I maintain my belief," said
the man. "You call it miles of rampart;
I call the division a line, a thread, a sheet
of glass. But then, you see, you only know
one side, and I only know the other."
"What preposterous affectation !" the girl
said, as with a pretty shiver she ran indoors.
Maitland stood for a moment looking back
at the darkness. Within the firelit hall,


F0UNTAINBLT7E.
289
questions which were gall and wormwood to
that young man. But he answered honestly,
after his fashion.
"Isn't he very rich?" she asked, "And I
suppose he lives very plainly?"
"Rich as Croesus, and he sticks in his ugly
rooms in the Albany because he never thinks
enough about the thing to change. I've been
in them once, and you never saw such a place.
He's a maniac for fresh air, so they're large
enough, but they're littered like a stable with
odds and ends of belongings. He must have
several thousand books, and yet he hasn't a
decent binding among them. He hasn't a
photograph of a single soul, and only one
picture, which, I believe, was his father. But
you never saw such a collection of whips
and spurs and bits. It smells like a harness-
room, and there you find Maitland, when by
any chance he is at home, working half the
night and up to the eyes in papers. I
don't think the man has any expenses ex-
cept food and rent, for he wears the same
clothes for years. And he has given up
horses."
"Was he fond of horses?" Miss Clara
asked.
T


FOUNTAINBLTJE.
291
being healthily tired, was in an excellent
temper, and he found himself enticed into
what for him was a rare performance—talk
about himself. They were sitting apart from
the others, and, ere ever he knew, he was
answering the girl's questions with an absent-
minded frankness. In a little she had drawn
from him the curious history of his life, which
most men knew, but never from his own lips.
"I was at school for a year," he said,
"and then my father died and our affairs
went to pieces, I had to come back and
go into an office, a sort of bank. I hated
it, but it was good for me, for it taught
me something, and my discontent made me
ambitious. I had about eighty pounds
a-year, and I saved from that. I worked
too at books incessantly, and by-and-by I
got an Oxford scholarship at an obscure
college, I went up there, and found myself
in a place where every one seemed well-off,
while I was a pauper. However, it didn't
trouble me much, for I had no ambition
to play the fool. I only cared about two
things — horses and metaphysics. I hated
all games, which I thought only fit for
children. I daresay it was foolish, but then


292
FOUNTAINBLUE.
you see I had had a queer upbringing. I
managed to save a little money, and one
vacation when I was wandering about in
Norfolk, sleeping under haystacks and work-
ing in harvest-fields when my supplies ran
down, I came across a farmer. He was a
good fellow and a sort of sportsman, and
I took a fancy to him. He had a colt to
sell which I fancied more, for I saw it had
blood in it. So I bought it for what
seemed a huge sum to me in those days,
but I kept it at his farm and I superin-
tended its education. I broke it myself
and taught it to jump, and by-and-by in
my third year I brought it to Oxford and
entered for the Grind on it. People laughed
at me, but I knew my own business. The
little boys who rode in the thing knew
nothing about horses, and not one in ten
could ride; so I entered and won. It was
all I wanted, for I could sell my horse then,
and the fellow who rode second bought it.
It was decent of him, for I asked a big
figure, and I think he had an idea of doing
me a kindness, I made him my private
secretary the other day."
"You mean Lord Drapier ?" she asked.


FOUNTAINBLUE.
293
"Yes—Drapier. That gave me money to
finish off and begin in town. Oh, and I
had got a first in my schools. I knew very
little about anything except metaphysics, and
I never went to tutors. I suppose I knew
a good deal more than the examiners in my
own subject, and anyhow they felt obliged
to give me my first after some grumbling.
Then I came up to town with just sixty
pounds in my pocket, but I had had the
education of a gentleman."
Maitland looked out of the window, and
the sight of the mist-clad hills recalled him
to himself. He wondered why he was
telling the girl this story, and he stopped
suddenly.
"And what did you do in town?" she
asked, with interest.
"I hung round and kept my eyes open.
I nearly starved, for I put half my capital
on a horse which I thought was safe, and
lost it. By-and-by, quite by accident, I
came across a curious fellow, Ransome—you
probably have heard his name. I met him
in some stables where he was buying a
mare, and he took a fancy to me. He
made me his secretary, and then, because


294
FOUNT AINBLUE.
I liked hard work, he let me see his busi-
ness. It was enormous, for the man was
a genius after a fashion; and I slaved away
in his office and down at the docks for
about three years. He paid me just enough
to keep body and soul together and cover
them with clothes; but I didn't grumble,
for I had a sort of idea that I was on my
probation. And then my apprenticeship
came to an end."
"Yes," said the girl.
"Yes; for you see Eansome was an odd
character. He had a sort of genius for
finance, and within his limits he was even
a great administrator. But in everything
else he was as simple as a child. His soul
was idyllic: he loved green fields and
Herrick and sheep. So it had always been
his fancy to back out some day and retire
with his huge fortune to some country place
and live as he pleased. It seemed that he
had been training me from the first day I
went into the business, and now he cut the
rope and left the whole enormous concern
in my hands. I needed every atom of my
wits, and the first years were a hard
struggle. I became of course very rich;


KOUNTAINBLUE. 295
but I had to do more, I had to keep the
thing at its old level. I had no natural
turn for the work, and I had to acquire
capacity by sheer grind. However, I man-
aged it, and then, when I felt my position
sure, I indulged myself with a hobby and
went into politics."
"You call it a hobby?"
"Certainly. The ordinary political career
is simply a form of trifling. There's no
trade on earth where a man has to fear
so few able competitors. Of course it's very
public and honourable and that sort of thing,
and I like it; but sometimes it wearies me
to death."
The girl was looking at him with curious
interest. "Do you always get what you
want?" she asked.
"Never," he said.
"Then is your success all disappoint tnent?"
"Oh, I generally get a bit of my ambi-
tions, which is all one can hope for in this
world."
"I suppose your ambitions are not idyllic,
like Mr Ransome's?"
He laughed. "No, I suppose not. t
never could stand your Corot meadows and


298
FOUNTAINBLUK
away beyond the Seal's Headland. Do you
know the place, Mr Maitland?"
"Eilean na Cille? Yes. It used to be
dangerous for currents, but a steam-yacht
does not require to fear them."
"Well, we'll be ready to start at twelve,
and I must go in to give orders about
lunch."
A little later she came out with a bundle
of letters in her hands. "Here are your
letters, Mr Maitland; but you mustn't try to
answer them, or you'll be late." He put the
lot in his jacket pocket and looked up at the
laughing girl. "My work is six hundred
miles behind me," he said, "and to-day I have
only the Eilean na Cille to think of." And, as
she passed by, another name took the place
of the Eilean, and it seemed to him that at
last he had found the link which was to bind
together the two natures—his boyhood and
his prime.
Out on the loch the sun was beating with
that steady August blaze which is more
torrid than midsummer. But as the yacht
slipped between the horns of the land, it
came into a broken green sea with rollers
to the north where the tireless Atlantic


FOUNTAIN BLUE.
299
fretted on the reefs. In a world of cool salt
winds and the golden weather of afternoon,
with the cries of tern and gull about the
bows and the foam and ripple of green water
in the wake, the party fell into a mood of
supreme contentment. The restless Miss
Clara was stricken into a figure of contem-
plation, which sat in the bows and watched
the hazy blue horizon and the craggy mainland
hills in silent delight. Maitland was revelling
in the loss of his isolation. He had ceased
to be alone, a leader, and for the moment
felt himself one of the herd, a devotee of
humble pleasures. His mind was blank, his
eyes filled only with the sea, and the lady
of his devotion, in that happy moment of
romance, seemed to have come at last within
the compass of his hopes.
The Islands of the Waves are low green
ridges which rise little above the highest tide-
mark. The grass is stiff with salt, the sparse
heather and rushes are crooked with the winds,
but there are innumerable little dells where]a
light wild scrub flourishes, and in one a spring
of sweet water sends a tiny stream to the
sea. The yacht's company came ashore in
boats, and tea was made with a great bustle


300
FOUNTAINBLUE.
beside the well, while the men lay idly in
the bent and smoked. All wind seemed to
have died down, a soft, cool, airless peace
like a June evening was abroad, and the
heavy surging of the tides had sunk to a
distant whisper. Maitland lifted his head,
sniffed the air, and looked uneasily to the
west, meeting the eye of one of the sailors
engaged in the same scrutiny. He beckoned
the man to him.
"What do you make of the weather?"
he asked.
The sailor, an East - coast man from
Arbroath, shook his head. "It's ower lown
a' of a sudden," he said. "It looks like mair
wind nor we want, but I think it'll haud till
the morn."
Maitland nodded and lay down again. He
smiled at the return of his old sea craft and
weather-lore, on which he had prided himself
in his boyhood; and when Miss Clara came
up to him with tea she found him grinning
vacantly at the sky.
"What a wonderful lull in the wind," she
said. "When I was here last these were
real isles of the waves, with spray flying over
them and a great business to land. But now


302
FOUNTAINBLUE.
for poetry. I am merely repeating the non-
sense I was brought up on. Shall I talk
to you about politics?"
"Heaven forbid! And now I will tell
you my own story about these isles. There
is a hermit's cell on one of them and crosses,
like Iona. The hermit lived alone all winter,
and was fed by boats from the shore when
the weather was calm. When one hermit
died another took his place, and no one knew
where he came from. Now one day a
great lord in Scotland disappeared from his
castle. He was the King's Warden of
the Marches and the greatest soldier of
his day, but he disappeared utterly out of
men's sight, and people forgot about him.
Long years after the Northmen in a great
fleet came down upon these isles, and the
little chiefs fled before them. But suddenly
among them there appeared an old man, the
hermit of the Wave Islands, who organised
resistance and gathered a strong army. No
one dared oppose him, and the quarrelsome
petty chiefs forgot their quarrels under his
banner, for he had the air of one born to
command. At last he met the invaders in
the valley of Fountainblue, and beat them so


FOUNTAINBLUE.
303
utterly that few escaped to their ships. He
fell himself in the first charge, but not before
his followers had heard his battle-cry of ' Saint
Bride,' and known that the Hermit of the
Isles and the great King's Warden were
the same."
"That was a common enough thing in wild
times. Men grew tired of murder and glory
and waving banners, and wanted quiet to
make their peace with their own souls. I
should have thought the craving scarcely
extinct yet."
"Then here is your chance, Mr Maitland,"
said the girl, laughing. "A little trouble
would make the hut habitable, and you could
simply disappear, leaving no address to for-
ward your letters to. Think of the sensation,
'Disappearance of a Secretary of State,' and
the wild theories and the obituaries. Then
some day when the land question became
urgent on the mainland, you would turn up
suddenly, settle it with extraordinary wisdom,
and die after confiding your life-story to some
country reporter. But I am afraid it would
scarcely do, for you would be discovered by
Scotland Yard, which would be ignominious."
"It is a sound idea, but the old device is


304
FOUNTAINBLUE.
too crude. However, it could be managed
differently. Some day, when civilisation
grows oppressive, Miss Clara, I will remem-
ber your advice."
The afternoon shadows were beginning to
lengthen, and from the west a light sharp
wind was crisping the sea. The yacht was
getting up steam, and boats were coming
ashore for the party. The deep blue waters
were flushing rose-pink as the level westering
sun smote them from the summit of a cloud-
bank. The stillness had gone, and the air
was now full of sounds and colour. Miss
Clara, with an eye on the trim yacht,
declared her disapproval. "It is an evening
for the cutter," she cried, and in spite of
Mrs Etheridge's protests she gave orders
for it to be made ready. Then the self-
willed young woman looked round for com-
pany. "Will you come, Mr. Maitland?" she
said. "You can sail a boat, can't you? And
Mr Despencer, I shall want you to talk to
me when Mr Maitland is busy. We shall
race the yacht, for we ought to be able to
get through the Scarfs Neck with this wind."
"I am not sure if you are wise, Miss Clara,"
and Maitland pulled down his brows as he


FOUNTAINBLUE. 305
v
looked to the west. "It will be wind—in
a very little, and you stand the chance of a
wetting."
"I don't mind. I want to get the full
good of such an evening. You want to be
near the water to understand one of our sun-
sets. I can be a barbarian too, you know."
It was not for Maitland to grumble at this
friendliness; so he followed her into the
cutter with Despencer, who had no love for
the orders but much for her who gave them.
He took the helm and steered, with directions
from the lady, from his memory of the intri-
cate coast. Despencer with many rugs looked
to Miss Clara's comfort, and, having assured
his own, was instantly entranced with the
glories of the evening.
The boat tripped along for a little in a
dazzle of light into the silvery grey of the
open water. Far in front lay the narrow
gut called the Scarfs Neck, which was the
by-way to the loch of Fountainblue. Then
Maitland at the helm felt the sheets suddenly
begin to strain, and, looking behind, saw that
the Isles of the Waves were almost lost in
the gloom, and that the roseate heavens
were quickly darkening behind. The wind
U


FOUNTAIN BLUE.
307
the gale he could land them at Fountainblue,
though it might take hours and involve much
discomfort. He remembered the coast like his
own name; he relished the grim rage of the
elements, and he kept the cutter's head out
to sea with a delight in the primeval conflict.
The last flickering rays of light, coming
from the screen of cloud, illumined the girl's
pale face, and the sight disquieted him.
There was a hint of tragedy in this game.
Despencer, nervously self-controlled, was re-
assuring Clara. Ploughing onward in the
blackening night in a frail boat on a wind-
threshed sea was no work for a girl. But
it was Despencer who was comforting her!
Well, it was his proper work. He was made
for the business of talking soft things to
women. Maitland, his face hard with spray,
looked into the darkness with a kind of
humour in his heart. And then, as the boat
shore and dipped into the storm, its human
occupants seemed to pass out of the picture,
and it was only a shell tossed on great waters
in the unfathomable night. The evening had
come, moonless and starless, and Maitland
steered as best he could by the deeper
blackness which was the configuration of the


310
FOUNTAINBLUE.
forward in the grip of a black current with
a gale behind and unknown reefs before.
And then he seemed to remember some-
thing of this current which swept along
the isles. In a little—so he recalled a
boyish voyage in clear weather—they would
come to a place where the sea ran swift
and dark beside a kind of natural wharf.
Here he had landed once upon a time, but
it was a difficult enterprise, needing a quick
and a far leap at the proper moment, for
the stream ran very fast. But if this leap
were missed there was still a chance. The
isle was the great Eilean Righ, and the
current swung round its southern end, and
then, joining with another stream, turned
up its far side, and for a moment washed
the shore. But if this second chance were
missed, then nothing remained but to fall
into the great sea-going stream and be
carried out to death in the wide Atlantic.
He strained his eyes to the right for Eilean
Righ. Something seemed to approach, as
they bent under an access of the gale.
They bore down upon it, and he struggled
to keep the boat's head away, for at this
pace to grate upon rock would mean up-


FOUNTAINBLUE.
311
setting. The sail was down, fluttering
amidships like a captive bird, and the
gaunt mast bowed with the wind. A hor-
rible fascination, the inertia of nightmare,
seized him. The motion was so swift and
beautiful; why not go on and onward,
listlessly 1 And then, conquering the weak-
ness, he leaned forward and called to Clara.
She caught his arm like a child, and he
pulled her up beside him. Then he
beckoned Despencer, and, shrieking against
the din, told him to follow him when he
jumped. Despencer nodded, his teeth chat-
tering with cold and the novel business.
Suddenly out of the darkness, a yard on
their right, loomed a great flat rock along
which the current raced like a mill-lade.
The boat made to strike, but Maitland
forced her nose out to sea, and then as
the stern swung round he seized his chance.
Holding Clara with his left arm he stood
up, balanced himself for a moment on the
gunwale, and jumped. He landed sprawling
on his side on some wet seaweed, over
which the sea was lipping, but undeniably
on land. As he pulled himself up he had
a vision of the cutter, dancing like a cork,


312
FOUNTAINBLUE.
vanishing down the current into the
darkness.
Holding the girl in his arms, he picked
his way across the rock pools to the edge
of the island heather. For a moment he
thought Clara had fainted. She lay still
and inert, her eyes shut, her hair falling
foolishly over her brow. He sprinkled some
water on her face, and she revived suffi-
ciently to ask her whereabouts. He was
crossing the island to find Despencer, but
he did not tell her. "You are safe," he
said, and he carried her over the rough
ground as lightly as a child. An intense
exhilaration had seized him. He ran over
the flats and strode up the low hillocks
with one thought possessing his brain. To
save Despencer, that of course was the
far-off aim on his mind's horizon, but all
the foreground was filled with the lady.
"Parmi ceu haut bois"—the old poetry of
the world had penetrated to his heart.
The black night and the wild wind and
the sea were the ministrants of love. The
hollow shams of life with their mincing
conventions had departed, and in this
savage out-world a man stood for a man.


316
FOUNTAINBLUE.
hold, with Despencer, half - choked and all
but fainting, hanging heavily on his right
arm. Blind with spray, sick with sea-water,
and aching with his labours, he gripped at
last the tangles of seaweed, which meant
the flat surface, and with one final effort
raised himself and Despencer to the top.
There he lay for a few minutes with his
head in a rock-pool till the first weariness
had passed.
He staggered with his burden in his arms
along the ragged reef to the strip of sand
where Clara was weeping hysterically. The
sight of her restored Maitland to vigour, the
appeal of her lonely figure there in the wet
bracken. She must think them all dead,
he reflected, and herself desolate, for she
could not have interpreted rightly his own
wild rush into the waves. When she heard
his voice she started, as if at a ghost, and
then seeing his burden, ran towards him.
"Oh, he is dead!" she cried. "Tell me!
tell me!" and she clasped the inert figure
so that her arm crossed Maitland's. Des-
pencer, stupefied and faint, was roused to
consciousness by a woman's kisses on his
cheek, and still more by his bearer abruptly


FOUNTAINBLUE.
317
laying him on the heather. Clara hung
over him like a mother, calling him by soft
names, pushing his hair from his brow,
forgetful of her own wet and sorry plight.
And meanwhile Maitland stood watching,
while his palace of glass was being shivered
about his ears.
Aforetime his arrogance had kept him
from any thought of jealousy; now the time
and place were too solemn for trifling, and
facts were laid bare before him. Sentiment
does not bloom readily in a hard nature,
but if it once comes to flower it does not
die without tears and lamentation. The
wearied man, who stood quietly beside the
hysterical pair, had a moment of peculiar
anguish. Then he conquered sentiment, as
he had conquered all other feelings of whose
vanity he was assured. He was now, as he
was used to be, a man among children; and
as a man he had his work. He bent over
Clara. "I know a hollow in the middle of the island," he said, "where we can camp
the night. I'll carry Despencer, for his
ankle is twisted. Do you think you could
try to walk?"
The girl followed obediently, her eyes


FOUNTAINBLUE.
319
made a couch of bracken, and laid there
the still feeble Despencer. The man was
more weak than ill; but for his ankle he
was unhurt; and a little brandy would have
brought him to himself. But this could not
be provided, and Clara saw in his condition
only the sign of mortal sickness. With
haggard eyes she watched by him, easing
his head, speaking soft kind words, forget-
ful of her own cold and soaking clothes.
Maitland drew her gently to the fire, shook
down the bracken to make a rest for her
head, and left a pile of logs ready for use.
"I am going to the end of the island," he
said, "to light a fire for a signal. It is the
only part which they can see on the main-
land, and if they see the blaze they will
come off for us as soon as it is light." The
pale girl listened obediently. This man was
the master, and in his charge was the safety
of her lover and herself.
Maitland turned his back upon the warm
nook, and stumbled along the ridge to the
northern extremity of the isle. It was not
a quarter of a mile away, but the land was
so rough with gullies and crags that the
journey took him nearly an hour. Just off


FOUNTAINBLUE.
321
cessation, like the lull after a great floop
or a snowslip. The tides still eddied and
swayed, but it was noiselessly; the world
moved, yet without sound or friction. The
bitter wind which chilled his face, and stirred
up the red embers was like a phantom blast,
without the roughness of a common gale.
For a moment he seemed to be set upon a
huge mountain with the world infinitely re-
mote beneath his feet. To all men there
come moments of loneliness of body, and to
some few the mingled ecstasy and grief of
loneliness of soul. The child - tale of the
Ocean Quiet came back to him, the hour of
the Breathing of God. Surely the great
silence was now upon the world. But it
was an evil presage, for all who sailed into
it were homeless wanderers for ever after.
Ah well! he had always been a wanderer,
and the last gleam of home had been left
behind, where by the firelight in the cold
cranny a girl was crooning over her lover.
His past, his monotonous, brilliant past,
slipped by with the knotless speed of a vision.
He saw a boy, haunted with dreams, chafing
at present delights, clutching evermore at the
faint things of fancy. He saw a man, playing
x


322 FOUNTAINBLUE.
with the counters which others played with,
fighting at first for bare existence, and then
for power and the pride of life. Success came
over his path like a false dawn, but he knew
in his heart that he had never sought it.
What was that remote ineffable thing he
had followed? Here in the quiet of the
shadowy waters he had the moment of self-
revelation which comes to all, and hopes and
dim desires seemed to stand out with the
clearness of accomplished facts. There had
always been something elect and secretary at
the back of his fiercest ambitions. The
ordinary cares of men had been to him but
little things to be played with; he had won
by despising them; casting them from him,
they had fallen into the hollow of his hand.
And he had held them at little, finding his
reward in his work, and in a certain alertness
and freshness of spirit which he had always
cherished. There is a story of island-born
men who carry into inland places and the
streets of cities, the noise of sea-water in
their ears, and hear continually the tern
crying and the surf falling. So from his
romantic boyhood this man had borne an
arrogance towards the things of the world


FOUNT AINBLUE. 323
which had given him a contemptuous empire
over a share of them. As he saw the pano-
rama of his life no place or riches entered
into it, but only himself, the haggard, striving
soul, growing in power, losing, perhaps, in
wisdom. And then, at the end of the way,
Death, to shrivel the power to dust, and with
the might of his sunbeam to waken to life the
forgotten world of the spirit.
In the hush he seemed to feel the wheel
and the drift of things, the cosmic order
of nature. He forgot his weariness and his
plashing clothes as he put more wood on the
beacon and dreamed into the night. The
pitiless sea, infinite, untamable, washing the
Poles and hiding Earth's secrets in her breast,
spoke to him with a far-remembered voice.
The romance of the remote isles, the homes
of his people, floating still in a twilight of
old story, rose out of the darkness. His life,
with its routine and success, seemed in a
moment hollow, a child's game, unworthy of
a man. The little social round, the manipu-
lation of half-truths, the easy victories over
fools—surely this was not the task for him.
He was a dreamer, but a dreamer with an
iron hand; he was scarcely in the prime of


324
FOUNTAINBLUE.
life; the world was wide and his chances
limitless. One castle of cards had already
been overthrown; the Ocean Quiet was
undermining another. He was sick of domes-
ticity of every sort—of town, of home, of
civilisation. The sad elemental world was
his, the fury and the tenderness of nature,
the peace of the wilds which old folk had
called the Breathing of God. "Parmi Cell haut bois conduyrai m'amie"—this was still
his motto, to carry untarnished to the end
an austere and beautiful dream. His little
ambitions had been but shreds and echoes
and shadows of this supreme reality. And
his love had been but another such simula-
crum; for what he had sought was no foolish,
laughing girl, but the Immortal Shepherdess,
who, singing the old songs of youth, drives
her flocks to the hill in the first dewy dawn
of the world.
Suddenly he started and turned his head.
Day was breaking in a red windy sky, and
somewhere a boat's oars were plashing in the
sea. And then he realised for the first time
that he was cold and starving and soaked
to the bone.


326
FOUNTAINBLTJE.
of thing. She must, for there is reason to
believe that she refused for its sake the
greatest match—I speak with all reverence
—which this happy country could offer. I
know you like Maitland as little as I do,
but we agree in admiring the Colossus from
a distance. Well, the Colossus has, so to
speak, been laid low by a frivolous member
of your sex. It is all a most romantic tale.
Probably you have heard the gist of it, but
here is the full and circumstantial account.
• • * • • • •
"We found Maitland beside the fire he
had been feeding all night, and I shall never
forget his figure alone in the dawn on that
rock, drenched and dishevelled, but with his
haggard white face set like a Crusader's. He
took us to a kind of dell in the centre of
the island, where we found Clara and Des-
pencer shivering beside a dying fire. He had
a twisted ankle and had got a bad scare,
while she was perfectly composed, though
she broke down when we got home. It must
have been an awful business for both, but
Maitland never seems to have turned a
hair. I want to know two things. First,
how in the presence of great danger he


328
F0UNTA1NBLUE.
a tree and Clara was reading to him. Mait-
land was saying good-bye, and he asked for
Despencer. We told him that he was with
Clara in the garden. He smiled one of those
odd scarce smiles of his, and went out to
them. When I saw his broad shoulders bend-
ing over the chair and the strong face
looking down at the radiant Jack with his
amiable good looks, confound it, Clo, I had
to contrast the pair, and admit with Shake-
speare the excellent foppery of the world.
Well-a-day !' Smooth Jacob still robs homely
Esau.' And perhaps it is a good thing, for
we are most of us Jacobs, and Esau is an un-
comfortable fellow in our midst.
"A week later came the surprising, the
astounding news that he had taken the
African Governorship. A career ruined,
every one said, the finest chance in the
world flung away; and then people specu-
lated, and the story came out in bits, and
there was only one explanation. It is the
right one, as I think you will agree, but it
points to some hidden weakness in that
iron soul that he could be moved to fling
over the ambitions of years because of a
girl's choice. He will go and bury himself


FOUNTAINBLUE.
329
in the wilds, and our party will have to
find another leader. Of course he will do
his work well, but it is just as if I were
to give up my chances of the Woolsack
for a county-court judgeship. He will pro-
bably be killed, for he has a million
enemies; he is perfectly fearless, and he
does not understand the arts of compromise.
It was a privilege, I shall always feel, to
have known him. He was a great man,
and yet — intellect, power, character, were
at the mercy of a girl's caprice. As I write,
I hear Clara's happy laugh below in the
garden, probably at some witticism of the
fortunate Jack's. Upon which, with my
usual pride in the obvious, I am driven
to reflect that the weak things in life may
confound the strong, and that, after all,
the world is to the young. . . ."


330
VI.
SIR HUGH CLANROYDEN TO MR HENRY
DURWARD. SOME YEARS LATER.
". . . I AM writing this on board ship, as
you will see from the heading, and shall
post it when I get to the Cape. You have
heard of my appointment, and I need not
tell you how deep were my searchings of
heart before I found courage to accept.
Partly I felt that I had got my chance;
partly I thought—an inconsequent feeling—
that Maitland, if he had lived, would have
been glad to see me in the place. But I
am going to wear the Giant's Robe, and
Heaven knows I have not the shoulders to
fill it. Yet I am happy in thinking that
I am in a small sense faithful to his
memory.
"No further news, I suppose, has come
of the manner of his death? Perhaps we


332
FOUNTAINBLU&
nominally of the blood, have gone to seed
in mind, or are spoilt by coarse marriages,
or, worst of all, have the little trifling
superior airs of incompetence. But he, he
had the most transcendent breeding in mind
and spirit. He had no need for self-asser-
tion, for his most casual acquaintances put
him at once, in a different class from all
other men. He had never a trace of a
vulgar ideal; men's opinions, worldly honour,
the common pleasures of life, were merely
degrees of the infinitely small. And yet he
was no bloodless mystic. If race means
anything, he had it to perfection. Dreams
and fancies to him were the realities, while
facts were the shadows which he made
dance as it pleased him.
"The truth is, that he was that rarest
of mortals, the iron dreamer. He thought
in aeons and cosmic cycles, and because of
it he could do what he pleased in life. We
call a man practical if he is struggling in
the crowd with no knowledge of his where-
abouts, and yet in our folly we deny the
name to the clear-sighted man who can
rule the crowd from above. And here I
join issue with you and everybody else.


FOUNTAINBLUE.
333
You thought it was Miss Clara's refusal
which sent him abroad and interrupted his
career. I read the thing otherwise. His
love for the girl was a mere accident, a
survival of the domestic in an austere
spirit. Something, I do not know what,
showed him his true desires. She may
have rejected him; he may never have
spoken to her; in any case the renunciation
had to come. You must remember that
that visit to Fountainblue was the first
that he had paid since his boyhood to his
boyhood's home. Those revisitings have
often a strange trick of self-revelation. I
believe that in that night on the island he
saw our indoor civilisation and his own
destiny in so sharp a contrast that he
could not choose but make the sever-
ance. He found work where there could
be small hope of honour or reward,
but many a chance for a hero. And I
am sure that he was happy, and that it
was the longed-for illumination that dawned
on him with the bullet which pierced his
heart.
"But, you will say, the fact remains that
he was once in love with Miss Clara, and


334
FOUNTAINBLUE.
that she would have none of him. I do
not deny it. He was never a favourite
with women; but, thank Heaven, I have
better things to do than study their
peculiarities. . . ."
THE END.
ruiHTRD BY WITXIAW M.ACKWOOD AND








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