THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES THE LILAC SUNBONNET BY THE SAME author. The Stickit Minister AND SOME COMMON MEN. 7th Edition. Cloth, 5s. EDITION DE LUXE, 60 ILLUSTRATIONS. 250 COPIES. ONE GUINEA. The Raiders : Some Passages in the Life of John Faa, Lord and Earl of Little Egypt. 6th Edition. Cloth, 6s. Mad Sir Uchtred of the Hills {AUTONYM LIBRARY). 2nd Edition. Paper, is. 6d. ; cloth, 2s. London : T. FISHER UNWIN. THE LILAC SUNBONNET BY S. R. Crockett LONDON T. FISHER UNWIN PATERNOSTER SQUARE Mdcccxciv /5f To my Wife I inscribe This Story of True Love. 860731 CONTENTS. TAGE PROLOGUE. BY THE WAYSIDE I. THE BLANKET-WASHING II. THE MOTHER OF KING LEMUEL III. A TREASURE-TROVE IV. A CAVALIER PURITAN V. A LESSON IN BOTANY VI. CURLED EYELASHES VII. CONCERNING TAKING EXERCISE VIII. SAUNDERS ARMS FOR CONQUEST IX. THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF X. THE LOVE-SONG OF THE MAVIS XI. ANDREW KISSOCK GOES TO SCHOOL XII. MIDSUMMER DAWN XIII. A STRING OF THE LILAC SUNBONNET XIV. CAPTAIN AGNEW GREATORIX XV. ON THE EDGE OF THE ORCHARD . XVI. THE CUIF BEFORE THE SESSION XVII. WHEN THE KYE COMES HAME XVIII. A DAUGHTER OF THE PICTS XIX. AT THE BARN END XX. " DARK-BROWED EGYPT" XXI. THE RETURN OF EBIE FARRISH XXII. A SCARLET POPPY . • 9 12 • 25 29 • 33 42 • 5o 59 65 7* . 87 9+ • i°5 112 • I2 3 130 • 135 • H3 . 147 • 152 . 160 . 165 • 173 8 CONTENTS. CHAf. PAGE XXIII. CONCERNING JOHN BAIRDIESON . 1 79 XXIV. LEGITIMATE SPORT . . . . 1 9 1 XXV. BARRIERS BREAKING . . . 200 XXVI. PRECIOUS PERIL ...... 205 XXVII. THE OPINIONS OF SAUNDERS MOYVDIEWORT UPON BESOMSHANKS . . . . 2l6 XXVIII. THAT GIPSY JESS ..... 229 XXIX. THE PARK OF THE MOON AT THE GRANNOCH BRIDGE ...... 236 XXX. THE HILL GATE ...... 245 XXXI. THE STUDY OF THE MANSE OF DULLARG . 257 XXXII. OUTCAST AND ALIEN FROM THE COMMONWEALTH 264 XXXIII. JOCK GORDON TAKES A HAND . . . 27O XXXIV. THE DEW OF THEIR YOUTH . . . 277 XXXV. SUCH SWEET SORROW ..... 292 XXXVI. OVER THE HILLS AND FAR AWa' . . 304 XXXVII. UNDER THE RED HEATHER . . . . 314 XXXVIII. BEFORE THE REFORMER'S CHAIR . . 32 I XXXIX. JEMIMA, KEZIA, AND LITTLE KEREN-HAPPUCH 329 XL. A TRIANGULAR CONVERSATION . . -336 XLI. THE MEETING OF THE SYNOD . . . 342 XLII. PURGING AND RESTORATION .... 349 XLIII. THREADS DRAWN TOGETHER . . . 355 XLIV. WINSOME'S FAREWELL TRYST. . . . 360 XLV. THE LAST OF THE LILAC SUNBONNET . 367 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. PROLOGUE. BY THE WAYSIDE. As Ralph Peden came along the dusty Cairn Edward road from the coach which had set him down there on its way to the Ferry town, he paused to rest in the evening light at the head of the Long Wood of Lar- brax. Here, under boughs that arched the way, he took from his shoulders his knapsack, filled with Hebrew and Greek books, and rested his head on the larger bag of roughly tanned Westland leather, in which were all his other belongings. They were not numerous. He might, indeed, have left both bags for the Dullarg carrier on Saturday, but to live lacking his beloved books for four whole days was not to be thought of for a moment by Ralph Peden. He would rather have carried them up the eight long Scots miles to the manse of the Dullarg one by one. As he sat by the ancient tipsy milestone, which had swayed side-long and lay half buried amid the grass and dock leaves, a tall, dark girl came by — half turning in passing to look at the young man as he rested. It was Jess Kissock, from the Herd's House at Craig 9 io THE LILAC SUNBONNET. Ronald, on her way home from buying trimmings for a new hat. This happened to her just twice a year, and was a solemn occasion. " Is this the way to the manse of Dullarg ? " asked the young man, standing up with his hat in his hand, the brim just beneath his chin. He was a handsome young man when he stood up straight. Jess looked at him attentively. They did not speak after that fashion In her country, nor yet do they take their hats in their hands when they have occasion to speak to young women. Yet she found both customs pleasant. " I am myself going past the Dullarg," she said, and paused with a hiatus like an invitation. Ralph Peden was a simple young man, but he rose and shouldered his knapsack without a word. The slim dark-haired girl, with the bright quick eyes like a bird, put out her hand to take a share of the burden of Ralph's bag. " Thank you, but I am quite able to manage it myself," he said ; " I could not think of letting you put your hand to it." " I am no fine lady," said the girl, with a fine little impatient movement of her brows, as if she had stamped her foot. " I am nothing but a cottar's lassie." " But then, how comes it that you speak as you do?" asked Ralph. " I have been long in England — as a lady's maid," she answered with a curious, disquieting look at him. She had taken one side of the bag of books in spite of his protest, and now walked steadily by Ralph's side through the evening coolness. BY THE WAYSIDE. n " This is the first time you have been hereaway ? ' ! his companion asked. Ralph nodded a quick affirmative and smiled. " Then," said Jess Kissock, the rich blood mantling her dark cheeks, " I am the first from the Dullarg you have spoken to ? " " The very first ! " said Ralph. " I am glad," said Jess Kissock. But in the young man's heart there was no answering gladness, though in very sooth she was an exceeding handsome maid. CHAPTER I. THE BLANKET-WASHING. Ralph Peden lay well content under a thorn bush above the Grannoch water. It was the second day of his sojourning in Galloway — the first of his breath- ing that heather scent on which the bees grew tipsy, and of listening lazily to the grasshoppers chirring in the long bent by the loch side. Yesterday his father's friend, Allan Welsh, minister of the Marrow kirk in the parish of Dullarg, had held high preliminary dis- course with him as to his soul's health, and made many inquiries as to how it sped in the great city with the precarious handful of pious folk, who gathered there to listen to the precious and savoury truths of the pure Marrow teaching. Ralph Peden was charged with many messages from his father, the metropolitan Marrow minister, to Allan Welsh of Dullarg — dear to his soul as the only minister who had upheld the essentials on that great day of searching and separation, when among the assembled Presbyters so many had gone backward and walked no more with him. " Be faithful with the young man, my son," Allan Welsh read in the quaintly sealed and delicately written letter which his brother minister in Edinburgh THE BLANKET-WASHING. 13 had sent to him, and which Ralph had duly delivered in the square, grim manse of Dullarg with a sedate and old-fashioned reverence which sat strangely on one of his years. " Be faithful with the young man," continued the letter ; " he is well grounded in the fundamentals ; his head is filled with godly fear, and he has sound views on the Headship ; but he has always been a little cold and distant even to me, his father according to the flesh. With his companions he is apt to be distant and silent. I am to blame for the solitude of our life here in James's Court, but to you I do not need to tell the reason of that. The Lord give you his guidance in leading the young man in the right way." So far Gilbert Peden's letter had run staidly and in character like the spoken words of the writer. But here it broke off. The writing, hitherto fine as a hair, thickened ; and from this point became crowded and difficult, as though the floods of feeling had broken some dam. " O man Allan, for my sake, if at all you have loved me, or owe me anything, dig deep and see if the lad has a heart. He shows it not to me." So that is why Ralph Peden lies couched in the sparce sprays of the ling, just on the braeface where the dry, twisted timothy grasses are beginning to overcrown the purple bells of the heather. Tall and clean-limbed, with a student's pallor of clear-cut face, a slightly ascetic stoop, dark brown curls clustering over a white forehead, and eyes which looked steadfast and true, the young man was sufficient of a hero. And not too much. He wore a broad straw hat, which he had a pleasant habit of pushing back, so that i + THE LILAC SUNBONNET. his clustering locks fell over his brow after a fashion which all women considered becoming. But Ralph Peden heeded not what women thought, said, or did, for he was trysted to the kirk of the Marrow, that sole treasure-house of orthodox truth in Scotland, which is as good as saying in the wide world — perhaps even in the universe. Ralph Peden had dwelt all his life with his father in an old house in James's Court, Edinburgh, overlooking the great bounding circle of the northern horizon and the eastern sea. He had been trained by his father to think more of a professor's opinion on his Hebrew version than of a woman's opinion on any subject whatever. He had been told that women were an indispensable part of the economy of Providence ; but, though he accepted word by word the Westminster Confession, and as a still more inexorable addition the confessions and protests of the remnant of the true kirk in Scotland (known as the Marrow kirk), he could not but consider woman a poor makeshift, even as providing for the continuity of the race. Surely she could not have been created when God looked upon all that He had made and found it very good. The thought preserved Ralph's orthodoxy. Ralph Peden had come out into the clear morning air, with his note-book and a volume which he had been studying all the way from Edinburgh. As he lay at length among the grass he conned it over and over. He referred to passages here and there. He set out very calmly with that kind of deep determination with which a day's work in the open air with a book is often begun. Not for a moment did he break the monotony of his study. The marshalled columns of THE BLANKET-WASHING. 15 strange letters were mowed down before him like meadow grass before the scytheman. A great humble-bee, barred with tawny orange, worked his way up from the front door of his hole in the bank, buzzing shrilly in an impatient, stifled manner at finding his dwelling blocked as to its exit by so mountainous a bulk. Ralph Peden rose in a hurry. The beast seemed to be inside his coat. He had instinctively hated bees and indeed everything that buzzed ever since as a child he had made certain experiments with the paper nest of a tree-building wasp. The humble-bee buzzed a little more, dis- contentedly, thought of turning back, crept out at last from beneath the Hebrew Lexicon, and appeared to comb his hair with his feeler. Then he slowly mounted along the broad blade of a meadow fox-tail grass, which bent under him as if to afford him an elastic send-off upon his flight. With a spring and a sidelong swoop he lumbered up, taking his way over the single field which separated his house from the edge of the Grannoch water — where on the other side, above the glistening sickle-sweep of white sand which looked so inviting, untouched as yet under the pines by the morning sun, the drifted hyacinths lay like a blue wreath of peat reek in the hollows of the wood. But there was a whiff of genuine peat smoke some- where in the air, and Ralph Peden, before he returned to his book, was aware of the murmur of voices. He had moved away from the humble-bee's dwelling and established himself on a quieter slope under a bush of broom. A whin-chat said " check, check " above him, and flirted a brilliant tail ; but Ralph Peden was not afraid of whin-chats. Here he settled himself 16 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. again to study, knitting his brows and drumming on the ground with the toe of one foot to concentrate his attention. The whin-chat could hear him murmuring to himself at intervals, "Surely that is the sense — it must be taken this way." Sometimes, on the con- trary, he shook his head at Luther's Commentary, which lay on the short, warm turf before him, as if in reproof. Ralph was of his father's opinion, that Luther, but for his great protective reputation, and the fact that he had been dead some time, might very well have been served with a libel for heresy — at least if he had been privileged to minister to the Marrow kirk. Of course he did well enough for Germany, a country of great laxity, where as in prelatic England, they drank beer. Then after a little Ralph pulled his hat over his eyes to think, and lay back till he could just see one little bit of Loch Grannoch gleaming through the trees, and the farm of Nether Crae set on the hillside high above it. He counted the sheep on the green field over the loch, numbering the lambs twice because they frisked irresponsibly about, being full of frivolity and having no opinions concerning Luther to sober them. Gradually a haze span itself over the landscape, and Ralph Peden's head slowly fell back till it rested somewhat sharply upon a spikelet of prickly whin. His whole body sat up instantly and automatically, with an exclamation which was quite in Luther's manner. He had not been sleeping. He rejected the thought ; yet he acknowledged it as nevertheless passing strange that, just where the old single-arched Bridge of Crae takes a long stride over the Grannoch lane, there was THE BLANKET- WASHING. 17 now a great black pot a-swing above a pale blinking fire of peats and fir-branches, and a couple of great tubs set close together on the waterside stones. There was, too, a ripple of girls' laughter, which sent a strange stirring of excitement along the nerves of the young man. He gathered his books to move away ; but on second thoughts, looking through the long, swaying tendrils of the broom under which he sat, he resolved to remain. After all, the girls might be as harmless as his helper of yesterday. " It is most annoying," he said ; " I had been quieter in James's Court." Yet he smiled a little to himself, for even at that day the broom did not grow in James's Court, nor the blackbirds flute their mellow whistle there. Loch Grannoch stretched away three miles to the south, basking in alternate blue and white, as cloud and sky mirrored themselves upon it. The first broad rush of the ling 1 was climbing the slopes of the Crae Hill above — a pale lavender near the loch-side, deepen- ing to crimson on the dryer slopes where the heath- bells grew shorter and thicker together. Beneath him the wimpling lane slid as silently away from the sleeping loch as though it were eloping and feared to awake an angry parent. The whole range of hill and wood and water was drenched in sunshine. Silence clothed it like a garment — save only for the dark of the shadow under the bridge, from whence had come that ring of girlish laughter which had jarred upon the nerves of Ralph Peden. Suddenly there emerged from the indigo shade where the blue spruce firs overarched the bridge, a 1 Common heath [Erica tetralix). 2 18 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. girl carrying two shining pails of water. Her arms were bare, her sleeves rolled high above her elbow ; and her figure, tall and shapely, swayed gracefully to the movement of the pails. Ralph did not know before that there is an art in carrying water. He was ignorant of many things, but even with his views on woman's place in the economy of the universe, he could not but be satisfied with the fitness and the beauty of the girl who came up the path, swinging her pails with compensatory sway of lissom body, and a strong outward flex of the elbow which kept the brimming pails swinging in safety by her side. Ralph Peden never took his eyes off" her as she came, the theories of James's Court notwithstanding. Nor indeed need we for a little time. For this is Winifred, better known as Winsome Charteris, a very important young person indeed, to whose beauty and wit the poets of three parishes did vain reverence ; and, what she might well value more, whose butter was the best (and commanded the highest price) of any that went into Dumfries market on Wednesdays. Fair hair, crisping and tendrilling over her brow, swept back in loose and flossy circlets till caught close behind her head by a tiny ribbon of blue — then, again escaping, it went scattering and wavering over her shoulders wonderingly, like nothing on earth but Winsome Charteris's hair. It was small wonder that the local poets grew grey before their time in trying to find a rhyme for " sunshine," a substantive which, for the first time, they had applied to a maiden's hair. For the rest, a face rather oval than long, a nose which the schoolmaster declared was "statuesque" — (used in a good sense, he explained to the village folk, THE BLANKET-WASHING. 19 who could never be brought to see the difference between a statue and an idol — the second command- ment being of literal interpretation along the Loch Grannoch side), and eyes which, emulating the parish poet, we can only describe as like two blue waves when they rise just far enough to catch a sparkle of light on their crests. The subject of her mouth, though a tempting one, we refuse to touch. It has already wrecked three promising reputations. But withal Winsome Charteris set her pails as frankly and plumply on the ground as though she were plain as a pike-staff, and bent prosaically over to look into the gypsy-pot which swung on its birchen triangle. Then she made an impatient movement of her hand, as if to push aside the biting fir-wood smoke. This angered Ralph, who considered it ridiculous and ill-ordered that a gesture which showed only a hasty temper and an ill-regulated mind should be undeniably pretty and pleasant to look upon, just because it was made by a girl's hand. He was angry with himself, yet nevertheless he hoped she would do it again. Instead, she took up one pail of water after the other, swung them upward with a single dexterous move- ment, and poured the water into the pot, from which the steam was already rising. Ralph Peden could see the sunlight sparkle in the water as it arched itself solidly out of the pails. He was not near enough to see the lilac sprig on her light summer gown ; but the lilac sunbonnet which she wore, principally it seemed in order that it might hang by the strings upon her shoulders, was to Ralph a singularly attrac- tive piece of colour in the landscape. This he did not resent, because it is always safe to admire colour. 20 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. Ralph would have been glad to be able to slip off quietly to the manse. Indeed he told himself so over and over again, till he believed it. This process is easy. But he saw very well that he could not now rise from the lee of the whin-bush without being full in view of this eminently practical and absurdly attrac- tive young woman. So he turned to his Hebrew Lexicon with a sigh, and a grim contraction of determined brows which recalled his father. A country girl was nothing to the hunter after curious roots and the amateur of finely shaded significances in Piel and Pual. " I zuill not be distracted ! " Ralph said doggedly, though a Scot, correct for once in his grammar ; and he pursued a recalcitrant particle through the dic- tionary like a sleuth-hound. A clear shrill whistle rang through the slumberous summer air. " Bless me," said Ralph, startled, " this is most discomposing ! " He raised himself cautiously on his elbow, and beheld the girl of the water-pails standing in the full sunshine with her lilac sunbonnet in her hand. She waved it high above her head. Then she paused a moment to look right in his direction under a hand held level with her brows. Suddenly she dropped the sunbonnet, put a couple of fingers into her mouth in a manner which, if Ralph had only known it, was much admired of all the young men in the parish, and whistled clear and loud, so that the stone-chat flut- tered up indignant and scurried to a shelter deeper among the gorse. A most revolutionary young person this. He regretted that the humble-bee had moved him nearer the bridge. THE BLANKET-WASHING 21 Ralph was deeply shocked that a girl should whistle, and still more that she should use two ringers to do it, for all the world like a herd on the hill. He bethought him that not one of his cousins, Professor Habakkuk Thriepneuk's daughters (who studied Chaldzeic with their father), would ever have dreamed of doing that. He imagined their horror at the thought, and a picture, compound of Jemima, Kezia, and Kerenhappuch, rose before him. Down the hill, out from beneath the dark green solid-foliaged elder bushes, there came a rush of dogs. " Save us," said Ralph, who saw himself discovered, " the deil's in the lassie ; she'll have the dogs on me ! " — an expression he had learned from John Bairdison, his father's " man," who in an unhallowed youth had followed the sea. Then he would have reproved himself for the unlicensed exclamation as savouring of the " minced oath," had he not been taken up with watching the dogs. There were two of them. One was a large, rough deerhound, clean cut about the muzzle, shaggy everywhere else, which ran first, taking the hedges and dykes in his stride. The other was a small, short- haired collie, which, with his ears laid back and an air of determination not to be left behind, followed grimly after. The collie went under the hedges, diving in- stinctively for the holes which the hares had made as they went down to the water for their evening drink. Both dogs crossed to windward of him, racing for their mistress. When they reached the green level where the great tubs stood, they leaped upon her with short sharp barks of gladness. She fended them off again with gracefully impatient hand ; then bending low, 22 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. she pointed to the loch-side a quarter of a mile below, where a herd of half a dozen black Galloway cows, flecked with the red and white of the smaller Ayr- shires, could be seen pushing its way through the lush heavy grasses of the water meadow. " Away by there ! Fetch them, Roger ! " she cried. " Haud at them — the kye's in the meadow ! " The dogs darted away level. The tall grass swal- lowed them up. rhe cows continued their slow advance, browsing as they went ; but in a little while their dark fronts were turned towards the dogs, in whom after a momentary indecision they recognised an approaching enemy. With a startled rush the herd drove through the meadow and poured across the unfenced road up to the hill pasture which they had left, whose scanty grasses had doubtless turned slow bovine thoughts to the coolness of the meadow grass, and the pleasure of standing ruminant knee-deep in the river, with wavy tails flicking the flies in the shade. For a little while Ralph Peden breathed freely again, but his satisfaction was short-lived. One girl was discomposing enough, but here were two. Moreover the new-comer, having arranged some blankets in a tub to her satisfaction, calmly tucked up her skirts in a professional manner and got bare- foot into the tub beside them. Then it dawned upon Ralph, who was not very well instructed on matters of household economy, that he had chanced upon a Galloway blanket-washing ; and that, like the gentle- man who spied upon Musidora's toilet (of whom he had read in Mr. James Thomson's Seasons), he might possibly witness more than he had come out to see. THE BLANKET-WASHING. 23 Yet it was impossible to rise composedly and take his way manseward. Ralph wished now that he had gone at the first alarm. It had become so much more difficult now, as indeed it always does in such cases. Moreover, he was morally certain that these two vagabonds of curs would return. And they would be sure to find him out. Dogs were unneces- sary and inconvenient beasts, always sniffing and nosing about. He decided to wait. The new-comer of the kilts was after all no Naiad or Hebe. Her outlines did not resemble to any marked degree the plates in his excellent classical dictionary. She was not exactly short in stature, but so strong and of a complexion so ruddily beaming above the reaming white which filled the blanket tub, that her mirthful face shone up at him like the sun through an evening mist. But Ralph did not notice that, in so far as she could, she had relieved the taller maiden of the heavier share of the work ; and that her laugh was hung on a hair trigger, to go off at every jest and fancy of Winsome Charteris. All this goes to introduce Miss Meg Kissock, chief and favoured maid-servant at the Dullarg farm, and devoted worshipper of Winsome, the young mistress thereof. Meg indeed, would have thanked no one for an introduction, being at all times well able (and willing) to introduce herself. It had been a shock to Ralph Peden when Meg Kissock walked up from the lane-side barefoot, and when she cleared the decks for the blanket tramping. He had, it is true, seen something like it before on the banks of the water of Leith, then running clear and limpid over its pebbles, save for a flour-mill or two 24 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. on the lower reaches. But it was altogether another thing when, plain as print, he saw his first goddess of the shining water-pails sit calmly down on the great granite boulder in the shadow of the bridge, and take one small foot in her hand with the evident intention of removing her foot-gear and occupying the second tub. The hot blood surged in responsive shame to Ralph Peden's cheeks and temples. He started up. Meg Kissock was tramping the blankets rhythmically, holding her green kirtle well up with both hands, and singing with all her might. The goddess of the shining pails was also happily unconscious, with her face to the running water. Ralph bent low and hastened through a gap in the fence towards the shade of the elder bushes on the slope. He did not run — he has never acknowledged that ; but he certainly came almost indistinguishably near it. As soon, indeed, as he was really out of sight, he actually did take to his heels and run in the direction of the manse, dis- concerted and demoralised. The dogs completed his discomfiture, for they caught sight of his flying figure and gave chase — contenting themselves, however, with pausing on the hillside where Ralph had been lying, with indignant barkings and militant tails high-crested in the air. So Winsome Charteris went up to the broom bushes which fringed the slope to find out what was the matter with Tyke and Roger. When she got there a slim black figure was just vanishing round the bend of the Far Away Turn. Winsome whistled low this time, and without putting even one finger into her mouth. CHAPTER II. THE MOTHER OF KING LEMUEL. It was not till Ralph Peden had returned to the study of the manse of the Marrow Kirk of Dullarg, and the colour induced by exercise had had time to die out of his naturally pale cheeks, that he remembered having left his Hebrew Bible and Lexicon, as well as a half-written exegesis on an important subject, underneath the fatal whin bush above the bridge over the Grannoch water. He would have been glad to rise and seek them immediately — a task which, indeed, no longer presented itself in such terrible colours to him. He found himself even anxious to go. It would be a serious thing were he to lose his father's Lexicon and Mr. Welsh's Hebrew Bible. Moreover, he could not bear the thought of leaving the sheets of his exposition of the last chapter of Proverbs to be the sport of the gamesome Galloway winds — or, still worse thought, the laughing-stock of game- some Galloway young women who whistled with two fingers in their mouths. Yet the picture of the maid of the loch which rose before him struck him as no unpleasant one. He remembered for one thing how the sun shone through 25 i6 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. the tangle of her hair. But he had quite forgotten, on the other hand, at what part of his exegesis he had left off. It was, however, a manifest impossibility for him to slip out again. Besides, he was in mortal terror lest Mr. Welsh should ask for his Hebrew Bible, or offer to revise his chapter of the day with him. All the afternoon he was uneasy, finding no excuse to take himself away to the loch-side in order to find his Bible and Lexicon. " I understand you have been studying, with a view to license, the last chapter of the Proverbs of Solomon r " said Gilbert Welsh, interrogatively, bending his shaggy brows and pouting his underlip at the student. The Marrow minister was a small man, with a body so dried and twisted ("shauchelt" was the local word) that all the nerve stuff of a strong nature had run up to his brain, so that when he walked he seemed always on the point of falling forward, over- balanced by the weight of his cliff-like brow. " Ralph, will you ' ground ' the argument of the mother of King Lemuel in this chapter ? But perhaps you would like to refer to the original Hebrew ? " said the minister. " Oh, no," interrupted Ralph, aghast at the latter suggestion, " I do not need the text — thank you, sir." But, in spite of his disclaimer, he devoutly desired to be where the original text and his written comment upon it were at that moment — which, indeed, was a consummation even more devoutly to be wished than he had any suspicion of. The Marrow minister leaned his head on his hand and looked waitingly at the young man. THE MOTHER OF KING LEMUEL. 27 Ralph recalled himself with an effort. He had to repeat to himself that he was in the manse study, and almost to pinch his knee to convince himself of the reality of his experiences. But this was not necessary a second time, for, as he sat hastily down on one of Allan Welsh's hard-wood chairs, a prickle from the gorse bush which he had brought back with him from Loch Grannoch side was argument sharp enough to convince Bishop Berkeley. "Compose yourself to answer my question," said the minister, with some slight severity. Ralph wondered silently if even a minister of the Marrow kirk in good standing, could compose himself on one whin prickle for certain, and the probability of several others developing themselves at various angles hereafter. Ralph " grounded " himself as best he could, ex- plaining the views of the mother of King Lemuel as to the woman of virtue and faithfulness. He seemed to himself to have a fluency and a fervour in exposition to which he had been a stranger. He began to have new views about the necessity for the creation of Eve. Woman might possibly, after all, be less purely gratuitous than he had supposed. " The woman who is above rubies," said he, " is one who rises early to care for the house, who oversees the handmaids as they cleanse the household stuffs — in a " (he just saved himself from saying " in a black pot") — "in a fitting vessel by the rivers of water." " Well put and correctly mandated," said Mr. Welsh, very much pleased. There was unction about this young man. Though a bachelor by pro- fession, he loved to hear the praises of good women ; for he had once known one. 28 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. "She opened her mouth with wisdom ; and " Here Ralph paused, biting his tongue to keep from describing the picture which rose before him. "And what," said the minister, tentatively, leaning forward to look into the open face of the young man — " what is the distinction or badge of true beauty and favour of countenance, as it is so well expressed by the mother of Kin<2; Lemuel ? " " A lilac sunbonnet ! " said Ralph Peden, student in divinity. CHAPTER III. A TREASURE-TROVE. Winsome Charteris was a self-possessed maid, but undeniably her heart beat faster when she found on the brae face, beneath the bush of broom, two books the like of which she had never seen before, as well as an open note-book with writing upon it in the neatest and delicatest of hands. First, as became a prudent woman of experience, she went up to the top of the hill to assure herself that the owner of this strange treasure was not about to return. Then she carefully let down her high-kilted print dress, till only her white feet "like little mice stole in and out." It did not strike her that this sacrifice to the conventions was just a trifle belated. As she returned she said " Shoo ! " at every tangled bush, and flapped her apron as if to scare whatever fearful wild fowl might have left behind it in its nest under the broom such curious nest-eggs as two great books full of strange, bewitched-looking printing, and a note-book of uncouth but interesting writings. Then, with a half sigh of disappointment, Winsome Charteris sat herself down to look into this matter. Meg Kissock from the bridge end showed signs of 29 30 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. coming up to see what she was about ; but Winsome imperiously checked the movement. " Bide where you are, Meg ; I'll be down with you presently." She turned over the great Hebrew Bible reverently. " A. Welsh " was written on the fly-leaf. She had a strange idea that she had seen it before. It seemed somehow thrillingly familiar. " That's the minister's Hebrew Bible book, no doubt," she said. " For that's the same kind of printing as between the double verses of the hundred- and-nineteenth Psalm in my grandfather's big Bible," she continued, sapiently shaking her head till the crispy ringlets tumbled about her eyes, and she had impatiently to toss them aside. She laid the Bible down and peeped into the other strange-looking book. There were single words here of the same kind as in the other, but the most part was in ordinary type, though in a language of which she could make nothing. The note-book was a resource. It was at least readable, and Winsome Charteris began expectantly to turn it over. But something stirred reprovingly in her heart. It seemed as if she were listening to a conversation not meant for her. So she kept her finger on the leaf, but did not turn it. " No," she said, " I will not read it. It is not meant for me." Then, after a pause, " At least I will only read this page which is open, and then look at the beginning to see whose it is ; for, you know, I may need to send it back to him." The back she had seen vanish round the Far Away Turn demanded the masculine pronoun. A TREASURE-TROVE. 31 She lifted the book and read : " Alas ! " (so ran the writing, fluent and clear, small as printer's type, Ralph Peden's beautiful Hellenic script), " alas, that the good qualities of the house- wives of Solomon's days are out of date and forgotten in these degenerate times ! Women, especially the younger of them, are become gadabouts, chatterers in the public ways, idle, adorners of their vain selves, pamperers of their frail tabernacles " Winsome threw down the book and almost trod upon it as upon a snake. " 'Tis some city fop," she said, stamping her foot, " who is tired of the idle pavement dames. I wonder if he has ever seen the sun rise or done a day's work in his life ? If only I had the wretch ! But I will read no more ! " In token of the sincerity of the last assertion, she picked up the note-book again. There was little more to read. It was at this point that the humble- bee had startled the writer. But underneath there were words faintly scrawled in pencil : " Must concentrate attention " — " The proper study of mankind is " — this last written twice, as if the writer were practising copy-lines absently. Then at the very bottom was written, so faintly that hardly any eyes but Winsome's could have read the words : " Of all colours I do love the lilac. I wonder all maids do not wear gear of that hue ! " " Oh ! " said Winsome Charteris, quickly. Then she gathered up the books very gently, and taking a kerchief from her neck, she folded the two great books within it, fastening them with a cunning 32 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. knot. She was carrying them slowly up towards the farm town of Craig Ronald in her bare arms when Ralph Peden sat answering his catechism in the study at the manse. She entered the dreaming courtyard, and walked sedately across its silent sun-flooded spaces without a sound. She passed the door of the cool parlour where her grandfather and grandmother sat, the latter with her hands folded and her great tortoise- shell spectacles on her nose, taking her afternoon nap. A volume of Waverley lay beside her. Into her own white little room Winsome went, and laid the bundle of books in the bottom of the wall-press, which was lined with sheets of the Cairn Edward Miscellany. She looked at them some time before she shut the door. " His name is Ralph," she said. " I wonder how old he is — I shall know to-morrow, because he will come back ; but — I would like to know to-night." She sighed a little — so light a breath that it was only the dream of a sigh. Then she looked at the lilac sunbonnet, as if it ought to have known. " At any rate he has very excellent taste," she said. But the lilac sunbonnet said never a word. CHAPTER IV. A CAVALIER PURITAN. The farm town of Craig Ronald drowsed in the quiet of noon. In the open court the sunshine triumphed, and only the purple-grey marsh mallows along the side of the house under the windows gave any sign of life. In them the bees had begun to hum at earliest dawn, an hour and a half before the sun looked over the crest of Ben Gairn. They were humming busily still. In all the chambers of the house there was the same reposeful stillness. Through them Winsome Charteris moved with free, light step. She glanced in to see that her grandfather and grandmother were wanting for nothing in their cool and wide sitting- room, where the brown mahogany-cased eight-day clock kept up an unequal ticking, like a man walking upon two wooden legs of which one is shorter than the other. It said something for Winsome Charteris and her high-hearted courage, that what she was accustomed to see in that sitting-room had no effect upon her spirits. It was a pleasant room enough, with two windows looking to the south — little round-budded, pale-petalled monthly roses nodding and peeping 3 33 34 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. within the opened window-frames. Sweet it was with a great peace, every chair covered with old sprigged chintz, flowers of the wood and heather from the hill set in china vases about it. The room where the old folk dwelt at Craig Ronald was fresh within as is the dew on sweetbrier. Fresh, too, was the apparel of her grandmother, the flush of youth yet on her delicate cheek, though the Psalmist's limit had long been passed for her. As Winsome looked within — " Are ye not sleep- ing, grandmother ? " she said. The old lady looked up with a resentful air. " Sleepin' ! The lassie's gane gyte ! What for wad I be sleepin' in the afternune ? An' me wi' the care o' yer gran'faither — sic a handling, him nae better nor a bairn, an' you a bit feckless hempie wi' yer hair fleeing like the tail o' a twa-year-auld cowt ! Sleepin' indeed ! Na, sleepin's nane for me ! " The young girl came up and put her arms about her grandmother. " That's rale unceevil o' ye, noo, Granny White- mutch ! " she said, speaking in the coaxing tones to which the Scots language lends itself so easily, "an' it's just because I hae been sae lang at the blanket- washin', seein' till that hizzy Meg. An' ken ye what I saw ! — ane o' the black dragoons in full retreat, grannie ; but he left his camp equipage ahint him, as the sergeant said when Ye ken the story, grannie. Ye maun hae been terrible bonny in thae days ! " " 'Deed I'm nane sae unbonny yet, for a' yer helicat flichtmafleathers, sprigget goons, an' laylac bonnets," said the old lady, shaking her head till the white silk A CAVALIER PURITAN. 35 top-knots trembled. " No, nor I'm nane sae auld nayther. The gudeman in the corner there, he's auld and dune gin ye like, but no me — no me ! Gin he warna spared to me, I could even get a man yet," continued the lively old lady, " an' whaur wad ye be then, my lass, I wad like to ken ? " " Perhaps I could get one too, granny," she said. And she shook her head with an air of triumph. Winsome kissed her grandmother gently on the brow. " Nane o' yer Englishy tricks an' trokin's," said that lady, settling the white muslin band which she wore across her brow wrinkleless and straight, where it had been disarrayed by the onslaught of her im- pulsive granddaughter. " Aye," she went on, stretching out a hand whicn would have done credit to a great dame, so white and slender was it in spite of the hollows which ran into a triangle at the wrist, and the pale-blue veins which the slight wrinkles threw into relief. " An' I mind the time when three o' his Majesty's officers — nane o' yer militia wi' horses that rin awa' wi' them ilka time they gang oot till exerceese, but rale sodgers wi' sabre-tashies to their heels and spurs on them like pitawta dreels. Aye, sirs, but that was before I married an elder in the Kirk o' the Marrow. I wasna twenty-three when I had dune wi' the gawds an' vainities o' this wicked world." " I saw a minister lad the day — a stranger," said Winsome, very quietly. "Sirce me," returned her grandmother briskly, her face lighting up ; " kenned I e'er the like o' ye, Winifred Chayrteris, for licht-heeditness an' lack o' a' common sense ! Saw a minister an' ne'er thocht, ;,6 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. belike, o' sayin' cheep ony mair nor if he had been a wutterick. An' what like was he, na ? Was he young, or auld — or no sae verra auld, like myseF ? Did he look like an Establisher by the consequence o' the body, or " " But, grannie dear, how is it possible that I should ken, when all that I saw of him was but his coat- tails ? It was him that was running away." "My certes," said grannie, "but the times are changed since my day ! When I was as young as ye are the day it wasna sodger or minister ayther that wad hae run frae the sicht o' me. But a minister, and a fine, young-looking man, I think ye said," continued Mistress Walter Skirving, anxiously. " Indeed, grandmother, I said nothing " began Winsome. " Haud yer tongue, deil's i' the lassie, he'll be comin' here. Maybes he's comin' up the loan this verra meenit. Get me my best kep, the French yin o' Flanders lawn trimmed wi' Valenceenes lace that Captain Wildfeather, of his Majesty's But na, I'll no think o' thae times, I canna bear to think o' them wi' ony complaisance ava. But bring me my kep — haste ye fast, lassie ! " Obediently Winsome went to her grandmother's bedroom and drew from under the bed the " mutch " box lined with pale green paper, patterned with faded pink roses. She did not smile when she drew it out. She was accustomed to her grandmother's ways. Too often she herself felt the cavalier looking out from under her Puritan teaching ; for the wild strain of the Gordon blood held true to its kind, and Win- some's grandmother had been a Gordon at Lochenkit, A CAVALIER PURITAN. 37 whose father had ridden with Kenmure in the great rebellion. When she had brought the white goffered mutch with its cunning plaits and puckers, granny tried it on in various ways, Winsome meanwhile holding a small mirror before her. " As I was sayin', I renounced thinkin' aboot the vanities o' youth langsyne. Aye, it'll be forty years sin' — for ye maun mind that I was marriet whan but a lassie. Aye me, it's forty-five years since Ailie Gordon, as I was then, wed wi' Walter Skirving o' Craig Ronald — noo o' his ain chammer neuk, puir man, for he'll never leave it mair," added she, with a brisk kind of acknowledgment towards the chair of the semi-paralytic in the corner. There silent and unregarding Walter Skirving sat — a man still splendid in frame and build, erect in his chair, a shawl over his knees even in this day of fervent heat, looking out dumbly on the drowsing, humming world of broad, shadowless moonshine, and often also on the equable silences of the night. " No that I regret it the day, though he is but the name o' the man he yince was. For fifty years since, there was nae lad like Walter Skirving cam into Dumfries High Street frae Stewartry or frae Shire. No a fit in buckled shune sae licht as his. His weel- shapit leg covered wi' the bonny l rig-an'-fur ' stockin' that I knitted mysel' frae the cast on o' the ower- fauld to the bonny white forefit that sets afF the blue sae weel. Walter Skirving could button his knee- breeks withoot bendin' his back — that nane could do but the king's son himsel' ; an' sic a dancer as he was afore guid an' godly Maister Cauldsowans took haud 38 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. o' him at the tent, wi' preachin' a sermon on booin' the knee to Baal. Aye, aye, it's a' awa' — an' it's mony the year since I thocht on it, let alane wantin' back thae days o' vanity an' the pride o' sinfu' youth ! " "Tell me about the officer men, granny," said Winsome. " 'Deed wull I no. It wad be mair tellin' ye gin ye were learnin' yer Caritches." " But, grandmammy dear, I thought that you said that the officer men ran away from you " " Hear till her ! Rin frae me ? Certes, ye're no blate. They cam' frae far an' near to get a word wi' me. Na, there was nae rinnin' frae a bonny lass in thae days. Weel, there was three o' them ; an' they cam' ower the hill to see the lasses, graund in their reed breeks slashed wi' yellow. An' what for no, they war his Majesty's troopers ; an' though nae doot they had been on the wrang side o' the dyke, they were braw chiels for a' that." " An' they cam' to see you, granny ? " asked Winsome, who approved of the subject. " What else — but they got an unco begunk. 1 Ye see, my faither had bocht an awfu' thrawn young bull at the Dumfries fair, an' he had been gaun gilravagin' aboot ; an' whaur should the contrary beast betak' himsel' to but into the Roman camp on Craig Ronald bank, where the big ditch used to be ? There we heard him routin' for three days till the cotmen fand him i' the hinderend, an' poo'ed him oot wi' cart-rapes. But when he got oot — certes, but he was a wild beast ! He ran at Jock Hinderlands afore he could 1 Cheat. A CAVALIER PURITAN. 39 climb up a tree ; an', fegs, he gaed up a tree withoot clim'in', Pse warrant, an' there he hung, hanket by the waistband o' his breeks, baa-haain' for his minnie to come and lift him doon, an' him as muckle a clamper- some hobbledehoy as ever ye saw ! " Then what did Carlaverock Jock do but set his heid to a yett and ding it in flinders ; fair fire-wood he made o't ; an' sae, rampagin' into the meadow across whilk," continued the old lady, with a rising delight in her eye, " the three cavalry men were comin' to see me, wi' the spurs on them jangling lood. Reed breeks didna suit Jock's taste at the best o' times, and he had no been brocht up to countenance yellow facin's. So the three braw King George's sodgers that had dune sic graund things at Fontenoy took the quickest road through the meadow. Captain St. Clair, he trippit on his sword, an' was aye under- stood to cry oot that he had never eaten beef in his life. Ensign Withershins threw his shako ower his shoother and jumpit intil the water, whaur he ex- pressed his opinion o' Carlaverock Jock, stan'in' up to his neck in Luckie Mowatt's pool — the words I dinna juist call to mind at this present time, which, indeed, is maybe as weel ; but it was Lieutenant Lichtbody, o' his Majesty's Heavy Dragoons, that cam' afF at the waurst. He made for the stane dyke, the seeven-fit march dyke that rins up the hill, ye ken. Weel, he made as if he wad mak' ower it, but Boreland's big Heelant bull had heard the routin' o' his friend Car- laverock Jock, an' was there wi' his horns spread like a man keppin' yowes. Aye, my certes ! " here the old lady paused, overcome by the humour of her recollections, laughing in her glee a delightfully 40 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. catching and mellow laugh, in which Winsome joined. " Sae there was my braw beau, Lieutenant Licht- body, sittin' on his hunkers on the dyke tap girnin' at Carlaverock Jock an' the Boreland Hiclantman on baith sides o' him, an' tryin' tae hit them ower the nose wi' the scabbard o' his sword, for the whinger itseF had drappit oot in what ye micht ca' the forced retreat. It was bonny, bonny to see ; an' whan the three cam' up the loanin' the neist day, 'Sirs,' I said, ' I'm thinkin' ye had better be gaun. I saw Car- laverock Jock the noo, fair tearin' up the greensward. It wudna be bonny gin his Majesty's officers had twice to mak' sae rapid a march to the rear — an' you, Lieutenant Lichtbody, canna hae a'thegither gotten the better o' yer lang sederunt on the tap o' the hill dyke. It's a bonny view that ye had. It was a peety that ye had forgotten yer perspective glasses.' " And wad ye believe it, lassie, the threesome turned on the braid o' their fit an' marched doon the road withoot as muckle as a Fair-guid-e'en or Fair- guid-day ! " " And what said ye, granny dear ? " said Winsome, who sat on a low seat looking up at her granny. "O lassie, I juist set my braid hat ower my lug wi' the bonny white cockade intil 't an' gied them 'The Wee, Wee German Lairdie' as they gaed doon the road, an' syne on the back o't : " * Awa, Whigs, awa' ! Ye' re but a pack ' But the great plaid-swathed figure of Winsome's grandfather turned at the words of the long-forgotten A CAVALIER PURITAN. 41 song as though waking from a deep sleep. A slum- berous fire gleamed momentarily in his eye. "Woman," he said, " hold your peace ; let not these words be heard in the house of Walter Skirving ! " Having thus delivered himself, the fire faded out of his eyes dead as black ashes ; he turned to the window, and lost himself again in meditation, looking with steady gaze across the ocean of sunshine which flooded the valley beneath. His wife gave him no answer. She seemed scarce to have heard the interruption. But Winsome went across and pulled the heavy plaid gently ofF her grand- father's shoulder. Then she stood quietly by him with one hand upon his head and with the other she softly stroked his brow. A milder light of under- standing grew in his dull eye, and he put up his hand uncertainly as if to take hers. " But what for should I be takin' delicht in speakiiv o' thae auld unsanctified regardless days," said her grandmother, " that 'tis mony a year since I hae ta'en ony pleesure in thinkin' on ? Gae wa', ye hempie that ye are ! " she cried, turning with a sudden and uncalled-for sparkle of temper on her granddaughter ; " there's nae time an' little inclination in this hoose for yer flichty conversation. I wonder muckle that yer thouchts are sae set on the vanities o' young men. And such are all that delight in them." She went on somewhat irrelevantly, "Did not godly Maister Cauld- sowans redd up the doom o' such — c all desirable young men riding upon horses "An' I'll gae redd up the dairy, an' kirn the buttei, granny ! " said Winsome Charteris, breaking in on the flow of her grandmother's reproaches. CHAPTER V A LESSON IN BOTANY No lassie in all the hill country went forth more heart-whole into the June morning than Winsome Charteris. She was not, indeed, wholly a girl of the south uplands. Her grandmother was never done reminding her of her " Englishy " ways, which, according to that authority, she had contracted during those early years she had spent in Cumberland. From thence she had been brought to the farm town of Craig Ronald, soon after the decease of her only uncle, Adam Skirving — whose death, coming after the loss of her own mother, had taken such an effect upon her grandfather that for years he had seldom spoken, and now took little interest in the ons-oinfjs of the farm. Walter Skirving was one of a class far commoner in Galloway sixty years ago than now. He was a " bonnet laird " of the best type, and his farm, which included all kinds of soil — arable and pasture, meadow and moor, hill pasture and wood — was of the value of about ^300 a year, a sum sufficient in those days to make him a man of substance and consideration in the country. 42 A LESSON IN BOTANY. 43 He had been all his life — except for a single year in his youth when he broke bounds — a Marrow man of the strictest type ; and it had been the wonder and puzzle of his life (to others, not to himself) how he came to make up to Ailie Gordon, the daughter of the old moss-trooping Lochenkit Gordons, that had ridden with the laird of Redgauntlet in the killing time, and more recently had been out with Maxwell of Nithsdale, and Gordon of Kenmure, to strike a blow for the " King-over-the-Water." And to this very day, though touched with a stroke which prevented her from moving far out of her chair, Ailie Skirving showed the good blood and high-hearted lightsomeness that had won the young laird of Craig Ronald upon the Loch Grannoch side nearly fifty years before. It was far more of a wonder how Ailie Gordon came to take Walter Skirving. It may be that she felt in her heart the accent of a true man in the unbending, nonjuring elder of the Marrow kirk. Two great heart-breaks had crossed their lives : the shadow of the life story of Winsome's mother, that earlier Winsome whose name had not been heard for twenty years in the house of Craig Ronald ; and the more recent death of Adam, the strong, silent, chival- rous-natured son who, sixteen years ago, had been killed, falling from his horse as he rode home alone one winter's night from Dumfries. It was a natural thing to be in love with Winsome Charteris. It seemed natural to Winsome herself. Ever since she was a little lass running to school in Keswick, with a touse of lint-white locks blowing out in the gusts that came swirling off Skiddaw, Winsome had always been aware of a train of admirers. The 44. THE LILAC SUNBONNET. boys liked to carry her books, and were not so ashamed to walk home with her, as even at six years of age young Cumbrians are wont to be in the com- pany of maids, at least in open daylight. Since she came to Galloway, and opened out with each su c- ceeding year, like the bud of a moss rose growing in a moist place, Winsome had thought no more of masculine admiration than of the dull cattle that " goved " upon her as she picked her deft way among the stalls in the byre. In all Craig Ronald there was nothing between the hill and the best room that did not bear the mark of Winsome's method and administrative capacity. In perfect dependence upon Winsome, her granny had gradually abandoned all the management of the house to her, so that at twenty that young woman was a veritable Napoleon of finance and capacity. Only old Richard Clelland of the Boreland, grave and wise pillar of the Kirk by law established, still transacted her market business and banked her siller — being, as he often said, proud to act as "doer" for so fair a principal. So it hap- pened that all the reins of government about this tiny lairdship of one farm were in the strong and capable hands of a girl of twenty. And Meg Kissock was her true admirer and faithful slave — Winsome's heavy hand, too, upon occasion ; for all the men on the farm stood in awe of Meg's prowess, and very especially of Meg's tongue. So also the work fell mostly upon these two, and in less measure upon a sister of Meg's, Jess Kissock, lately returned from England. During the night and morning Winsome had studied with some attention the Hebrew Bible, in A LESSON IN BOTANY. 45 which the name Allan Welsh appeared, as well as the Latin Luther Commentary and the Hebrew Lexicon, on the first page of which the name of Ralph Peden was written in the same neat print hand as in the note-book. This was the second day of the blanket-washing, and Winsome, having in her mind a presentiment that the proprietor of these learned quartos would appear to claim his own, carried them down to the bridge, where Meg and her sister were already deep in the mysteries of frothing tubs and boiling pots. Win- some from the broomy ridge could hear the shrill "gifF-gafF" of their colloquy. She sat down under Ralph's very broom bush, and absently turned over the leaves of the note-book, catching sentences here and there. " I wonder how old he is ? " she said, meditatively ; "his coat-tails looked old, but the legs went too lively for an old man ; besides, he likes maids to be dressed in lilac " She paused still more thoughtfully. "Well, we shall see." She bent over and pulled the milky-stalked, white-seeded head of a dandelion. Taking it between the finger and thumb of her left hand she looked critically at it as though it were a glass of wine. " He is tall, and he is fair, and his age is " Here she pouted her pretty lips and blew once, and stopped. "One — ha, ha ! — he was an active babe when he ran from the blanket - tramping — two, three, four " Some tiny feather-headed spikelets disengaged them- selves unwillingly from the round and venerable down- 46 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. polled dandelion. They floated lazily up between the tassels of the broom upon the light breeze. "Five, six, seven, eight — faith, he was a clean- heeled laddie yon. Ye couldna see his legs or coat- tails for stour as he gaed roon' the Far Away Turn." Winsome was revelling in her Scots. She had learned it from her grandmother. " Nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen — I'll no can set the dogs on him then — sixteen, seventeen, eighteen — dear me, this grows interest- ing." The plumules were blowing off freely now, like snow from the eaves on a windy day in winter. " Nineteen, twenty, twenty-one — I must reverence my elders. If I do not blow stronger he'll turn out to be fifty — twenty-three, twenty-f " A shadow fell across the daintily-held dandelion and lay a blue patch on the grass. Only one pale grey star stood erect on the stem, the vacant green sheathing of the calyx turning suddenly down. " Tiuenty-four ! " said Ralph Peden, quietly, standing with his hat in his hand and an eager flush on his cheek. The last plumule floated away. Winsome Charteris had risen instinctively, and stood looking with crimson cheeks and quicker-coming breath at this young man who came upon her in the nick of time. She was startled and a little indignant. So they stood facing one another while one might count a score — silent, drinking each the other in, with that first flashing transference of electric sympathy possible only to the young and the innocent. It was the young man who spoke first. Winsome A LESSON IN BOTANY. 47 was somewhat piqued that he should dare to come upon her while so foolishly engaged. Not, of course, that she cared for a moment what he thought of her, but he ought to have known better than to steal upon her while she was behaving in such a ridiculous, childish way. It showed what he was capable of. "My name is Ralph Peden," he said, humbly. "I came from Edinburgh the day before yesterday. I am staying with Mr. Welsh at the manse." Winsome Charteris glanced down at the books and blushed still more deeply. The Hebrew Bible and Lexicon lay harmlessly enough on the grass, and the Luther was swinging in a frivolous and untheological way on the strong, bent twigs of broom. But where was the note-book ? Like a surge of Solway tide the remembrance came over her that, when she had plucked the dandelion for her soothsaying, she had thrust it carelessly into the loose bosom of her lilac- sprigged gown. Indeed, a corner of it peeped out at this moment. Had he seen it ? — monstrous thought ! She knew young men and the interpretations that they put upon nothings ! This, in spite of his solemn looks and mantling bashfulness, was a young man. " Then I suppose these are yours," said Winsome, turning sideways towards the indicated articles upon the ground so as to conceal the note-book. The young man removed his eyes momentarily from her face and looked in the direction of the books. He seemed to have entirely forgotten what it was that had brought him to Loch Grannoch bridge so early this June morning. Winsome took advantage of his glance to feel if her sunbonnet sat straight, and as her 4.8 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. hand was on its way to her clustering curls she took the opportunity of thrusting Ralph's note-book into more complete concealment. Then her hands went up to her head only to discover that her sunbonnet had slipped backward, and was now hanging down her back by the strings. Ralph Peden looked up at her, apparently entirely satisfied. What was a note-book to him now ? He saw the sunbonnet resting upon the wavy distraction of the pale gold hair. He had a luxurious eye for colour. That lilac and gold went well together, was his thought. Trammelled by the fallen head-gear, Winsome threw her head back, shaking out her tresses in a way that Ralph Peden never forgot. Then she caught at the strings of the errant bonnet. " Oh, let it alone ! " he suddenly exclaimed. " Sir ? " said Winsome Charteris — interrogatively, not imperatively. Ralph Peden, who had taken a step forward in the instancy of his appeal, came to himself as;ain in a moment. " I beg your pardon," he said, very humbly, " I had no right " He paused, uncertain what to say. Winsome Charteris looked up quickly, saw the sim- plicity of the young man, in one full eye-blink read his heart, then dropped her eyes again and said : "But I thought you liked lilac sunbonnets ! " Ralph Peden had now his turn to blush. Hardly in the secret of his own heart had he said this thing. Only to Mr. Welsh had his forgetful tongue uttered the word that was in his mind, and which had covered since yesterday morn all the precepts of that A LESSON IN BOTANY. 49 most superfluously wise woman, the mother of King Lemuel. " Are you a witch ? " asked Ralph, blundering as an honest and bashful man may in times of distress, into the boldest speech. " You want to go up and see my grandmother, do you not ? " said Winsome, gravely, for such conversa- tion was not to be continued on any conditions. "Yes," said the young man, perjuring himself with a readiness and facility most unbecoming in a student desiring letters of probation from the Protesting and Covenant-keeping Kirk of the Marrow. Ralph Peden lightly picked up the books, which, as Winsome knew, were a not inconsiderable weight to carry. " Do you find them quite safe ? " she asked. " There was a heavy dew last night," he answered, " but in spite of it they seem quite dry." " We often notice the same thing on Loch Gran- noch side," said Winsome. "I thought — that is, I was under the impression — that I had left a small book with some manuscript notes ! " said the young man, tentatively. " It may have dropped among the broom," replied the simple maid. Whereupon the two set to seeking, both bare- headed — brown cropped head and golden wilderness of tresses not far from one another, while the " book of manuscript notes " rose and fell to the quickened heart-beating of that wicked and deceitful girl, Win- some Charteris. CHAPTER VI. CURLED EYELASHES. Now Meg Kissock could stand a great deal, and she would put up with a great deal to pleasure her mis- tress ; but half an hour of loneliness down by the washing was overly much for her, and the struggle between loyalty and curiosity ended, after the manner of her sex, in the victory of the latter. As Ralph and Winsome continued to seek, they came time and again close together, and the propin- quity of flushed cheek and mazy ringlet stirred some- thing in the lad's heart which had never been touched by the Mistresses Thriepneuk, who lived where the new houses of the Plainstones look over the level meadows of the Borough Muir. His father often said within himself, as he walked the Edinburgh streets to visit some sick kirk member, as he had written to his friend Allan Welsh, " Has the lad a heart ? " Had he seen him on that broomy knowe over the Grannoch water, he would not have doubted, though he might well have been fearful of that heart's too sudden awakening. Never before had the youth come within that delicate aura of charm which radiates from the burst- so CURLED EYELASHES. 51 ing bud of the finest womanhood. Ralph Peden had kept his affections ascetically virgin. His nature's finest juices had indeed gone to feed the brain, yet all the time his heart had waited tremulously expectant of the revealing of a mystery. Winsome Charteris had come so suddenly into his life that the universe seemed new-born in a day. He sprang at once from the thought of woman as only an unexplained part of the creation, to the conception of her (meaning thereby Winsome Charteris) as an angel who had not quite lost her first estate. It was a strange thing for Ralph Peden, as indeed it is for every true man, to come for the first time within the scope of the unconscious charm of a good girl. There is, indeed, no better solvent of a cold nature, no better antidote to a narrow education, no better bulwark of defence against frittering away the strength and solemnity of first love, than a sudden, strong plunge into its deep waters. Like timid bathers, who run a little way into the tide and then run out again with ankles wet, fearful of the first chill, many men accustom themselves to love by degrees. So they never taste the sweetness and strength of it as did Ralph Peden in these days, when, never having looked upon a maid and seen the level summer lightning of mutual interest flashing in other eyes, he plunged into love's fathomless mysteries as one may dive upon a still day from some craggy plat- form among the westernmost isles into Atlantic depths. Winsome's light summer dress touched his hand and thrilled the lad to his remotest nerve centres. He stood light-headed, taking in, as only they twain 52 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. looked over the loch with far-away eyes, that subtle fragrance of youth and purity, at once delicate and free, which like a garment clothed the maid of the Grannoch lochside. "The water's on the boil," cried Meg Kissock, setting her ruddy shock of hair and blooming, ampli- fied, buxom form above the knoll, wringing at the same time the suds from her hands, " an' I canna lift it aff mysel'." Her mistress looked at her with a sudden suspicion. Since when had Meg grown so feeble ? " We had better go down," she said simply, turning to Ralph, who would have cheerfully assented had she suggested that they should together walk into the loch among the lily beds. It was the " we " that overcame him. His father had used the pronoun in quite a different sense. " We will take the twenty-ninth chapter of second Chronicles this morning, Ralph — what do we understand by this peculiar use of vav converslve ? " But it was quite another thing when Winsome Charteris said simply, as though he had been her brother : " We had better go down ! " So they went down, taking upon their way the little stile at which Winsome had meditated over the remarks of Ralph Peden concerning the creation of Eve. Meg Kissock led the van, and climbed the dyke vigorously without troubling the steps, her kirtle fitting her for such exercises. Winsome came next, and Ralph stood aside to let her pass. She sprang up the low steps light as a feather, rested her finger-tips for an appreciable fraction of a second on CURLED EYELASHES. 53 the hand which he instinctively held out, and was over before he realised that anything had happened. Yet it seemed that in that contact, light as a rose-leaf blown by the winds of late July against his cheek, all his past life had been shorn clean away from the future as with a sharp sword. Ralph Peden had, upon occasion, dutifully kissed his cousins Jemima, Kezia, and Kerenhappuch ; but, on the whole, after due experience of this exercise, he felt more pleasure when he partook of the excellent bannocks prepared for him by the fair hands of Keren- happuch herself. This, however, was wholly a new thing. His breath came suddenly short. He breathed rapidly as though to give his lungs more air. The atmosphere seemed to have grown rarer and colder. Indeed, it was a different world altogether, and the blanket-washing itself was transferred to some de- liciously homely outlying annex of paradise. Yet it seemed the most natural thing in the world that he should be helping this girl, and he went forward with the greatest assurance to lift the black pot off the fire for her. The keen, acrid swirls of wood-smoke blew into his eyes, and the rank steam of yellow home-made soap, manufactured with bracken ash for lye, rose to his nostrils. Now, Ralph Peden was well made and strong. Spare in body but accurately compacted, if he had ever struggled with anything more formidable than the folio hide-bound Calvins and Turretins on his father's lower shelves in James's Court, he had been no mean antagonist. But, though he managed with a great effort to lift the black pot off its gypsy tripod, he would have let the boiling contents swing dangerously against his 54 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. legs had not Winsome caught sharply at his other hand and leaning over, balanced the weight of the boiling water. So they walked down the path to where the reaming tubs stood under the shade of the great ash-trees, with their sky-tossing, dry-rustling leaves. There Ralph set his burden down. Meg Kissock had been watching him keenly. She saw that he had severely burned his hand, and noted also that he said nothing whatever about it. He was a man. This gained for Ralph Meg's hearty approval almost as much as his bashfulness and native good looks. What Meg Kissock did not know was that Ralph was altogether unconscious of the wound in his hand. It was a deeper wound which at that time was monopolising his thoughts. But this little inci- dent was more than a thousand college certificates in the eyes of Meg Kissock, and Meg's friendship was decidedly worth cultivating. Even for its own sake she did not give it lightly, Before Winsome Charteris could release her hand, Ralph turned and said : " Do you know that you have not yet told me your name ? " Winsome did know it very well, but she only said, "My name is Winsome Charteris, and this is Meg Kissock." "Winsome Charteris, Winsome Charteris," said Ralph's heart over and over again, and he had not even the grace to say " Thank you " ; but Meg stepped up to shake him by the hand. " I'm braw an' prood to ken ye, sir," said Meg. " That muckle sumph, Saunders Mowdiewort, telled me a' aboot ye comin' an' the terrible store o' lear ye CURLED EYELASHES. 55 hae. He's the minister's man, ye ken, an' howks the graves ower by at the parish kirk-yard, for the auld betheral there winna gang ablow three fit deep, and them that haes ill-tongued wives to haud doon disna want ony mistak' " " Meg," said her mistress, " do not forget yourself." " Deil a fear," said Meg, airily ; "it was auld Sim o' Glower-ower-'em, the wizened auld hurcheon, that set a big thruch stane ower his first wife ; and when he buried his second in the neist grave, he just turned the broad flat stone. ' Guid be thankit ! ' he says, ' I had the forethocht to order a stane heavy eneuch to haud them baith doon ! ' " " Get to the washing, Meg," said Winsome. " Fegs ! " returned Meg, "ye war in nae great hurry yersel' doon aff the broomy knowe ! What's a' the steer sae sudden like ? " Winsome disdained an answer,, but stood to her own tub, where some of the lighter articles — pillow- slips, and fair sheets of " seventeen-hundred " linen were waiting her daintier hand. As Winsome and Meg washed, Ralph Peden carried water, learning the wondrous science of carrying two pails over a wooden hoop ; and in the frankest tutelage Winsome put her hand over his to teach him, while the relation of master and pupil asserted its ancient danger. It had never happened to Winsome Charteris to meet any one to whom she was attracted with such frank liking. She had never known what it was to have a brother, and she thought that this clear-eyed young man might be a brother to her. It is a fallacy common among girls that young men desire them for 56 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. sisters. Ralph himself was under no such illusion ; or at least would not have been, had he had the firmness of mind to sit down half a mile from his emotions and coolly look them over. But in the meanwhile he was only conscious of a great and rising delight in his heart. As Winsome Charteris bent above the wash-tub he was at liberty to observe how the blood mantled on the clear oval of her cheek. He had time to note — of course entirely as a philosopher — the pale purple shadow under the eyes, over which the dark, curling lashes came down like the fringe of the curtain of night. " Why — I wonder why ? " he said, and stopped aghast at his utterance aloud of his inmost thought. " What do you wonder ? " said Winsome, glancing up with a frank dewy freshness in her eyes. " I wonder why — I wonder that you are able to do all this work," he said, with an attempt to turn the corner of his blunder. Winsome shook her head. " Now you are trying to be like other people," she said, frankly, " I do not think you will succeed. That was not what you were going to say. If you are to be my friend, you must speak all the truth to me and speak it always." A thing which, indeed, no man does to a woman. And, besides, nobody had spoken of Ralph Peden being a friend to her. The meaning was that their hearts had been talking while their tongues had spoken of other things ; and though there was no thought of love in the breast of Winsome Charteris, already in the intercourse of a single morning she had given this young Edinburgh student of CURLED EYELASHES. 57 divinity a place which no other had ever attained to. Had she had a brother, she thought, what would he not have been to her ? She felt specially fitted to have a brother. It did not occur to her to ask whether she would have carried her brother's college note-book, even by accident, where it could be stirred by the beating of her heart. Much, indeed, in their future history may be understood by remembering the fact that they were brought up solitary children among graver seniors, and so were thrown inward upon themselves. " Well," Ralph said at last, " I will tell you what I was wondering. You have asked me, and you shall know : I only wondered why your eyelashes were so much darker than your hair." Winsome Charteris was not in the least disturbed. " Ministers should occupy their minds with some- thing else," she said, demurely. " What would Mr. Welsh say ? I am sure he has never troubled his head about such things. It is not fitting," Winsome said, severely. " But I am not a minister, and I want to know," said this persistent young man, wondering at him- self. " Well," said Winsome, glancing up with mischief in her eye, " I suppose because I am a very indolent sort of person, and dark window-blinds keep out the light." " But why are they curled up at the end ? " asked unblushingly the author of the remarks upon Eve formerly quoted. " It is time that you went up and saw my grand- mother ! " said Winsome, with great composure. 58 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. "Juist what I was on the point o' remarkin' mysel' ! " said Meg Kissock, wiping her brow with her hand, and leaving a white fleck of froth on her apple-red cheek. CPIAPTER VII. CONCERNING TAKING EXERCISE. Winsome and Ralph walked silently and composedly- side by side up the loaning under the elder-trees, over the brook at the watering-place to which in her hoydenish girlhood Winsome had often ridden the horses when the ploughmen loosed Bell and Jess from the plough. In these days she rode without a side- saddle. Sometimes she did it yet when the spring gloamings were gathering fast, but no one knew this except Jock Forrest, the ploughman, who never spoke any more than he could help, but was a hero to work. Silence deep as that of yesterday wrapped about the farmhouse of Craig Ronald. The hens were all down under the lee of the great orchard hedge, chuckling and chunnering low to themselves, and nestling with their feathers spread balloon-wise, while they flirted the hot summer dust over them. It fell among their droopy and flaccid combs. Down where the grass was in shadow a mower was sharpen- ing his blade. The clear metallic sound of the " strake " or sharpening strop, covered with pure white Loch Skerrow sand set in grease, which scythemen 50 6o THE LILAC SUNBONNET. universally use in Galloway, cut through the slum- berous hum of the noonday air as the blade itself cuts through the meadow grass. The bees in the purple flowers beneath the window boomed a mellow bass, and the grasshoppers made love by millions in the couch grass, chirring in a thousand fleeting raptures. " Wait here while I go in," commanded Winsome, indicating a chair in the cool, blue-flagged kitchen, which Meg Kissock had marked out in white, with whorls and crosses of immemorial antiquity — the same that her Pictish forefathers had cut deep in the hard Silurian rocks of the southern uplands. It was a little while before, in the dusk of the door- way Winsome appeared, looking paler, fairer, and more infinitely removed from him than before. In- stinctively he wished himself out with her again on the broomy knowe. He seemed somehow nearer to her there. Yet he followed obediently enough. Within the shadowed " ben "-room of Craig Ronald all the morning, an oddly assorted pair of old people had been sitting — as indeed every morning they sat, one busily reading and often looking up to talk ; while the other, the master of the house himself, sat silent, a majestic and altogether pathetic figure, looking solemnly out with wide-open, dreamy eyes, waking to the actual world of speech and purposeful life only at rare intervals. But Walter Skirving was keenly awake when Ralph Peden entered. It was in fact he, and not his partner, who spoke first — for Walter Skirving's wife, among other things, had learned when to be silent — and that was only when she must. " You honour my hoose," he said ; " though it CONCERNING TAKING EXERCISE 61 grieves me indeed that I canna rise to receive yin o' your family an' name ! But what I have is at your service, for it was your noble faither that led the faithful into the wilderness on the day o' the Great Apostasy ! " The young man shook him by the hand. He had no bashfulness here. He was on his own ground. This was the very accent of the society in which he moved in Edinburgh. "I thank you," he said, quietly and courteously, stepping back at once into the student of divinity j " I have often heard my father speak of you. You were the elder from the south who stood by him on that day. He has ever retained a great respect for you." " It was a great day," Walter Skirving muttered, letting his arm rest on the little square deal table which stood beside him with his great Bible open upon it — " a great day — aye, Maister Peden's laddie i' my hoose ! He's welcome, he's mair nor welcome." So saying, he turned his eyes once more on the blue mist that filled the wide Grannoch Valley, and the bees hummed again in the honey-scented marsh- mallows so that all heard them. " This is my grandmother," said Winsome, who stood entirely quiet behind her chair, swinging the sunbonnet in her hand. From her flower-set corner the old lady held out her hand. With a touch of his father's old-fashioned courtesy he stooped and kissed it. Winsome instinctively put her own hand quickly behind her, as though he had kissed that. Once such practices have a beginning, who knows where they may end ? She had not expected it of him, though, 6z THE LILAC SUNBONNET. curiously, she thought no worse of him for his gallantry. But the lady of Craig Ronald was obviously greatly pleased. " The lad has guid bluid in him. That's the minnie o' him, nae doot. She was a Gilchrist o' Linwood on Nithsdale. What she saw in your faither to tak' him I dinna ken ony mair than I ken hoo it cam' to pass that I am the mistress o' Walter Skirving's hoose the day. Come oot ahint my chair, lassie ; dinna be lauchin' ahint folks's backs. D'ye think I'm no mistress o' my ain hoose yet, for a' that ye are sic a grand housekeeper wi' your way o't." The accusation was wholly gratuitous. Winsome had been grave with a great gravity. But she came obediently out, and seated herself on a low stool by her grandmother's side. There she sat, holding her hand, and leaning her elbow on her knee. Ralph thought he had never seen anything so lovely in his life — an observation entirely correct. The old lady was clad in a dress of some dark stiff material, softer than brocade, which, like herself, was more beautiful in its age than even in youth. Folds of snowy lawn covered her breast and fell softly about her neck, being fastened there by a plain black pin. Her face was like a portrait by Henry Raeburn, so beautifully venerable and sweet. The twinkle in her brown eyes alone told of the forceful and restless spirit which was im- prisoned within. She had been reading a new volume by the Great Unknown, which the Lady Elizabeth had sent her over from the Big House of Greatorix. She had laid it down on the entry of the young man. Now she turned sharp upon him. CONCERNING TAKING EXERCISE. 63 " Let me look at ye, Maister Ralph Peden. Whaur gat ye the c Ralph ' ? That's nae westland Whig name. Aye, aye, I mind — what's com in' o' my memory ? Yer grandfaither was auld Ralph Gilchrist ; but ye dinna talc' after the Gilchrists — na, na, there was no ane o' them weel-faured — muckle-moo'd Gilchrists they ca'ed them. It'll be your faither that you favour." And she turned him about for inspection with her hand. " Grandmother " began Winsome, anxious lest she should say something to offend the guest of the house. But the lady did not heed her gentle monition. " Was't you that ran awa' frae a bonny lass yes- treen ? " she queried, sudden as a flash of summer lightning. It was now the turn of both the younger folk to blush. Winsome reddened with vexation at the thought that he should think that she had seen him run and gone about telling of it. Ralph only grew redder and redder, and remained speechless. He did not think of anything at all. " I am fond of exercise," he said, falteringly. The gay old lady rippled into a delicious silver stream of laughter, a little thin, but charmingly provo- cative. Winsome did not join, but she looked up imploringly at her grandmother, leaning her head back till her tresses swept the ground. When Mistress Skirving recovered herself — " Exer- ceese, quo' he j heard ye ever the like o' that? In my young days lads o' speerit took their exerceese in comin' to see a bonny lass — juist as I was sayin' to Winifred yestreen nae farer 2ane. Hoot awa', twa 64 THE LILAC SUNBONNET young folk ! The simmer days are no lang. Waes me, but I had my share o' them ! Talc' them while they shine, bankside an' burnside an' the bonny heather. Aince they bloomed for Ailie Gordon. Once she gaed hand in hand alang the braes, where noo she'll gang nae mair. Awa' wi' ye, ye're young an' honest. Twa auld cankered carles are no fit company for twa young folks like you. Awa' wi' ye; gie him bite an' sup ; dinna be strange wi' his mither's bairn, say I — an' the guid man has spoken for the daddy o' him." Thus was Ralph Peden made free of the Big House of Craig Ronald. CHAPTER VIII. SAUNDERS ARMS FOR CONQUEST. Saunders Mowdiewort, minister's man and grave- digger, was going a-sweethearting. He took offslowly the leathern " breeks " of his craft, sloughing them as an adder casts his skin. They collapsed upon the floor with a hideous suggestion of distorted human limbs, as Saunders went about his further preparations. Saunders was a great soft-bodied fair man, of the chubby flaxen type so rare in Scotland — the type which looks at home nowhere but alon? the south coast of England. Saunders was about thirty-five. He was a widower in search of a wife, and made no secret of his devotion to Margaret Kissock, the "lass" of the farm town of Craig Ronald. Saunders was generally slow of speech when in company, and bashful to a degree. He was therefore accustomed to make up his mind what he would say before venturing within the range of the sharp tongue of his well-beloved — in theory an excellent plan, but one which requires for success both self-possession and a good memory. But for lack of these Saunders had made an excellent courtier. Saunders made his toilet in the little stable of the 5 6 * 66 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. manse, above which he slept. As he scrubbed him- self he kept up a constant sibilant hissing, as though he were an equine of doubtful steadiness with whom the hostler behooved to be careful. First he carefully removed the dirt down to a kind of load-line midway his neck ; then he frothed the soap-suds into his red, rectangular ears, which stood out like speaking trumpets ; there he let it remain. Soap is for putting on the face, grease on the hair. It is folly then to wash either off. Besides which, it is wasteful and probably sinful. His flaxen hair stood out in wet strands and clammy tags and tails. All the while Saunders kept muttering to himself: " An' says I to her : c Meg Kissock, ye're a bonny woman,' says I. ' My certie, but ye hae e'en like spunkies, or maybes," said Saunders in a medita- tive tone, " I had better say ' like green glass whurlies in a sky-licht.' It micht be considered mair coortin' like ! " 11 Then she'll up an' say, ' Saunders, ye mak' me fair ashamed to listen to ye. Be mensefu', can ye no ? ' " This pleased Saunders so much that he slapped his thigh so that the pony started and clattered to the other side of his stall. " Then I'll up an' tak' her roun' the waist, an' I'll look at her like this " Here Saunders practised the effect of his fascinations in the glass, a panorama which was to some extent marred by the necessary opening of his mouth to enable the razor he was using to excavate the bristles out of the professional creases in his lower jaw. Saunders was in the habit of pulling down his mouth to express extra grief when SAUNDERS ARMS FOR CONQUEST. 67 a five-foot grave had been ordered. His seven-foot manifestations of respect for the deceased were a sight to see. He held the opinion that anybody that had no more * conceit o' themsel's ' than to be buried in a three-foot grave, did not deserve to be mourned at all. This crease was one of Saunders's assets, and had therefore to be carefully attended to. Even love must not interfere with it. "Sae after that, I'll talc' her roun' the waist, juist like this," said he, insinuating at the same time his left arm circumferentially. It was an ill-judged movement, for, instead of circling Meg Kissock's waist, he extended his arm round the off hind leg of Birsie, the minister's pony, who had become a trifle short-tempered in his old age. Now it was upon this very leg and at this very place that, earlier in the day, a large buzzing horse-fly had temporarily settled. Birsie was in no condition, therefore, for argument upon the subject. So with the greatest readiness he struck straight out behind and took Saunders what he himself called a " dinnle on the elbuck." Nor was this all, for the razor, suddenly levered upwards by Birsie's hoof, added another and entirely unprofessional wrinkle to his face. Saunders uprose in wrath, for the soap was stinging furiously in the cut, and expostulated with Birsie with a handful of reins which he lifted off the lid of the corn-chest. " Ye ill-natured, thrawn, upsettin' blastie, ye donnart auld deevil ! " he cried. Another voice broke in from the doorway. " Alexander Mowdiewort, gin ye desire to use minced oaths and braid oaths indiscriminately, ye 6S THE LILAC SUNBONNET. shall not use them in my stable. Though ye be but a mere Erastian and uncertain in yer kirk membership, ye are at least an occasional hearer, whilk is better than naething, at the Kirk o' the Marrow ; and what is more to the point, ye are my own hired servant, and I desire that ye cease from makin' use o' any such expressions upon my premises." "Weel, minister," said Saunders, penitently, "I ken brawly I'm i' the wrang ; but ye ken yersel', gin ye had gotten a din tile in the elbuck that garred ye loup like a troot i' Luckie Mowatt's pool, or gin ye had cuttit yersel' wi' yer ain razor, wad c Effectual Callin',' think ye, hae been the first word i' yer mooth ? Noo, minister, fair Hornie ! " " At any rate," said the minister, " what I would have said or done is no excuse for you, as ye well know. But how did it happen?" " Weel, sir, ye see the way o't was this : I was thinkin' to myseP, c There's twa or three ways o' takin' the buiks intil the pulpit — There's the way consequential — that's Gilbert Prettiman o' the Kirk- lands way. Did ever ye notice the body ? He hauds the Bibles afore him as if he war Moses an' Aaron gaun afore Pharaoh, wi' the coat-taillies o' him fleein' oot ahint, an' his chin pointin' to the soon'in'-board o' the pulpit." "Speak respectfully of the patriarchs," said Mr. Welsh, sententiously. Saunders looked at him with some wonder expressed in his eyes. " Far be it frae me," he said, " to speak lichtly o' ony ane o' them (though, to tell the truth, some o' them war gye boys). I hae been ower lang connectit SAUNDERS ARMS FOR CONOUEST. 69 wi' them, for I hae carriet the buiks for fifteen year, ever since my faither rackit himseP howkin' the grave o' yer predecessor, honest man — an' I hae leeved a' my days juist ower the wa' frae the kirk." " But then they say, Saunders," said the minister, smilingly, "'the nearer the kirk the farther frae grace.' " "'Deed, minister," said Saunders, " Grace Kissock is a nice bit lassie, an' Jess will be no that ill in a year or twa, but o' a' the Kissocks commend me till Meg. She wad mak' a graund wife. What think ye, minister ! " Mr. Welsh relaxed his habitual severe sadness of expression and laughed a little. He was accustomed to the sudden jumps which his man's conversation was wont to take. " Nay," he said, " but that is a question for you, Saunders. It is not I that think of marrying her." " The Lord be thankit for that ! For gin the minister gaed speerin' at the lasses, what chance wad there be for the betheral ? " " Have you spoken to Meg herself yet ? " asked Mr. Welsh. " Na," said Saunders ; " I haena that, though I hae made up my mind to hae it oot wi' her this verra nicht — if sae it micht be that ye warna needin' me, that is," he added, doubtfully ; " but I hae guid reason to hope that Meg " " What reason have you, Saunders ? Has Margaret expressed a preference for you in any way ? * " Preference ! " said Saunders ; " 'deed she has that, minister ; a maist marked preference. It was only the last Tuesday afore Whussanday that she gied me a 7o THE LILAC SUNBONNET. daud i' the lug that fair dang me stupid. Caa that yc nocht ? " " Well, Saunders," said the minister, going out, " certainly I wish you good speed in your wooing ; but see that you fall no more out with Birsie, lest you be more bruised than you are now ; and for the rest, learn wisely to restrain your unruly member." " Thank ye, minister," said Saunders ; " I'll do my best endeavours to obleege ye. Meg's clours are like oreeginal sin and to be borne wi' a' complaisancy ; but Birsie's dunts are, so to speak, gratuitous and amount to actual transgression. Haud up there, ye jaud ! " CHAPTER IX. THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. "Here's the Cuif!" said Meg Kissock, who with her company gown on, and her face glowing from a brisk wash, sat knitting a stocking in the rich gloam- ing light at the gable end of the house of Craig Ronald. Winsome usually read a book within, sitting by the window which looked up the long green croft to the fir-woods and down to the quiet levels of Loch Grannoch, on which the evening mist was gathering in pale translucent blue. It was a common thing for Meg and Jessie Kissock to bring their knitting and darning there on summer evenings, and on their milking-stools sit below the window. If Winsome were in a mood for talk she did not read much, but listened instead to the brisk chatter of the maids. Sometimes the ploughmen, Jock Forrest and Ebie Farrish, came to " ca' the crack," and it was Winsome's delight on these occasions to listen to the flashing claymore of Meg Kissock's rustic wit. Before she settled down, Meg had taken in the three tall candles " ben the hoose," where the old people sat — Walter Skirving, as ever, silent and far away, his wife deep in some lively book lent her by the Lady Elizabeth out of the library of Greatorix Castle 71 72 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. A bank of wild thyme lay just beneath Winsome's window, and over it the cows were feeding, blowing softly through their nostrils among the dewy grass and clover till the air was fragrant with their balmy breath. " Guid e'en to ye, Cuif," cried Meg Kissock, as soon as Saunders Mowdiewort came within earshot. He came stolidly forward tramping through the bog with his boots newly greased with what remained of the smooth candle " dowp " with which he had previously sleeked his flaxen locks. He wore a broad blue Kilmarnock bonnet, checked red and white in a " dambrod " pattern round the edge, and a blue coat with broad pearl buttons. It may be well to explain that there is a latent meaning, apparent only to Galloway folk of the ancient time, in the word "cuif." It conveys at once the ideas of inefficiency and folly, of simplicity and the ignorance of it. The Cuif is a feckless person of the male sex, who is a recognised butt for a whole neighbourhood to sharpen its wits upon. The particular Cuif so addressed by Meg came slowly over the knoll. " Guid e'en to ye," he said, with the best visiting manners of the parish of Dullarg. " Can ye no see me as weel, Saunders ? " said Jess, archly, for all was grist that came to her mill. Saunders rose like a trout to the fly. " Ow aye, Jess, lass, I saw ye brawly, but it disna do to come seekin' twa lasses at ae time." " Dinna ye be thinkin' to put awa' Meg aside your last, an' then come here a-coortin' me ! " said Jess, sharply. Saunders was hurt for the moment at this pointed THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 75 allusion both to his profession and also to his condition as a " seekin' " widower. " Wha seeks you, Jess, 'ill be sair ill-aff ! " he replied, very briskly for a Cuif. The sound of Meg's voice in round altercation with Jock Gordon, the privileged "natural" or innocent fool of the parish, interrupted this interchange of amenities — which was indeed as friendly and as much looked for between lads and lasses as the ordinary greeting of " Weel, hoo's a' wi' ye the nicht ? " which began every conversation between responsible folks. "Jock Gordon, ye lazy ne'er-do-weel, ye hinna carried in a single peat, an' it comin' on for parritch- time. D'ye think my maister can let the like o' you sorn on him, week in, week oot, like a mawk on a sheep's hurdie ? Gae wa' oot o' that, liein' sumphin' an' sleepin' i' the middle o' the forenicht, an' carry the water for the boiler an' bring in the peats frae the stack." Then there arose a strange elricht quavering voice — the voice of those to whom God has not granted their due share of wisdom. Jock Gordon was famed all over the country for his shrewd replies to those who set their wits in contest with his. Jock is remembered on all Deeside, and even to Nithsdale. He was a man well on in years at this time, certainly not less than forty-five. But on his face there was no wrinkle set — not a fleck of gray upon his bonnetless fox-red shock of hair, weather-rusted and usually stuck full of feathers and short pieces of hay. Jock Gordon was permitted to wander as a privileged visitor through the length and breadth of the south hill country. He paid long visits to Craig Ronald, where he had a great 74 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. admiration and reverence for the young mistress, and a hearty detestation for Meg Kissock, who, as he at all times asserted, " was the warst maister to serve atween the three Cairnsmuirs." " Richt weel Fll do yer biddin', Meg Kissock," he answered, in his shrill falsetto, "but no for your sake or the sake o' ony belangin' to you. But there's yae bonny doo, wi' her hair like gowd, an' a fit that she micht set on Jock Gordon's neck, an' it wad please him weel. An' said she, £ Do the wark Meg Kissock bids ye,' so Jock Gordon, Lord o' Kelton Hill an' Earl o' Clairbrand, will perform a' yer wull. Ither- wise it's no in any dochter o' Hurkle-backit Kissock to gar Jock Gordon move haund or fit." So saying, Jock clattered away with his water-pails, muttering to himself. Meg Kissock came out again to sit down on her milking-stool under the westward window, within which was Winsome Charteris, reading her book unseen by the last glow of the red west. Jess and Saunders Mowdiewort had fallen silent. Jess had said her say, and did not intend to exert herself to entertain her sister's admirer. Jess was said to look not unkindly on Ebie Farrish, the younger ploughman who had recently come to Craig Ronald from one of the farms at the " laigh " end of the parish. Ebie had also, it was said, with better authority, a hanging eye to Jess, who had the greater reason to be kind to him, that he was the first since her return from England who had escaped the more bravura attractions of her sister. " Can ye no find a seat guid eneuch to sit doon on, Cuif ? " inquired Meg with quite as polite an inten- THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 75 tion as though she had said, " Be so kind as to take a seat." The Cuif, who had been uneasily balancing himself first on one foot and then on the other, and apologetically passing his hand over the sleek side of his head which was not covered by the bonnet, replied gratefully : " 'Deed I wull that, Meg, since ye are sae pressin'." He went to the end of the milk-house, selected a small tub used for washing the dishes of red earthen- ware and other domestic small deer, turned it upside down, and seated himself as near to Meg as he dared. Then he tried to think what it was he had intended to say to her, but the words somehow would not now come at call. Before long he hitched his seat a little nearer, as though his present position was not quite comfortable. But Meg checked him s rply. " Keep yer distance, Cuif," she said ; " ye smell o' the muils." * " Na, na, Meg, ye ken brawly I haena been howkin' since Setterday fortnicht, when I burriet Tarn Roger- son's wife's guid-brither's auntie, that leeved grainin' an' deein' at her life wi' the rheumatics an' wame disease, an' died at the last o' eatin' swine's cheek an' guid Cheddar cheese thegither at Sandy Mulwharchar's pig-killin'." " Noo, Cuif," said Meg, with an accent of warning in her voice, " gin ye dinna let alane deevin' us wi' yer kirkyaird clavers, ye'll no sit lang on my byne." From the end of the peat-stack, out of the dark hole 1 Churchyard earth. 76 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. made by the excavation of last winter's stock of fuel, came the voice of Jock Gordon, singing : "The dcil he sat on the high lumtap, Hech how, black a?i' reeky ! Gang ycr ways and drink ycr drap, Ye'll need it a' gin ye come to stap /// my hole sae black an' reeky, O ! Hech hozo, black and reeky I " Hicland kilt an' Lawland hose, Parritch-fcd an' reared on brose, Ye'll drink nae drap whan ye come tae stap /// my hole sae black a/i' reeky, ! Hech how, black arf reeky ! " Meg Kissock and her sweetheart stopped to listen. Saunders Mowdiewort smiled an unprofessional smile when he heard the song of the natural. " That's a step ayont the kirkyaird, Meg," he said. "What think ye o' that ? Gin ye hae sic objections to hear aboot honest men in their honest graves, what say ye to that elricht craitur scraichin' aboot the verra deil an' his hearth-stane ? " Certainly it sounded more than a little uncanny in the gloaming, coming out of that dark place where even in the daytime the black Galloway rats cheeped and scurried, to hear the high, quavering voice of Jock Gordon singing his unearthly rhymes. By and by those at the house gable could see that the innocent had climbed to the top of the peat-stack in some elvish freak, and sat there cracking his thumbs and singing with all his might: THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 77 " Hech how, black art reeky, I?i my bole sae black an' reeky, Of" "Come doon oot o' that this meenit, Jock Gordon, ye gomeral ! " cried Meg, shaking her fist at the un- couth shape twisting and singing against the sunset sky like one demented. The song stopped, and Jock Gordon slowly turned his head in their direction. All were looking towards him, except Ebie Farrish, the new ploughman, who was wondering what Jess Kissock would do if he put his arm around her waist. " What said ye ? " Jock asked from his perch on the top of the peat-stack. " Hae ye fetched in the peats an' the water, as I bade ye ? " asked Meg, with great asperity in her voice. " D'ye think that ye'll win aff ony the easier in the hinnerend, by sittin' up there like yin o' his ain bairns, takkin' the deil's name in vain ? " "Gin ye dinna tak' tent to yerseP, Meg Kissock," retorted Jock, " wi' yer eternal yammer o' * Peats, Jock Gordon,' an' ' Water, Jock Gordon,' ye'll maybes find yersel' whaur Jock Gordon'll no be there to serve ye ; but the 111 Auld Boy'll keep ye in routh o' peats, never ye fret, Meg Kissock, wi' that reed-heed o' yours to set them a-lunt. Faith an' ye may cry 1 Water ! water ! ' till ye crack yer jaws, but nae Jock Gordon there — na, na — nae Jock Gordon there. Jock kens better." But at this moment there was a prolonged rumble, and the whole party sitting by the gable end (the " gavel," as it was locally expressed) rose to their feet from tub and hag-clog and milking-stool. There had 7^ THE LILAC SUNBONNET. been a great peat-slip. The whole side of the stack had tumbled bodily into the great "black peat-hole" from which the winter's firing had come, and which was a favourite lair of Jock's own, being ankle-deep in fragrant dry dust or "coom" — which is, strange to say, a perfectly clean and even a luxurious bedding, far to be preferred as a couch to "flock" or its kindred abominations. All the party ran forward to see what had become of Jock, whose song had come to so swift a close. Out of the black mass of down-fallen peat there came a strange, pleading voice. "O guid deil, O kind deil, dinna yirk awa' puir Jock to that ill bit — puir Jock, that never yet did ye ony hairm, but aye wished ye weel ! Lat me afF this time, braw deil, an' I'll sing nae mair ill sangs aboot ye !" "Save us ! " exclaimed Meg Kissock, "the craitur's prayin' to the 111 Body himsel'." Ebie Farrish began to clear away the peat, which was, indeed, no difficult task. As he did so, the voice of Jock Gordon mounted higher and higher : " O mercy me, I hear them clawin' an' skartin' and skrauchelin' ! Dinna let the wee yins wi' the lang riven taes and the nebs like gleds get haud o' me ! I wad rayther hae yerseP, Maister Sawtan, for ye are a big mensefu' deil. Ouch ! I'm dune for noo, a'thegither ; he haes gotten puir Jack at lang an' last ! Sirce me, I smell the reekit rags o' him ! " But it was only Ebie Farrish that held him by the roll of ancient cloth which served as a collar for Jock's coat. When he was pulled from under the peats and set upon his feet, he gazed around with a bewildered look. THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 79 " O man, Ebie Farrish," he said solemnly, " gin I didna think ye war the deil himsel' — ye see the evil of trusting to the ootward appearance ! " There was a shout of laughter at the expense of Ebie, in which Meg thought that she heard an answer- ing ripple from within Winsome's room. " Surely, Jock, ye were never prayin' to the deil ? " asked Meg, from the window, very seriously. "Ye ken far better than that." " An' what for should I no pray to the deil ? He's a desperate onsonsy chiel yon. It's as weel to be in wi' him as oot wi' him ony day. Wha' kens what's afore them, or wha they may be behauden to afore the morrow's morn ? " answered Jock, stoutly. " But d'ye ken," said John Scott, the theological herd, who had quietly " daundered doon " as he said, from his cot-house up on the hill, where his bare- legged bairns played on the heather and short grass all day, to set his shoulder against the gable end for an hour with the rest. " D'ye ken what Maister Welsh was sayin' was the correct doctrine amang thae New Licht Moderates — 1 hireling shepherds,' was the best word he caaed them ? Noo I'm no on mysel' wi' sae muckle speakin' aboot the deil. But the minister was sayin' that the New Moderates threep that there's nae deil at a'. He dee'd some time since ! " " Gae wa' wi' ye, John Scott ! wha's gaun aboot doin' sae muckle ill then, I wad like to ken ? " said Meg Kissock. " Dinna tell me," said Jock Gordon, " that the puir deil's deed, and that we'll hae to pit up wi' Ebie Farrish. Na, na, Jock's maybe daft, but he kens better than that ! " 80 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. " They say," said John Scott, pulling meditatively at his cuttv, " that the pooer is vested noo in a kind o' comy-tee ! " "I dinna haud wi' corny-tees mysel'," replied Meg ; "it's juist haein' mony maisters, ilka yin mair canker- some and thrawn than anither ! " "Weel, gin this news be true, an' the Auld Deil's deed at last, there's a heep o' fowk in this parish should be mentioned in his wull," said Jock Gordon, signifi- cantly. "They're near kin till him — forby a heep o' bairns that he has i' the laich-side o' the loch. They're that hard and near there, they'll no gie a puir body as muckle as a meal o' meat or the shelter o' a barn." "But," said Ebie Farrish, who had been thinking that, after all, the new plan might have its con- veniences, " gin there's nae deil to tempt, there'll be nae deil to punish." But the herd was a staunch Marrow man. He was not led away by any human criticism, nor yet by the new theology. " New Licht here, New Licht there," he said ; " I canna' pairt wi' ma deil. Na, na, that's ower muckle to expect o' a man o' ma age ! " Having thus defined his theological position, with- out a word more he threw his soft checked plaid of Gallowav wool over his shoulders, and fell into the herd's long swinging heather step, mounting the steep brae up to his cot on the hillside as easily as if he were walking along a level road. There was a long silence ; then a ringing sound, sudden and sharp, and Ebie Farrish fell inexplicably from the axe-chipped hag-clog, which he had rolled up to sit upon. Ebie had been wondering for more THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 81 than an hour what would happen if he put his arm round Jess Kissock's waist. He knew now. Then, after a little Saunders Mowdiewort, who was not unmindful of his prearranged programme nor yet oblivious of the flight of time, saw the stars come out, he knew that if he were to make any progress, he must make haste; so he leaned over towards his sweet- heart and whispered, " Meg, my lass, ye're terrible bonny." "D'ye think ye are the first man that has telled me that, Cuif ? " said Meg, with point and emphasis. Jock Forrest, the senior ploughman — a very quiet, sedate man with a seldom stirred but pretty wit, laughed a short, silent laugh, as though he knew something about that. Again there was a pause, and as the night wind began to draw southward in cool gulps of air ofF the hills, Winsome Charteris's window was softly closed. " Hae ye nocht better than that to tell us, Cuif ? " said Meg, briskly, " nocht fresh-like ? " " Weel," said Saunders Mowdiewort, groping round for a subject of general interest, his profession and his affection being alike debarred, " there's that young Enbra' lad that's come till the manse. He's a queer root, him." "What's queer aboot him ? " asked Meg, in a semi- belligerent manner. A young man who had burned his fingers for her mistress's sake must not be lightly spoken of. " Oh, nocht to his discredit ava, only Manse Bell heard him arguin' wi' the minister aboot the weemen- folk the day that he cam'. He canna' bide them, she says." 6 82 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. "He has but puir taste," said Ebie Farrish ; "a snod bit lass is the bonniest work o' Natur'. Noo for mysel' " "D'ye want anither? " asked Jess, without apparent connection. " He'll maybe mend o' that opcenion, as mony a wise man has dune afore him," said Meg, sententiously. "Gae on, Cuif; what else aboot the young man ? " " Oh, he's a lad o' great lear. He can read ony language back or forrit, up or doon, as easy as suppin' sowens. He can speak byordinar' graund. They say he'll beat the daddy o' him for preachin' when he's leecensed. He rade Birsie this mornin' too, after the kickin' randie had cuist me afF his back like a draff sack." " Then what's queer aboot him ? " said Jess. Meg said nothing. She felt a draught of air suck into Winsome's room, so that she knew that the subject was of such interest that her mistress had again opened her window. Meg leaned back so far that she could discern a glint of yellow hair in the dark- ness. The Cuif was about to light his pipe. Meg stopped him. " Nane o' yer lichts here, Cuif," she said j " it's time ye were thinkin' aboot gaun ower the hill. But ye haena' telled us yet what's queer aboot the lad." " Weel, woman, he's aye write — writin', whiles on sheets o' paper, and whiles on buiks." " There's nocht queer aboot that," says Meg ; " so does ilka minister." " But Manse Bell gied me ane o' his writings, that she had gotten aboot his bedroom somewhere. She THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 83 said that the wun' had blawn't aff his table, but I mis- doot her." " Yer ower great wi' Manse Bell an' the like o' her, for a man that comes to see me !" said Meg, who was a very particular young woman indeed. " It was cuttit intil lengths like the metre psalms, but it luikit gye an' daft like, sae I didna' read it," said the Cuif, hastily. " Here it's to ye, Meg. I was e'en gaun to licht my cutty wi't." Something shone gray-white in Saunders's hand as he held it out to Meg in the darkness. It passed into Meg's palm, and then was seen no more. The session at the house end was breaking up. Jess had vanished silently. Ebie Farrish was not. Jock Forrest had folded his tent and stolen away. Meg and Saunders were left alone. It was his supreme opportunity. He leaned over towards his sweetheart. His blue bonnet had fallen to the ground, and there was a distinct odour of warm candle-grease in the air. " Meg," he said, " yer maist amazin' bonny, an' I'm that fond o' ye that I am faain' awa' frae my meat ! O Meg, woman, I think o' ye i' the mornin' afore the Lord's Prayer, I sair misdoot ! Guid forgie me ! I find mysel' whiles wonderin' gin I'll see ye the day afore I can gang ower in my mind the graves that's to howk, or gin Birsie's oats are dune. O Meg, Meg, I'm that fell fond o' ye that I gruppit that thrawn speldron Birsie's hind leg juist i' the fervour o' thinkin' o' ye." " Hoo muckle hae ye i' the week ? " said Meg, practically, to bring the matter to a point. "A pound a week," said Saunders Mowdiewort, 84 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. promptly, who though a Cuif was a business man, " an' a cottage o' three rooms wi' a graun' view baith back an' front ! " "Ow aye," said Meg, sardonically, "I ken yer graund view. " It's o' yer last wife's tombstane, wi' the inscriptions the length o' my airm aboot Betty Mowdiewort an' a' her virtues, that Robert Paterson cuttit till ye a year past in Aprile. Na, na, ye'll no get me to leeve a' my life lookin' oot on that ilk] time I wash my dishes. It wad mak' yin be wantin' to dee afore their time to get sic-like. Gang an' speer Manse Bell. She's mair nor half blind onyway, an' she's fair girnin' fain for a man, she micht even tak' you." With these cruel words Meg lifted her milking- stool and vanished within. The Cuif sat for a long time on his byne lost in thought. Then he arose, struck his flint and steel together, and stood looking at the tinder burning till it went out, without having remembered to put it to the pipe which he held in his other hand. After the last sparks ran every way and flickered, he threw the glowing red embers on the ground, kicked the pail on which he had been sitting as solemnly as if he had been performing a religious duty to the end of the yard, and then stepped stolidly into the darkness. The hag-clog was now left alone against the wall beneath Winsome's window, within which there was now the light of a candle and a waxing and waning shadow on the blind as some one went to and fro. Then there was a sharp noise as of one clicking in the "steeple" or brace of the front door (which opened in two halves), and then the metallic grit of THE ADVENT OF THE CUIF. 85 the key in the lock, for Craig Ronald was a big house, and not a mere farm which might be left all night with unbarred portals. Winsome stepped lightly to her own door, which opened without noise. She looked out and said, in a compromise between a coaxing whisper and a voice of soft command : " Meg, I want ye." Meg Kissock came along the passage with the healthy glow of the night air on her cheeks, and her candle in her hand. She seemed as if she would pause at the door, but Winsome motioned her im- periously into her chamber. So Meg came within, and Winsome shut to the door. Then she simply held out her hand, at which Meg gazed as silently. "Meg !" said Winsome, warningly. A queer, faint smile passed momentarily over the face of Winsome's handmaid, as though she had been long trying to solve some problem and had suddenly and unexpectedly found the answer. Slowly she lifted up her dark green druggit skirt, and out of a pocket of enormous size, which was swung about her waist like a captured leviathan heaving inanimate on a ship's cable, she extracted a sheet of crumpled paper. Winsome took it without a word. Her eye said "Good-night " to Meg as plain as the minister's text. Meg Kissock waited till she was at the door, and then, just as she was making her silent exit, she said : " Ye'll tak' as guid care o't as the ither yin ye fand. Ye can pit them baith thegither." Winsome took a step towards her as if with some purpose of indignant chastisement. But the red head and twinkling eyes of mischief vanished, and Winsome S6 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. alone stood with the paper in her hand. Just as she had begun to smooth out the crinkles produced by the hands of Manse Bell who could not read it, Saunders who would not, and Meg Kissock who had not had time to read it, the head of the last named was once more projected into the room, looking round the edge of the rose-papered door. " Yell mak' a braw mistress o' the manse, Mistress — Ralph — Pedcn ! " she said, nodding her head after each proper name. CHAPTER X. THE LOVE-SONG OF THE MAVIS. Winsome stamped her little foot in real anger now, and crumpling the paper in her hand she threw it indignantly on the floor. She was about to say something overwhelming to Meg, but that erratic and privileged domestic was already in her own room at the top of the house with the door barred. But something like tears stood in Winsome's eyes. She was very angry indeed. She would speak to Meg in the morning. She was mistress of the house, and not to be treated as a child. Meg should have her warning to leave at the term. It was ridiculous the way that she had taken to speaking to her lately. It was clear that she had been allowing her handmaid far too great liberties. It did not occur to Winsome Charteris that Meg had been accustomed to tease her in something like this manner about every man under forty who had come to Craig Ronald on any pretext whatever — from young Johnnie Dusticoat, the son of the wholesale meal-miller from Dumfries, to Agnew Greatorix, eldest son of the Lady Elizabeth, who came over from the castle with books for her grandmother rather oftener than might be absolutely necessary j 87 88 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. and who, though a " papist," had waited for Winsome three Sabbath days at the door of the Marrow kirk, a building which he had never previously entered during his life. Winsome went still indignant to bed. It was altogether too aggravating that Meg should take the matter so, she said to herself. " Of course I do not care a button," she said over and over as she turned her hot cheek upon the pillow and looked towards the pale gray-blue of the window- panes, in which there was already the promise of the morning ; though yet it was hardly midnight of the short midsummer of the north. " It would be too ridiculous to suppose that I should care in the least for anybody whom I have only seen twice. Why, it was more than a year before I really cared for dear old granny ! Meg might know better, and it is very silly of her to say things like that. I shall send back his book and paper to-morrow morning by Andrew Kissock when he goes to school." Yet even after this resolution she still lay sleepless. " Now I will go to sleep," said Winsome, resolutelv shutting her eyes. "I will not think about him any more." It was assuredly a noble and fitting resolve. But Winsome had yet to discover in restless nights and troubled morrows that sleep and thought are two gifts of God which do not come or go at man's bidding. In her silent chamber there seemed to be a kind of hushed yet palpable life. It appeared to Winsome as if there were about her a thousand little whispering voices. Unseen presences flitted everywhere. She could hear them laughing such wicked, mocking laughs. They were clustering round the crumpled THE LOVE-SONG OF THE MAVIS. 89 piece of paper in the corner. Well, it might lie there for ever for her. " I would not read it even if it were light. I shall send it back to him to-morrow without reading it. Very likely It Is a Greek exercise, at any rate." Yet, for all these brave sayings, neither sleep nor dawn had come, when, clad in shadowy white and the more manifest golden glimmer of her hair, she glided to the window-seat ; and drawing a great knitted shawl about her, she sat, a slender figure enveloped from head to foot in sheeny white. The shawl imprisoned the pillow-tossed masses of her rippling hair, throwing them forward about her face, which, in the half light, seemed to be encircled with an aureole of pale Florentine gold. In her hand Winsome held Ralph Peden's poem, and in spite of her determination not to read it, she sat waiting till the dawn should come. It mieht be something of great importance. It might only be a Greek exercise. It was, at all events, necessary to find out, in order that she might send it back. It was a marvellous dawning, this one that Winsome waited for. Dawn is the secret of the universe. It thrills us somehow with a far-off" prophecy of that eternal dawning when the God That Is shall reveal Himself — the Morn which shall brighten into the more perfect day. It was just the slack water — the water-shed of the night. So clear it was this June midnight that the lingering gold behind the western ridge of the Orchar Hill, where the sun went down, was neither brighter nor yet darker than the faint tinge of lucent green, like the colour of the inner curve of the sea-wave just 90 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. as it bends to break, which had begun to glow behind the fir woods to the east, where he was to rise. The birds were waking sleepily. Chaffinches began their clear, short, natural bursts of song. " Churr ! " said the last barn owl as he betook himself sleepily to bed. The first rook sailed slowly overhead from Hensol wood. He was seeking the early worm. But that animal thought the rate of mortality high and was staying indoors. The green lake in the east was spreading and taking a roseate tinge just where it touched the pines on the rugged hillside. Beneath Winsome's window a blackbird hopped down upon the grass and took a tentative dab or two at the first slug he came across ; but it was really too early for breakfast for a good hour yet, so he flew up again into a bush and preened his feathers, which had been discomposed by the limited accommodation of the night. Now he was on the topmost twig, and Winsome saw him against the crimson pool which was fast deepening in the east. Suddenly his mellow pipe fluted out over the grove. Winsome listened as she had never listened before. Why had it become so strangely sweet to listen to the simple sounds ? Why, after an unknown fashion, did the rich Tyrian dye of the dawn touch her cheek and flush the flowering floss of her silken hair ? A thrush from the single laurel at the gate told her : " There — there — there — " (so he sang,) Can't you see, can't you see, can't you sec it ? Love is the secret, the secret / Could you but know it, did you but show it / Hear me ! hear me / hear me ! Down in the forest I loved her / THE LOVE-SONG OF THE MAVIS. 91 Sweet, sweet, sweet I Would you but listen, I would love you ! All is sweet mid pure a fid good / Tzvilight and morning dew, I love it, I love it, Do you, do you, do you ? " This was the thrush's love-song. Now it was light enough for Winsome to read her own by the red light of the midsummer's dawn. This was Ralph's Greek exercise : "Sweet mouth, red lips, broad unwrinkled brow, Sworn troth, woven hands, holy marriage vow, Unto us make answer, what is wanting now ? Love, love, love, the whiteness of the snow ; Love, love, love, and the days of long ago. Broad lands, bright sun, as it was of old ; Red wine, loud mirth, gleaming of the gold ; Something yet a-wanting — how shall it be told ? Love, love, love, the whiteness of the snow ; Love, love, love, and the clays of long ago. Large heart, true love, service void of sound, Life-trust, death-trust, here on Scottish ground, As in olden story, surely I have found — Love, love, love, the whiteness of the snow Love, love, love, and the days of long ago." The thrush had ceased singing while Winsome read. It was another voice which she heard — the first authentic call of the springtime for her. It coursed through her blood. It quickened her pulse. It enlarged the pupil of her eye till the clear ger- mander blue of the iris grew moist and dark. It was a song for her heart, and hers alone. She felt it, 92 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. though no more than a leaf blown to her by chance winds. It might have been written for any other, only she knew that it was not. Ralph Peden had said nothing to her. The poem certainly did not suggest a student of divinity in the Kirk of the Marrow. There were a thousand objections — a thousand reasons — every one valid, against such a thing. But love that laughs at locksmiths is equally contemptuous of logic. It was hers, hers, and hers alone. A breath from Love's wing as he passed came again to Winsome. The blackbird was silent, but the thrush again broke in with his jubilant love-song, while Winsome, with her love-song laid against a dewy cheek, paused to listen with a beating heart and a new comprehension : " Hear / hear I hear ! Dear / dear ! dear ! Far away, far away, far away, I saw him pass this way, I saw him pass this way, Tirriroo, tirrieoo ! so tender and true y Chippiwee, ckippiwec, oh, try him and see ! Cheer up ! cheer up I cheer up / Hill come and he'll kiss you, He'll kiss you and kiss you, And I'll see him do it, do it, do it ! " " Go away, you wicked bird ! " said Winsome, when the master singer in speckled grey came to this part of his song. So saying, she threw, with such exact aim that it went in an entirely opposite direction, a quaint pink sea-shell at the bird, a shell which had been given her by a lad who was going away again to THE LOVE-SONG OF THE MAVIS. 93 sea three years ago. She was glad now, when she thought of it, that she had kissed him because he had no mother to say good-bye to him, for he never came back any more. " Keck, keck ! " said the mavis indignantly, and went away. Then Winsome lay down on her white bed well content, and pillowed her cheek on a crumpled piece of paper. CHAPTER XL ANDREW KISSOCK. GOES TO SCHOOL. Love is, in maidens' hearts, of the nature of an intermittent fever. The tide of Solway flows, but the more rapid his flow the swifter his ebb. The higher the wrack is borne up the beach, the deeper, six hours after, are laid bare the roots of the seaweed upon the shingle. Now Winsome Charteris, however her heart might conspire against her peace, was not at all the girl to be won before she was wooed. Also there is to be counted upon that delicious spirit of contrariness that makes a woman even when well wooed, by no means desirous of seeming won. Besides, in the broad daylight of common day Winsome was less attuned and touched to emotional issues than in the red dawn. She had even taken the poem and the exercise book out of the sacred enclosure, where they had been hid so long. How did she really know that she had any good claim to either ? Indeed, she was well aware that to one of the manuscripts she had no claim whatever. Therefore she placed both the note-book and the poem within the same band as her precious housekeeping account-book, which she reverenced next her Bible — a very practical 94 ANDREW KISSOCK GOES TO SCHOOL. 95 proceeding which pleased her, and showed that she was quite above all foolish sentiment. Then she went to churn for an hour and a half, pouring in a little hot water critically from time to time in order to make the butter come. This exercise may be re- commended as an admirable corrective to foolish flights of imagination. There is something concrete about butter-making which counteracts an overplus of sentiment — especially when the butter will not come. But hot water may be overdone. Now Winsome Charteris was a hard-hearted young woman — a fact that may not as yet have appeared ; at least so she told herself. She had come to the conclusion that she had been foolish to think at all of Ralph Peden, so she resolved to put him at once and altogether out of her mind, which, as every one knows, is quite a simple matter. Yet during the morning she went three times into her little room to look at her housekeeping book, which by accident lay within the same band as Ralph Peden's lost manu- scripts. First, she wanted to see how much she got for butter at Cairn Edward the Monday before last ; then to discover what the price was on that very same day last year. It is an interesting thing thus to follow the fluctuations of the produce market, especially when you churn the butter yourself. The exact quotation of documents is a valuable thing to learn. Nothing is so likely to grow upon one as a habit of inaccuracy. This was what her grandmother was always telling her, and it behooved Winsome to improve. Each time as she strapped the documents together she said, " And these go back to-day by Andra Kissock when he goes to school." Then 96 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. she took another lookj in order to assure herself that no forgeries had been introduced within the band while she was churning the butter. The documents were still quite genuine. Winsome went out to relieve Jess Kissock in the dairy, and as she went she communed with herself: "It is right that I should send them back. The verses may belong to somebody else — somebody in Edinburgh — and, besides, I know them by heart." A good memory is a fine thing. The Kissocks lived in one of the Craig Ronald cot-houses. Their father had in his time been one of the herds, and upon his death, many years ago, Walter Skirving had allowed the widow and children to remain In the house in which Andrew Kissock, senior, had died. Mistress Kissock was a large-boned, soft-voiced woman, who had supplied what dash of tenderness there was in her daughters. She had reared them according to good traditions, but as she said, when all her brood were talking at the same time, she alone quietly silent : " The Kissocks tak' efter their faither, they're great hands to talk — a' bena An'ra'." Andrew was her youngest, a growing lump of a boy of twelve, who was exceeding silent in the house, though often voluble enough out of it. Every day Andra betook himself to school, along the side of Loch Grannoch, by the path which looked down on the cloud-flecked mirror of the lock. Some days he got there, but very occasionally. His mother got him ready early this June morning. He brought in the kye for Jess. He helped Jock Gordon to carry water for Meg's kitchen mysteries. ANDREW KISSOCK GOES TO SCHOOL. 97 He listened to a brisk conversation proceeding from the "room " where his very capable sister was engaged in getting the old people settled for the day. For all this was part of the ordinary routine. As soon as the whole establishment knew that Walter Skirving was again at the window over the marsh-mallow sand and his wife at her latest book, a sigh of satisfaction went up and the wheels of the day's work revolved. So this morning it came time for Andra to go to school all too soon. Andra did not want to stay at home from school, but it was against a boy's principle to appear glad to go to school, so Andra regularly made it a point of honour to make a feint of wanting to stay every morning. " Can I no bide an' help ye wi' the butter-kirnin' the day, Jess ? " said Andra, rubbing himself briskly all over as he had seen the ploughmen do with their horses. When he got to his own bare red legs he reared and kicked violently, calling out at the same time : "Wad ye then, ye tairger, tuts — stan' still there, ye kickin' beast ! " as though he were seme fiery un- tamed from the desert. Jess made a dart at him with a wet towel. " Gang oot o' my kitchen wi' yer nonsense ! " she cried. Andra passaged like a stronglv bitted charger to the back door, and there fairly ran away with himself, flourishing in the air a pair of very dirty heels. Ebie Farrish was employed over a tin basin at the stable door, making his breakfast toilet, which he always undertook, not when he shook himself out of bed in the stable loft at five o'clock, but before he went in to devour Jess with his eyes and his porridge 7 98 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. in a more ordinary way. It was at this point that Andra Kissoclc, that prancing Galloway barb, breaking away from all restrictions, charged between Ebie's legs, and overset him into his own horse-trough. The yellow soap was in Ebie's eyes, and before he got it out the small boy was far enough away. The most irritating thing was that from the back kitchen came peal on peal of laughter. " It's surely fashionable kind o' sea-bathin' to tak' a dook in the stable-trough, nae less ! " Ebie gathered himself up savagely. His temperature was something considerably above summer heat, yet he dared not give expression to his feelings, for his experiences in former courtships had led him to the conclusion that you cannot safely, having regard to average family prejudice, prematurely abuse the brothers of your sweetheart. After marriage the case is believed to be different. Winsome Charteris stood at the green gate which led out of the courtyard into the croft, as Andra was making his schoolward exit. She held a parcel ready for him. This occasioned no surprise, nor did the very particular directions as to delivery, and the dire threatenings against forgetfulness or failure in the least dismay Andra. He was entirely accustomed to them. From his earliest years he had heard nothing else. He had never been reckoned " a sure hand," and it was only in default of a better messenger that Winsome now employed him. The directions were indeed so explicit that there did not appear to be any possibility of mistake. He had only to go to the manse and leave the parcel for Mr. Ralph Peden " without a message." ANDREW KISSOCK GOES TO SCHOOL. 99 So Andrew Kissock, nothing loath, promised faith- fully. He never objected to promising ; that was easy. He carried the small, neatly wrapped parcel in his hand, walking most sedately so long as Winsome's eyes were upon him. He was not yet old enough to be under the spell of their witchery ; but then Win- some's eyes controlled his sister Meg's hand, and for that latter organ he had a most profound respect. Now we must take the trouble to follow in some detail the course of this small boy going to school, for though a thing of no interest in itself save as a study in the science of procrastination, a good deal of our history directly depends upon it. As soon as Andrew was out of sight he pulled his leather satchel round so that he could open it with ease, and, having taken a handful of broken and very stale crumbs out of it for immediate use, he dropped Winsome's parcel within. There it kept company with a tin flask of milk which his mother filled for him every morning, having previously scalded the vessel well to restore its freshness. This was specially carefully done after a sad occasion upon which his mother, having poured in the fine new milk for Andra's dinner fresh from Crummie the cow, out of the flask mouth there crawled a number of healthy worms which that enterprising youth had collected from various quarters which it is perhaps best not to specify. Not that Andra objected in the least. Milk was a good thing ; worms were good things ; and he was far above the paltry superstition that one good thing could spoil another. He will always consider to his dying day that the very sound licking which his mother administered to him, for spoiling at once ioo THE LTLAC SUNBONNET. the family breakfast and his own dinner, was one of the most uncalled-for and gratuitous that even in his wide experience it had been his lot to receive. So Andra took his way to school. He gambolled along, smelling and rooting among the ragged robin and starwort in the hedges like an unbroken collie. It is safe to say that no further thought of school or message crossed his mind from the moment that the highest white steading of Craig Ronald sank out of view, until his compulsory return. Andra shut out from his view facts so commonplace and ignominious as home and school. At the first loaning end, where the road to the Nether Crae came down to cross the bridge — just at the point where the Grannoch lane leaves the narrows of the loch, Andra betook himself to the side of the road, with a certain affectation of superabundant secrecv- With prodigious exactness he examined the stones at a particular part of the dyke, hunted about for one of remarkable size and colour, said " Hist ! hist ! " in a mysterious way, and ran across the road to see that no one was coming. As we have seen, Andra was the literary person of the family. His eldest brother had gone to America in the slow sailing packet of those days, where he was working in New York as a joiner. This youth was in the habit of sending across books and papers describing the terrible encounters with Indians in the Boone country — the " dark and bloody land " of the early romancers. Not one in the family looked at the insides of these relations of marvels except Andra, who, when he read the story of the Indian scout ANDREW KISSOCK GOES TO SCHOOL. 101 trailing the murderers of his squaw across a continent in order to annihilate them just before they entered New York city, felt that he had found his vocation — which was to be an Indian scout, if indeed nature had made it too late for him to think of being a full- blooded Indian. The impressive pantomime at the bridge was in order to ascertain whether his bosom companion, Dick Little, had passed on before him. He knew, as soon as he was within a hundred yards of the stone, that he had not passed. Indeed, he could see him at that very moment threading his way down through the tangle of heather and bog myrtle — or, as he would have said, "gall busses opposite." But what of that? — Mighty is the power of makebelieve, and in Andra, repressed as he was at home, there was concentrated the energy and power of some highly imaginative ancestry. He had a full share of the quality which ran in the family, and was exceeded only by his brother Jock in New York, who had been " the biggest leer in the country side " before he emigrated to a land where at that time this quality was not specially marked among so many wielders of the long bow. Jock, in his letters, used to frighten his mother with dark tales of his hair-breadth escapes from savages and desperadoes on the frontier, yet, strangely enough, his address remained steadily at New York. Now it is not often that an Easter Galloway boy takes to lying ; but when he does, a mere Nithsdale man has no chance with him, still less a man from the simple-minded levels of the " Shire." x But Andra 1 Wigtonshire is invariably spoken of in Galloway as the Shire, Kirkcudbrightshire as the Stewartry. io2 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. Kissock always lied from the highest motives. He elevated the saying of the thing that was not, to the height of a principle. He often lied, knowing that he would be thrashed for it — even though he was aware that he would be rewarded for telling the truth. He lied because he would not demean himself to utter so commonplace a thing as the truth. It need not therefore surprise us in the least that when Dick Little came across the bridge he was greeted by Andra Kissock with the information that he was in the clutches of The Avenger of Blood, who, mounted upon a mettle steed with remarkably dirty feet, curveted across the road and held the pass. He was required to give up a " soda scone or his life." The bold Dick, who had caught the infection, stoutly refused to yield either. His life was dear to him, but a soda scone considerably dearer. He would rather be dead than hungry any day. " Then die, traitor ! " said Andra, throwing down his bag, all forgetful of Winsome Charteris's precious parcel and his promises thereanent. So these two brave champions had at one another with most surprising valour. They were armed with wooden swords as long as themselves, which they manoeuvred with both hands in a marvellously savage manner. When a blow did happen to get home, the dust flew out of their jackets. But still the champions fought on. They were in the act of finishing the quarrel by the submission of Dick in due form, when Allan Welsh, passing across the bridge on one of his pastoral visitations, came upon them suddenly. Dick was on his knees at the time, his hands on the ground, and Andra was forcing ANDREW KISSOCK GOES TO SCHOOL. 103 his head determinedly down toward the surface of the king's highway. Meanwhile Dick was objecting in the most vigorous way. " Boys," said the stern, quiet voice of the minister, " what are you doing to each other ? Are you aware it is against both the law of God and man to fight in this way ? It is only from the beasts that perish that we expect such conduct. " If you please, sir," answered Andra, in a shame- faced way, yet with the assurance of one who knows that he has the authorities on his side, " Dick Little wull no bite the dust." " Bite the dust ! — what do you mean, laddie ? " asked the minister, frowning. "Weel sir, if ye please, sir, the buik says that the yin that got his licks fell down and bit the dust. Noo, Dick's doon fair aneuch. Ye micht speak till him to bite the dust ! " And Andra, clothed in the garments of conscious rectitude, stood back to give the minister room to deliver his rebuke. The stern face of the minister relaxed. " Be ofF with you to school," he said ; " I'll look in to see if you have got there in the afternoon." Andra and Dick scampered down the road, snatch- ing their satchels as they ran. In half an hour they were making momentary music under the avenging birch rod of Duncan Duncanson, the learned Dullarg schoolmaster. Their explanations were excellent. Dick said that he had been stopped to gather the eggs, and Andra that he had been detained conversing with the minister. The result was the same in both cases — Andra getting double for sticking to his statement. io + THE LILAC SUN BONNET. Yet botli stories were true, though quite accidentally so, of course. This is what it is to have a bad character. Neither boy, however, felt any ill-will whatever at the schoolmaster. They considered that he was there in order to lick them. For this he was paid by their parents' money, and it would have been a fraud if he had not duly earned his salary by dusting their jackets daily. Let it be said at once that he did most conscientiously earn his money, and seldom overlooked any of his pupils even for a single day. Back at the Grannoch bridge, under the parapet, Allan Welsh, the minister of the Kirk of the Marrow, found the white packet lying which Winsome had tied with such care. He looked all round to See whence it had come. Then taking it in his hand, he looked at it a long time silently, with a strange and not unkindly expression on his face. He lifted it to his lips and kissed the handwriting which addressed it to Master Ralph Peden. As he paced away he carefully put it in the inner pocket of his coat. Then, with his head farther forward than ever, and the im- manence of his great brow overshadowing his ascetic face, he set himself slowly to climb the brae. CHAPTER XII. MIDSUMMER DAWN. True love is at once chart and compass. It led Ralph Peden into a cloudy June dawning. It was soft, amorphous, uncoloured night when he went out. Slate-coloured clouds were racing along the tops of the hills from the south. The wind blew in fitful gusts and veering flaws among the moorlands, making eddies and backwaters of the air, which twirled the fallen petals of the pear and cherry blossoms in the little manse orchard. As he stepped out upon the moor and the chill of dawn struck inward, he did not know that Allan Welsh was watching him from his blindless bedroom. Dawn is the testing-time of the universe. Its cool, solvent atmosphere dissolves social amenities. It is difficult to be courteous, impossible to be polite, in that hour before the heart has realised that its easy task of throwing the blood horizontally to brain and feet has to be exchanged for the harder one of throwing it vertically to the extremities. Ralph walked slowly and in deep thought through the long avenues of glimmering beeches and under the dry rustle of the quivering poplars. Then, as the 105 106 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. first red of dawn touched his face, he looked about him. He was clear of the trees now, and the broad open expanse of the green fields and shining water meadows that ring in Loch Grannoch widened out before him. The winds sighed and rumbled about the hill-tops of the Orchar and the Black Laggan, but here in the valley only the cool moist wind of dawn drew largely and statedly to and fro. Ralph loved Nature instinctively, and saw it as a town-bred lad rarely does. He was deeply read in the more scientific literature of the subject, and had spent many days in his Majesty's Physic gardens, which lie above the broad breast of the Forth. He now proved his learning, and with quick, sure eye made it real on the Galloway hills. Every leaf spoke to him. He could lie for half a day and learn wisdom from the ant. He took in the bird's song and the moth's flight. The keepers sometimes wondered at the lights which flashed here and there about the plantations, when in the coolness of a moist evening he went out to entrap the sidelong-dashing flutterers with his sugar-pots. Yet since he came to Galloway, and especially since he smelled the smell of the wood-fire set for the blanket-washing above the Crae Water bridge, there were new secrets open to him. He possessed a voice that could wile a bird ofF a bough. His inner sympathy with wild and tame beasts alike was such that as he moved quietly among a drowsing, cud- chewing herd on the braes of Urioch not a beast moved. Among them a wild, untamed colt stood at bay, its tail arched with apprehension yet sweeping the MIDSUMMER DAWN. 107 ground, and watched him with flashing eyes of sus- picion. Ralph held out his hand slowly, more as if it were growing out of his side by some rapid natural process than as if he were extending it. He uttered a low " sussurrus " of coaxing and invitation, all the while imperceptibly decreasing his distance from the colt. The animal threw back its head, tossed its mane in act to flee, thought better of it and dropped its nose to take a bite or two of the long coarse grass. Then again it looked up and continued to gaze, fascinated at the beckoning and caressing fingers. At last, with a little whinny of pleasure, the colt, wholly reassured, came up and nestled a wet nose against Ralph's coat. He took the wild thing's neck within the arch of his arm, and the two new friends stood awhile in grave converse. A moment afterwards Ralph bent to lay a hand upon the head of one of the placid queys that had watched the courtship with full, dewy eyes of bovine unconcern. Instantly the colt charged into the still group with a wild flourish of hoofs and viciously snapping teeth, scattering the black-polled hornless Galloways like smoke. Then, as if to reproach Ralph for his unfaithfulness, he made a circle of the field at a full, swinging gallop, sending the short turf flying from his unshod hoofs at every stride. Back he came again, a vision of floating mane and streaming tail, and stopped dead three yards from Ralph, his forelegs strained and taut, ploughing furrows in the grass. As Ralph moved quietly across the field the colt followed, pushing a cool moist nose over the young man's shoulder. When at last Ralph set a foot on the projecting stone which stood out from the side io8 THE LILAC SUNBONNET. of the grey, lichen-clad stone dyke, the colt stood stretching an eager head over, desirous of following him ; then, with a whinny of disappointment, he rushed round the field, charging at the vaguely wondering and listlessly grazing cattle with head arched down between his forelegs and a flourish of widely distributed heels. Over the hill, Craig Ronald was still wrapped in the lucid impermanence of earliest dawn, when Win- some Charteris set her foot over the blue flag-stones of the threshold. The high tide of darkness, which in these northern summer mornings never rose very high or lasted very long, had ebbed away. The indigo grey of the sky was receding, and tinging towards the east with an imperceptibly graded lavender which merged behind the long shaggy outline of the pine ridge into a wash of pale lemon yellow. The world paused, finger on lip, saying " Hush ! " to Winsome as she stepped over the threshold into the serenely breathing morning air, while the illimi- table sky ran farther and farther back as the angels drew up the blinds from the windows of heaven. " Hush ! " said the cows over the hedge, blowing fragrant breaths of approval from their wide, comma- shaped nostrils upon the lush grass and upon the short heads of white clover, as they stood face to the brae, all with their heads in order, eating their way upward like an army on the march. " Hush ! hush ! " said the sheep who were strag- gling over the shorter grass of the High Park, feeding fitfully in their short, uneasy way — crop, crop, crop — and then after a pause, moving forward each his own length and beginning all over again. MIDSUMMER DAWN. 109 But the sheep and the kine, the dewy grass and the brightening sky, might every one have spared their pains, for it was in no wise in the heart of Winsome Charteris to make a noise amid the silences of dawn. Meg Kissock, who still lay snug by Jess in a plump-cheeked country sleep, made noise enough to stir the country side when, rising, she set briskly about to get the house on its morning legs. But Winsome was one of the few people in this world — few but happy — to whom a sunrise is more precious than a sunset — rarer and more calming, instinct with message and sign from the God of covenant-keeping. Also, Winsome betook herself early to bed, and so awoke attuned to the sun's up-rising. What drew her forth so early this June day was no thought or hope or plan, except the desire to read the heart of Nature, and perhaps that she might not be left too long alone with the parable of her own heart. A girl's heart is full of thoughts which it dares not express to herself — of fluttering and trembling possi- bilities, chrysalis-like, set aside to await the warmth of an unrevealed summer. In Winsome's soul the first flushing glory of the May of youth was waking the prisoned life. But there were throbs and thrillings too piercingly sweet to last undeveloped. The burst- ing bud of her healthful beauty, quickened by the shy reticence of her soul, was shaking the centres of her life, even as a laburnum-tree mysteriously quivers when the golden rain is in act to break from the close-clustered dependent budlets. Thus it was that, at the stile which helps the paths between the Dullarg and Craig Roland to overleap the high hill dyke, Ralph met Winsome. As they no THE LILAC SUNBONNET. looked into one another's eyes, they saw Nature sud- denly dissolve into confused meaninglessness. There was no clear gospel for either of them there, save the message that the old world of their hopes and fears had wholly passed away. Yet no new world had come when over the hill dyke their hands met. They said no word, for there is no form of greeting for such. Eve did not greet Adam in polite phrase when he awoke to find her in the dawn of one Eden day, a helpmate meet for him. Neither did Eve reply that " it was a fine morning." It is always a fine morning in Eden. Contrariwise they were silent, and so were these two. Their hands lay within one another a single instant. Then, with a sense of something wanting, Ralph sprang as lightly over the dyke as an Edinburgh High School boy ought, who had often played hares and hounds in the Hunter's Bog, and been duly thrashed therefor by Dr. Adam 1 on the following morning. When Ralph stood beside her upon the sunny side of the stile he instinctively resumed Winsome's hand. For this he had no reason, certainly no excuse. Still, it may be urged in defence that it was as much as an hour or an hour and a half before Winsome remem- bered that he needed any. Our most correct and ordered thoughts have a way of coming to us belated, like the passenger who strolls in confidently ten minutes after the platform is clear. But then, also, like him, they are at least ready for the next train. As Winsome and Ralph turned towards the east, the sun set his face over the great Scotch firs on the 1 The very famous master of the High School of Edinburgh. MIDSUMMER DAWN. m ridge, whose tops stood out like poised irregular blots on the fire-centred ocean of light. It was the new day, and if the new world had not come with it, of a surety it was well on the way. CHAPTER XIII. A STRIN'G OF THE LILAC SUN'BOXNET. For a time they were silent, though it was not long before Winsome drew away her hand, which, how- ever, continued to burn consciously for an hour afterwards. Silence settled upon them. The con- straint of speech fell first upon Ralph, being town- bred and accustomed to the convenances at Professor Thriepneuk's. " You rise early," he said, glancing shyly down at Winsome, who seemed to have forgotten his presence. He did not wish her to forget. He had no objection to her dreaming, if only she would dream about him. Winsome turned the bewildering calmness of her eves upon him. A gentleman, they say, is calm-eyed. So is a cow. But in the eye of a good woman there is a peace which comes from many generations of mothers — who, every one Christs according to their wav, have suffered their heavier share of the Eden curse. Ralph would have given all that he possessed — which, by the wav, was not exactly a fortune — to be able to assure himself that there was any hesitancy or bashfulness in the elance which met his own. But A STRING OF THE LILAC SUNBONNET. n? Winsome's eyes were as clearly and frankly blue as if God had made them new that morning. At least Ralph looked upon their Sabbath peace and gave thanks, finding them very good. A gleam of lauehter, at first silent and far a. sprang into them — like a breeze coming down Loch Grannoch when it lies asleep in the sun, sending shining sparkles winking shoreward, and causing the wavering golden lights on the shallow sand of the b to scatter tremulously. So in the depths of Win- some's eyes glimmered the coming smile. Winsome could be divinely serious, but behind there lay the possibility and certainty of very frank earthly laughter. If, as Ralph thought, not for the first time in this rough island story, this girl were indeed an angel, surely she was one to whom her M..