[3]The metal was molten by the command of Douglas, and poured down his throat; and thus he received both his reward and punishment at the same time.—"History of Galloway," 1841, vol. i.
[3]The metal was molten by the command of Douglas, and poured down his throat; and thus he received both his reward and punishment at the same time.—"History of Galloway," 1841, vol. i.
Let never man be bold enough to say—Thus, and no further, shall my passion stray;The first crime past compels us into more,And guilt growsfate, that was butchoicebefore.Aaron Hill.
The silence of a minute was, perhaps, the most severe comment which followed this story of more than Oriental barbarity. Indignation made the fiery young king almost speechless. He snatched from the table one of those Beauvais goblets, which were then greatly esteemed and were mounted with silver-gilt. It was full of water, and he drank it thirstily.
"My brave kinsman—so young, so faithful, and so merry!" exclaimed Sir Patrick Gray, with more of grief than anger in his tone; "I would give my life to save his; for it must be in imminent peril."
"No such sacrifice will be necessary," said the king; "we shall write to this daring lord, commanding him at once, on peril of his allegiance, to yield up Sir Thomas MacLellan of Bombie to our messenger, and set him forth of Thrave."
"But who," asked the chancellor, "will be daring enough to bear such a message into the wilds of Galloway, beyond the land of the Annandale thieves?"
"That will I, and blithely, too: MacLellan would do as much for me," replied Sir Patrick, with energy.
"Reflect, my friend; a royal herald were safer," said the king. "You are the enemy of Douglas in more ways than one."
"How, your highness? I am not wont to reflect much in time of peril."
"True, Sir Patrick; but this mission becomes doubly one of life and death, and of many perils to you; for loyalty to me is, perhaps, your smallest crime in the eyes of Douglas," said the king.
"Then I have reflected. Douglas shall release my father's sister's son, or I shall cleave him to the beard in his own hall!" exclaimed Gray, with a sudden burst of passion.
"That would not mend the matter much; and I should only be in thee but one faithful subject the less, and faithful subjects are rather scarce at present. Alas! my valiant friend, this strong traitor is likely to hang thee like a faulty hound—even as he hanged the gentle and noble Herries of Terregles."
"I have given my word to ride on this perilous errand, and, with your majesty's permission, go I shall," said Gray, resolutely.
"Good," said the chancellor, striking his long cane on the oak floor; "a soldier's word is his bond for weal or woe."
"In the cause of our king and kindred, I will do all that MacLellan would, were he free. Oh! your highness, write at once; furnish me with due credentials; time in this is precious, and the waste of it perilous!"
"When shall you depart on this mission?"
"So soon as I can get my horse and armour; within an hour, I shall have left these new walls of Edinburgh many a mile behind me."
"'Tis well—good service is ever promptly done."
"I am the subject and soldier of your majesty," replied Gray, bowing with modest confidence.
"And a faithful one!" added the king, giving his hand to his favourite, who was now in his thirty-fifth year, with a fine martial face, a clear bright eye, and a heart that was brave as it was tender and true. "But know you the language of these wild men among whom you are venturing—thefremitScots of Galloway?"
"I know but little more than our Lowland tongue, with a smattering of Flemish and French, picked up when I had more leisure than desire to learn them—the castle of Bommel; yet I can make a shift to use others, too, that are more universally known."
"How?"
"I can make love to the women and show my purse to the men," said Gray, with a gaiety that was half assumed; "I'll warrant they will both understand me."
"I fear me, Sir Patrick, you may have to show your sword more frequently, on a king's errand though you be; but within an hour a letter shall be prepared."
"And within that time, with the permission of your highness, I shall be armed and mounted," said Gray, bowing low again and retiring in haste.
There was a momentary silence after this, for the mission on which Gray was departing was one of great peril to himself. Indeed, as Lord Glammis observed, "he was the last man in Scotland who should have undertaken it."
"Chancellor," said the king suddenly, "you spoke of a bond, or league, as athirdcause for the hatred of Douglas against Sir Thomas MacLellan. What is this document?"
"A matter so formidable, so seriously affecting the welfare of the realm, and the honour of your crown, that I know not in what language to approach it; but the abbot of Tongland has sent me a copy of the actual deed."
The manner of Crichton became so grave and earnest that the king changed colour, and the master of the household and the abbot of Melrose, who remained silent and somewhat apart, exchanged glances expressive of interest and alarm.
"Say on," said James briefly, and striking the floor with his heel.
"The earl of Douglas, for the aggrandisement of his power and family, has formed a league offensive and defensive with the earls of Crawford and Rosse—a league by which he hopes to bid complete defiance to your royal authority, and to bringforty thousand men at a day's noticeinto the field against it; and to this compact they have bound themselves by rebellious and sacrilegious but solemn and terrible oaths, that each shall aid and assist the others and their friends against thewhole world."
The chancellor then handed to James a duplicate of this remarkable bond, which was signed and sealed by Douglas; by Alexander (with the long beard), earl of Crawford, who was surnamed the Tiger, and was sheriff of Aberdeen, and bailiff of Scone; Donald, earl of Rosse and lord of the Isles; Hugh Douglas, earl of Ormond; James Dunbar, earl of Murray; Douglas, Lord Balvenie; James Hamilton, lord of Cadzow, and many others of the highest rank.
On beholding this terrible bond, James felt for a moment as if the crown which had come to him from a long line of monarchs was about to be torn from his head. He grew very pale, then perceiving that the keen and deeply-set eyes of his stern, faithful, and uncompromising chancellor were fixed upon him, he rallied his spirits and said, "This must be crushed in the bud, lest in its bloom it crush us."
"And to crush it we must first dissemble, and take these rebels in detail—break the rods separately which while in a bundle might defy our efforts."
"I must have apersonalinterview with this daring earl of Douglas," said the king, "even if I condescend to ride to Thrave for it. But meanwhile Gray shall bear to him three documents——"
"Three?" reiterated Crichton, looking up.
"He shall be written to intreating, rather than demanding, the release of Sir Thomas MacLellan, who refused to join this infamous league. I shall entrust Gray with a second missive containing a summons to a conference, and assuring Douglas of a restoration to favour, and forgiveness for the past, provided he break this bond, and as a guarantee——"
"Yes—yes," interrupted the old chancellor, grinding his almost toothless gums; "he will require something of that kind, while the memory of that 23rd of November, 1440, is fresh in Galloway."
"Then as a security the earl shall have a letter of safe conduct, to and from the castle of Stirling, signed by our own hand. Let this be seen to at once," and the king, as if weary of the morning, but in reality crushed and overwhelmed by its terrible revelations, retired to another room, muttering as he did so, "Oh, my poor father, who perished by the swords of regicides! how happier would I be if seated with you at the feet of God, than on this throne of Scotland?"
So thought James II. in 1450; how many of his descendants had better reason to utter the same bitter prayer, ere throne, and crown, and sceptre passed away from them.
Exactly one hour after the king retired, Sir Patrick Gray, carefully armed and splendidly mounted, departed on perilous, and—considering the state of the country, the lack of fords, roads, bridges, and hostelries—distant journey of ninety old Scottish miles. Over his suit of mail he wore a surcoat, on which the royal arms were embroidered to show that he rode on the special service of the king, and that to molest him involved the penalties of treason.
His departure was viewed with deep interest by the court and his soldiers. All expressed doubt and pity, for the unscrupulous character of Douglas inspired all men with terror, and as he rode off, the old warder at the castle gate shook his silvery head while saying, "By my faith, Foulis, ye'll come back faster than ye gang, gif ye e'er come back ava—but God speed ye the gate, man!"
Oh, name the mighty ransom; task my power;Let there be danger, difficulty, death,To enhance the price.—Tamerlane.
It may easily be supposed that, with all his anxiety for the fate of his kinsman, Sir Patrick's desire to see, or be near Murielle, was also near his heart; and inspired by this double object, he rode rapidly, and tasking the speed of his horse, passed through districts the features of which have long since been changed by time and cultivation: for rivers that were then broad and deep have shrunk to mere rills, and rills have disappeared; stone bridges have superseded dangerous and subtle fords, where the luring kelpie lurked for the drowning wayfarer; lochs and morasses have become fertile fields; dense forests, where the wild bull bellowed, and the savage boar whetted his tusks on the gnarled oak, have been cleared away; populous towns have sprung into existence, where whilom the thatched hamlet stood; churches, wherein generations had worshipped God in fervour and holiness, and where Scotland's best and bravest men were laid under tombs of marble and brass, have been ruined and desecrated, as if by the hands of sikhs or sepoys; but hills whereon the mosstrooper drove herd and hirsel, and where the wild furze and whin grew in luxuriance, have been rendered arable to their steepest summits, and fertile, even, as the most fertile parts of Lothian.
By many an old Roman road formed by the warriors of the adventurous Agricola, and those of the discomfited emperor Severus—old ways, where the rank grass grew among the causeway stones, he travelled, and soon reached the wild heathy uplands of Stobo that look down on the green vale of the Tweed, and then the steeps of Hells Cleuch, which are furrowed by a mountain torrent that rushes red and foaming to join the broader waters of the Forth. On by the wild morasses of Tweedsmuir, where an ancient Celtic cross that stood amid the rough obelisks of a Druid Temple of the Sun, was the only landmark for that savage and solitary pass, which was overlooked by the barred and battlemented tower of many a rude mosstrooping laird.
On—on yet past Moffat, secluded in its lovely vale amid its almost inaccessible hills, above the dim summits of which the pale blue mist was floating, and the black eagles were soaring, past its naked or heathy mountain gorges, through which the yellow rays of the setting sun were falling on the moss-covered shealing, and the browsing herd and hirsel; and on the old square castles of red sandstone, built with seashell mortar, the abode of many a turbulent baron.
He was now amid the tremendous scenery of the Southern Highlands; and there, after a ride of fifty miles from Edinburgh, he tarried for the night with the priest of the village church, as he wanted rest, seclusion, and secrecy. There, as at one or two other places, he arranged for a relay of horses, as he knew not what might be the issue of his expedition; and ere it was over, he had reason to thank Heaven for his foresight.
Refreshed and newly horsed, he departed next day with the rising sun, and soon saw the moors of Kirkmichael and the mossy monolith of the six corpses, where Wallace slew Sir Hugh of Moreland and five other Englishmen; and ere long Dumfries, so red and sombre, with its spires of St. Michael and of many a convent and friary, rose before him, and with its long bridge of the thirteenth century—then considered the rival of that of London—spanning by thirteen carved Gothic arches the broad blue waters of the lovely Nith, where, between green and undulating shores, they rolled, glittering in the sunshine, towards the Solway Firth.
The ruined castle of the false Comyns yet overlooked the river; and the jangle of the convent-bell at Nunholm came and went on the noonday wind.
He advanced along the bridge, the passage of which was barred by an iron gate and portal of old red sandstone. It was quaint and time-worn, having been built by the Lady Devorgilla, of Galloway, the mother of the mock-king, John Baliol. Above it were the arms of the burgh—a chevron with threefleurs-de-lys; St. Michael winged and trampling on a serpent, with the motto, "a' at the Lower Burn," the slogan and the muster-place of the inhabitants. At this gate a toll on corn, merchandise, and passengers was collected for the benefit of the Franciscan monastery, which the pious Lady Devorgilla had founded for the salvation of her soul, and of the souls of her ancestors and posterity, in the full-flowing Christian charity of an age which is branded as the dark and superstitious simply because we know little or nothing about it. After this gate was passed, and its iron grille had clanked behind him, the heart of Gray beat faster, for he was now completely in Galloway—the land of his love and of his enemies.
The warder or loiterer, who looked across the Nith from the old castle of Dumfries, saw the flashing of armour in the noonday sunshine, as our solitary horseman rode furiously on, and, from his speed, supposed that some warden-raid or invasion was at hand; and the old Franciscan who dosed on a seat by the friary wall woke up from his dreams, and, in dread of either, muttered anAve Maria gratia plena, &c., and dosed off to sleep again.
The peasant on the rigs of Teregles saw him passing like a whirlwind, and thought, with an angry sigh, that he might soon have to exchange his blue bonnet and grey maud for a breastplate and bourgoinette; for such speed never betokened an errand of peace, but of tumult and war.
Evening saw the messenger traversing the uplands of Tracquair, where the heaths are dark, the rocks are bleak, and where the black cattle browse in the grassy haughs; and past "the Bush" so famed in song; it was then a thicket of birchen-trees, through which a mounted trooper could ride unseen, even with his Scottish lance, six ells long, uplifted at arm's length.
Here, by the side of a lonely bridle-path which crossed a waste moorland, he found a man lying dead. His breast was exposed and exhibited a deep spear-wound, in which a sprig of thorn was inserted, and around which the last drops of blood had grown black and coagulated. A grey-robed priest was near the body on his knees, engaged in prayer. Gray reined in his horse, and, waiting until the churchman had ended, said,
"What does this slaughter mean, father?"
"It is the thorn-twig," said the monk, with a bewildered air.
"Explain?" said Gray, impatiently; "I have no time to read riddles."
"It is the cognisance of the Laird of Pompherston."
"And what does it mean, now?"
"Art so dull, or come from such a distance, as not to know?" asked the monk, throwing back his cowl and looking up with surprise in his grim and bearded visage.
"I confess that I am."
"Well, it signifies that this unfortunate, Donacha MacKim, the gudeman of Bourick, has been slain by the Douglases, for having been in arms against them at Raeberry; so Pompherston took a twig from his helmet and placed it where you see—in that bloody lance-wound. And now, sir, for our Blessed Lady's sake, aid me to convey him to Tracquair, that he may have the rites of a Christian burial."
"Under favour, good father, that I cannot do, as I ride for life and death on the king's service," replied Gray, in a tone of regret.
"A perilous errand here, while the Douglases are all abroad," replied the monk, shaking his shaven head.
"In arms?" said Gray, starting.
"No—hunting, and they have ridden over all the countryside, from the Bush aboon Tracquair to the Carlinwark at Thrave."
The setting of the sun found Gray beyond the waters of Urr, which he crossed near that mysterious mound known as the Moat of Urr, and on his left saw the Dub o' Hass, where many a foreign galliot and Scottish caravel were at anchor, and the banks of which were then and for long after, according to local tradition, the haunt of the Mermaid of Galloway, whose wondrous beauty was such that no man could behold her without a love that became madness, and whose hair was like shining gold, through the links of which her white shoulders and bosom shone, as she floated on the crystal water, inspiring men with passion that ended in death.
Her comb was o' the whitely pearl,Her hand like new-won milk;Her breasts were like the snowy curdIn a net o' seagreen silk.
But, thinking more of armed men than of alluring mermaids, Gray rode to where stood a little hostelry, kept apparently by a vassal of the kirk, as the signboard bore the papal crown and cross-keys; so he tarried there to refresh himself and horse again. He was received with profound respect, but with a curiosity the suppression of which seemed difficult, as the royal blazon which he wore upon his surcoat was seldom seen onthatside of the Nith, though the hostelry was established as a halting-place for the wealthy abbots of Tongland, Newabbey, and the priors of St. Mary and Lincluden, when passing that way with their retinues.
The edifice was simply a large thatched cottage, divided in two by a partition named thehallan; beyond it was the principal fireplace, the lintel of which projected far over the hearth, and was wide enough to show the row of hams hung there to be smoked, and the iron bar whereon the kail-pot swung. Within this apartment—for the fireplace was really one—lay a whinstone seat, called thecat-hud, and a stone bench, the place of honour for strangers, and thereon Sir Patrick seated himself, by the gudeman's request.
Above the mantelpiece hung the black iron morion and two-handed whinger of the latter—with kirn-cuts of corn gaily ornamented with ribbons—the trophies of the last year's harvest home. The floor was of sanded clay; the ceiling showed the open cabers of the roof; while a long dresser laden with shining utensils, a few wooden creepies or stools and meal-arks, formed the furniture of this Scottish hotel of the fifteenth century.
The adjacent Moat of Urr was alleged to be full of fairies who danced in the moonlight round its strange concentric circles; and they were further said to be great bibbers of the good wine kept for the use of the before-mentioned abbots and priors; thus "mine host" of the papal tiara and keys had always a fair red cross painted on the ends of his runlets when they were landed at the Dub o' Hass; but the green imps nevertheless found a key to his cellars, and used gimlets of mortal mould to draw off the Canary and Alicant.
The gudewife of the house had just increased the number of King James's subjects and Earl Douglas's vassals by a male child, when Gray arrived; and near him, in the ingle, the nurse was administering to it theash-sap, with due solemnity, by putting an ash-stick in the fire of peats and bog-pine that blazed on the hearth, and receiving in a horn spoon the juice which oozed from the other end. This was thefirstfood of the newly-born children of the Gael, and when older they received their first flesh on the point of their father's sword or dagger.
With half his armour off, listless and weary, Sir Patrick Gray sat by the rustic fire on the ingle-seat, and some time elapsed before he became aware that the eyes of a stranger, who reclined on an oak settee in a shaded corner, were fixed with calm but firm scrutiny upon him.
This personage wore a scarlet cloth hood, which was buttoned from his chin to his breast, having a cape that covered his back and shoulders. His massive frame, which was of herculean proportions, was cased in a doublet of black bull's hide, having the hair smoothly dressed, and it was tied with a succession of thongs and little iron skewers. A kilt of coarse tartan, with hose of untanned deerskin, revealed his sturdy knees, which seemed strong as oak knots, and hairy as those of a gorilla. Secured by a square steel buckle, a broad buff belt encircled his waist, at which hung a double-handed sword and poniard of mercy. His great brawny hands were crossed upon the shaft of a ponderous iron mace, having a chain and "morning star," and as he rested his chin thereon, his vast black beard hung over them, while he surveyed the Captain of the Guard with his wild, keen, and fierce dark eyes, the natural expression of which, under their black and shaggy brows, seemed a scowl.
Everything about this man seemed expressive of colossal proportions and brutal strength. As if danger might not be distant, with an air that in another would have seemed bravado, but in him was quite natural, he drew his mighty sword, examined the point, tested the spring of the blade, and smiled with a grim satisfied air, as he sheathed it again.
In most of the incidents of our story we have been compelled to follow and to portray the course of events with the care of an historian rather than of a romancer; and thus must we detail, or rathertranslate, the conversation which ensued between Sir Patrick Gray and this burly Celtic giant, as it was maintained in a strange mixture of old Doric Scottish and the Celtic language then spoken by the inhabitants of Galloway.
"What may the last news be among you here?" asked Sir Patrick.
"What could they be but of sorrow?" growled the other.
"I doubt it not where Earl James abides."
"You are a bold man to say so," replied the Galwegian.
"I am in the king's service, my friend, and a good cause gives courage; but, beside the storming of Raeberry, and the lawless capture of Sir Thomas MacLellan, what is there new in Galloway?"
"The foul slaughter of the laird of Sandwick, whom the Douglas troopers fell upon in Kirkandrews, and killed when at his prayers,—and this was yesternight."
"Another act of sacrilege?"
"Air mhuire! so my lord the abbot of Tongland terms it; but they were dainty gentlemen who followed the laird of Glendoning," said the other, with bitter irony; "they cared not to stain the floor or altar of God's consecrated church with blood; so they dragged old Sandwick forth, though he clung to the iron altar-rail, and drew him to the louping-on-stane at the grave-yard gate, and there hacked him to pieces."
"It was like these men of Thrave," said Sir Patrick; "but a day of vengeance for these continued atrocities must come, and speedily too."
As he said this the host, who was making a posset of Alicant on the hearth, looked up with terror; but the strong man with the mace laughed bitterly, and added, as he struck the floor with his mace,
"Dioul! the sooner the better for me."
"And who are you?" asked Sir Patrick.
"Would you be a wiser man for knowing?" was the cautious and not over-courteous response; "yet I care not if I tell: I am Malise MacKim,—"
"What—Malise, the hereditary smith of Thrave—MacKim the Brawny?" exclaimed Gray, with something of alarm in his tone.
"Yes," said the other through his clenched teeth.
Gray, by a twitch of his belt, brought his dagger conveniently to his hand; MacKim saw the movement, and smiled disdainfully.
"Has the earl wronged you?" asked Sir Patrick.
"To the heart's core," was the emphatic reply. "Oh, mhuire as truidh! mhuire as truidh! that I should ever have it to say—I, whose fathers have eaten the bread of his race for generations—ay, since thefirsthandful of earth was laid there to form the Moat of Urr—yea, yea, since first the Urr waters ran, and leaves grew in the wood of Dalbeattie!"
"What has happened?"
"His people have this day slain my brother Donacha MacKim, near the Bush aboon Tracquair, and have carried off his daughter, who was the love of my youngest son; but I have seven—SEVENsons, each taller and stronger than myself, and I will have sure vengeance on Douglas, if he grants it not to me; and this I have sworn by the cross of St. Cuthbert, and by the soul of her I love best on earth, my wife Meg."
The black eyes of the gigantic smith glared with genuine Celtic fury and hate as he said this; he beat the floor with his roughly-shod feet, and his strong fingers played nervously with the shaft of his mace, the chain and morning-star of which (a ball a pound in weight, furnished with four sharp iron spikes) lay on the floor. Gray, as he surveyed him, reflected that it was extremely fortunate that the smith's fealty to Douglas had been broken, otherwise he might have proved a very unpleasant companion for the night in that small and solitary hostelry, situated, as it was, in a hostile and lawless district. This meeting, however, taught Gray to be wary, and thus, though knowing the country well, he affected to be a stranger.
"Is the abbot of Tongland at Thrave?" he asked.
"No; the earl, in sport, poured a ladleful of gold down the throat of the Raeberry warder; so his father confessor pronounced a malediction upon him, and retired to the abbey at Tongland, in disgust and despair at his cruelty."
"How far is it from hence to the clachan?"
"About ten miles."
"And to the abbey?"
"It is beside the clachan."——"Good."
During that night Gray slept with his door and window well secured, with his sword drawn under his head, and his armour on a chair by his bedside, to be ready for any emergency. The lassitude incident to his long journey on horseback by such rough roads—for then they went straight over hill and down valley, through forest, swamp, and river—made him sleep long and late on his bed of freshly-pulled heather; thus the noon of the next was far advanced before he set out once more.
Malise MacKim, his sullen acquaintance of the preceding evening, conducted him for some distance beyond the Urr, and told him, what Gray already knew well, that if he wished to reach the clachan of Tongland, he must pass the Loch of Carlinwark on his right, and pursue the road that lay through the wood on the left bank of the Dee.
"And whither go you, my friend?" he asked, as the gigantic smith was about to leave him.
"To join my seven sons, and scheme our vengeance; yet what can mortal vengeance avail against the earl of Douglas?"——"How?" said Gray; "in what manner?"
"Know you not that he wears a warlock jacket, against which the sharpest swords are pointless?"
"What do you mean?" asked the soldier, keeping his horse in check.
"I mean a doublet made for him by a warlock in Glenkens, woven of the skins of water-snakes caught in a south-running burn where three lairds' lands met, and woven for him under the beams of a March moon, on the haunted Moat of Urr."
Gray laughed and said, "I should like to test this dagger, my poor MacLellan's gift, upon that same doublet."
"Moreover," said the smith, lowering his voice, while a deeper scowl impressed his grisly visage, "it is said in Galloway here, that when Earl James, a child, was held by his godmother at the font in Tongland Abbey Kirk, the blessed water, as it fell from the hand of Abbot John, hissed upon his little face as upon iron in a white heat."
"Peace, carle! can a stout fellow like thee be moonling enough to give such stories credence?"
"'Tis folly, perhaps, to think of them, betouch us, too! so near the Moat of Urr," said the smith, with a perceptible shudder, as he glanced covertly over his shoulder.
"And why here more than elsewhere?"
"Know ye not?" asked the smith, in a whisper.
"You forget that I am a stranger."
"True. Then it was onthisspot that James Achanna, the earl's sooth fast-friend and henchman, sold himself to Satan, after conjuring him up by performing some nameless rites of hell."
"Adieu, and God be wi' you," said Gray, laughing, yet nevertheless making the sign of the cross, for the place was savage and solitary, and he was not without a due share of the superstition incident to his age and country. Turning his horse, he rode rapidly off.
As he did so, a cunning smile passed over the swarthy face of Malise MacKim, who swung his mace round his head as if he were about to brain an enemy.
The day was far advanced, when, at Kelton, Gray crossed the Dee by a flat-bottomed boat, near a place where a group of peasants were assembled under a gallows-tree. Thereon hung a man, and there, by paying a fee to the doomster of Thrave, persons afflicted by wens, or similar excrescences, came to obtain the benefit of thedeid-strake—a touch of the dead hand being deemed a certain cure.
When Gray saw the poor corse swinging in the wind, he remembered the fate of Sir Herbert Maxwell, and reflected how easily Douglas might release Murielle from her marriage-ties by putting him to death, as he had done that powerful baron; yet his heart never trembled, nor did he swerve from his resolution of attempting to save MacLellan, in spite of every danger.
And a good evening to my friend Don Carlos.Some lucky star has led my steps this way:I was in search of you.—The Spanish Student.
Before Gray crossed the Dee at Kelton, there came over the scenery a dense white mist, which rolled like smoke along the hills, and hung in dewdrops on his horse's mane and bridle, dimming the brightness of his armour and the embroidery of his surcoat. In this obscurity he lost his way amid the waste muirlands which the road, a mere bridle-path destitute of wall or fence, traversed. Then a sharp shower of hail fell, the stones rattling on his steel trappings as on a latticed window; and through the openings in the haze, the far-stretching dells and pastoral hills of Galloway seemed wet and grey and dreary.
The country was singularly desolate; he met no person to direct him; thus, amid the obscurity of the mist and the approaching evening, he knew not where he was, but continued to ride slowly and vaguely on.
Anon a breeze came, and the grey clouds began to disperse; the hail ceased, and the haze rolled away like finely-carded wool along the sides of the hills. The setting sun of August beamed forth in his farewell splendour, the mavis and merle chorused merrily in the sauch and hawthorn trees; for a time the hill-tops became green, and the high corn that waved on the upland slopes seemed to brighten with the partial heat and moisture. After a time, Sir Patrick found that he had penetrated to the border of Glenkens, then the wildest and most savage part of Galloway. Wheeling round his horse, he rode fast in the direction from whence he had come, and just as the sun's broad disc began to dip behind the grassy hills, and to shed its warm light upon the windings of the Dee, from an eminence he could see afar off the vast square keep of Thrave looming black and sombre, with the dusky smoke ascending from its great chimney-stalks into the calm sky in steady columns, unbroken by the breeze.
Soft was the evening light, and softer now the air, and no sound but the occasional lowing of the black cattle, or those nameless country noises which seem to come from afar, broke the stillness of the vast pastoral landscape.
The Dee has all the characteristics of a Scottish stream: now gliding stealthily and sullenly through deep pools and dark rocky chasms, where the wiry pine, the crisp-leaved oak, and the feathery silver birch cast their shadows on the darting trout or the lurking salmon; now chafing and brawling in white foam over a precipitous ledge of red sandstone, then gurgling down a bed of "unnumbered pebbles;" and now sweeping broad and stilly past a thatched clachan, a baron's moated tower, a ruined chapel, where bells were rung and masses said when Alan was lord of Galloway and constable of Scotland; then round some statelier fane like Tongland, or a vast feudal strength like Thrave of the Douglases.
After seeing the latter, Gray rode slowly and thoughtfully, for it brought the face, the form, the voice, the smile, and all the image of Murielle more vividly before him. The scenery, the place, the very air, seemed full of the presence of her, his loved and lost one.
And now the moon arose, but not brilliantly; it shot fitful gleams between weird masses of flying cloud, with a pale and ghastly effect which made the gnarled trunks of the old trees seem like spectres or fantastic figures. Erelong, Gray entered a long and narrow glen, clothed on each side by a thick fir forest, where the density of the wiry foliage was such that the darkness became quite opaque.
Here he suddenly found himself joined by a horseman, who came either from the wayside thicket or out of the ground—it might have been either, so unexpected was his appearance. A gleam of the moon, as it came down a ravine, showed that this man and his horse were of great strength and stature. He wore a hunting suit, with a sword, bugle, and small steel cap which glittered in the moonlight.
"Under favour, I presume, we may travel together?" said he, bluntly.
"Provided the road be broad enough," replied Gray in the same manner, for there was something in this man's voice which strangely affected him, causing his hair to bristle up, his pulses to quicken, and the almost obliterated wounds on his face to smart.
Whence was this emotion? Where had he heard that voice before? Where seen that grim and sturdy figure? Each looked from time to time at the other, and seemed anxious to make outwhoor what he was.
"Go you far this way?" asked the stranger.
"No," replied Gray, curtly.
"May I ask how far?"——"I am bound for Thrave."
"Indeed," said the other, looking fixedly at Gray, as they walked their horses side by side; "have you made a long journey?"——"From Edinburgh," replied Gray, briefly.
"You are a bold man to pass through the Johnstones of Annandale and the Borderland at this time."
"How bolder at this time than at any other?"
"That you may soon learn," replied the stranger, laughing at Gray's tone of displeasure.
"I am Sir Patrick Gray of Foulis, captain of the king's guard, and am bound to ride wherever he may order, and woe to those who dare obstruct me," said Gray, peering forward to discern the speaker, who started visibly at this reply, and after the silence of a moment said, "I too am bound for Thrave. For two days past I have been abroad hunting, but have missed or outridden my friends. Well, what may the news be from the good town of Edinburgh? and how fare the king, his carpet knights, and cock-sparrow courtiers, eh?"
"Were I not riding on the king's errand, which makes my life more precious than if I were riding on my own, I would find you a more fitting reply than words," said Gray, who could scarcely repress his rising wrath, for the tone of the other chafed him.
"You have chosen a perilous time, assuredly, to enter Galloway on the king's service," observed the stranger, loftily; "and if my words displease, I can give full reparation when your errand is sped."
"'Tis enough, sir," said Gray, hoarsely; "on the morrow Ishallhave sure vengeance. No man shall slight the king in my presence, and live."
"By my sooth, his last messenger—the Rothsay herald, who came hither anent the laird of Teregles—left Galloway faster than he entered it. We are about to teach this James Stuart, that the realm of Scotland was not made forhisespecial use. What? after fighting for centuries, and defeating Romans, Saxons, Danes, and Normans—in short, all the invaders of England—we are now to tremble before this boy-king and his little Gueldrian wife? Has he forgotten how his father died?"
"How—what mean you?" asked Gray, making a vigorous effort to control his passion.
"In the Black Friary at Perth," said the other, grinding his teeth, "with the swords of Grahame and Athole clashing in his heart."
"Be assured our king hasnotforgotten it—but hush—be wary."
"And wherefore hush?" was the fierce response.
"Because they who did that deed, the most foul murder of God's anointed king, perished miserably on the scaffold more than twenty years ago. Their ashes have long since mingled with the earth, for fire consumed and the wind of heaven scattered them; but their names exist in the execration of all good men and true."
"Hard words," said the other, scoffingly; "hard words, sir, for us, who are on the eve, perhaps, of a most just rebellion against his son, if he and his Flemish princess, with that old fox, Crichton, push us too severely; and then I think his dainty Falkland knights, and well-fed Lothian infantry, may find it perilous work to march through Nithsdale and penetrate among the wild hills of Galloway."
Gray did not answer; they had now emerged from the wood, and the Loch of Carlinwark was shining like a mirror in the full splendour of the moonlight. At some distance he could discern the three old thorn-trees, where, on a similarly calm and lovely moonlit night, he had first plighted love, life, and hope, to Murielle; and now, as then, he could see Thrave, her home and her prison, casting its long black shadows on the Dee.
"Here is Thrave," said the stranger, reining up his powerful horse beside the barbican-gate.
"And you, sir?——"
"I am James, earl of Douglas," replied the other, sternly and loftily; "you are on the king's errand, Sir Patrick Gray—'tis well; I bid you welcome; but remember, save for that tabard which you wear, by the bones of St. Bryde, I would hang you by the neck from that stone knob above the gate!"
Gray bowed and smiled bitterly, as they rode into the court-yard, and he found himself inclosed by the gates and surrounded by the followers of his mortal enemy.
He had shuddered on passing under the barbican-gate, for a man was hanging at the gallows-knob above it. Gray knew the dread custom there—that each culprit or victim was replaced by another, and he knew notwhothe next "tassel" might be.
The night-wind lifted the dead man's hair at times as the body swung mournfully to and fro. Beneath this ghastly object, in the blaze of the torches which were upheld by a crowd of liveried serving-men and savage-looking kilted Galwegians, there shone a great shield of carved and painted stone. It bore the arms of the ancient lords of Galloway—azure a lion rampant,argentcrowned with an imperial diadem, impaled with the countless quarterings of the Douglases.
The moon was waning now; but the number of torches, as they flared on the walls and grated windows of the vast keep, made the court-yard seem light as if the night was noon.
As Gray dismounted, a familiar voice reached his ear, saying, "Thanks, brave friend and kinsman—you have perilled much to save me!"
"Thou art right, MacLellan—I come by the king's orders, so take courage!" replied Gray, looking about him; but fromwhichof the black gratings of that lofty edifice the voice came his eye failed to discover.
A cruel smile passed over the grim face of the earl, as he said, "Sir Patrick Gray, it is ill speaking between a full man and a fasting; so get you to bed for to-night; after breakfast to-morrow, we will consider your errand from the king; and you have my knightly word for your safety while within the walls of Thrave."
"And how, when I leave them, my lord?"
"That is as may be," said the other, turning on his heel.
With these dubious, or rather ominous words, the earl retired, and within an hour, Gray, after partaking of some refreshment alone, found himself lying on a couch with his armour on and his drawn sword by his side, endeavouring to court sleep, with his mind full of the terrible novelty of his situation; and not without a sense of charm, for he knew that Murielle was near him, and that the same roof covered them both.
On a tabourette by the bedside were placed a night-lamp, a cup of sack posset, and the earl of Douglas's dagger as a symbol of peace and protection—that he had armed his unwelcome guest against even hisownhousehold; for such was the custom of the age and country.
First rose a star out owre the hill,And next the lovelier moon;While the bonnie bride o' GallowayLooked for her blythe bridegroom;Lythlie she sang as the new moon rose,Blythe as a young bride may,When the new moon lights her lamp o' love,And blinks the bride away.—Cromek.
Sir Patrick Gray sprang from a couch, where dreams, rather than sleep, had pressed thick and fast upon him. He rose while yet the summer sun was below the green Galloway hills, and while the dark waters of the Dee were veiled by the white mists of the early morning.
His mind was full of Murielle, and he was not without hope, that while all the numerous household and powerful feudal garrison were yet abed, he might find some means to communicate with her—to see, to speak to one so beloved—one from whom he had been so long, so wickedly separated—his seven years' wedded wife!
It seemed to Gray, while thinking of this, that some one had been softly and timidly tapping at his door.
Gently drawing back the numerous bars of wood and iron, with which the doors of all bed-chambers in old Scottish mansions were furnished in those days and for long after, he stepped into an arched corridor; then, on looking along its dusky vista, he saw a female figure approach, and what were his emotions on beholding the sudden realization of his dearest wish—Murielle, who had left the room thus early on the same errand and with the same desperate yet tenderly loving hope, had been watching the door ofhischamber.
She seemed pale and wan, as one who had been sleepless; but though more womanly and more full in figure, she was otherwise unchanged as when he had seen her last, on that happy and yet unfortunate night, in the church of St. Genevieve, in Flanders.
"At last, my Murielle!"
"Atlastwe meet—but oh! for a moment only."
They clasped each other in a tender embrace—heart to heart, and lip to lip. His face was bent on hers, and her tears of joy and fear fell fast.
"You love me still, Murielle?"
"Still!" she reiterated reproachfully—"oh, with all my life and strength."
"But to what a hopeless love and aimless life have my passion and its selfish ties consigned you!" said he; "we are the slaves of others and of destiny."
"Such have we ever been, since that fatal day on which my cousins, William and David, were slain. That was in 1440,tenlong, long years ago; but—"
"A crisis in our fate is coming now, dear Murielle."
"But say why—oh, why are you here—here in Thrave, here, where your life is in peril so deadly?"
"I am come, in our good king's name, to demand MacLellan's release, and to invite the earl, under cartel, to meet the council at Stirling, that all these evils may be peacefully ended."
"I pray to the kind Father of all, and to his Blessed Mother, who is in heaven, that it may be so," sighed poor Murielle. "But oh, I am so weary, weary—so sad and weary here! They keep me quite a prisoner, though not so cruelly as they keep Sir Thomas MacLellan; for I am told by Marion Douglas that he is confined in the pit."
"Mahoun! say you so, dearest—in that horrid vault?"
"Yes; but hush—we may be overheard."
"Ah! my brave and noble kinsman—such a doom! Was it not in that dungeon that Earl Archibald, the first duke of Touraine, kept MacLellan, the laird of Borgue, chained, like a wild beast, till he became a jabbering idiot, and when found by the prior of St. Mary's Isle, he was laughing as he strove to catch the single sunbeam that fell through the grated slit into his prison—yea, striving fatuously to catch it with his thin, wan, fettered hand—the same hand that carried the king's banner at the battle of Homildon!"
"Do not frown thus, my dearest heart," said Murielle, weeping; "I have little need to add to the hatred that grows apace in every breast against the name of Douglas."
"Do not say ineverybreast, sweet Murielle—sweet wife," he added, pressing her close and closer still in his embrace; "for my heart is wrung with anguish and with love for you, and of this love God alone knoweth the depth and the strength!"
Murielle continued to weep in silence.
"My love for you," resumed Gray, "and my duty to the king, whom my father, old Sir Andrew Gray, taught me to love, respect, and almost worship, are impulses that rend my heart between them. At the risk of my life I have ridden here on the king's service, alone, with no protection but my sword, my hand, and, it may be, this royal tabard—a badge but little respected on this side of the Nith or Annan."
"And you came——"
"To see you, and to save MacLellan from the fate of Sir Herbert Herries. God wot, though, I would give the last drop of my blood to serve my kinsman. A king's herald might have borne the mandate as well as I; but the hope of seeing you—of hearing your dear voice, of concerting some plan for your escape and future freedom from a tyranny that is maddening,—chiefly, if not alone, brought me into the wilds of Galloway—the very land and stronghold of the enemies of the throne."
"Say not the enemies," said Murielle mournfully. "I hope that men misjudge us sorely."
"I hope they do; yet there are strange whispers abroad of a rebel league with the earls of Ross and Crawford, with Henry of England, and the lord of the Isles—a league to dethrone the king and plunge the land in ruin. But let us speak at present of escape—of flight——"
"My disappearance would be your destruction; all Galloway, with hound and horn, would be upon your track."
"True—Douglas gave me his word for safety only whilewithinthe walls of Thrave," said Gray, bitterly.
"The most sunny summer-day may have its clouds, dear Patrick; but here, in this dull residence, with me it is ever cloud, and never sunshine—I mean the sunshine of the heart. My time is passed, as it were, in perpetual winter. I have no solace—no friend—no amusement, but my cithern and the songs you loved so well——"
"And lovestill, Murielle, for the sake of you!"
"So cheerlessly I live on without hope or aim, a wedded nun, amid councils of fierce and stern men, whose meetings, debates, and thoughts are all for opposition, and revenge for the terrible deed of 1440."
"In other words, Murielle, men who are ripe for treason and rebellion."
"Whywillyou speak or think so harshly of us?" she asked so imploringly that Gray kissed her tenderly as his only or best reply.
"And that spiteful beauty your sister—what says she of me now?"——"That you are the king's liege man," was the cautious answer.
"She is right, my beloved one—I am his till death——"
"And our enemy!" said a sharp voice close by them, like the hiss of a snake.
They turned and saw Margaret, the countess of Douglas, standing at the entrance of her bower-chamber, the tapestry covering the door of which she held back with one hand. She was clad entirely in black, with a long veil of fine lace depending from the apex of her lofty head-dress, enveloping her haughty head and handsome white shoulders. She was somewhat changed since Gray had seen her last, for angry passions were lining her young face prematurely; her marvellous beauty remained in all its striking power; but it was the beauty of a devil—diavolessa, an Italian would term it. Ten years of feud and anxious hostility to the crown and its adherents had imparted a sternness to her fine brow, a keen boldness to her black eyes, and a sneering scorn to her lovely lip that made her seem a tragedy queen.
"And so another errand than the king's message, anent his minion's life or death, has brought you hither, scurvy patch!" said she scornfully; "but by St. Bryde I shall rid our house and my sister of such intrusive visitors!"
"Madame," Gray began, with anger.
"Varlet—would you dare to threaten me?" she exclaimed, holding up a clenched hand, which was white, small, and singularly beautiful; "but, my gay moth, you will flutter about that poor candle until your wings are burnt. I have but to say one word to Douglas of this clandestine meeting and he will hang you in your boots and tabard above our gate, where Herbert of Teregles and many a better man has hung."
"Oh, sister Margaret," urged Murielle, trembling like an aspen-leaf.
"Ha—to speak that word would remove the only barrier to your being duchess of Albany—and why should Inotspeak it?" she continued fiercely and with flashing eyes; "Why should I not speak it?"
"Because, dear Maggie, you have still some gentle mercy left, and Heaven forbids you," said Murielle, clinging to her pitiless sister.
"Begone, madam," said the latter imperiously; "your instant obedience alone purchases my silence. But here comes Sir Alan Lauder."
So ended abruptly, as at the abbot's house in Edinburgh, this unexpected meeting. Terror for her lover-husband's life made Murielle withdraw instantly with her sister, just as Sir Alan Lauder of the Bass, who was still captain and governor of Thrave, approached with an undisguised sneer on his lips to say that the earl would receive Sir Patrick Gray at brekfaast, in his own chamber, and there give his answer to the king's message.
And darest thou, then,To beard the lion in his den,The Douglas in his hall?—Scott.
Clad in a robe of fine scarlet cloth, which was lined with white fur, and fastened by a brooch or jewel at the neck, and which was open just enough to show an undershirt and long hose of buff-coloured silk, the earl of Douglas was seated in a high-backed easy-chair, which was covered with crimson taffety. His feet were placed on a tabourette, and close by, with his long sharp nose resting on his outstretched paws, crouched Souyllard, the snow-white bloodhound, uttering deep growls from time to time.
Breakfast, which consisted of cold beef, partridge-pie, flour cakes, wheaten bread, honey, ale, and wine, was spread upon the table, which, like the rest of the carved oak furniture, and like the castle itself, seemed strong enough to last twenty generations of Douglases. The equipage was entirely composed of the beautiful pottery of Avignon, which was all of a dark-brown metallic tint, like tortoise-shell, but perforated and in relief.
At the earl's hand, in the old Scottish fashion, stood a flat-shaped pilgrim-bottle of usquebaugh. It was from Beauvais, and bore a Scots lion, with the threefleurs-de-lys, and the name ofCharle Roy VII., for it was a personal gift from the then reigning monarch of France to Douglas, when last at his hunting-castle in the wood of Vincennes.
A painted casement, one half of which stood open, admitted the warm rays of the summer sun through the deep embrasure of the enormously thick castle-wall, and afforded a glimpse without of the far-stretching landscape and the windings of the Dee, and, nearer still, the green islet it formed around Thrave, on the grassy sward of which some noisy urchins and pages belonging to the feudal garrison were gambolling, playing at leapfrog, and launching stones and mimic spears at an old battered quintain, or carved figure of an armed man, which stood there for the use of those who practised tilting.
As Gray entered in his armour, with his surcoat on and his helmet open, readier for departure than a repast, the earl, without rising or offering his hand, bowed with cold courtesy, with a sardonic smile on his white lip and hatred in his deep-set eyes. He made a signal to a page who was in attendance to withdraw, and they were immediately left together. "I said last night that it was ill speaking between a full man and a fasting," said he; "we are both fasting this morning, so, Sir Patrick, let us eat, drink, and then to business."
As they were both anxious to come to the point at issue, after a few morsels of food and a draught of spiced ale, the grim earl spoke again:—
"I have read the king's letters—that anent the laird of Bombie, and that which invites me to a conference at Stirling, with a safe conduct to me and all my followers. By my faith, Sir Patrick, I think their number, in horse, foot, and archers, will be their best safe conduct. The first letter demands——"
"The release, the instant release of my kinsman, Sir Thomas MacLellan, of Bombie, and of that ilk, steward of Kirkcudbright, whom you unlawfully and most unworthily detain here a prisoner," said Gray, whom the cool and insolent bearing of Douglas exasperated beyond the point of prudence. "What if I refuse," asked the latter with an icy smile.
"That the king and council will consider."
"What if he be dead?"
"He isnotdead," exclaimed Gray with growing excitement; "last night I heard his voice, for he addressed me as we entered the barbican."
"Ha!" said Douglas sharply, with a furious glance.
"But dead or alive, lord earl, in the king's name I demand his body!"
"That shall I grant you readily," replied Douglas grimly, as he blew on a silver whistle which lay on the table. The arras of the doorway was raised, and there reappeared the page, to whom the earl gave a ring, which he drew from his finger, and said, "Tell James Achanna to lead forth the laird of Bombie from the vault, and to obey my orders."
The page bowed and retired; and he observed, if Gray did not, the terribly sinister expression which at that moment filled the earl's eyes.
"You saidlead forth, my lord; hence my kinsman lives, and I thank you," said Gray with more composure.
"Some men die between the night and morning, others between the morning and the night;—but now about this conference at Stirling: what boon does the king hold out as an inducement for a Douglas to risk so much as an acceptance of royal hospitality?"
"Boon, my lord?"
"By St. Bryde, I spoke plainly enough!"
"'Twas said the restoration to you of the office of Warden of the Marches towards England, the seat at the Privy Council, and the commission of Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom."
"In short, all of which I was unjustly deprived, by Crichton's influence, during my absence in France and Italy," said the earl, removing the breast from a partridge.
Gray did not reply, for at that moment the castle bell was tolled slowly, and a strange foreboding seized him. "With the recollection of the Black Dinner of 1440 before me, by the Devil's mass! I would require some great boon to tempt me, assuredly," said the earl, with a laugh which had something diabolical in its sound.
"My lord, there will be the king's safe conduct."
"King's memories are precarious. Since the day of the bloody banquet at which my kinsman perished, I have been, as it were, a man of granite in a shirt of steel—immoveable, implacable—and feeling no sentiment but the longing for revenge!"
The earl, with a sparkling eye and a flushing cheek, spoke as feelingly as if he hadnothad a secret hand in the execution of his nephews, nor won anything by it.
"King James," he added, "has yet to learn what a ten years' hatred is!"
"Ten years?" reiterated Gray, as he thought of Murielle.
"Ten years—we are in the year 1450, and for the ten which have preceded it, my armour has scarcely ever been off," said the earl; "and even in my own hall the sword and dagger have never been from my side."
"For the same reason, my lord, you have kept other men's armour on, and others' weapons on the grindstone," replied Gray; "but endeavour to be as good and loyal as your fathers were, earl of Douglas—renounce your evil leagues, and bonds for rebellion, else you may find the king alike more wise and powerful than you imagine."
"I seek not advice from you, laird of Foulis," said Douglas, with proud disdain. "Within sound of the bells of Holyrood, or those of St. Giles, your king may be both powerful and wise; but on this side the Moat of Urr, I have my doubts of his power or wisdom."
"How, my lord?"
"He would scarcely be wise to venture into the wilds of Galloway, even with all the forces he and that fangless wolf, his chancellor, may collect; and never powerful enough to do so, with the hope of success."——"Daring words, when said of one who is king of all Scotland."
"But I am lord of all Galloway, and I shall uphold its ancient rights and laws in battle, as stoutly as Earl Archibald did in Parliament."
"An old story, my lord," said Gray, rising.
"True; in the days of Robert II.," added Douglas, rising also.
"In 1385," observed Gray, with a scarcely perceptible smile.
"I forget."——"Though you forget many things, my lord," said Gray, rashly and impetuously, "do not imagine that you or they are forgotten."
"Does this imply a threat, my cock-laird of the north country?" asked Douglas, with profound disdain.
"As you please—I am a plain soldier."
A ferocious expression darkened the earl's face; but Gray drew back a pace, and laid a hand significantly on his tabard.
"Sir Patrick Gray, I advise you to get your horse and begone!" thundered Douglas, starting to his feet. "Without there! Order Sir Patrick's horse to the barbican-gate!"
"But your answer to the king?" said Gray, tightening his waistbelt, and preparing for a sudden start.
"That I shall convey in person to Stirling."
"And my kinsman——"
"Dead or alive?" said Douglas, with a sullen glare in his eye. Alarmed by the expression of the earl's face, Gray said earnestly:—
"Lest you might not obey the king's commands, proud lord, or might scoff at my humble request, I bring you a mother's prayer for her son."
"A mother's?" said Douglas, pausing as they descended the staircase together.
"The prayer of my father's sister, Marion Gray, for her son's release."——"It comes too late," muttered the earl under his black moustache, as they issued into the sunny court-yard of Thrave.
Lift not the shroud! a speaking stainOf blood upon its sable seen,Tells how the spirit fled from plain,For there the headsman's axe hath been.Ballad.
"The king's demand shall be granted, but rather foryoursake—come hither," said the earl.
There was a cruel banter in his manner, a bitter smile on his face, and Gray grew pale, and felt the blood rush back upon his heart with a terrible foreboding as they crossed the court-yard.
Then his eye at once detected something like a human form stretched at full length upon the ground, and covered by a sheet. About it there could be no doubt—it was so cold, white, angular, and fearfully rigid. Upon the breast was placed a platter filled with salt—a Scottish superstition as old as the days of Turpin—and close by lay an axe and bloodstained billet, about which the brown sparrows were hopping and twittering in the warm morning sunshine. With a choking sensation in his throat, Gray stepped resolutely forward.
"Remove this cloth," said the earl to some of his people who were near; and on their doing so, there was seen the body of a headless man—a body which Gray knew too well to be that of his friend and kinsman, for on the breast of the soiled and faded pourpoint was embroidered a gold scutcheon, with the three black chevrons of MacLellan.
"Sir Patrick, you have come a little too late," said the sneering earl; "here lies your father's sister's son; but, unfortunately, he wants the head, and a head is an awkward loss. The body, however, is completely at your service."
Grief and indignation almost choked Gray's utterance. He knelt down and kissed the cold right hand, which yet bore the mark of an iron fetter, and then turning to the earl, said, "My lord, you may now dispose of the body as you please; but the head——"
"Behold it on the battlement above you!"[4]
Gray mounted his horse, which was at that moment led to the outer gate by the earl's grooms; and mistrusting them, though feeling as one in a terrible dream, before putting his foot in the stirrup he carefully examined his bridle, girths, and crupper. Then, says Sir Walter Scott in his history, "his resentment broke forth in spite of the dangerous situation in which he was placed":—
"My lord," said he, shaking his gauntleted hand close to the earl's beard, "if I live you shall bitterly pay for this day's work; and I—Patrick Gray of Foulis—tell thee, that thou art a bloodthirsty coward—a disgrace to knighthood and nobility!"
He then wheeled round his horse, pressed the sharp Rippon spurs into its flanks, and galloped off.
"To horse and chase him!" cried the earl, furiously. "I will ride to Stirling, false minion, withyourhead at my saddle-bow! To horse and follow him—this venturesome knight must sleep beside his kinsman!"
"But he came on the king's service," urged Sir Alan Lauder, as he put his foot in the stirrup of his horse, when some twenty or thirty mounted moss-troopers came hurriedly from the stable court.
"Bah! love-lured and destiny dragged him hither. Let slip Souyllard the sleuth-bratch. Horse and spear, I say, Lauder and Achanna—a hundred crowns for the head of yonder minion! I swear by St. Bryde of Douglas and Kildara, by the Blessed Virgin and her son, never to eat at a table, sleep in a bed, to rest under a Christian roof, or to lay aside sword and armour, till I have passed my dagger through the heart of Patrick Gray, dead or alive!"——"If you break this terrible vow," said Sir Alan, aghast at the earl's fury, and the form it took in words.
"Then I pray Heaven, at the judgment day, to show such mercy to me as I shall show my enemies," was the fierce response.
It was fortunate for the earl that he soon found a friar to release him from a vow, the fulfilment of which must have entailed a vast deal of trouble, fuss, and discomfort upon him and his followers.
"A hundred crowns and St. Bryde for Douglas!" was the shout of the moss-troopers, as they dashed through the outer gate, and with their light active horses, their steel caps, jacks, and spears, they clattered over the drawbridge; but Gray, after escaping six or eight crossbow bolts, was already three miles before them, and spurring in hot haste along the road towards Dumfries.
It was a fortunate circumstance for him that he was well mounted on a fleet, strong, and active horse; for he was a muscular man, and heavily mailed, while his pursuers, being Border Prickers, wore but little armour, and their wiry nags were used to scamper on forays in all weathers and seasons by day and night, over moor, and moss, and mountain sides.
Gray knew well that if taken his death was certain; for Douglas, reckless, ruthless, and bloodthirsty, by nature, was certain now to give full scope to his long-treasured hatred.
He no longer heard the whooping of his pursuers; he had either distanced them, or they were husbanding their energies for a long chase; but there came after him at times, upon the hollow wind, the grunting bark of the sleuth-bratch, by which he was surely and savagely tracked, Souyllard, the earl's favourite white bloodhound, and the heart of the fugitive swelled anew, with grief and rage, and hatred of his unrelenting tormentor.
He was far from shelter or succour, for until he reached the Lothians, all the land belonged to his enemies, or to those who dared not protect him. For miles and miles before him stretched flattened hills and open plains covered with waving heather, the purple tints of which were glowing in the noonday sun, and these tints deepened into blue or black on the shaded sides of the glens. The whirr of the blackcock was heard at times, as it rose from the pale green or withered yellow leaves of the ferns that grew among the rushes, where the trouting burn brawled, or by the lonely ravine, the red-scaured bank, or stony gulley, which Gray made his foam-covered horse clear by a flying leap.
Louder and nearer came the savage bay of the sleuth-bratch, and Gray, as he looked back, could see it tracking him closely and surely; while about three miles distant the border spears of his pursuers glittered on the summit of a hill.
He had swam his horse through the Urr and spurred on for miles, and now before him lay Lochrutton, with its old peel-house, named, from its loneliness, the castle-of-the-hills; then, as he was about to cross a foaming tributary of the loch—a stream that tore, all red and muddy, through a stony ravine—the bounding sleuth-bratch came upon him, and sprang at his horse's flanks, just as the terrified animal rose into the air to cross by a flying leap.
Clenching his gauntleted hand, Gray struck the fierce brute on the head, and it fell into the rushing torrent; but gained the other side as soon as he, and sent its deep, hoarse bay into the air, as if to summon the pursuers. Now, the terrible sleuth-bratch was running parallel with his horse's flanks, and vainly he strove to strike at it with his sword. His temples throbbed as if with fever, and now, for air, for coolness, and relief, he drew off his barred helmet; then he tossed it into a bush, for the double purpose of staying the hound and concealing it as a trace of his flight. Spurring on—he redoubled his efforts to escape; he called to his horse—he cheered and caressed it, while the perspiration of toil oozed through the joints of his armour, from his gorget to his spurs.
The terrible white hound was preparing for a final, and, doubtless, a fatal spring, when a man, whose head and shoulders were enveloped in a scarlet hood, suddenly rose from the whin bushes amid which Gray was galloping, and, by a single blow from his ponderous mace, dashed out the brains of the dog, killing it on the spot.
Gray had just time to perceive that his preserver was Malise MacKim, the smith of Thrave, when he passed on like a whirlwind; and now he saw before him, in the distance, the lovely and far-stretching valley of the Nith, the long bridge, the red-walled town, the spires, and the old castle of Dumfries. He dashed through the portal of the bridge, and pushed on by the way for Edinburgh; but, owing to the rough and devious nature of the roads, night overtook him among the wilds of Tweedmuir. If he drew bridle for a moment, he still heard the tramp of hoofs in his rear, for now fresh horsemen had joined in the pursuit; and, but for the relays he had so wisely provided, and of which he only once availed himself, he had assuredly been taken and slain.
At Moffat, he obtained his own favourite horse from the priest of the village church.
"Will you not, for safety, have your charger's shoes reversed?" said the churchman, as Gray mounted.
"Like King Robert of old; but there is no snow to reveal the track."