Patsy by Samuel Rutherford Crockett (read aloud TXT) 📖

man were in difficulties, Kennedy McClure waited for the time when he would be ready to accept an offer for such and such a meadow or stretch of corn-land which he had long coveted. He would not cheat. He would pay the proper price in ringing guineas, but he must have the first chance. And then, overjoyed by the mere sight of the added acres, he would pace the newly acquired territory with a step to which a full figure lent importance, a certain pride of bearing which went well with the length of his purse, and the authority which could be felt in his least word.
Kennedy kept up a certain parade of humility, but his looks and walk belied him. A Royal Commission once approached him with a summons to give evidence as to a plague of voles which was desolating the fertile fields of the south-west, and his opinion was valuable because he had recently acquired by purchase the great, barren hill called Ben Marrick.
"What is your business?" said the chairman, a profound English agriculturist, with as profound an ignorance of the fine shades of Galloway speech.
"_I work on the land_," said Kennedy McClure with smileless deference.
"What, a farm labourer?" said the great man; "this is first-hand evidence indeed. Well, I suppose that you have studied the devastation caused by these animals on the--the--what is the name--ah, yes, Ben Marrick?"
"My lord," said the many-acred "farm labourer," "there is never a vole on the Ben o' Marrick. The vole is far ower good a judge of land to waste his time on the Marrick."
It needed the intervention of the local clerk of the commission to convince the chairman that he was talking to a man far richer than himself, besides being experienced and sage to the confines of rural wisdom.
It was to this kinsman that Eben McClure was thinking of making an appeal. He knew that along with the property, Kennedy had taken over the carriage and capitally matched horses of the late laird of Glen Marrick. Perhaps he would lend them to a kinsman in order to oblige a Royal Duke. He need not be too precise as to what the Royal Duke wanted them for if the pay were good and sure.
Accordingly Eben the Spy went to Supsorrow with an unquiet heart. He was not at all assured how he would be received. He guessed, however, that a promise made to the laird his cousin, that his herds and workmen, his plough-hands and cattlemen, should be respected by the superintendent of the "press," might do much to calm the first indignation which his proposal would infallibly arouse.
Then Kennedy of Supsorrow hated the Free Traders, because they drew away young men from his service and gave them false notions as to the amount of yearly wage with which they ought to be content.
When a man can make as much by a couple of successful "runs" as by a year's hard work at Supsorrow, he naturally began to reflect. And when the Laird approached him to know if he were "staying on" as term-time approached, the bargain became more difficult to strike. In many cases it was finally understood between contracting parties that the wages should continue the same, but that the occasional absence of a pair of horses from the stables was a matter to which the master should shut his eyes so long as he was satisfied in other ways.
Now Laird Supsorrow did not like this, but was compelled to like it or leave it. He had so added to his fields, multiplied his acres, extended the territories on which fed his flocks and herds, that service he must have, and that of the best. He must be able to trust his men--for, though he rode from dawn to dark, he could not overlook a tenth of his belongings.
Still, though compelled to submit, Kennedy McClure bore a secret grudge to the Traffic, all the more bitter that he did not venture to show it in any way.
Eben found him getting ready to ride forth to look at a new farm for the purchase of which he was negotiating.
The spy, in spite of his recent assumption of military port, made but a poor figure beside his wealthy kinsman. The Laird wore his light blue riding-coat with silver buttons, his long-flapped waistcoat, from which at every other minute he took the gold snuff-box that was his pride, white knee breeches, and rig-and-fur stockings of a tender grey-blue, finished by stout black shoes with silver buckles of the solidest. He clung to his old weather-beaten cocked hat, which, in the course of argument, he would often take from his head and tap upon the palm of his hand to emphasize his points.
"Kinsman," said Eben McClure, bowing humbly, without venturing to shake hands, "I have need of a word with you. I shall not in any way detain you, but it is a matter of His Majesty's Service, which I judge it will be for your good to know."
The Laird of Supsorrow regarded his cousin with no very friendly eye, and, pulling his gold snuff-box from his pocket, began to tap it in an irritated, impatient manner.
"Ye are not thinking of coming here to borrow money as ye did the time before?" he growled, "for if so, I tell you plainly that there is not the half of a copper doit for you here. Besides, I hear that you are doing very comfortably in the King's service, making yourself rich as well as universally beloved, and a credit to your name!"
Eben McClure took the flout as he would have taken a kick from that honoured double-soled shoe.
"Cousin Kennedy," he said, "I have no purpose but to do you service. As you are good enough to remark, I have nothing to complain of in the service of His Majesty, and it shall be my first duty and pleasure to repay to you the little advance you were good enough to make me--with interest."
Kennedy McClure looked his visitor over coolly.
"You have been robbing the stage?" he demanded.
The spy laughed, but it was a laugh from the teeth out-wards. As the French say, he laughed "yellow." Nevertheless, he drew a pocket-book from his breast, and suggested that if his kind cousin could spare the time, perhaps it would be as well for them to speak together in a more retired place.
"Come ben," said the Laird of Supsorrow, "there is no close time for the receiving of siller."
They passed through a vast kitchen where everything was in the pink of order. The tables were ranged in the middle. An array of pots brooded over the fire, so close that they jostled each other. To the right the eyes of the spy fell with respect upon the great oaken chair of the master. For in this also the Laird had kept up the patriarchal style. He still willingly, and with a certain gusto, took his seat in his own kitchen, where he smoked and talked at ease with the men and maids as they came or went. A little cupboard with a double door was fixed above the chair within reach of his hand. It contained his pipes and his library--a Bible, the poems of Burns, Boston's _Fourfold State_, _The Cloud of Witnesses_, a Grey's _Tables_, a book on mensuration, Fowler's _Horse Doctor_, and many almanacs tied in packets.
The master of all these strode through the kitchen, opened a door, passed down a long passage, and ushered his relative into a room full of stacked papers, driving whips, favourite bits and bridles. The grate was still full of burned papers. A tall five-branched silver candlestick stood in the middle of the table, and along the wall were ranged a few chairs of the rudest fashioning, but all polished with use.
He motioned to Eben of Stonykirk to take a seat in one of these and proceed with what he had to say.
"I can only give you a quarter of an hour," said the Laird. "I have an appointment with that wee wastrel of a man-of-law, McKinstrie, down at the Foulds. He is coming express-like from Cairnryan to meet me--and it's me that will have to pay for his time!"
Whereupon the spy opened out his case and the great man of horses and beeves listened intently. The Duke of Lyonesse wanted a carriage to drive into England, where his brother, the Duke of Cumberland, had an estate. The neighbouring great lords were all Jacobites at heart. Yes, even the Earl Raincy had point-blank refused his carriage--a service such as any gentleman might render to another, whatever might be his political opinions.
"And so you come to me to hire," said Kennedy, scornfully. "I do not keep post-chaises, man."
"No, cousin, no," said the spy earnestly, "your name need not appear at all. Only leave the door of your stable unlocked, or at least so barred that we can easily get through without doing damage, and we will answer for the rest. And I will pay you fifty pounds down on the spot."
"That is not anything near the value of the horses," said Laird Supsorrow, keeping his eyes fixed upon his cousin so that he might divine where the trap lay.
"No," said Eben, "it is not. But if one of your men rides after--that is, a few hours in the rear, the horses and carriage will be delivered to him at the boundary of the kingdom of Scotland just at the farther side of the Gretna bridge--"
"H-m-m," said Kennedy McClure, "if you deposit the money here, and obtain a written security from his Highness to indemnify me for any damage to the horses or vehicle, you are at liberty to do as you like with Ben Marrick's equipage. On my side I shall arrange with Saunders Grieve, my yardsman, that you shall not be disquieted in taking them."
"Would not a word from my Lord Wargrove suit you?"
"No," thundered the Laird, "let me have his Highness's fist and seal or I shall not let a hoof leave the yard! What is Lord Wargrove to me?"
"Very well, then, cousin. I will send you the document by a sure hand, and I leave the fifty pounds in your hands now, merely taking your receipt for the Duke's satisfaction."
The Spy well knew that there was not the least possibility of getting his Royal Highness to sign such a document, but as he himself was leaving the country for good at any rate, he did not mind adding a little forgery to his other necessary arrangements. Paper and seal were easily accessible in the parlour, where the Duke often kept Eben waiting for hours. He was an expert in other people's penmanship, and the princely scrawl would not present the least difficulty to him. Still, in case of accident, it would be as well to keep back the document till the last possible moment. For his cousin was not a man to be easily hoodwinked, and he might take it into his head to ride over, document in hand, to require the prince acknowledge his own signature.
As he rode away the spy said to himself, "Yes, forgery it is, of course. But sometimes it is worth while tossing a penny to see which it shall be--fortune, or the hangman's rope."


CHAPTER XI
THE TRAMPLING OF HORSE IN THE NIGHT
Whitefoot the brown-eyed, intent on his business, was taking his usual route to Ladykirk. It was a dark night, but he could see more and farther than any man. He knew that Patsy would be waiting for him in the kitchen of Miss Aline's house, that she would have something extremely toothsome for him to eat while she was preparing the collar which in a few minutes