Cleg Kelly, Arab of the City: His Progress and Adventures

"There doesna appear to be muckle steer aboot the place, for siccan an awfu' thing to hae happened so lately!" said Mistress Fraser.

"Na," said the arch-deceiver Alick, making a last effort, "we are tryin' to keep a' thing as quaite as possible."

"And faith, I dinna wonder. Gin the wives nooadays had ony spunk in them ava', ye wad be mobbed and ridden on the stang, my man!" Then her grievance against Mirren came again upon Mistress Fraser with renewed force, "O, the randy, the besom," she cried; "wait till I get her!"

By this time they were nearing the door of Sandyknowes.

"I dinna think I'll come ben wi' ye the noo. I'll gang ower by the barn instead. There's some things to look to there, I misdoubt," said Alick.

Just then they heard Mirren's voice raised in a merry laugh. It was really at the tale of Boy Hugh and Miss Briggs, which Vara was telling her.

But the sound brought a scared look to the face of Mistress Fraser.

"She's lauchin', I declare!" she cried; "that's an awesome bad sign. Guid kens hoo mony there may be by this time – "

And she fairly lifted her voluminous petticoats, and, with her bundles under her arm, ran helter-skelter for the door of Sandyknowes, more like a halfling lassie than a douce mother of eleven bairns.

Muckle Alick saw her fairly in at the kitchen door.

"I think I'll gang ower by to the barn," he said.

But he had not got more than half-way there when both leaves of the kitchen door sprang open, and out flew Mistress Fraser with the large wooden pot-stick or spurtle in her hand. Alick had admired her performance as she ran towards the house. But it was nothing to the speed with which she now bore down upon him.

"It was like the boat train coming doon by the Stroan, ten minutes ahint time, an' a director on board!" he said afterwards.

At the time Muckle Alick had too many things to think about, to say anything whatever. He ran towards the barn as fast as he could for the choking laughter which convulsed him. And behind him sped the avenger with the uplifted porridge spurtle, crying, "O ye muckle leein' deevil – ye blackguaird – ye cunnin' hound, let me catch ye – "

And by the cheek of the barn door catch him Mistress Fraser did. And then, immediately after, it was Muckle Alick who received the reward of iniquity. But Mirren stood in the doorway with little Gavin in her arms and Vara and Boy Hugh at either side, and laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks in twin parallel rills.

"Gie him his paiks, and soundly, Mistress Fraser; pink him weel. Hit him on the knuckles or on the elbows. Ye micht as weel hit Ben Gairn as try to hurt him by hitting him on the head!"

Alick was speechless with laughter, but Mistress Fraser exclaimed with each resounding stroke, "Twa laddies and a lassie! O ye vermin! – And me has sent to the Folds and the Cowdenslacks for twa cradles to mak' up the three. Ye hae made a bonny fule o' me. I'll never hear the last o' it till my dying day in this countryside. But, at ony rate, I take my piper's pay in ha'pence out o' your skin, my man Alick!"

ADVENTURE XLII.
MUCKLE ALICK CONSIDERS

"Noo that the collyshangie's dune," quoth Mirren Douglas, "ye micht gie us a word o' advice what we should do wi' the bairns. But come oot by. They are a' to their beds doon the hoose. And we can be takin' a look at the blossoms as we gang."

"We are to plant cabbage here next year, Mistress Fraser says!" cried Muckle Alick.

"Havers!" said his wife. But Mistress Fraser gave Alick a look which said as plain as print, "Have you not had enough?"

"Heard ye what the name o' the puir wandering things might be?" asked Mistress Fraser.

"Aye," said Mirren, briskly, "I hae heard a' aboot it. Their name is Kavannah. Their faither gaed awa' to Liverpool a whilie since to seek wark. And the bairns has left their mither in Edinburgh to seek their faither. And I judge their mither is a gye ill yin."

"Did she tell ye that?" asked Muckle Alick, quickly.

"Na, but I jalloused it!"⁵ said his wife.

"And hoo in the world could ye jallouse sic a thing as that?" said he.

"Just the way ye jallouse that the express is comin' when ye hear the whistle, and the signal draps to 'clear,' ye muckle nowt!" said his wife, taking what is known as a personal example.

"The lassie didna tell me yae single word, but the boy showed me an arr-mark on his temple. 'The awfu' woman did that!' says he.

"'And wha's the awfu' woman, my bonny man?' says I."

"The lassie tried to turn him, but he oot wi' it. 'It's just my mither!' says he. And if ye didna caa that a gye near signal, I ken na what is. It's as plain as findin' bits o' a dog collar in the sausage or a burn troot in the milk!"

But her husband did not laugh, as he usually did at her sayings. His own humour was not of that kind, but slow, ponderous, and deliberate.

"What are ye standin' there gapin' at?" demanded his wife.

Alick held up his hand. His wife knew that this was a signal that he wished to be left to think undisturbed a little longer. So she hurried Mistress Fraser along to look at what she called her "nasty-hurcheons." Sandy's mental machinery, like his bodily, was slow to set in motion, but it worked with great momentum when once it was set a-going.

Muckle Alick was putting two and two together.

"I ken a' aboot it," he said at length, when the process was complete. "We will need to be awesome careful. Thae bairns' faither never got to Liverpool; consequently it's little use them gaun there to seek him. He's either in his grave or the Edinburgh Infirmary. D'ye mind yon tramp man that gat the hurt in his head last spring, by hiding and sleepin' in the cattle waggons when they were shuntin'? His name was James Kavannah. I'se warrant he was the bairns' faither!"

Mirren Douglas gave Muckle Alick a bit clap on the shoulder.

"Whiles ye are nane so stupid, man," she said, "I believe ye are richt."

"And he was on his road to Liverpool, too," added Alick, "for when he was oot o' his mind he cried on aboot that a' the time. And aye the owerword o' his sang was, 'She'll no get me in Liverpool!'"

His wife looked at Alick. And Muckle Alick looked at Mirren.

"We'll keep them awhile, onyway, till they can get a better hame. The lassie will soon be braw and handy," said Mirren.

"I'm thinkin'," said Alick, "that the flower-beds will hae to come up after a', and we'll plant taties if the porridge pot shows signs o' wearin' empty."

It was thus that our three wanderers found a place of lodgment in the wilderness in the kindly house of Sandyknowes.

"There's my sister Margaret up at Loch Spellanderie," said Mistress Fraser; "she was tellin' me on Monday that she was wantin' a lass. She's no very easy to leeve wi', I ken. But she will gie a guid wage, and the lass would get an insicht into country wark there. It micht be worth while thinkin' aboot."

"It is kind o' ye to think o't," said Mirren, doubtfully.

"O," replied Mistress Fraser, "I'm nane so sure o' that. As I tell ye, oor Meg is nane o' the easiest to serve. But, as the guid Buik says, it's a good and siccar lesson for the young to bear the yoke in their youth."

"An' I'm sure thae puir bairns hae had their share o't," said Muckle Alick.

"I suppose," said Mistress Fraser, as she prepared to take her leave, "that ye canna keep your thumb on the joke aboot the twa laddies and a lassie. Na, it's no to be expected o' you, Mirren. It's ower guid a tale to tell, specially on me, that aye prided mysel' on letting naebody draw my leg. But ye did me to richts this time, ye great stirk – to bring me fleein' ower here wi' my coaties kilted as if I had the back-door trot, a' to see three newly-come-hame bairns, and the auldest o' them near woman muckle. And the loon that gaed me the cheat an elder o' the kirk! Sorrow till ye, Alick, but I could find it in my heart to clour your lugs even yet."

"Ye hae my richt guidwull," said Mirren, encouragingly.

But Muckle Alick only laughed. Then Tam Fraser came in seeking his wife.

"I hae been hearin' a' aboot your daft ploy, rinnin' in front o' the engine and gettin' dunted oot o' the road," said he. "Some folk was threepin' that it was awesome brave o' ye, but I think it was juist a daft, rackless triflin' wi' Providence. That's my thocht on't."

"What was that? I hae heard tell o' it for the first time," said Mirren. "But that's nae new thing in this hoose. Alick's married wife is aye the last to hear o' his daft-like doin's."

"O, nocht very special this time," said Tam Fraser. "He only threw a hundred and six Irish drovers oot o' a third story window ower the engine o' the Port express, but there's nae mair than ten o' them dead. And then he louped in front on an engine gaun at full speed and to draw some bairns frae below the wheels," said Tam Fraser, giving the local version, corrected to date.

"Is this true?" said his wife severely, fixing her eyes upon Alick with a curious expression in them.

"There's juist aboot as muckle truth in it as there is in maist Netherby stories for common, after they hae gotten ten minutes' start," said Muckle Alick.

"What is your version o't?" said his wife, never taking her eyes off her husband.

"O, it was naething to tell aboot," said Muckle Alick. "There was some drovers in a carriage where they had nae business, and they wadna come oot, till I gaed in to them – and then they cam' oot! And the wee laddie an' the bairn were comin' alang the line afore the engine. And Geordie couldna stop. So I gied them a bit yirk oot and gat a dunch in the back wi' the buffer."

Mirren took her husband by the rough velveteen coat-sleeve.

"My man!" she said, rubbing her cheek against it. "But what for did ye no tell me?"

"I was gaun to tell ye the morn's mornin'," said Alick. "There was nae harm dune, ye see, but yin o' my gallus buttons riven off an' the buffer of Geordie's engine smashed. I was gaun to tell ye in the mornin' aboot the button needing sewin' on."

"Did ye ever see siccan auld fules," said Tam Fraser, as he and his wife went home, "rubbin' her cheek again his airm, that's as thick as a pump theekit frae the frost wi' strae rapes?"

"Haud your tongue, Tam," said his wife, whose temper had suffered; "if I had a man like that I wad rub my cheek against his trouser leg, gin it pleasured him, the day by the length."

ADVENTURE XLIII.
TOWN KNIGHT AND COUNTRY KNIGHT

Mr. Cleg Kelly awoke early on the day upon which he was to make the bold adventure of getting to Netherby Junction without enriching the railway company by the amount of his fare. But his conscience was clean; he was going to work his passage. It is true that neither the general manager nor yet the traffic inspector had been consulted in the matter. But for the sake of Cleg's friend (to be exact, Cleaver's boy's sweetheart's fellow-servant, cook at Bailie Holden's), Duncan Urquhart was willing (and he believed able) to engineer Cleg's passage to Netherby without fee or reward.

Duncan was friendly with the guard of his goods train, which is a thing not too common with those who have to run goods trains together, week in and week out. The shunting at night in particular is wearing to the temper, especially in the winter time, when it is mostly dark in an hour or two whenever your train happens to start.

"Can you stand there and turn a brake?" said Duncan to Cleg, setting him in a small compartment by himself; "screw her up whenever we are running downhill. Ye will ken when by the gurring and shaking."

Mr. Duncan Urquhart was a very different man during the day, to the gay and gallant evening caller who had won the easy-melted heart of the cook at Holden's – which a disappointed suitor once said bitterly was made of dripping. He was very grimy; he spoke but seldom, and then mostly in the highly imaginative and metaphorical language popular on the Greenock and South-Eastern. Duncan Urquhart, as has already been mentioned, was quite a first-class swearer, and had an originality not common among engineers, which he owed to his habit of translating literally from the Gaelic. Also, though he swore incessantly, he never defiled his mouth with profanity, but confined himself assiduously to personal abuse, which, if less sonorous, is infinitely more irritating to the swearee.

So hour after hour Cleg stood in the train and was hurled and shaken southwards towards Netherby. He helped at the shunting, coupling, and uncoupling with the best. For, from his ancient St. Leonards experience, he could run the coal-waggons to their lies as well as a professional. And though his occupations had been varied and desultory, Cleg was a born worker. He always saw merely the bit of work before him, and he set his teeth into it (as he said picturesquely) till he had clawed his way through.

Thus it was that Cleg found himself at Netherby Junction one Saturday night at six o'clock. It was the first time he had ever been further than the confines of the Queen's Park. And his vision of the country came to him as it were in one day. He saw teams driving afield. He saw the mowers in the swathes of hay. He watched with keen delight the grass fall cleanly before the scythe, and the point of the blade stand out at each stroke six inches from under the fallen sweep of dewy grass.

"Netherby Junction! Guidnicht!" said Duncan Urquhart, briefly. He had an appointment to keep with the provost's cook, who was also partial to well-bearded men with blue pilot-cloth jackets. Duncan would not have been in such a hurry, but for the fact that it took him half an hour to clean himself. He knew that half an hour when you go a-courting, and when the other fellow may get there first, is of prime importance.

Now, as Cleg Kelly stepped out upon the cattle-landing bank, he caught a glimpse of the biggest man he had ever seen, walking slowly along the white dusty road which led out of the passenger station. He was swinging his arms wide of his sides, as very big and broad men always do.

Cleg sped after him at top speed and took a tour round him before he spoke. The big man paid no attention, walking with his eyes fixed on the ground.

"Are ye the man that pitched oot the drovers?" said Cleg at last, coming to anchor in front of the giant.

Muckle Alick stopped in the road, as much surprised as though the town clock had spoken to him. For Cleg put a smartness and fire in his question to which the boys about Netherby were strangers.

"Where come ye frae?" he said to Cleg.

"I come from Edinburgh to see Vara Kavannah," said Cleg. "Is she biding wi' you?"

"She was, till yestreen," said Alick.

"And where is she noo?" said Cleg, buckling up his trousers.

"She is gane to serve at Loch Spellanderie by the Water o' Ae!" said Alick.

"And how far micht that be?" asked Cleg, finishing his preparations.

"Three mile and a bittock up that road!" said Muckle Alick, pointing with his finger to a well-made dusty road which went in the direction of the hills.

"Guidnicht!" cried Cleg, shortly. And was off at racing pace.

Muckle Alick watched him out of sight.

"That cowes a'!" he said, "to think that I could yince rin like that to see a lass. But the deil's in the loon. He's surely braw an early begun!"

Then Muckle Alick went round and told his wife.

"It will be the laddie frae Enbra that got them the wark in the mill, and gied up his wood hut to the bairns to leeve in. What for did ye no bring him to see Hugh Boy and the bairn?"

"I dinna ken that he gied me the chance," said Alick. "He was aff like a shot to Loch Spellanderie. I wad gie a shilling to hear what Mistress McWalter will say to him when he gets there. I houp that it'll no make her unkind to the lassie! If it does, I'll speak to her man. And at the warst she can aye come back to us. At a pinch we could be doing without her wage!"

"Aweel," said his wife, "the loon will be near there by this time."

And the loon was.

Cleg was just turning up over the hill road towards Loch Spellanderie, when he heard that most heartsome sound to the ear of a country boy – the clatter of the pasture bars when the kye are coming home. It is a sound thrilling with reminiscences of dewy eves, or heartsome lowsing times, of forenichts with the lasses, and of all that to a country lad makes life worth living.

But to Cleg the rattle of the bars meant none of these things. Two people were standing by the gate – a boy and a girl. Cleg thought he would ask them if this was the right road to Loch Spellanderie.

But as he came nearer he saw that the girl was Vara herself. She was in close and, apparently, very friendly talk with a stranger – a tall lad with a face like one of the white statues in the museum, at which Cleg had often peeped wonderingly on free days when it was cold or raining outside.

"Vara!" cried Cleg, leaping forward towards his friend.

"Cleg! What are you doing here?" said Vara Kavannah, holding out her hand.

But there was something in her manner that froze Cleg. He had come with a glowing heart. He had overcome difficulties. And now she did not seem much more glad to see him than she had been to talk with this young interloper at the gate of the field.

"This is Kit Kennedy," said Vara, with a feeling that she must by her tactfulness carry off an awkward situation.

"O it is, is it?" said Cleg, ungraciously.

Vara went on hastily to tell Cleg about the children – how well and how happy they were, how Gavin was twice the weight he had been, how Hugh Boy ran down the road each night to meet Muckle Alick, and how she was now able to keep herself, besides helping a little to support Hugh and Gavin also.

Cleg stood sulkily scraping the earth with the toe of his boot. Kit Kennedy left them together, and was going off with the cows towards the byre. He had seen a tall, gaunt woman, who was not to be trifled with, walking through the courtyard, and he knew it was time to take the kye in.

Vara stopped talking to Cleg somewhat quickly. For she also had seen Mistress McWalter. She walked away towards the farm. Cleg and Kit were left alone.

Quick as lightning Cleg thrust his arm before Kit Kennedy's face.

"Spit ower that!" he said.

Kit hesitated and turned away.

"I dinna want to fecht ye!" he said, for he knew what was meant.

"Ye are feared!" said Cleg, tauntingly.

Kit Kennedy executed the feat in hydraulics required of him.

"After kye time," said he, "at the back o' the barn."

Cleg nodded dourly.

"I'll learn ye to let my lass alane!" said the town boy.

"I dinna gie a button for your lass, or ony ither lass. Forbye there was nae ticket on her that I could see!" answered he of the country.

"Aweel," said Cleg; "then I'll warm ye for sayin' that ye wadna gie a button for her. I'm gaun to lick ye at ony rate."

"To fecht me, ye mean?" said Kit Kennedy, quietly.

Thus was gage of battle offered and accepted betwixt Cleg Kelly and Kit Kennedy.

ADVENTURE XLIV.
CLEG RELAPSES INTO PAGANISM

The lists of Ashby were closed. The heralds and pursuivants did their devoirs, and the trumpets rang out a haughty peal. Or at least to that effect, as followeth:

"Come on!" said Cleg Kelly.

"Come on yoursel'!" said Kit Kennedy.

"Ye're feared," cried the Knight of the City, making a hideous face.

"Wha's feared?" replied the Knight of the Country, his fists twirling like Catherine wheels. The boys slowly revolved round one another. It was like the solar system, only on a somewhat smaller scale. For first of all their fists revolved separately round each other, then each combatant revolved on his own axis, and lastly, very slowly and in a dignified manner, they revolved round one another.

All this happened in the cool of the evening, at the back of the barn at the farmhouse of Loch Spellanderie. It was after the kye had all been milked and Vara Kavannah was in the house clearing away the porridge dishes, while the mistress put the fretful children to bed with an accompanying chorus of scoldings, slappings, and wailings of the smitten.

As the lads stood stripped for fight Cleg was a little taller than Kit Kennedy, and he had all the experience which comes of many previous combats. But then he was not, like Kit Kennedy, thrice armed, in the consciousness of the justice of his quarrel.

"Come on," cried Cleg again, working up his temperature to flash point, "ye gawky, ill-jointed, bullock-headed, slack-twisted clod-thumper, ye! See gin I canna knock the conceit oot o' ye in a hop, skip, and jump! I hae come frae Edinburgh to do it. I'll learn you to tak' up wi' my lass! Come on, ye puir Cripple-Dick!"

And at that precise moment Kit Kennedy, after many invitations, very suddenly did come on. Cleg, whose passion blinded him to his own hurt, happened to be leaning rather far forward. It is customary in the giving of "dares" round about the Sooth Back, for the threatener to stick his head as far forward as he can and shake it rapidly up and down in a ferocious and menacing manner. This ought to continue, according to the rules, for fully ten minutes, after which the proceedings may commence or not according to circumstances. But Kit Kennedy, farm assistant to Mistress McWalter of Loch Spellanderie, was an ignorant boy. He had had few advantages. He did not even know the rules appertaining to personal combats, nor when exactly was the correct time to accept an invitation and "come on."

So that was the reason why Cleg Kelly's left eye came unexpectedly in violent contact with Kit's knuckles. These were as hard with rough labour as a bullock's hind leg.

The sudden sting of the pain had the effect of making Cleg still more vehemently angry. "I'll learn you," he shouted, "ye sufferin', shairny blastie o' the byres, to strike afore a man's ready. You fecht! Ye can nae mair fecht than a Portobello bobbie! Wait till I hae dune wi' ye, my man. There'll no be as muckle left o' ye as wad make cat-meat to a week-auld kittlin'. What for can ye no fecht fair?"

Our hero's cause was so bad, and his lapse into heathenism became at this point so pronounced, that for the sake of all that has been we decline to report the remainder of his speech.

But Kit Kennedy did not wait on any further preliminaries.

Ding-dong! went his fists, one on Cleg's other eye and the other squarely on his chest. Cleg was speaking at the time, and the latter blow (as he afterwards said) fairly took the words from him and made him "roop" like a hen trying to crow like a cock.

At this terrible breach of all laws made and promulgated for the proper conduct of pitched battles, what remained of Cleg's temper suddenly gave way. He rushed at Kit Kennedy, striking at him as hard as he could, without the slightest regard to science. But Kit Kennedy was staunch, and did not yield an inch. Never had the barn end of Loch Spellanderie witnessed such a combat. Cleg, on his part, interpolated constant remarks of a disparaging kind, such as "Tak' that, ye seefer!" "That'll do for ye!" But Kit Kennedy, on the other hand, fought silently. The most notable thing, however, about the combat was that in the struggle neither of the knights took the slightest pains to ward off the other's blows. They were entirely engrossed in getting in their own.

The dust flew bravely from their jackets, until the noise resembled the quick, irregular beating of carpets more than anything else. But, after all, not very much harm was done, and their clothes could hardly have been damaged by half a dozen Waterloos. It was like to be a drawn battle, for neither combatant would give in. All Cleg's activity and waspishness was met and held by the country boy with dogged persistency and massive rustic strength. Cleg was lissom as a willow wand, Kit tough and sturdy as an oak bough. And if Cleg avoided the most blows, he felt more severely those which did get home.

Thus, not unequally, the battle raged, till the noise of it passed all restraint. John McWalter of Loch Spellanderie was making his evening rounds. As he went into the barn he heard a tremendous disturbance at the back among his last year's corn-stacks. He listened eagerly, standing on one foot to do it. The riot was exceedingly mysterious. Very cautiously he opened the top half of the barn door and peered through. It might be an ill-set tinker come to steal corn. John McWalter had Tweed and Tyke with him, and they frisked their tails and gave each a little muffled bark to intimate that they should much like to join in the fray.

John McWalter was not used to facing difficult positions on his own responsibility, so quite as cautiously he slipped back again through the barn, and crossed the yard to the house.

His wife was actively engaged scolding Vara for wasting too much hot water in cleaning the supper bowls. This happened every evening, and Vara did not greatly mind. It saved her from being faulted for something new.

"Ye lazy, guid-for-naething!" Mrs. McWalter was saying, "I wonder what for my daft sister at Netherby sent a useless, handless, upsetting monkey like you to a decent house – a besom that will neither work nor yet learn – "

At this moment John McWalter put his head within the door.

"There's twa ill-set loons killin' yin anither ahint the barn!" he said.

"What's that gotten to do wi' it, guidman," replied his wife. "Guid life! Ye cry in that sudden I thought it was twa o' the kye hornin' yin anither. But what care I for loons? Juist e'en let them kill yin anither. There ower great plenty o' them aboot Loch Spellanderie at ony rate! Ill plants o' a graceless stock. Never was a McWalter yet worth his brose!"

"But," said her husband, "it's Kit Kennedy fechtin' wi' a stranger loon that I never saw afore! And I dinna believe he has foddered the horse!"

Mistress McWalter snatched up the poker.

"Him," she cried, "the idle, regairdless hound, what can the like o' him be thinkin' aboot? I'll learn him. Gin he gets himsel' killed fechting wi' tinklers for his ain pleesure, wha is to look the sheep and bring in the kye in the mornin'? And the morn kirnin' day too!"

So in the interests of the coming hour at which the week's cream was to be churned into butter, and from no regard whatever for her nephew's life or limb, the mistress of Loch Spellanderie hasted out to interfere in the deadly struggle. But Vara Kavannah was before her. She flew out of the kitchen door, and ran round the house. The McWalters followed as best they could, her mistress calling vainly on her to go back and wash the dishes.

When Vara turned the corner, Cleg and Kit were still pelting at it without the least sign of abating interest. Cleg was now darting hither and thither, and getting in a blow wherever he could. Kit was standing doggedly firm, only wheeling on his legs as on a pivot, far enough to meet the town boy's rushes. It was a beautiful combat, and the equality of it had very nearly knocked all the ill-nature out of them. Respect for each other was growing up in their several bosoms, and if only they could have stopped simultaneously they would have been glad enough to shake hands.

So when Vara came flying round the corner and ran between them, the boys were quite willing to be separated, indeed even thankful.

"Run, quick!" she cried to Cleg, "they are comin'. O haste ye fast!"

But Cleg did not know any respect for the powers that be. He knew that the ordinary bobby of commerce did not dwell in the country. And besides, even if he did, the lad who could race red-headed Finnigan, the champion runner of the Edinburgh force, and who had proved himself without disgrace against the fastest fire engine in the city, was not likely to be caught, even in spite of the fact that he had run all the way from Netherby Junction that night already.

So Cleg turned a deaf ear to Vara's entreaties, and, very simply and like a hero, wiped his face with the tail of his coat.

Kit Kennedy also kept his place, a fact which deserves recognition. For he, on his part, faced a peril long known and noted. The mystery of unknown and unproven danger did not fascinate him.

In a moment more Mistress McWalter, a tall, masculine woman, with untidy hair of frosty blue-black, came tearing round the corner, while at the same time out of the back barn door issued John McWalter, armed with a pitchfork, and followed by Tweed and Tyke, the clamourous shepherding dogs of Loch Spellanderie.

Cleg found his position completely turned, and he himself beset on all sides. For behind him the Loch lay black and deep. And in front the wall of the barn fairly shut him in between his enemies. Mistress McWalter dealt Kit Kennedy a blow with the poker upon his shoulder as she passed. But this was simply, as it were, a payment on account, for his final settlement could be deferred. Then, never pausing once in her stride, she rushed towards Cleg Kelly. But she did not know the manifold wiles of a trained athlete of the Sooth Back. For this kind of irregular guerilla warfare was even more in Cleg's way than a plain, hammer-and-tongs, knockdown fight.

As she came with the poker stiffly uplifted against the evening sky, Mistress McWalter looked exceeding martial. But, as Cleg afterwards expressed it, "A woman shouldna try to fecht. She's far ower flappy aboot the legs wi' goons and petticoats." Swift as a duck diving, Cleg fell flat before her, and Mistress McWalter suddenly spread all her length on the ground. Cleg instantly was on his feet again. Had the enemy been a man, Cleg would have danced on him. But since (and it was a pity) it was a woman, Cleg only looked about for an avenue of escape.

Kit Kennedy pointed with his finger an open way round the milkhouse. And Cleg knew that the information was a friendly enough lead. He had no doubts as to the good faith of so sturdy a fighter as Kit Kennedy. He was obviously not the stuff that traitors are made of.

But a sudden thought of inconceivable grandeur flushed Cleg's cheek. Once for all, he would show them what he could do. He would evade his pursuers, make his late adversary burst with envy, and wring the heart of Vara Kavannah, all by one incomparable act of daring. So he stood still till Mistress McWalter arose again to her feet and charged upon him with a perfect scream of anger. At the same time John McWalter closed in upon the other side with his hay-fork and his dogs. Cleg allowed them to approach till they were almost within striking distance of him. Then, without giving himself a moment for reflection, he wheeled about on his heels, balanced a moment on the brink, bent his arms with the fingers touching into a beautiful bow, and sprang far out into the black water.