CHAPTER XXIV
To hail the king in seemly sort
The ladie was full fain,
But King Arthur, all sore amazed,
No answer made again
‘What wight art thou,’ the ladie said,
‘That will not speak to me?
Sir, I may chance to ease thy pain,
Though I be foul to see’
The Marriage of Sir Gawaine.
The fairy bride of Sir Gawaine, while under the influence of the spell of her wicked step-mother, was more decrepit probably, and what is commonly called more ugly, than Meg Merrilies; but I doubt if she possessed that wild sublimity which an excited imagination communicated to features marked and expressive in their own peculiar character, and to the gestures of a form which, her sex considered, might be termed gigantic. Accordingly, the Knights of the Round Table did not recoil with more terror from the apparition of the loathly lady placed between ‘an oak and a green holly,’ than Lucy Bertram and Julia Mannering did from the appearance of this Galwegian sibyl upon the common of Ellangowan.
‘For God’s sake,’ said Julia, pulling out her purse, ‘give that dreadful woman something and bid her go away.’
‘I cannot,’ said Bertram; ‘I must not offend her.’
‘What keeps you here?’ said Meg, exalting the harsh and rough tones of her hollow voice. ‘Why do you not follow? Must your hour call you twice? Do you remember your oath? “Were it at kirk or market, wedding or burial,”’--and she held high her skinny forefinger in a menacing attitude.
Bertram--turned round to his terrified companions. ‘Excuse me for a moment; I am engaged by a promise to follow this woman.’
‘Good Heavens! engaged to a madwoman?’ said Julia.
‘Or to a gipsy, who has her band in the wood ready to murder you!’ said Lucy.
‘That was not spoken like a bairn of Ellangowan,’ said Meg, frowning upon Miss Bertram. ‘It is the ill-doers are ill-dreaders.’
‘In short, I must go,’ said Bertram, ‘it is absolutely necessary; wait for me five minutes on this spot.’
‘Five minutes?’ said the gipsy, ‘five hours may not bring you here again.’
‘Do you hear that?’ said Julia; ‘for Heaven’s sake do not go!’
‘I must, I must; Mr. Dinmont will protect you back to the house.’
‘No,’ said Meg, ‘he must come with you; it is for that he is here. He maun take part wi’ hand and heart; and weel his part it is, for redding his quarrel might have cost you dear.’
‘Troth, Luckie, it’s very true,’ said the steady farmer; ‘and ere I turn back frae the Captain’s side I’ll show that I haena forgotten ‘t.’
‘O yes,’ exclaimed both the ladies at once, ‘let Mr. Dinmont go with you, if go you must, on this strange summons.’
‘Indeed I must,’ answered Bertram; ‘but you see I am safely guarded. Adieu for a short time; go home as fast as you can.’
He pressed his sister’s hand, and took a yet more affectionate farewell of Julia with his eyes. Almost stupefied with surprise and fear, the young ladies watched with anxious looks the course of Bertram, his companion, and their extraordinary guide. Her tall figure moved across the wintry heath with steps so swift, so long, and so steady that she appeared rather to glide than to walk. Bertram and Dinmont, both tall men, apparently scarce equalled her in height, owing to her longer dress and high head-gear. She proceeded straight across the common, without turning aside to the winding path by which passengers avoided the inequalities and little rills that traversed it in different directions. Thus the diminishing figures often disappeared from the eye, as they dived into such broken ground, and again ascended to sight when they were past the hollow. There was something frightful and unearthly, as it were, in the rapid and undeviating course which she pursued, undeterred by any of the impediments which usually incline a traveller from the direct path. Her way was as straight, and nearly as swift, as that of a bird through the air. At length they reached those thickets of natural wood which extended from the skirts of the common towards the glades and brook of Derncleugh, and were there lost to the view.
‘This is very extraordinary,’ said Lucy after a pause, and turning round to her companion; ‘what can he have to do with that old hag?’
‘It is very frightful,’ answered Julia, ‘and almost reminds me of the tales of sorceresses, witches, and evil genii which I have heard in India. They believe there in a fascination of the eye by which those who possess it control the will and dictate the motions of their victims. What can your brother have in common with that fearful woman that he should leave us, obviously against his will, to attend to her commands?’
‘At least,’ said Lucy, ‘we may hold him safe from harm; for she would never have summoned that faithful creature Dinmont, of whose strength, courage, and steadiness Henry said so much, to attend upon an expedition where she projected evil to the person of his friend. And now let us go back to the house till the Colonel returns. Perhaps Bertram may be back first; at any rate, the Colonel will judge what is to be done.’
Leaning, then, upon each other’s arm, but yet occasionally stumbling, between fear and the disorder of their nerves, they at length reached the head of the avenue, when they heard the tread of a horse behind. They started, for their ears were awake to every sound, and beheld to their great pleasure young Hazlewood. ‘The Colonel will be here immediately,’ he said; ‘I galloped on before to pay my respects to Miss Bertram, with the sincerest congratulations upon the joyful event which has taken place in her family. I long to be introduced to Captain Bertram, and to thank him for the well-deserved lesson he gave to my rashness and indiscretion.’
‘He has left us just now,’ said Lucy, ‘and in a manner that has frightened us very much.’
Just at that moment the Colonel’s carriage drove up, and, on observing the ladies, stopped, while Mannering and his learned counsel alighted and joined them. They instantly communicated the new cause of alarm.
‘Meg Merrilies again!’ said the Colonel. ‘She certainly is a most mysterious and unaccountable personage; but I think she must have something to impart to Bertram to which she does not mean we should be privy.’
‘The devil take the bedlamite old woman,’ said the Counsellor; ‘will she not let things take their course, prout de lege, but must always be putting in her oar in her own way? Then I fear from the direction they took they are going upon the Ellangowan estate. That rascal Glossin has shown us what ruffians he has at his disposal; I wish honest Liddesdale maybe guard sufficient.’
‘If you please,’ said Hazlewood, ‘I should be most happy to ride in the direction which they have taken. I am so well known in the country that I scarce think any outrage will be offered in my presence, and I shall keep at such a cautious distance as not to appear to watch Meg, or interrupt any communication which she may make.’
‘Upon my word,’ said Pleydell (aside), ‘to be a sprig whom I remember with a whey face and a satchel not so very many years ago, I think young Hazlewood grows a fine fellow. I am more afraid of a new attempt at legal oppression than at open violence, and from that this young man’s presence would deter both Glossin and his understrappers.--Hie away then, my boy; peer out--peer out, you ‘ll find them somewhere about Derncleugh, or very probably in Warroch wood.’
Hazlewood turned his horse. ‘Come back to us to dinner, Hazlewood,’ cried the Colonel. He bowed, spurred his horse, and galloped off.
We now return to Bertram and Dinmont, who continued to follow their mysterious guide through the woods and dingles between the open common and the ruined hamlet of Derncleugh. As she led the way she never looked back upon her followers, unless to chide them for loitering, though the sweat, in spite of the season, poured from their brows. At other times she spoke to herself in such broken expressions as these: ‘It is to rebuild the auld house, it is to lay the corner-stone; and did I not warn him? I tell’d him I was born to do it, if my father’s head had been the stepping-stane, let alane his. I was doomed--still I kept my purpose in the cage and in the stocks; I was banished--I kept it in an unco land; I was scourged, I was branded--my resolution lay deeper than scourge or red iron could reach;--and now the hour is come.’
‘Captain,’ said Dinmont, in a half whisper, ‘I wish she binna uncanny! her words dinna seem to come in God’s name, or like other folks’. Od, they threep in our country that there ARE sic things.’
‘Don’t be afraid, my friend,’ whispered Bertram in return.
‘Fear’d! fient a haet care I,’ said the dauntless farmer; ‘be she witch or deevil, it’s a’ ane to Dandie Dinmont.’
‘Haud your peace, gudeman,’ said Meg, looking sternly over her shoulder; ‘is this a time or place for you to speak, think ye?’
‘But, my good friend,’ said Bertram, ‘as I have no doubt in your good faith or kindness, which I have experienced, you should in return have some confidence in me; I wish to know where you are leading us.’
‘There’s but ae answer to that, Henry Bertram,’ said the sibyl. ‘I swore my tongue should never tell, but I never said my finger should never show. Go on and meet your fortune, or turn back and lose it: that’s a’ I hae to say.’
‘Go on then,’ answered Bertram; ‘I will ask no more questions.’
They descended into the glen about the same place where Meg had formerly parted from Bertram. She paused an instant beneath the tall rock where he had witnessed the burial of a dead body and stamped upon the ground, which, notwithstanding all the care that had been taken, showed vestiges of having been recently moved. ‘Here rests ane,’ she said; ‘he’ll maybe hae neibours sune.’
She then moved up the brook until she came to the ruined hamlet, where, pausing with a look of peculiar and softened interest before one of the gables which was still standing, she said in a tone less abrupt, though as solemn as before, ‘Do you see that blackit and broken end of a sheeling? There my kettle boiled for forty years; there I bore twelve buirdly sons and daughters. Where are they now? where are the leaves that were on that auld ash tree at Martinmas! The west wind has made it bare; and I’m stripped too. Do you see that saugh tree? it’s but a blackened rotten stump now. I’ve sate under it mony a bonnie summer afternoon, when it hung its gay garlands ower the poppling water. I’ve sat there, and,’ elevating her voice, ‘I’ve held you on my knee, Henry Bertram, and sung ye sangs of the auld barons and their bloody wars. It will ne’er be green again, and Meg Merrilies will never sing sangs mair, be they blythe or sad. But ye’ll no forget her, and ye’ll gar big up the auld wa’s for her sake? And let somebody live there that’s ower gude to fear them of another warld. For if ever the dead came back amang the living, I’ll be seen in this glen mony a night after these crazed banes are in the mould.’
The mixture of insanity and wild pathos with which she spoke these last words, with her right arm bare and extended, her left bent and shrouded beneath the dark red drapery of her mantle, might have been a study worthy of our Siddons herself. ‘And now,’ she said, resuming at once the short, stern, and hasty tone which was most ordinary to her, ‘let us to the wark, let us to the wark.’
She then led the way to the promontory on which the Kaim of Derncleugh was situated, produced a large key from her pocket, and unlocked the door. The interior of this place was in better order than formerly. ‘I have made things decent,’ she said; ‘I may be streekit here or night. There will be few, few at Meg’s lykewake, for mony of our folk will blame what I hae done, and am to do!’
She then pointed to a table, upon which was some cold meat, arranged with more attention to neatness than could have been expected from Meg’s habits. ‘Eat,’ she said--’eat; ye’ll need it this night yet.’
Bertram, in complaisance, eat a morsel or two; and Dinmont, whose appetite was unabated either by wonder, apprehension, or the meal of the morning, made his usual figure as a trencherman. She then offered each a single glass of spirits, which Bertram drank diluted, and his companion plain.
‘Will ye taste naething yoursell, Luckie?’ said Dinmont.
‘I shall not need it,’ replied their mysterious hostess. ‘And now,’ she said, ‘ye maun hae arms: ye maunna gang on dry-handed; but use them not rashly. Take captive, but save life; let the law hae its ain. He maun speak ere he die.’
‘Who is to be taken? who is to speak?’ said Bertram, in astonishment, receiving a pair of pistols which she offered him, and which, upon examining, he found loaded and locked.
‘The flints are gude,’ she said, ‘and the powder dry; I ken this wark weel.’
Then, without answering his questions, she armed Dinmont also with a large pistol, and desired them to choose sticks for themselves out of a parcel of very suspicious-looking bludgeons which she brought from a corner. Bertram took a stout sapling, and Dandie selected a club which might have served Hercules himself. They then left the hut together, and in doing so Bertram took an opportunity to whisper to Dinmont, ‘There’s something inexplicable in all this. But we need not use these arms unless we see necessity and lawful occasion; take care to do as you see me do.’
Dinmont gave a sagacious nod, and they continued to follow, over wet and over dry, through bog and through fallow, the footsteps of their conductress. She guided them to the wood of Warroch by the same track which the late Ellangowan had used when riding to Derncleugh in quest of his child on the miserable evening of Kennedy’s murder.
When Meg Merrilies had attained these groves, through which the wintry sea-wind was now whistling hoarse and shrill, she seemed to pause a moment as if to recollect the way. ‘We maun go the precise track,’ she said, and continued to go forward, but rather in a zigzag and involved course than according to her former steady and direct line of motion. At length she guided them through the mazes of the wood to a little open glade of about a quarter of an acre, surrounded by trees and bushes, which made a wild and irregular boundary. Even in winter it was a sheltered and snugly sequestered spot; but when arrayed in the verdure of spring, the earth sending forth all its wild flowers, the shrubs spreading their waste of blossom around it, and the weeping birches, which towered over the underwood, drooping their long and leafy fibres to intercept the sun, it must have seemed a place for a youthful poet to study his earliest sonnet, or a pair of lovers to exchange their first mutual avowal of affection. Apparently it now awakened very different recollections. Bertram’s brow, when he had looked round the spot, became gloomy and embarrassed. Meg, after uttering to herself, ‘This is the very spot!’ looked at him with a ghastly side-glance--’D’ye mind it?’
‘Yes!’ answered Bertram, ‘imperfectly I do.’
‘Ay!’ pursued his guide, ‘on this very spot the man fell from his horse. I was behind that bourtree bush at the very moment. Sair, sair he strove, and sair he cried for mercy; but he was in the hands of them that never kenn’d the word! Now will I show you the further track; the last time ye travelled it was in these arms.’
She led them accordingly by a long and winding passage, almost overgrown with brushwood, until, without any very perceptible descent, they suddenly found themselves by the seaside. Meg then walked very fast on between the surf and the rocks, until she came to a remarkable fragment of rock detached from the rest. ‘Here,’ she said in a low and scarcely audible whisper--’here the corpse was found.’
‘And the cave,’ said Bertram, in the same tone, ‘is close beside it; are you guiding us there?’
‘Yes,’ said the gipsy in a decided tone. ‘Bend up both your hearts; follow me as I creep in; I have placed the fire-wood so as to screen you. Bide behind it for a gliff till I say, “The hour and the man are baith come”; then rin in on him, take his arms, and bind him till the blood burst frae his finger nails.’
‘I will, by my soul,’ said Henry, ‘if he is the man I suppose--Jansen?’
‘Ay, Jansen, Hatteraick, and twenty mair names are his.’
‘Dinmont, you must stand by me now,’ said Bertram, ‘for this fellow is a devil.’
‘Ye needna doubt that,’ said the stout yeoman; ‘but I wish I could mind a bit prayer or I creep after the witch into that hole that she’s opening. It wad be a sair thing to leave the blessed sun and the free air, and gang and be killed like a tod that’s run to earth, in a dungeon like that. But, my sooth, they will be hard-bitten terriers will worry Dandie; so, as I said, deil hae me if I baulk you.’ This was uttered in the lowest tone of voice possible. The entrance was now open. Meg crept in upon her hands and knees, Bertram followed, and Dinmont, after giving a rueful glance toward the daylight, whose blessings he was abandoning, brought up the rear.
CHAPTER XXV
Die, prophet! in thy speech;
For this, among the rest, was I ordained.
Henry VI. Part III.
The progress of the Borderer, who, as we have said, was the last of the party, was fearfully arrested by a hand, which caught hold of his leg as he dragged his long limbs after him in silence and perturbation through the low and narrow entrance of the subterranean passage. The steel heart of the bold yeoman had well-nigh given way, and he suppressed with difficulty a shout, which, in the defenceless posture and situation which they then occupied, might have cost all their lives. He contented himself, however, with extricating his foot from the grasp of this unexpected follower. ‘Be still,’ said a voice behind him, releasing him; ‘I am a friend--Charles Hazlewood.’
These words were uttered in a very low voice, but they produced sound enough to startle Meg Merrilies, who led the van, and who, having already gained the place where the cavern expanded, had risen upon her feet. She began, as if to confound any listening ear, to growl, to mutter, and to sing aloud, and at the same time to make a bustle among some brushwood which was now heaped in the cave.
‘Here, beldam, deyvil’s kind,’ growled the harsh voice of Dirk Hatteraick from the inside of his den, ‘what makest thou there?’
‘Laying the roughies to keep the cauld wind frae you, ye desperate do-nae-good. Ye’re e’en ower weel off, and wotsna; it will be otherwise soon.’
‘Have you brought me the brandy, and any news of my people?’ said Dirk Hatteraick.
‘There’s the flask for ye. Your people--dispersed, broken, gone, or cut to ribbands by the redcoats.’
‘Der deyvil! this coast is fatal to me.’
‘Ye may hae mair reason to say sae.’
While this dialogue went forward, Bertram and Dinmont had both gained the interior of the cave and assumed an erect position. The only light which illuminated its rugged and sable precincts was a quantity of wood burnt to charcoal in an iron grate, such as they use in spearing salmon by night. On these red embers Hatteraick from time to time threw a handful of twigs or splintered wood; but these, even when they blazed up, afforded a light much disproportioned to the extent of the cavern; and, as its principal inhabitant lay upon the side of the grate most remote from the entrance, it was not easy for him to discover distinctly objects which lay in that direction. The intruders, therefore, whose number was now augmented unexpectedly to three, stood behind the loosely-piled branches with little risk of discovery. Dinmont had the sense to keep back Hazlewood with one hand till he whispered to Bertram, ‘A friend--young Hazlewood.’
It was no time for following up the introduction, and they all stood as still as the rocks around them, obscured behind the pile of brushwood, which had been probably placed there to break the cold wind from the sea, without totally intercepting the supply of air. The branches were laid so loosely above each other that, looking through them towards the light of the fire-grate, they could easily discover what passed in its vicinity, although a much stronger degree of illumination than it afforded would not have enabled the persons placed near the bottom of the cave to have descried them in the position which they occupied.
The scene, independent of the peculiar moral interest and personal danger which attended it, had, from the effect of the light and shade on the uncommon objects which it exhibited, an appearance emphatically dismal. The light in the fire-grate was the dark-red glare of charcoal in a state of ignition, relieved from time to time by a transient flame of a more vivid or duskier light, as the fuel with which Dirk Hatteraick fed his fire was better or worse fitted for his purpose. Now a dark cloud of stifling smoke rose up to the roof of the cavern, and then lighted into a reluctant and sullen blaze, which flashed wavering up the pillar of smoke, and was suddenly rendered brighter and more lively by some drier fuel, or perhaps some splintered fir-timber, which at once converted the smoke into flame. By such fitful irradiation they could see, more or less distinctly, the form of Hatteraick, whose savage and rugged cast of features, now rendered yet more ferocious by the circumstances of his situation and the deep gloom of his mind, assorted well with the rugged and broken vault, which rose in a rude arch over and around him. The form of Meg Merrilies, which stalked about him, sometimes in the light, sometimes partially obscured in the smoke or darkness, contrasted strongly with the sitting figure of Hatteraick as he bent over the flame, and from his stationary posture was constantly visible to the spectator, while that of the female flitted around, appearing or disappearing like a spectre.
Bertram felt his blood boil at the sight of Hatteraick. He remembered him well under the name of Jansen, which the smuggler had adopted after the death of Kennedy; and he remembered also that this Jansen, and his mate Brown, the same who was shot at Woodbourne, had been the brutal tyrants of his infancy. Bertram knew farther, from piecing his own imperfect recollections with the narratives of Mannering and Pleydell, that this man was the prime agent in the act of violence which tore him from his family and country, and had exposed him to so many distresses and dangers. A thousand exasperating reflections rose within his bosom; and he could hardly refrain from rushing upon Hatteraick and blowing his brains out.
At the same time this would have been no safe adventure. The flame, as it rose and fell, while it displayed the strong, muscular, and broad-chested frame of the ruffian, glanced also upon two brace of pistols in his belt, and upon the hilt of his cutlass: it was not to be doubted that his desperation was commensurate with his personal strength and means of resistance. Both, indeed, were inadequate to encounter the combined power of two such men as Bertram himself and his friend Dinmont, without reckoning their unexpected assistant Hazlewood, who was unarmed, and of a slighter make; but Bertram felt, on a moment’s reflection, that there would be neither sense nor valour in anticipating the hangman’s office, and he considered the importance of making Hatteraick prisoner alive. He therefore repressed his indignation, and awaited what should pass between the ruffian and his gipsy guide.
‘And how are ye now?’ said the harsh and discordant tones of his female attendant.’ Said I not, it would come upon you--ay, and in this very cave, where ye harboured after the deed?’
‘Wetter and sturm, ye hag!’ replied Hatteraick, ‘keep your deyvil’s matins till they’re wanted. Have you seen Glossin?’
‘No,’ replied Meg Merrilies; ‘you’ve missed your blow, ye blood-spiller! and ye have nothing to expect from the tempter.’
‘Hagel!’ exclaimed the ruffian, ‘if I had him but by the throat! And what am I to do then?’
‘Do?’ answered the gipsy; ‘die like a man, or be hanged like a dog!’
‘Hanged, ye hag of Satan! The hemp’s not sown that shall hang me.’
‘It’s sown, and it’s grown, and it’s heckled, and it’s twisted. Did I not tell ye, when ye wad take away the boy Harry Bertram, in spite of my prayers,--did I not say he would come back when he had dree’d his weird in foreign land till his twenty-first year? Did I not say the auld fire would burn down to a spark, but wad kindle again?’
‘Well, mother, you did say so,’ said Hatteraick, in a tone that had something of despair in its accents; ‘and, donner and blitzen! I believe you spoke the truth. That younker of Ellangowan has been a rock ahead to me all my life! And now, with Glossin’s cursed contrivance, my crew have been cut off, my boats destroyed, and I daresay the lugger’s taken; there were not men enough left on board to work her, far less to fight her--a dredge-boat might have taken her. And what will the owners say? Hagel and sturm! I shall never dare go back again to Flushing.’
‘You’ll never need,’ said the gipsy.
‘What are you doing there,’ said her companion; ‘and what makes you say that?’
During this dialogue Meg was heaping some flax loosely together. Before answer to this question she dropped a firebrand upon the flax, which had been previously steeped in some spirituous liquor, for it instantly caught fire and rose in a vivid pyramid of the most brilliant light up to the very top of the vault. As it ascended Meg answered the ruffian’s question in a firm and steady voice: ‘BECAUSE THE HOUR’S COME, AND THE MAN.’
At the appointed signal Bertram and Dinmont sprung over the brushwood and rushed upon Hatteraick. Hazlewood, unacquainted with their plan of assault, was a moment later. The ruffian, who instantly saw he was betrayed, turned his first vengeance on Meg Merrilies, at whom he discharged a pistol. She fell with a piercing and dreadful cry between the shriek of pain and the sound of laughter when at its highest and most suffocating height. ‘I kenn’d it would be this way,’ she said.
Bertram, in his haste, slipped his foot upon the uneven rock which floored the cave--a fortunate stumble, for Hatteraick’s second bullet whistled over him with so true and steady an aim that, had he been standing upright, it must have lodged in his brain. Ere the smuggler could draw another pistol, Dinmont closed with him, and endeavoured by main force to pinion down his arms. Such, however, was the wretch’s personal strength, joined to the efforts of his despair, that, in spite of the gigantic force with which the Borderer grappled him, he dragged Dinmont through the blazing flax, and had almost succeeded in drawing a third pistol, which might have proved fatal to the honest farmer, had not Bertram, as well as Hazlewood, come to his assistance, when, by main force, and no ordinary exertion of it, they threw Hatteraick on the ground, disarmed him, and bound him. This scuffle, though it takes up some time in the narrative, passed in less than a single minute. When he was fairly mastered, after one or two desperate and almost convulsionary struggles, the ruffian lay perfectly still and silent. ‘He’s gaun to die game ony how,’ said Dinmont; ‘weel, I like him na the waur for that.’
This observation honest Dandie made while he was shaking the blazing flax from his rough coat and shaggy black hair, some of which had been singed in the scuffle. ‘He is quiet now,’ said Bertram; ‘stay by him and do not permit him to stir till I see whether the poor woman be alive or dead.’ With Hazlewood’s assistance he raised Meg Merrilies.
‘I kenn’d it would be this way,’ she muttered, ‘and it’s e’en this way that it should be.’
The ball had penetrated the breast below the throat. It did not bleed much externally; but Bertram, accustomed to see gunshot wounds, thought it the more alarming. ‘Good God! what shall we do for this poor woman?’ said he to Hazlewood, the circumstances superseding the necessity of previous explanation or introduction to each other.
‘My horse stands tied above in the wood,’ said Hazlewood. ‘I have been watching you these two hours. I will ride off for some assistants that may be trusted. Meanwhile, you had better defend the mouth of the cavern against every one until I return.’ He hastened away. Bertram, after binding Meg Merrilies’s wound as well as he could, took station near the mouth of the cave with a cocked pistol in his hand; Dinmont continued to watch Hatteraick, keeping a grasp like that of Hercules on his breast. There was a dead silence in the cavern, only interrupted by the low and suppressed moaning of the wounded female and by the hard breathing of the prisoner.
CHAPTER XXVI
For though, seduced and led astray,
Thoust travell’d far and wander’d long,
Thy God hath seen thee all the way,
And all the turns that led thee wrong
The Hall of Justice.
After the space of about three-quarters of an hour, which the uncertainty and danger of their situation made seem almost thrice as long, the voice of young Hazlewood was heard without. ‘Here I am,’ he cried, ‘with a sufficient party.’
‘Come in then,’ answered Bertram, not a little pleased to find his guard relieved. Hazlewood then entered, followed by two or three countrymen, one of whom acted as a peace-officer. They lifted Hatteraick up and carried him in their arms as far as the entrance of the vault was high enough to permit them; then laid him on his back and dragged him along as well as they could, for no persuasion would induce him to assist the transportation by any exertion of his own. He lay as silent and inactive in their hands as a dead corpse, incapable of opposing, but in no way aiding, their operations. When he was dragged into daylight and placed erect upon his feet among three or four assistants who had remained without the cave, he seemed stupefied and dazzled by the sudden change from the darkness of his cavern. While others were superintending the removal of Meg Merrilies, those who remained with Hatteraick attempted to make him sit down upon a fragment of rock which lay close upon the high-water mark. A strong shuddering convulsed his iron frame for an instant as he resisted their purpose. ‘Not there! Hagel! you would not make me sit THERE?’
These were the only words he spoke; but their import, and the deep tone of horror in which they were uttered, served to show what was passing in his mind.
When Meg Merrilies had also been removed from the cavern, with all the care for her safety that circumstances admitted, they consulted where she should be carried. Hazlewood had sent for a surgeon, and proposed that she should be lifted in the meantime to the nearest cottage. But the patient exclaimed with great earnestness, ‘Na, na, na! to the Kaim o’ Derncleugh--the Kaim o’ Derncleugh; the spirit will not free itself o’ the flesh but there.’
‘You must indulge her, I believe,’ said Bertram; ‘her troubled imagination will otherwise aggravate the fever of the wound.’
They bore her accordingly to the vault. On the way her mind seemed to run more upon the scene which had just passed than on her own approaching death. ‘There were three of them set upon him: I brought the twasome, but wha was the third? It would be HIMSELL, returned to work his ain vengeance!’
It was evident that the unexpected appearance of Hazlewood, whose person the outrage of Hatteraick left her no time to recognise, had produced a strong effect on her imagination. She often recurred to it. Hazlewood accounted for his unexpected arrival to Bertram by saying that he had kept them in view for some time by the direction of Mannering; that, observing them disappear into the cave, he had crept after them, meaning to announce himself and his errand, when his hand in the darkness encountering the leg of Dinmont had nearly produced a catastrophe, which, indeed, nothing but the presence of mind and fortitude of the bold yeoman could have averted.
When the gipsy arrived at the hut she produced the key; and when they entered, and were about to deposit her upon the bed, she said, in an anxious tone, ‘Na, na! not that way--the feet to the east’; and appeared gratified when they reversed her posture accordingly, and placed her in that appropriate to a dead body.
‘Is there no clergyman near,’ said Bertram, ‘to assist this unhappy woman’s devotions?’
A gentleman, the minister of the parish, who had been Charles Hazlewood’s tutor, had, with many others, caught the alarm that the murderer of Kennedy was taken on the spot where the deed had been done so many years before, and that a woman was mortally wounded. From curiosity, or rather from the feeling that his duty called him to scenes of distress, this gentleman had come to the Kaim of Derncleugh, and now presented himself. The surgeon arrived at the same time, and was about to probe the wound; but Meg resisted the assistance of either. ‘It’s no what man can do that will heal my body or save my spirit. Let me speak what I have to say, and then ye may work your will; I’se be nae hindrance. But where’s Henry Bertram?’ The assistants, to whom this name had been long a stranger, gazed upon each other. ‘Yes!’ she said, in a stronger and harsher tone, ‘I said HENRY BERTRAM OF ELLANGOWAN. Stand from the light and let me see him.’
All eyes were turned towards Bertram, who approached the wretched couch. The wounded woman took hold of his hand. ‘Look at him,’ she said, ‘all that ever saw his father or his grandfather, and bear witness if he is not their living image?’ A murmur went through the crowd; the resemblance was too striking to be denied. ‘And now hear me; and let that man,’ pointing to Hatteraick, who was seated with his keepers on a sea-chest at some distance--’let him deny what I say if he can. That is Henry Bertram, son to Godfrey Bertram, umquhile of Ellangowan; that young man is the very lad-bairn that Dirk Hatteraick carried off from Warroch wood the day that he murdered the gauger. I was there like a wandering spirit, for I longed to see that wood or we left the country. I saved the bairn’s life, and sair, sair I prigged and prayed they would leave him wi’ me. But they bore him away, and he’s been lang ower the sea, and now he’s come for his ain, and what should withstand him? I swore to keep the secret till he was ane-an’-twenty; I kenn’d he behoved to dree his weird till that day cam. I keepit that oath which I took to them; but I made another vow to mysell, that if I lived to see the day of his return I would set him in his father’s seat, if every step was on a dead man. I have keepit that oath too. I will be ae step mysell, he (pointing to Hatteraick) will soon be another, and there will be ane mair yet.’
The clergyman, now interposing, remarked it was a pity this deposition was not regularly taken and written down, and the surgeon urged the necessity of examining the wound, previously to exhausting her by questions. When she saw them removing Hatteraick, in order to clear the room and leave the surgeon to his operations, she called out aloud, raising herself at the same time upon the couch, ‘Dirk Hatteraick, you and I will never meet again until we are before the judgment-seat; will ye own to what I have said, or will you dare deny it?’ He turned his hardened brow upon her, with a look of dumb and inflexible defiance. ‘Dirk Hatteraick, dare ye deny, with my blood upon your hands, one word of what my dying breath is uttering?’ He looked at her with the same expression of hardihood and dogged stubbornness, and moved his lips, but uttered no sound. ‘Then fareweel!’ she said, ‘and God forgive you! your hand has sealed my evidence. When I was in life I was the mad randy gipsy, that had been scourged and banished and branded; that had begged from door to door, and been hounded like a stray tyke from parish to parish; wha would hae minded HER tale? But now I am a dying woman, and my words will not fall to the ground, any more than the earth will cover my blood!’
She here paused, and all left the hut except the surgeon and two or three women. After a very short examination he shook his head and resigned his post by the dying woman’s side to the clergyman.
A chaise returning empty to Kippletringan had been stopped on the highroad by a constable, who foresaw it would be necessary to convey Hatteraick to jail. The driver, understanding what was going on at Derncleugh, left his horses to the care of a blackguard boy, confiding, it is to be supposed, rather in the years and discretion of the cattle than in those of their keeper, and set off full speed to see, as he expressed himself, ‘whaten a sort o’ fun was gaun on.’ He arrived just as the group of tenants and peasants, whose numbers increased every moment, satiated with gazing upon the rugged features of Hatteraick, had turned their attention towards Bertram. Almost all of them, especially the aged men who had seen Ellangowan in his better days, felt and acknowledged the justice of Meg Merrilies’s appeal. But the Scotch are a cautious people: they remembered there was another in possession of the estate, and they as yet only expressed their feelings in low whispers to each other. Our friend Jock Jabos, the postilion, forced his way into the middle of the circle; but no sooner cast his eyes upon Bertram than he started back in amazement, with a solemn exclamation, ‘As sure as there’s breath in man, it’s auld Ellangowan arisen from the dead!’
This public declaration of an unprejudiced witness was just the spark wanted to give fire to the popular feeling, which burst forth in three distinct shouts: ‘Bertram for ever!’ ‘Long life to the heir of Ellangowan!’ ‘God send him his ain, and to live among us as his forebears did of yore!’
‘I hae been seventy years on the land,’ said one person.
‘I and mine hae been seventy and seventy to that,’ said another; ‘I have a right to ken the glance of a Bertram.’
‘I and mine hae been three hundred years here,’ said another old man, ‘and I sail sell my last cow, but I’ll see the young Laird placed in his right.’
The women, ever delighted with the marvellous, and not less so when a handsome young man is the subject of the tale, added their shrill acclamations to the general all-hail. ‘Blessings on him; he’s the very picture o’ his father! The Bertrams were aye the wale o’ the country side!’
‘Eh! that his puir mother, that died in grief and in doubt about him, had but lived to see this day!’ exclaimed some female voices.
‘But we’ll help him to his ain, kimmers,’ cried others; ‘and before Glossin sail keep the Place of Ellangowan we’ll howk him out o’t wi’ our nails!’
Others crowded around Dinmont, who was nothing both to tell what he knew of his friend, and to boast the honour which he had in contributing to the discovery. As he was known to several of the principal farmers present, his testimony afforded an additional motive to the general enthusiasm. In short, it was one of those moments of intense feeling when the frost of the Scottish people melts like a snow-wreath, and the dissolving torrent carries dam and dyke before it.
The sudden shouts interrupted the devotions of the clergyman; and Meg, who was in one of those dozing fits of stupefaction that precede the close of existence, suddenly started--’Dinna ye hear? dinna ye hear? He’s owned! he’s owned! I lived but for this. I am a sinfu’ woman; but if my curse brought it down, my blessing has taen it off! And now I wad hae liked to hae said mair. But it canna be. Stay’--she continued, stretching her head towards the gleam of light that shot through the narrow slit which served for a window--’is he not there? Stand out o’ the light, and let me look upon him ance mair. But the darkness is in my ain een,’ she said, sinking back, after an earnest gaze upon vacuity; ‘it’s a’ ended now,
Pass breath,
Come death!’
And, sinking back upon her couch of straw, she expired without a groan. The clergyman and the surgeon carefully noted down all that she had said, now deeply regretting they had not examined her more minutely, but both remaining morally convinced of the truth of her disclosure.
Hazlewood was the first to compliment Bertram upon the near prospect of his being restored to his name and rank in society. The people around, who now learned from Jabos that Bertram was the person who had wounded him, were struck with his generosity, and added his name to Bertram’s in their exulting acclamations.
Some, however, demanded of the postilion how he had not recognised Bertram when he saw him some time before at Kippletringan. To which he gave the very natural answer--’Hout, what was I thinking about Ellangowan then? It was the cry that was rising e’en now that the young Laird was found, that put me on finding out the likeness. There was nae missing it ance ane was set to look for’t.’
The obduracy of Hatteraick during the latter part of this scene was in some slight degree shaken. He was observed to twinkle with his eyelids; to attempt to raise his bound hands for the purpose of pulling his hat over his brow; to look angrily and impatiently to the road, as if anxious for the vehicle which was to remove him from the spot. At length Mr. Hazlewood, apprehensive that the popular ferment might take a direction towards the prisoner, directed he should be taken to the post-chaise, and so removed to the town of Kippletringan, to be at Mr. Mac-Morlan’s disposal; at the same time he sent an express to warn that gentleman of what had happened. ‘And now,’ he said to Bertram, ‘I should be happy if you would accompany me to Hazlewood House; but as that might not be so agreeable just now as I trust it will be in a day or two, you must allow me to return with you to Woodbourne. But you are on foot.’--’O, if the young Laird would take my horse!’--’Or mine’--’Or mine,’ said half-a-dozen voices.--’Or mine; he can trot ten mile an hour without whip or spur, and he’s the young Laird’s frae this moment, if he likes to take him for a herezeld, [Footnote: See Note 8.] as they ca’d it lang syne.’ Bertram readily accepted the horse as a loan, and poured forth his thanks to the assembled crowd for their good wishes, which they repaid with shouts and vows of attachment.
While the happy owner was directing one lad to ‘gae doun for the new saddle’; another,’ just to rin the beast ower wi’ a dry wisp o’ strae’; a third, ‘to hie doun and borrow Dan Dunkieson’s plated stirrups,’ and expressing his regret ‘that there was nae time to gie the nag a feed, that the young Laird might ken his mettle,’ Bertram, taking the clergyman by the arm, walked into the vault and shut the door immediately after them. He gazed in silence for some minutes upon the body of Meg Merrilies, as it lay before him, with the features sharpened by death, yet still retaining the stern and energetic character which had maintained in life her superiority as the wild chieftainess of the lawless people amongst whom she was born. The young soldier dried the tears which involuntarily rose on viewing this wreck of one who might be said to have died a victim to her fidelity to his person and family. He then took the clergyman’s hand and asked solemnly if she appeared able to give that attention to his devotions which befitted a departing person.
‘My dear sir,’ said the good minister, ‘I trust this poor woman had remaining sense to feel and join in the import of my prayers. But let us humbly hope we are judged of by our opportunities of religious and moral instruction. In some degree she might be considered as an uninstructed heathen, even in the bosom of a Christian country; and let us remember that the errors and vices of an ignorant life were balanced by instances of disinterested attachment, amounting almost to heroism. To HIM who can alone weigh our crimes and errors against our efforts towards virtue we consign her with awe, but not without hope.’
‘May I request,’ said Bertram, ‘that you will see every decent solemnity attended to in behalf of this poor woman? I have some property belonging to her in my hands; at all events I will be answerable for the expense. You will hear of me at Woodbourne.’
Dinmont, who had been furnished with a horse by one of his acquaintance, now loudly called out that all was ready for their return; and Bertram and Hazlewood, after a strict exhortation to the crowd, which was now increased to several hundreds, to preserve good order in their rejoicing, as the least ungoverned zeal might be turned to the disadvantage of the young Laird, as they termed him, took their leave amid the shouts of the multitude.
As they rode past the ruined cottages at Derncleugh, Dinmont said, ‘I’m sure when ye come to your ain, Captain, ye’ll no forget to bigg a bit cot-house there? Deil be in me but I wad do’t mysell, an it werena in better hands. I wadna like to live in’t, though, after what she said. Od, I wad put in auld Elspeth, the bedral’s widow; the like o’ them’s used wi’ graves and ghaists and thae things.’
A short but brisk ride brought them to Woodbourne. The news of their exploit had already flown far and wide, and the whole inhabitants of the vicinity met them on the lawn with shouts of congratulation. ‘That you have seen me alive,’ said Bertram to Lucy, who first ran up to him, though Julia’s eyes even anticipated hers, ‘you must thank these kind friends.’
With a blush expressing at once pleasure, gratitude, and bashfulness, Lucy curtsied to Hazlewood, but to Dinmont she frankly extended her hand. The honest farmer, in the extravagance of his joy, carried his freedom farther than the hint warranted, for he imprinted his thanks on the lady’s lips, and was instantly shocked at the rudeness of his own conduct. ‘Lord sake, madam, I ask your pardon,’ he said. ‘I forgot but ye had been a bairn o’my ain; the Captain’s sae namely, he gars ane forget himsell.’
Old Pleydell now advanced. ‘Nay, if fees like these are going,’ he said--
‘Stop, stop, Mr. Pleydell,’ said Julia, ‘you had your fees beforehand; remember last night.’
‘Why, I do confess a retainer,’ said the Barrister; ‘but if I don’t deserve double fees from both Miss Bertram and you when I conclude my examination of Dirk Hatteraick to-morrow--Gad, I will so supple him! You shall see, Colonel; and you, my saucy misses, though you may not see, shall hear.’
‘Ay, that’s if we choose to listen, Counsellor,’ replied Julia.
‘And you think,’ said Pleydell, ‘it’s two to one you won’t choose that? But you have curiosity that teaches you the use of your ears now and then.’
‘I declare, Counsellor,’ answered the lively damsel, ‘that such saucy bachelors as you would teach us the use of our fingers now and then.’
‘Reserve them for the harpsichord, my love,’ said the Counsellor. ‘Better for all parties.’
While this idle chat ran on, Colonel Mannering introduced to Bertram a plain good-looking man, in a grey coat and waistcoat, buckskin breeches, and boots. ‘This, my dear sir, is Mr. Mac-Morlan.’
‘To whom,’ said Bertram, embracing him cordially, ‘my sister was indebted for a home, when deserted by all her natural friends and relations.’
The Dominie then pressed forward, grinned, chuckled, made a diabolical sound in attempting to whistle, and finally, unable to stifle his emotions, ran away to empty the feelings of his heart at his eyes.
We shall not attempt to describe the expansion of heart and glee of this happy evening.
CHAPTER XXVII
How like a hateful ape,
Detected grinning ‘midst his pilfer’d hoard,
A cunning man appears, whose secret frauds
Are open’d to the day!
Count Basil
There was a great movement at Woodbourne early on the following morning to attend the examination at Kippletringan. Mr. Pleydell, from the investigation which he had formerly bestowed on the dark affair of Kennedy’s death, as well as from the general deference due to his professional abilities, was requested by Mr. Mac-Morlan and Sir Robert Hazlewood, and another justice of peace who attended, to take the situation of chairman and the lead in the examination. Colonel Mannering was invited to sit down with them. The examination, being previous to trial, was private in other respects.
The Counsellor resumed and reinterrogated former evidence. He then examined the clergyman and surgeon respecting the dying declaration of Meg Merrilies. They stated that she distinctly, positively, and repeatedly declared herself an eye-witness of Kennedy’s death by the hands of Hatteraick and two or three of his crew; that her presence was accidental; that she believed their resentment at meeting him, when they were in the act of losing their vessel through the means of his information, led to the commission of the crime; that she said there was one witness of the murder, but who refused to participate in it, still alive--her nephew, Gabriel Faa; and she had hinted at another person who was an accessory after, not before, the fact; but her strength there failed her. They did not forget to mention her declaration that she had saved the child, and that he was torn from her by the smugglers for the purpose of carrying him to Holland. All these particulars were carefully reduced to writing.
Dirk Hatteraick was then brought in, heavily ironed; for he had been strictly secured and guarded, owing to his former escape. He was asked his name; he made no answer. His profession; he was silent. Several other questions were put, to none of which he returned any reply. Pleydell wiped the glasses of his spectacles and considered the prisoner very attentively. ‘A very truculent-looking fellow,’ he whispered to Mannering; ‘but, as Dogberry says, I’ll go cunningly to work with him. Here, call in Soles--Soles the shoemaker. Soles, do you remember measuring some footsteps imprinted on the mud at the wood of Warroch on--November 17--, by my orders?’ Soles remembered the circumstance perfectly. ‘Look at that paper; is that your note of the measurement?’ Soles verified the memorandum. ‘Now, there stands a pair of shoes on that table; measure them, and see if they correspond with any of the marks you have noted there.’ The shoemaker obeyed, and declared ‘that they answered exactly to the largest of the footprints.’
‘We shall prove,’ said the Counsellor, aside to Mannering, ‘that these shoes, which were found in the ruins at Derncleugh, belonged to Brown, the fellow whom you shot on the lawn at Woodbourne. Now, Soles, measure that prisoner’s feet very accurately.’
Mannering observed Hatteraick strictly, and could notice a visible tremor. ‘Do these measurements correspond with any of the footprints?’
The man looked at the note, then at his foot-rule and measure, then verified his former measurement by a second. ‘They correspond,’ he said, ‘within a hair-breadth to a foot-mark broader and shorter than the former.’
Hatteraick’s genius here deserted him. ‘Der deyvil!’ he broke out, ‘how could there be a footmark on the ground, when it was a frost as hard as the heart of a Memel log?’
‘In the evening, I grant you, Captain Hatteraick,’ said Pleydell, ‘but not in the forenoon. Will you favour me with information where you were upon the day you remember so exactly?’
Hatteraick saw his blunder, and again screwed up his hard features for obstinate silence. ‘Put down his observation, however,’ said Pleydell to the clerk.
At this moment the door opened, and, much to the surprise of most present, Mr. Gilbert Glossin made his appearance. That worthy gentleman had, by dint of watching and eavesdropping, ascertained that he was not mentioned by name in Meg Merrilies’s dying declaration--a circumstance certainly not owing to any favourable disposition towards him, but to the delay of taking her regular examination, and to the rapid approach of death. He therefore supposed himself safe from all evidence but such as might arise from Hatteraick’s confession; to prevent which he resolved to push a bold face and join his brethren of the bench during his examination. ‘I shall be able,’ he thought, ‘to make the rascal sensible his safety lies in keeping his own counsel and mine; and my presence, besides, will be a proof of confidence and innocence. If I must lose the estate, I must; but I trust better things.’
He entered with a profound salutation to Sir Robert Hazlewood. Sir Robert, who had rather begun to suspect that his plebeian neighbour had made a cat’s paw of him, inclined his head stiffly, took snuff, and looked another way.
‘Mr. Corsand,’ said Glossin to the other yokefellow of justice, ‘your most humble servant.’
‘Your humble servant, Mr. Glossin,’ answered Mr. Corsand drily, composing his countenance regis ad exemplar, that is to say, after the fashion of the Baronet.
‘Mac-Morlan, my worthy friend,’ continued Glossin, ‘how d’ ye do; always on your duty?’
‘Umph,’ said honest Mac-Morlan, with little respect either to the compliment or salutation.
‘Colonel Mannering (a low bow slightly returned), and Mr. Pleydell (another low bow), I dared not have hoped for your assistance to poor country gentlemen at this period of the session.’
Pleydell took snuff, and eyed him with a glance equally shrewd and sarcastic. ‘I’ll teach him,’ he said aside to Mannering, ‘the value of the old admonition, Ne accesseris in consilium antequam voceris.’
‘But perhaps I intrude, gentlemen?’ said Glossin, who could not fail to observe the coldness of his reception. ‘Is this an open meeting?’
‘For my part,’ said Mr. Pleydell, ‘so far from considering your attendance as an intrusion, Mr. Glossin, I was never so pleased in my life to meet with you; especially as I think we should, at any rate, have had occasion to request the favour of your company in the course of the day.’
‘Well, then, gentlemen,’ said Glossin, drawing his chair to the table, and beginning to bustle about among the papers, ‘where are we? how far have we got? where are the declarations?’
‘Clerk, give me all these papers,’ said Mr. Pleydell. ‘I have an odd way of arranging my documents, Mr. Glossin, another person touching them puts me out; but I shall have occasion for your assistance by and by.’
Glossin, thus reduced to inactivity, stole one glance at Dirk Hatteraick, but could read nothing in his dark scowl save malignity and hatred to all around. ‘But, gentlemen,’ said Glossin, ‘is it quite right to keep this poor man so heavily ironed when he is taken up merely for examination?’
This was hoisting a kind of friendly signal to the prisoner. ‘He has escaped once before,’ said Mac-Morlan drily, and Glossin was silenced.
Bertram was now introduced, and, to Glossin’s confusion, was greeted in the most friendly manner by all present, even by Sir Robert Hazlewood himself. He told his recollections of his infancy with that candour and caution of expression which afforded the best warrant for his good faith. ‘This seems to be rather a civil than a criminal question,’ said Glossin, rising; ‘and as you cannot be ignorant, gentlemen, of the effect which this young person’s pretended parentage may have on my patrimonial interest, I would rather beg leave to retire.’
‘No, my good sir,’ said Mr. Pleydell, ‘we can by no means spare you. But why do you call this young man’s claims pretended? I don’t mean to fish for your defences against them, if you have any, but--’
‘Mr. Pleydell,’ replied Glossin, ‘I am always disposed to act above-board, and I think I can explain the matter at once. This young fellow, whom I take to be a natural son of the late Ellangowan, has gone about the country for some weeks under different names, caballing with a wretched old mad-woman, who, I understand, was shot in a late scuffle, and with other tinkers, gipsies, and persons of that description, and a great brute farmer from Liddesdale, stirring up the tenants against their landlords, which, as Sir Robert Hazlewood of Hazlewood knows--’
‘Not to interrupt you, Mr. Glossin,’ said Pleydell, ‘I ask who you say this young man is?’
‘Why, I say,’ replied Glossin, ‘and I believe that gentleman (looking at Hatteraick) knows, that the young man is a natural son of the late Ellangowan, by a girl called Janet Lightoheel, who was afterwards married to Hewit the shipwright, that lived in the neighbourhood of Annan. His name is Godfrey Bertram Hewit, by which name he was entered on board the Royal Caroline excise yacht.’
‘Ay?’ said Pleydell, ‘that is a very likely story! But, not to pause upon some difference of eyes, complexion, and so forth--be pleased to step forward, sir.’ (A young seafaring man came forward.) ‘Here,’ proceeded the Counsellor, ‘is the real Simon Pure; here’s Godfrey Bertram Hewit, arrived last night from Antigua via Liverpool, mate of a West-Indian, and in a fair way of doing well in the world, although he came somewhat irregularly into it.’
While some conversation passed between the other justices and this young man, Pleydell lifted from among the papers on the table Hatteraick’s old pocket-book. A peculiar glance of the smuggler’s eye induced the shrewd lawyer to think there was something here of interest. He therefore continued the examination of the papers, laying the book on the table, but instantly perceived that the prisoner’s interest in the research had cooled. ‘It must be in the book still, whatever it is,’ thought Pleydell; and again applied himself to the pocket-book, until he discovered, on a narrow scrutiny, a slit between the pasteboard and leather, out of which he drew three small slips of paper. Pleydell now, turning to Glossin, requested the favour that he would tell them if he had assisted at the search for the body of Kennedy and the child of his patron on the day when they disappeared.
‘I did not--that is, I did,’ answered the conscience-struck Glossin.
‘It is remarkable though,’ said the Advocate, ‘that, connected as you were with the Ellangowan family, I don’t recollect your being examined, or even appearing before me, while that investigation was proceeding?’
‘I was called to London,’ answered Glossin, ‘on most important business the morning after that sad affair.’
‘Clerk,’ said Pleydell, ‘minute down that reply. I presume the business, Mr. Glossin, was to negotiate these three bills, drawn by you on Messrs. Vanbeest and Vanbruggen, and accepted by one Dirk Hatteraick in their name on the very day of the murder. I congratulate you on their being regularly retired, as I perceive they have been. I think the chances were against it.’ Glossin’s countenance fell. ‘This piece of real evidence,’ continued Mr. Pleydell, ‘makes good the account given of your conduct on this occasion by a man called Gabriel Faa, whom we have now in custody, and who witnessed the whole transaction between you and that worthy prisoner. Have you any explanation to give?’
‘Mr. Pleydell,’ said Glossin, with great composure, ‘I presume, if you were my counsel, you would not advise me to answer upon the spur of the moment to a charge which the basest of mankind seem ready to establish by perjury.’
‘My advice,’ said the Counsellor, ‘would be regulated by my opinion of your innocence or guilt. In your case, I believe you take the wisest course; but you are aware you must stand committed?’
‘Committed? for what, sir?’ replied Glossin. ‘Upon a charge of murder?’
‘No; only as art and part of kidnapping the child.’
‘That is a bailable offence.’
‘Pardon me,’ said Pleydell, ‘it is plagium, and plagium is felony.’
‘Forgive me, Mr. Pleydell, there is only one case upon record, Torrence and Waldie. They were, you remember, resurrection-women, who had promised to procure a child’s body for some young surgeons. Being upon honour to their employers, rather than disappoint the evening lecture of the students, they stole a live child, murdered it, and sold the body for three shillings and sixpence. They were hanged, but for the murder, not for the plagium [Footnote: This is, in its circumstances and issue, actually a case tried and reported.]--Your civil law has carried you a little too far.’
‘Well, sir, but in the meantime Mr. Mac-Morlan must commit you to the county jail, in case this young man repeats the same story. Officers, remove Mr. Glossin and Hatteraick, and guard them in different apartments.’
Gabriel, the gipsy, was then introduced, and gave a distinct account of his deserting from Captain Pritchard’s vessel and joining the smugglers in the action, detailed how Dirk Hatteraick set fire to his ship when he found her disabled, and under cover of the smoke escaped with his crew, and as much goods as they could save, into the cavern, where they proposed to lie till nightfall. Hatteraick himself, his mate Vanbeest Brown, and three others, of whom the declarant was one, went into the adjacent woods to communicate with some of their friends in the neighbourhood. They fell in with Kennedy unexpectedly, and Hatteraick and Brown, aware that he was the occasion of their disasters, resolved to murder him. He stated that he had seen them lay violent hands on the officer and drag him through the woods, but had not partaken in the assault nor witnessed its termination; that he returned to the cavern by a different route, where he again met Hatteraick and his accomplices; and the captain was in the act of giving an account how he and Brown had pushed a huge crag over, as Kennedy lay groaning on the beach, when Glossin suddenly appeared among them. To the whole transaction by which Hatteraick purchased his secrecy he was witness. Respecting young Bertram, he could give a distinct account till he went to India, after which he had lost sight of him until he unexpectedly met with him in Liddesdale. Gabriel Faa farther stated that he instantly sent notice to his aunt Meg Merrilies, as well as to Hatteraick, who he knew was then upon the coast; but that he had incurred his aunt’s displeasure upon the latter account. He concluded, that his aunt had immediately declared that she would do all that lay in her power to help young Ellangowan to his right, even if it should be by informing against Dirk Hatteraick; and that many of her people assisted her besides himself, from a belief that she was gifted with supernatural inspirations. With the same purpose, he understood his aunt had given to Bertram the treasure of the tribe, of which she had the custody. Three or four gipsies, by the express command of Meg Merrilies, mingled in the crowd when the custom-house was attacked, for the purpose of liberating Bertram, which he had himself effected. He said, that in obeying Meg’s dictates they did not pretend to estimate their propriety or rationality, the respect in which she was held by her tribe precluding all such subjects of speculation. Upon farther interrogation, the witness added, that his aunt had always said that Harry Bertram carried that round his neck which would ascertain his birth. It was a spell, she said, that an Oxford scholar had made for him, and she possessed the smugglers with an opinion that to deprive him of it would occasion the loss of the vessel.
Bertram here produced a small velvet bag, which he said he had worn round his neck from his earliest infancy, and which he had preserved, first from superstitious reverence, and latterly from the hope that it might serve one day to aid in the discovery of his birth. The bag, being opened, was found to contain a blue silk case, from which was drawn a scheme of nativity. Upon inspecting this paper, Colonel Mannering instantly admitted it was his own composition; and afforded the strongest and most satisfactory evidence that the possessor of it must necessarily be the young heir of Ellangowan, by avowing his having first appeared in that country in the character of an astrologer.