In the small hours of the following night the pulse of Thrums stopped for a moment, and then went on again, but the only watcher remained silent, and the people rose in the morning without knowing that they had lost one of their number while they slept. In the same ignorance they toiled through a long day.
It was a close October day in the end of a summer that had lingered to give the countryside nothing better than a second crop of haws. Beneath the beeches leaves lay in yellow heaps like sliced turnip, and over all the strath was a pink haze; the fields were singed brown, except where a recent ploughing gave them a mourning border. From early morn men, women and children (Tommy among them) were in the fields taking up their potatoes, half-a-dozen gatherers at first to every drill, and by noon it seemed a dozen, though the new-comers were but stout sacks, now able to stand alone. By and by heavy-laden carts were trailing into Thrums, dog-tired toilers hanging on behind, not to be dragged, but for an incentive to keep them trudging, boys and girls falling asleep on top of the load, and so neglecting to enjoy the ride which was their recompense for lifting. A growing mist mixed with the daylight, and still there were a few people out, falling over their feet with fatigue; it took silent possession, and then the shadowy forms left in the fields were motionless and would remain there until carted to garrets and kitchen corners and other winter quarters on Monday morning. There were few gad-abouts that Saturday night. Washings were not brought in, though Mr. Dishart had preached against the unseemly sight of linen hanging on the line on the Sabbath-day. Innes, stravaiging the square and wynds in his apple-cart, jingled his weights in vain, unable to shake even moneyed children off their stools, and when at last he told his beast to go home they took with them all the stir of the town. Family exercise came on early in many houses, and as the gude wife handed her man the Bible she said entreatingly, "A short ane." After that one might have said that no earthly knock could bring them to their doors, yet within an hour the town was in a ferment.
When Tommy and Elspeth reached the Den the mist lay so thick that they had to feel their way through it to the Ailie, where they found Gavinia alone and scared. "Was you peeping in, trying to fleg me twa three minutes syne?" she asked, eagerly, and when they shook their heads, she looked cold with fear.
"As sure as death," she said, "there was some living thing standing there; I couldna see it for the rime, but I heard it breathing hard."
Tommy felt Elspeth's hand begin to tremble, and he said "McLean!" hastily, though he knew that McLean had not yet left the Quharity Arms. Next moment Corp arrived with another story as unnerving.
"Has Grizel no come yet?" he asked, in a troubled voice. "Tommy, hearken to this, a light has been burning in Double Dykes and the door swinging open a' day! I saw it mysel', and so did Willum Dods."
"Did you go close?"
"Na faags! Willum was hol'ing and I was lifting, so we hadna time in the daylight, and wha would venture near the Painted Lady's house on sic a night?"
Even Tommy felt uneasy, but when Gavinia cried, "There's something uncanny in being out the night; tell us what was in Mr. McLean's bottle, Tommy, and syne we'll run hame," he became Commander Sandys again, and replied, blankly, "What bottle?"
"The ane I warned you he was to fling into the water; dinna dare tell me you hinna got it."
"I know not what thou art speaking about," said Tommy; "but it's a queer thing, it's a queer thing, Gavinia"—here he fixed her with his terrifying eye—"I happen to have found a—another bottle," and still glaring at her he explained that he had found his bottle floating on the horizon. It contained a letter to him, which he now read aloud. It was signed "The Villain Stroke, his mark," and announced that the writer, "tired of this relentless persecution," had determined to reform rather than be killed. "Meet me at the Cuttle Well, on Saturday, when the eight-o'clock bell is ringing," he wrote, "and I shall there make you an offer for my freedom."
The crew received this communication with shouts, Gavinia's cry of "Five shillings, if no ten!" expressing the general sentiment, but it would not have been like Tommy to think with them. "You poor things," he said, "you just believe everything you're telled! How do I know that this is not a trick of Stroke's to bring me here when he is some other gait working mischief?"
Corp was impressed, but Gavinia said, short-sightedly, "There's no sign o't."
"There's ower much sign o't," retorted Tommy. "What's this story about Double Dykes? And how do we ken that there hasna been foul work there, and this man at the bottom o't? I tell you, before the world's half an hour older, I'll find out," and he looked significantly at Corp, who answered, quaking, "I winna gang by mysel', no, Tommy, I winna!"
So Tommy had to accompany him, saying, valiantly, "I'm no feared, and this rime is fine for hodding in," to which Corp replied, as firmly, "Neither am I, and we can aye keep touching cauld iron." Before they were half way down the Double Dykes they got a thrill, for they realized, simultaneously, that they were being followed. They stopped and gripped each other hard, but now they could hear nothing.
"The Painted Lady!" Corp whispered.
"Stroke!" Tommy replied, as cautiously. He was excited rather than afraid, and had the pluck to cry, "Wha's that? I see you!"—but no answer came back through the mist, and now the boys had a double reason for pressing forward.
"Can you see the house, Corp?"
"It should be here about, but it's smored in rime."
"I'm touching the paling. I ken the road to the window now."
"Hark! What's that?"
It sounded like devil's music in front of them, and they fell back until Corp remembered, "It maun be the door swinging open, and squealing and moaning on its hinges. Tommy, I take ill wi' that. What can it mean?"
"I'm here to find out." They reached the window where Tommy had watched once before, and looking in together saw the room plainly by the light of a lamp which stood on the spinet. There was no one inside, but otherwise Tommy noticed little change. The fire was out, having evidently burned itself done, the bed-clothes were in some disorder. To avoid the creaking door, the boys passed round the back of the house to the window of the other room. This room was without a light, but its door stood open and sufficient light came from the kitchen to show that it also was untenanted. It seemed to have been used as a lumber-room.
The boys turned to go, passing near the front of the empty house, where they shivered and stopped, mastered by a feeling they could not have explained. The helpless door, like the staring eyes of a dead person, seemed to be calling to them to shut it, and Tommy was about to steal forward for this purpose when Corp gripped him and whispered that the light had gone out. It was true, though Tommy disbelieved until they had returned to the east window to make sure.
"There maun be folk in the hoose, Tommy!"
"You saw it was toom. The lamp had gone out itself, or else—what's that?"
It was the unmistakable closing of a door, softly but firmly. "The wind has blown it to," they tried to persuade themselves, though aware that there was not sufficient wind for this. After a long period of stillness they gathered courage to go to the door and shake it. It was not only shut, but locked.
On their way back through the Double Dykes they were silent, listening painfully but hearing nothing. But when they reached the Coffin Brig Tommy said, "Dinna say nothing about this to Elspeth, it would terrify her;" he was always so thoughtful for Elspeth.
"But what do you think o't a'?" Corp said, imploringly.
"I winna tell you yet," replied Tommy, cautiously.
When they boarded the Ailie, where the two girls were very glad to see them again, the eight-o'clock bell had begun to ring, and thus Tommy had a reasonable excuse for hurrying his crew to the Cuttle Well without saying anything of his expedition to Double Dykes, save that he had not seen Grizel. At the Well they had not long to wait before Mr. McLean suddenly appeared out of the mist, and to their astonishment Miss Ailie was leaning on his arm. She was blushing and smiling too, in a way pretty to see, though it spoilt the effect of Stroke's statement.
The first thing Stroke did was to give up his sword to Tommy and to apologize for its being an umbrella on account of the unsettled state of the weather, and then Corp led three cheers, the captain alone declining to join in, for he had an uneasy feeling that he was being ridiculed.
"But I thought there were five of you," Mr. McLean said; "where is the fifth?"
"You ken best," replied Tommy, sulkily, and sulky he remained throughout the scene, because he knew he was not the chief figure in it. Having this knowledge to depress him, it is to his credit that he bore himself with dignity throughout, keeping his crew so well in hand that they dared not give expression to their natural emotions.
"As you are aware, Mr. Sandys," McLean began solemnly, "I have come here to sue for pardon. It is not yours to give, you reply, the Queen alone can pardon, and I grant it; but, sir, is it not well known to all of us that you can get anything out of her you like?"
Tommy's eyes roved suspiciously, but the suppliant proceeded in the same tone. "What are my offences? The first is that I have been bearing arms (unwittingly) against the Throne; the second, that I have brought trouble to the lady by my side, who has the proud privilege of calling you her friend. But, Sandys, such amends as can come from an erring man I now offer to make most contritely. Intercede with Her Majesty on my behalf, and on my part I promise to war against her no more. I am willing to settle down in the neighboring town as a law-abiding citizen, whom you can watch with eagle eye. Say, what more wouldst thou of the unhappy Stuart?"
But Tommy would say nothing, he only looked doubtfully at Miss Ailie, and that set McLean off again. "You ask what reparation I shall make to this lady? Sandys, I tell thee that here also thou hast proved too strong for me. In the hope that she would plead for me with you, I have been driven to offer her my hand in marriage, and she is willing to take me if thou grantest thy consent."
At this Gavinia jumped with joy, and then cried, "Up wi' her!" words whose bearing the school-mistress fortunately did not understand. All save Tommy looked at Miss Ailie, and she put her arm on Mr. McLean's, and, yes, it was obvious, Miss Ailie was a lover at the Cuttle Well at last, like so many others. She had often said that the Den parade was vulgar, but she never said it again.
It was unexpected news to Tommy, but that was not what lowered his head in humiliation now. In the general rejoicing he had been nigh forgotten; even Elspeth was hanging on Miss Ailie's skirts, Gavinia had eyes for none but lovers, Corp was rapturously examining five half-crowns that had been dropped into his hands for distribution. Had Tommy given an order now, who would have obeyed it? His power was gone, his crew would not listen to another word against Mr. McLean.
"Tommy thought Mr. McLean hated you!" said Elspeth to Miss Ailie.
"It was queer you made sic a mistake!" said Corp to Tommy.
"Oh, the tattie-doolie!" cried Gavinia.
So they knew that Mr. McLean had only been speaking sarcastically; of a sudden they saw through and despised their captain. Tears of mortification rose in Tommy's eyes, and kind-hearted Miss Ailie saw them, and she thought it was her lover's irony that made him smart. She had said little hitherto, but now she put her hand on his shoulder, and told them all that she did indeed owe the supreme joy that had come to her to him. "No, Gavinia," she said, blushing, "I will not give you the particulars, but I assure you that had it not been for Tommy, Mr. McLean would never have asked me to marry him."
Elspeth crossed proudly to the side of her noble brother (who could scarcely trust his ears), and Gavinia cried, in wonder, "What did he do?"
Now McLean had seen Tommy's tears also, and being a kindly man he dropped the satirist and chimed in warmly, "And if I had not asked Miss Ailie to marry me I should have lost the great happiness of my life, so you may all imagine how beholden I feel to Tommy."
Again Tommy was the centre-piece, and though these words were as puzzling to him as to his crew, their sincerity was unmistakable, and once more his head began to waggle complacently.
"And to show how grateful we are," said Miss Ailie, "we are to give him a—a sort of marriage present. We are to double the value of the bursary he wins at the university—" She could get no farther, for now Elspeth was hugging her, and Corp cheering frantically, and Mr. McLean thought it necessary to add the warning, "If he does carry a bursary, you understand, for should he fail I give him nothing."
"Him fail!" exclaimed Corp, with whom Miss Ailie of course agreed. "And he can spend the money in whatever way he chooses," she said, "what will you do with it, Tommy?"
The lucky boy answered, instantly, "I'll take Elspeth to Aberdeen to bide with me," and then Elspeth hugged him, and Miss Ailie said, in a delighted aside to Mr. McLean, "I told you so," and he, too, was well pleased.
"It was the one thing needed to make him work," the school-mistress whispered. "Is not his love for his sister beautiful?"
McLean admitted that it was, but half-banteringly he said to Elspeth: "What could you do in lodgings, you excited mite?"
"I can sit and look at Tommy," she answered, quickly.
"But he will be away for hours at his classes."
"I'll sit at the window waiting for him," said she.
"And I'll run back quick," said Tommy.
All this time another problem had been bewildering Gavinia, and now she broke in, eagerly: "But what was it he did? I thought he was agin Mr. McLean."
"And so did I," said Corp.
"I cheated you grandly," replied Tommy with the audacity he found so useful.
"And a' the time you was pretending to be agin him," screamed Gavinia, "was you—was you bringing this about on the sly?"
Tommy looked up into Mr. McLean's face, but could get no guidance from it, so he said nothing; he only held his head higher than ever. "Oh, the clever little curse!" cried Corp, and Elspeth's delight was as ecstatic, though differently worded. Yet Gavinia stuck to her problem, "How did you do it, what was it you did?" and the cruel McLean said: "You may tell her, Tommy; you have my permission."
It would have been an awkward position for most boys, and even Tommy—but next moment he said, quite coolly: "I think you and me and Miss Ailie should keep it to oursels, Gavinia's sic a gossip."
"Oh, how thoughtful of him!" cried Miss Ailie, the deceived, and McLean said: "How very thoughtful!" but now he saw in a flash why Mr. Cathro still had hopes that Tommy might carry a bursary.
Thus was the repentant McLean pardoned, and nothing remained for him to do save to show the crew his Lair, which they had sworn to destroy. He had behaved so splendidly that they had forgotten almost that they were the emissaries of justice, but not to destroy the Lair seemed a pity, it would be such a striking way of bringing their adventures in the Den to a close. The degenerate Stuart read this feeling in their faces, and he was ready, he said, to show them his Lair if they would first point it out to him; but here was a difficulty, for how could they do that? For a moment it seemed as if the negotiations must fall through; but Sandys, that captain of resource, invited McLean to step aside for a private conference, and when they rejoined the others McLean said, gravely, that he now remembered where the Lair was and would guide them to it.
They had only to cross a plank, invisible in the mist until they were close to it, and climb a slippery bank strewn with fallen trees. McLean, with a mock serious air, led the way, Miss Ailie on his arm. Corp and Gavinia followed, weighted and hampered by their new half-crowns, and Tommy and Elspeth, in the rear, whispered joyously of the coming life. And so, very unprepared for it, they moved toward the tragedy of the night.
"Do you keep a light burning in the Lair?" McLean turned to ask, forgetting for the moment that it was not their domicile, but his.
"No, there's no light," replied Corp, equally forgetful, but even as he spoke he stopped so suddenly that Elspeth struck against him. For he had seen a light. "This is queer!" he cried, and both he and Gavinia fell back in consternation. McLean pushed forward alone, and was back in a trice, with a new expression on his face. "Are you playing some trick on me?" he demanded suspiciously of Tommy. "There is some one there; I almost ran against a pair of blazing eyes."
"But there's nobody; there can be nobody there," answered Tommy, in a bewilderment that was obviously unfeigned, "unless—unless—" He looked at Corp, and the eyes of both finished the sentence. The desolate scene at Double Dykes, which the meeting with McLean and Miss Ailie had driven from their minds, again confronted them, and they seemed once more to hear the whimpering of the Painted Lady's door.
"Unless what?" asked the man, impatiently, but still the two boys only stared at each other. "The Den's no mous the night," said Corp at last, in a low voice, and his unspoken fears spread to the womankind, so that Miss Ailie shuddered and Elspeth gripped Tommy with both hands and Gavinia whispered, "Let's away hame, we can come back in the daylight."
But McLean chafed and pressed upward, and next moment a girl's voice was heard, crying: "It is no business of yours; I won't let you touch her."
"Grizel!" exclaimed Tommy and his crew, simultaneously, and they had no more fear until they were inside the Lair. What they saw had best be described very briefly. A fire was burning in a corner of the Lair, and in front of it, partly covered with a sheet, lay the Painted Lady, dead. Grizel stood beside the body guarding it, her hands clenched, her eyes very strange. "You sha'n't touch her!" she cried, passionately, and repeated it many times, as if she had lost the power to leave off, but Corp crept past her and raised the coverlet.
"She's straikit!" he shouted. "Did you do it yoursel', Grizel? God behears, she did it hersel'!"
A very long silence it seemed to be after that.
Miss Ailie would have taken the motherless girl to her arms, but first, at Corp's discovery, she had drawn back in uncontrollable repulsion, and Grizel, about to go to her, saw it, and turned from her to Tommy. Her eyes rested on him beseechingly, with a look he saw only once again in them until she was a woman, but his first thought was not for Grizel. Elspeth was clinging to him, terrified and sobbing, and he cried to her, "Shut your een," and then led her tenderly away. He was always good to Elspeth.
There was no lack of sympathy with Grizel when the news spread through the town, and unshod men with their gallowses hanging down, and women buttoning as they ran, hurried to the Den. But to all the questions put to her and to all the kindly offers made, as the body was carried to Double Dykes, she only rocked her arms, crying, "I don't want anything to eat. I shall stay all night beside her. I am not frightened at my mamma. I won't tell you why she was in the Den. I am not sure how long she has been dead. Oh, what do these little things matter?"
The great thing was that her mamma should be buried in the cemetery, and not in unconsecrated ground with a stake through her as the boys had predicted, and it was only after she was promised this that Grizel told her little tale. She had feared for a long time that her mamma was dying of consumption, but she told no one, because everybody was against her and her mamma. Her mamma never knew that she was dying, and sometimes she used to get so much better that Grizel hoped she would live a long time, but that hope never lasted long. The reason she sat so much with Ballingall was just to find out what doctors did to dying people to make them live a little longer, and she watched his straiking to be able to do it to her mamma when the time came. She was sure none of the women would consent to straik her mamma. On the previous night, she could not say at what hour, she had been awakened by a cold wind, and so she knew that the door was open. She put out her hand in the darkness and found that her mamma was not beside her. It had happened before, and she was not frightened. She had hidden the key of the door that night and nailed down the window, but her mamma had found the key. Grizel rose, lit the lamp, and, having dressed hurriedly, set off with wraps to the Den. Her mamma was generally as sensible as anybody in Thrums, but sometimes she had shaking fits, and after them she thought it was the time of long ago. Then she went to the Den to meet a man who had promised, she said, to be there, but he never came, and before daybreak Grizel could usually induce her to return home. Latterly she had persuaded her mamma to wait for him in the old Lair, because it was less cold there, and she had got her to do this last night. Her mamma did not seem very unwell, but she fell asleep, and she died sleeping, and then Grizel went back to Double Dykes for linen and straiked her.
Some say in Thrums that a spade was found in the Lair, but that is only the growth of later years. Grizel had done all she could do, and through the long Saturday she sat by the side of the body, helpless and unable to cry. She knew that it could not remain there much longer, but every time she rose to go and confess, fear of the indignities to which the body of her darling mamma might be subjected pulled her back. The boys had spoken idly, but hunted Grizel, who knew so much less and so much more than any of them, believed it all.
It was she who had stood so near Gavinia in the ruined house. She had only gone there to listen to human voices. When she discovered from the talk of her friends that she had left a light burning at Double Dykes and the door open, fear of the suspicions this might give rise to had sent her to the house on the heels of the two boys, and it was she who had stolen past them in the mist to put out the light and lock the door. Then she had returned to her mamma's side.
The doctor was among the listeners, almost the only dry-eyed one, but he was not dry-eyed because he felt the artless story least. Again and again he rose from his chair restlessly, and Grizel thought he scowled at her when he was really scowling at himself; as soon as she had finished he cleared the room brusquely of all intruders, and then he turned on her passionately.
"Think shame of yoursel'," he thundered, "for keeping me in the dark," and of course she took his words literally, though their full meaning was, "I shall scorn myself from this hour for not having won the poor child's confidence."
Oh, he was a hard man, Grizel thought, the hardest of them all. But she was used to standing up to hard men, and she answered, defiantly: "I did mean to tell you, that day you sent me with the bottle to Ballingall, I was waiting at the surgery door to tell you, but you were cruel, you said I was a thief, and then how could I tell you?"
This, too, struck home, and the doctor winced, but what he said was, "You fooled me for a whole week, and the town knows it; do you think I can forgive you for that?"
"I don't care whether you forgive me," replied Grizel at once.
"Nor do I care whether you care," he rapped out, all the time wishing he could strike himself; "but I'm the doctor of this place, and when your mother was ill you should have come straight to me. What had I done that you should be afraid of me?"
"I am not afraid of you," she replied, "I am not afraid of anyone, but mamma was afraid of you because she knew you had said cruel things about her, and I thought—I won't tell you what I thought." But with a little pressing she changed her mind and told him. "I was not sure whether you would come to see her, though I asked you, and if you came I knew you would tell her she was dying, and that would have made her scream. And that is not all, I thought you might tell her that she would be buried with a stake through her—"
"Oh, these blackguard laddies!" cried McQueen, clenching his fists.
"And so I dared not tell you," Grizel concluded calmly; "I am not frightened at you, but I was frightened you would hurt my dear darling mamma," and she went and stood defiantly between him and her mother.
The doctor moved up and down the room, crying, "How did I not know of this, why was I not told?" and he knew that the fault had been his own, and so was furious when Grizel told him so.
"Yes, it is," she insisted, "you knew mamma was an unhappy lady, and that the people shouted things against her and terrified her; and you must have known, for everybody knew, that she was sometimes silly and wandered about all night, and you are a big strong man, and so you should have been sorry for her; and if you had been sorry you would have come to see her and been kind to her, and then you would have found it all out."
"Have done, lassie!" he said, half angrily, half beseechingly, but she did not understand that he was suffering, and she went on, relentlessly: "And you knew that bad men used to come to see her at night—they have not come for a long time—but you never tried to stop their coming, and I could have stopped it if I had known they were bad; but I did not know at first, and I was only a little girl, and you should have told me."
"Have done!" It was all that he could say, for like many he had heard of men visiting the Painted Lady by stealth, and he had only wondered, with other gossips, who they were.
He crossed again to the side of the dead woman, "And Ballingall's was the only corpse you ever saw straiked?" he said in wonder, she had done her work so well. But he was not doubting her; he knew already that this girl was clothed in truthfulness.
"Was it you that kept this house so clean?" he asked, almost irritably, for he himself was the one undusted, neglected-looking thing in it, and he was suddenly conscious of his frayed wristband and of buttons hanging by a thread.
"Yes."
"What age are you?"
"I think I am thirteen."
He looked long at her, vindictively she thought, but he was only picturing the probable future of a painted lady's child, and he said mournfully to himself, "Ay, it does not even end here; and that's the crowning pity of it." But Grizel only heard him say, "Poor thing!" and she bridled immediately.
"I won't let you pity me," she cried.
"You dour brat!" he retorted. "But you need not think you are to have everything your own way still. I must get some Monypenny woman to take you till the funeral is over, and after that—"
"I won't go," said Grizel, determinedly, "I shall stay with mamma till she is buried."
He was not accustomed to contradiction, and he stamped his foot. "You shall do as you are told," he said.
"I won't!" replied Grizel, and she also stamped her foot.
"Very well, then, you thrawn tid, but at any rate I'll send in a woman to sleep with you."
"I want no one. Do you think I am afraid?"
"I think you will be afraid when you wake up in the darkness, and find yourself alone with—with it."
"I sha'n't, I shall remember at once that she is to be buried nicely in the cemetery, and that will make me happy."
"You unnatural—"
"Besides, I sha'n't sleep, I have something to do."
His curiosity again got the better of the doctor. "What can you have to do at such a time?" he demanded, and her reply surprised him:
"I am to make a dress."
"You!"
"I have made them before now," she said indignantly.
"But at such a time!"
"It is a black dress," she cried, "I don't have one, I am to make it out of mamma's."
He said nothing for some time, then "When did you think of this?"
"I thought of it weeks ago, I bought crape at the corner shop to be ready, and—"
She thought he was looking at her in horror, and stopped abruptly. "I don't care what you think," she said.
"What I do think," he retorted, taking up his hat, "is, that you are a most exasperating lassie. If I bide here another minute I believe you'll get round me."
"I don't want to get round you."
"Then what makes you say such things? I question if I'll get an hour's sleep to-night for thinking of you!"
"I don't want you to think of me!"
He groaned. "What could an untidy, hardened old single man like me do with you in his house?" he said. "Oh, you little limmer, to put such a thought into my head."
"I never did!" she exclaimed, indignantly.
"It began, I do believe it began," he sighed, "the first time I saw you easying Ballingall's pillows."
"What began?"
"You brat, you wilful brat, don't pretend ignorance. You set a trap to catch me, and—"
"Oh!" cried Grizel, and she opened the door quickly. "Go away, you horrid man," she said.
He liked her the more for this regal action, and therefore it enraged him. Sheer anxiety lest he should succumb to her on the spot was what made him bluster as he strode off, and "That brat of a Grizel," or "The Painted Lady's most unbearable lassie," or "The dour little besom" was his way of referring to her in company for days, but if any one agreed with him he roared "Don't be a fool, man, she's a wonder, she's a delight," or "You have a dozen yourself, Janet, but I wouldna neifer Grizel for the lot of them." And it was he, still denouncing her so long as he was contradicted, who persuaded the Auld Licht Minister to officiate at the funeral. Then he said to himself, "And now I wash my hands of her, I have done all that can be expected of me." He told himself this a great many times as if it were a medicine that must be taken frequently, and Grizel heard from Tommy, with whom she had some strange conversations, that he was going about denouncing her "up hill and down dale." But she did not care, she was so—so happy. For a hole was dug for the Painted Lady in the cemetery, just as if she had been a good woman, and Mr. Dishart conducted the service in Double Dykes before the removal of the body, nor did he say one word that could hurt Grizel, perhaps because his wife had drawn a promise from him. A large gathering of men followed the coffin, three of them because, as yon may remember, Grizel had dared them to stay away, but all the others out of sympathy with a motherless child who, as the procession started, rocked her arms in delight because her mamma was being buried respectably.
Being a woman, she could not attend the funeral, and so the chief mourner was Tommy, as you could see by the position he took at the grave, and by the white bands Grizel had sewn on his sleeves. He was looking very important, as if he had something remarkable in prospect, but little attention was given him until the cords were dropped into the grave, and a prayer offered up, when he pulled Mr. Dishart's coat and muttered something about a paper. Those who had been making ready to depart swung round again, and the minister told him if he had anything to say to speak out.
"It's a paper," Tommy said, nervous yet elated, and addressing all, "that Grizel put in the coffin. She told me to tell you about it when the cords fell on the lid."
"What sort of a paper?" asked Mr. Dishart, frowning.
"It's—it's a letter to God," Tommy gasped.
Nothing was to be heard except the shovelling of earth into the grave. "Hold your spade, John," the minister said to the gravedigger, and then even that sound stopped. "Go on," Mr. Dishart signed to the boy.
"Grizel doesna believe her mother has much chance of getting to heaven," Tommy said, "and she wrote the letter to God, so that when he opens the coffins on the last day he will find it and read about them."
"About whom?" asked the stern minister.
"About Grizel's father, for one. She doesna know his name, but the Painted Lady wore a locket wi' a picture of him on her breast, and it's buried wi' her, and Grizel told God to look at it so as to know him. She thinks her mother will be damned for having her, and that it winna be fair unless God damns her father too."
"Go on," said Mr. Dishart.
"There was three Thrums men—I think they were gentlemen—" Tommy continued, almost blithely, "that used to visit the Painted Lady in the night time afore she took ill. They wanted Grizel to promise no to tell about their going to Double Dykes, and she promised because she was ower innocent to know what they went for—but their names are in the letter."
A movement in the crowd was checked by the minister's uplifted arm. "Go on," he cried.
"She wouldna tell me who they were, because it would have been breaking her promise," said Tommy, "but"—he looked around him inquisitively—"but they're here at the funeral."
The mourners were looking sideways at each other, some breathing hard, but none dared to speak before the minister. He stood for a long time in doubt, but at last he signed to John to proceed with the filling in of the grave. Contrary to custom all remained. Not until the grave was again level with the sward did Mr. Dishart speak, and then it was with a gesture that appalled his hearers. "This grave," he said, raising his arm, "is locked till the day of judgment."
Leaving him standing there, a threatening figure, they broke into groups and dispersed, walking slowly at first, and then fast, to tell their wives.
The solitary child remained at Double Dykes, awaiting the arrival of her father, for the Painted Lady's manner of leaving the world had made such a stir that the neighbors said he must have heard of it, even though he were in London, and if he had the heart of a stone he could not desert his bairn. They argued thus among themselves, less as people who were sure of it than to escape the perplexing question, what to do with Grizel if the man never claimed her? and before her they spoke of his coming as a certainty, because it would be so obviously the best thing for her. In the meantime they overwhelmed her with offers of everything she could need, which was kindly but not essential, for after the funeral expenses had been paid (Grizel insisted on paying them herself) she had still several gold pieces, found in her mamma's beautiful tortoise-shell purse, and there were nearly twenty pounds in the bank.
But day after day passed, and the man had not come. Perhaps he resented the Painted Lady's ostentatious death; which, if he was nicely strung, must have jarred upon his nerves. He could hardly have acknowledged Grizel now without publicity being given to his private concerns. Or he may never have heard of the Painted Lady's death, or if he read of it, he may not have known which painted lady in particular she was. Or he may have married, and told his wife all and she had forgiven him, which somehow, according to the plays and the novels, cuts the past adrift from a man and enables him to begin again at yesterday. Whatever the reason, Grizel's father was in no hurry to reveal himself, and though not to her, among themselves the people talked of the probability of his not coming at all. She could not remain alone at Double Dykes, they all admitted, but where, then, should she go? No fine lady in need of a handmaid seemed to think a painted lady's child would suit; indeed, Grizel at first sight had not the manner that attracts philanthropists. Once only did the problem approach solution; a woman in the Den-head was willing to take the child because (she expressed it) as she had seven she might as well have eight, but her man said no, he would not have his bairns fil't. Others would have taken her cordially for a few weeks or months, had they not known that at the end of this time they would be blamed, even by themselves, if they let her go. All, in short, were eager to show her kindness if one would give her a home, but where was that one to be found?
Much of this talk came to Grizel through Tommy, and she told him in the house of Double Dykes that people need not trouble themselves about her, for she had no wish to stay with them. It was only charity they brought her; no one wanted her for herself. "It is because I am a child of shame," she told him, dry-eyed.
He fidgeted on his chair, and asked, "What's that?" not very honestly.
"I don't know," she said, "no one will tell me, but it is something you can't love."
"You have a terrible wish to be loved," he said in wonder, and she nodded her head wistfully. "That is not what I wish for most of all, though," she told him, and when he asked what she wished for most of all, she said, "To love somebody; oh, it would be sweet!"
To Tommy, most sympathetic of mortals, she seemed a very pathetic little figure, and tears came to his eyes as he surveyed her; he could always cry very easily.
"If it wasna for Elspeth," he began, stammering, "I could love you, but you winna let a body do onything on the sly."
It was a vague offer, but she understood, and became the old Grizel at once. "I don't want you to love me," she said indignantly; "I don't think you know how to love."
"Neither can you know, then," retorted Tommy, huffily, "for there's nobody for you to love."
"Yes, there is," she said, "and I do love her and she loves me."
"But wha is she?"
"That girl." To his amazement she pointed to her own reflection in the famous mirror the size of which had scandalized Thrums. Tommy thought this affection for herself barely respectable, but he dared not say so lest he should be put to the door. "I love her ever so much," Grizel went on, "and she is so fond of me, she hates to see me unhappy. Don't look so sad, dearest, darlingest," she cried vehemently; "I love you, you know, oh, you sweet!" and with each epithet she kissed her reflection and looked defiantly at the boy.
"But you canna put your arms round her and hug her," he pointed out triumphantly, and so he had the last word after all. Unfortunately Grizel kept this side of her, new even to Tommy, hidden from all others, and her unresponsiveness lost her many possible friends. Even Miss Ailie, who now had a dressmaker in the blue-and-white room, sitting on a bedroom chair and sewing for her life (oh, the agony—or is it the rapture?—of having to decide whether to marry in gray with beads or brown plain to the throat), even sympathetic Miss Ailie, having met with several rebuffs, said that Grizel had a most unaffectionate nature, and, "Ay, she's hardy," agreed the town, "but it's better, maybe, for hersel'." There are none so unpopular as the silent ones.
If only Miss Ailie, or others like her, could have slipped noiselessly into Double Dykes at night, they would have found Grizel's pillow wet. But she would have heard them long before they reached the door, and jumped to the floor in terror, thinking it was her father's step at last. For, unknown to anyone, his coming, which the town so anxiously desired, was her one dread. She had told Tommy what she should say to him if he came, and Tommy had been awed and delighted, they were such scathing things; probably, had the necessity arisen, she would have found courage to say them, but they were made up in the daytime, and at night they brought less comfort. Then she listened fearfully and longed for the morning, wild ideas coursing through her head of flying before he could seize her; but when morning came it brought other thoughts, as of the strange remarks she had heard about her mamma and herself during the past few days. To brood over these was the most unhealthy occupation she could find, but it was her only birthright. Many of the remarks came unguardedly from lips that had no desire to pain her, others fell in a rage because she would not tell what were the names in her letter to God. The words that troubled her most, perhaps, were the doctor's, "She is a brave lass, but it must be in her blood." They were not intended for her ears, but she heard. "What did he mean?" she asked Miss Ailie, Mrs. Dishart, and others who came to see her, and they replied awkwardly, that it had only been a doctor's remark, of no importance to people who were well. "Then why are you crying?" she demanded, looking them full in the face with eyes there was no deceiving.
"Oh, why is everyone afraid to tell me the truth!" she would cry, beating her palms in anguish.
She walked into McQueen's surgery and said, "Could you not cut it out?" so abruptly that he wondered what she was speaking about.
"The bad thing that is in my blood," she explained. "Do cut it out, I sha'n't scream. I promise not to scream."
He sighed and answered, "If it could be cut out, lassie, I would try to do it, though it was the most dangerous of operations."
She looked in anguish at him. "There are cleverer doctors than you, aren't there?" she asked, and he was not offended.
"Ay, a hantle cleverer," he told her, "but none so clever as that. God help you, bairn, if you have to do it yourself some day."
"Can I do it myself?" she cried, brightening. "I shall do it now. Is it done with a knife?"
"With a sharper knife than a surgeon's," he answered, and then, regretting he had said so much, he tried to cheer her. But that he could not do. "You are afraid to tell me the truth too," she said, and when she went away he was very sorry for her, but not so sorry as she was for herself. "When I am grown up," she announced dolefully, to Tommy, "I shall be a bad woman, just like mamma."
"Not if you try to be good," he said.
"Yes, I shall. There is something in my blood that will make me bad, and I so wanted to be good. Oh! oh! oh!"
She told him of the things she had heard people say, but though they perplexed him almost as much as her, he was not so hopeless of learning their meaning, for here was just the kind of difficulty he liked to overcome. "I'll get it out o' Blinder," he said, with confidence in his ingenuity, "and then I'll tell you what he says." But however much he might strive to do so, Tommy could never repeat anything without giving it frills and other adornment of his own making, and Grizel knew this. "I must hear what he says myself," she insisted.
"But he winna speak plain afore you."
"Yes, he will, if he does not know I am there."
The plot succeeded, though only partially, for so quick was the blind man's sense of hearing that in the middle of the conversation he said, sharply, "Somebody's ahint the dyke!" and he caught Grizel by the shoulder. "It's the Painted Lady's lassie," he said when she screamed, and he stormed against Tommy for taking such advantage of his blindness. But to her he said, gently, "I daresay you egged him on to this, meaning well, but you maun forget most of what I've said, especially about being in the blood. I spoke in haste, it doesna apply to the like of you."
"Yes, it does," replied Grizel, and all that had been revealed to her she carried hot to the surgery, Tommy stopping at the door in as great perturbation as herself. "I know what being in the blood is now," she said, tragically, to McQueen, "there is something about it in the Bible. I am the child of evil passions, and that means that I was born with wickedness in my blood. It is lying sleeping in me just now because I am only thirteen, and if I can prevent its waking when I am grown up I shall always be good, but a very little thing will waken it; it wants so much to be wakened, and if it is once wakened it will run all through me, and soon I shall be like mamma."
It was all horribly clear to her, and she would not wait for words of comfort that could only obscure the truth. Accompanied by Tommy, who said nothing, but often glanced at her fascinated yet alarmed, as if expecting to see the ghastly change come over her at any moment—for he was as convinced as she, and had the livelier imagination—she returned to Monypenny to beg of Blinder to tell her one thing more. And he told her, not speaking lightly, but because his words contained a solemn warning to a girl who, he thought, might need it.
"What sort of thing would be likeliest to waken the wickedness?" she asked, holding her breath for the answer.
"Keeping company wi' ill men," said Blinder, gravely.
"Like the man who made mamma wicked, like my father?"
"Ay," Blinder replied, "fly from the like of him, my lass, though it should be to the other end of the world."
She stood quite still, with a most sorrowful face, and then ran away, ran so swiftly that when Tommy, who had lingered for a moment, came to the door she was already out of sight. Scarcely less excited than she, he set off for Double Dykes, his imagination in such a blaze that he looked fearfully in the pools of the burn for a black frock. But Grizel had not drowned herself; she was standing erect in her home, like one at bay, her arms rigid, her hands clenched, and when he pushed open the door she screamed.
"Grizel," said the distressed boy, "did you think I was him come for you?"
"Yes!"
"Maybe he'll no come. The folk think he winna come."
"But if he does, if he does!"
"Maybe you needna go wi' him unless you're willing?"
"I must, he can compel me, because he is my father. Oh! oh! oh!" She lay down on the bed, and on her eyes there slowly formed the little wells of water Tommy was to know so well in time. He stood by her side in anguish; for though his own tears came at the first call, he could never face them in others.
"Grizel," he said impulsively, "there's just one thing for you to do. You have money, and you maun run away afore he comes!"
She jumped up at that. "I have thought of it," she answered "I am always thinking about it, but how can I, oh, now can I? It would not be respectable."
"To run away?"
"To go by myself," said the poor girl, "and I do want to be respectable, it would be sweet."
In some ways Tommy was as innocent as she, and her reasoning seemed to him to be sound. She was looking at him woefully, and entreaty was on her face; all at once he felt what a lonely little crittur she was, and, in a burst of manhood,—
"But, dinna prig wi' me to go with you," he said, struggling.
"I have not!" she answered, panting, and she had not in words, but the mute appeal was still on her face.
"Grizel," he cried, "I'll come!"
Then she seized his hand and pressed it to her breast, saying, "Oh, Tommy, I am so fond of you!"
It was the first time she had admitted it, and his head wagged well content, as if saying for him, "I knew you would understand me some day." But next moment the haunting shadow that so often overtook him in the act of soaring fell cold upon his mind, and "I maun take Elspeth!" he announced, as if Elspeth had him by the leg.
"You sha'n't!" said Grizel's face.
"She winna let go," said Tommy's.
Grizel quivered from top to toe. "I hate Elspeth!" she cried, with curious passion, and the more moral Tommy was ashamed of her.
"You dinna ken how fond o' her I am," he said.
"Yes, I do."
"Then you shouldna want me to leave her and go wi' you."
"That is why I want it," Grizel blurted out, and now we are all ashamed of her. But fortunately Tommy did not see how much she had admitted in that hasty cry, and as neither would give way to the other they parted stiffly, his last words being "Mind, it wouldna be respectable to go by yoursel'," and hers "I don't care, I'm going." Nevertheless it was she who slept easily that night, and he who tossed about almost until cockcrow. She had only one ugly dream, of herself wandering from door to door in a strange town, asking for lodgings, but the woman who answered her weary knocks—there were many doors but it was invariably the same woman—always asked, suspiciously, "Is Tommy with you?" and Grizel shook her head, and then the woman drove her away, perceiving that she was not respectable. This woke her, and she feared the dream would come true, but she clenched her fists in the darkness, saying, "I can't help it, I am going, and I won't have Elspeth," and after that she slept in peace. In the meantime Tommy the imaginative—but that night he was not Tommy, rather was he Grizel, for he saw her as we can only see ourselves. Now she—or he, if you will—had been caught by her father and brought back, and she turned into a painted thing like her mother. She brandished a brandy bottle and a stream of foul words ran lightly from her mouth and suddenly stopped, because she was wailing "I wanted so to be good, it is sweet to be good!" Now a man with a beard was whipping her, and Tommy felt each lash on his own body, so that he had to strike out, and he started up in bed, and the horrible thing was that he had never been asleep. Thus it went on until early morning, when his eyes were red and his body was damp with sweat.
But now again he was Tommy, and at first even to think of leaving Elspeth was absurd. Yet it would be pleasant to leave Aaron, who disliked him so much. To disappear without a word would be a fine revenge, for the people would say that Aaron must have ill-treated him, and while they searched the pools of the burn for his body, Aaron would be looking on trembling, perhaps with a policeman's hand on his shoulder. Tommy saw the commotion as vividly as if the searchers were already out and he in a tree looking down at them; but in a second he also heard Elspeth skirling, and down he flung himself from the tree, crying, "I'm here, Elspeth, dinna greet; oh, what a brute I've been!" No, he could not leave Elspeth, how wicked of Grizel to expect it of him; she was a bad one, Grizel.
But having now decided not to go, his sympathy with the girl who was to lose him returned in a rush, and before he went to school he besought her to—it amounted to this, to be more like himself; that is, he begged her to postpone her departure indefinitely, not to make up her mind until to-morrow—or the day after—or the day after that. He produced reasons, as that she had only four pounds and some shillings now, while by and by she might get the Painted Lady's money, at present in the bank; also she ought to wait for the money that would come to her from the roup of the furniture. But Grizel waived all argument aside; secure in her four pounds and shillings she was determined to go to-night, for her father might be here to-morrow; she was going to London because it was so big that no one could ever find her there, and she would never, never write to Tommy to tell him how she fared, lest the letter put her father on her track. He implored her to write once, so that the money owing her might be forwarded, but even this bribe did not move her, and he set off for school most gloomily.
Cathro was specially aggravating that day, nagged him, said before the whole school that he was a numskull, even fell upon him with the tawse, and for no earthly reason except that Tommy would not bother his head with the oratio obliqua. If there is any kind of dominie more maddening than another, it is the one who will not leave you alone (ask any thoughtful boy). How wretched the lot of him whose life is cast among fools not capable of understanding him; what was that saying about entertaining angels unawares? London! Grizel had more than sufficient money to take two there, and once in London, a wonder such as himself was bound to do wondrous things. Now that he thought of it, to become a minister was abhorrent to him; to preach would be rather nice, oh, what things he should say (he began to make them up, and they were so grand that he almost wept), but to be good after the sermon was over, always to be good (even when Elspeth was out of the way), never to think queer unsayable things, never to say Stroke, never, in short, to "find a way"—he was appalled. If it had not been for Elspeth—
So even Elspeth did not need him. When he went home from school, thinking only of her, he found that she had gone to the Auld Licht manse to play with little Margaret. Very well, if such was her wish, he would go. Nobody wanted him except Grizel. Perhaps when news came from London of his greatness, they would think more of him. He would send a letter to Thrums, asking Mr. McLean to transfer his kindness to Elspeth. That would show them what a noble fellow he was. Elspeth would really benefit by his disappearance; he was running away for Elspeth's sake. And when he was great, which would be in a few years, he would come back for her.
But no, he—. The dash represents Tommy swithering once more, and he was at one or other end of the swither all day. When he acted sharply it was always on impulse, and as soon as the die was cast he was a philosopher with no regrets. But when he had time to reflect, he jumped miserably back and forward. So when Grizel was ready to start, he did not know in the least what he meant to do.
She was to pass by the Cuttle Well, on her way to Tilliedrum, where she would get the London train, he had been told coldly, and he could be there at the time—if he liked. The time was seven o'clock in the evening on a week-day, when the lovers are not in the Den, and Tommy arrived first. When he stole through the small field that separates Monypenny from the Den, his decision was—but on reaching the Cuttle Well, its nearness to the uncanny Lair chilled his courage, and now he had only come to bid her good-by. She was very late, and it suddenly struck him that she had already set off. "After getting me to promise to go wi' her!" he said to himself at once.
But Grizel came; she was only late because it had taken her such a long time to say good-by to the girl in the glass. She was wearing her black dress and lustre jacket, and carried in a bundle the few treasures she was taking with her, and though she did not ask Tommy if he was coming, she cast a quick look round to see if he had a bundle anywhere, and he had none. That told her his decision, and she would have liked to sit down for a minute and cry, but of course she had too much pride, and she bade him farewell so promptly that he thought he had a grievance. "I'm coming as far as the toll-house wi' you," he said, sulkily, and so they started together.
At the toll-house Grizel stopped. "It's a fine night," said Tommy, almost apologetically, "I'll go as far as the quarry o' Benshee."
When they came to the quarry he said, "We're no half-roads yet, I'll go wi' you as far as Padanarum." Now she began to wonder and to glance at him sideways, which made him more uncomfortable than ever. To prevent her asking him a question for which he had no answer, he said, "What makes you look so little the day?"
"I am not looking little," she replied, greatly annoyed, "I am looking taller than usual. I have let down my frock three inches so as to look taller—and older."
"You look younger than ever," he said cruelly.
"I don't! I look fifteen, and when you are fifteen you grow up very quickly. Do say I look older!" she entreated anxiously. "It would make me feel more respectable."
But he shook his head with surprising obstinacy, and then she began to remark on his clothes, which had been exercising her curiosity ever since they left the Den.
"How is it that you are looking so stout?" she asked.
"I feel cold, but you are wiping the sweat off your face every minute."
It was true, but he would have preferred not to answer. Grizel's questions, however, were all so straight in the face, that there was no dodging them. "I have on twa suits o' clothes, and a' my sarks," he had to admit, sticky and sullen.
She stopped, but he trudged on doggedly. She ran after him and gave his arm an impulsive squeeze with both hands, "Oh, you sweet!" she said.
"No, I'm not," he answered in alarm.
"Yes you are! You are coming with me."
"I'm not!"
"Then why did you put on so many clothes?"
Tommy swithered wretchedly on one foot. "I didna put them on to come wi' you," he explained, "I just put them on in case I should come wi' you."
"And are you not coming?"
"How can I ken?"
"But you must decide," Grizel almost screamed.
"I needna," he stammered, "till we're at Tilliedrum. Let's speak about some other thing."
She rocked her arms, crying, "It is so easy to make up one's mind."
"It's easy to you that has just one mind," he retorted with spirit, "but if you had as many minds as I have—!"
On they went.