Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume XIV Part 18

Curtseying as she entered, and blus.h.i.+ng as she spoke--"You are, sir, I believe," said she "a friend of poor M'Intyre's, just now in Glasgow Jail, for--for----" And here her emotion prevented her further utterance.

"I was," replied I, interposing to save her feelings, which I saw were painfully excited, "and I still am, his friend. Would to G.o.d I had some way of showing him, in his misfortune, how sincerely I am so!"

This I said with a degree of earnestness and fervour that seemed to make a strong impression on my fair, but mysterious visiter. She became pale and agitated, and I thought I could even discover a tear glittering in her eye. When this momentary emotion had pa.s.sed away--

"Then," she said, "I need not hesitate to trust you with a secret." And she glanced towards the door, to see that it was shut. "This night," she resumed, "M'Intyre will escape from prison."

"Escape!--how?--by what means?" I exclaimed, in amazement.

"By mine," she replied, calmly.

"By yours!" I said, with increased astonishment.

"Yes, sir, by mine. This night at twelve o'clock he will be without the prison walls, and at liberty, and you must then do him the last service he is ever likely to require at your hands. You will have a chaise waiting at the hour I have mentioned, at the first mile-stone on the Greenock road. Will you do this, and save the life of your unfortunate friend?"

Although a good deal confused by the suddenness and singularity of the whole affair, I, without a moment's hesitation or reflection, replied that I would; and, having made this promise, I asked my visiter if she would further confide in me, by telling me all the particulars connected with the proposed escape of my friend.

"Not now--not now," she said, gathering a tartan plaid, which she wore, round her, as if to depart; "but you will probably learn all afterwards.

In the meantime, farewell! and, as you would have a friend do to you in similar circ.u.mstances, so do you to your friend. Be faithful to your promise."

And, ere I could make any further remark, or put any other question, she hurried out of the apartment, hastily opened the street door, rushed out, and disappeared.

Interrupting this personal narrative for a time, we will s.h.i.+ft the scene, on the eventful night in question--eventful, at least, to the unfortunate subject of our story--to the house of the jailer in whose custody he was; and here we shall find, in the capacity of a domestic servant, a young woman, bearing a very striking resemblance to her who visited M'Intyre's friend, as above described. Indeed, there can be no doubt that they are the same. It was the jailer's custom, at this time, to make the rounds of the prison precisely at nine o'clock every night, to see that all was secure; and when this survey was completed, to carry all the keys with him to his own house, which was included in the general building, and had interior communication with that portion of it where prisoners were confined. On bringing up the keys, as usual, on the night of which we are speaking, the jailer gave them in charge to his wife, as he was invited out to join a party of friends on some occasion of merry-making--a circ.u.mstance which had been previously known to his family, and, amongst the rest, to the servant girl a short while since alluded to. Having received the keys from her husband, the jailer's wife carried them to her own bedroom for greater safety, and there deposited them in a drawer. In less than two hours after, this drawer was secretly visited by the young woman just spoken of, and a particular key carefully selected, detached from the rest, and transferred from the drawer in which it had lain into her pocket, when she withdrew with her prize. Shortly after this, the jailer returned, and retired to bed. When the whole was still, the purloiner of the key might have been seen stealing, with cautious steps, down the staircase that led into the princ.i.p.al pa.s.sage of the prison, where were stationed two turnkeys--one at the outer door, and one at the inner. Advancing to the former--

"James," said the girl, "Mr Simpson" (the name of the jailer) "desires to see you up-stairs immediately. Go to the little parlour, and wait for him there, and he'll come to you directly."

"La.s.sie," said the man, "I canna leave the door richtly; but if he wants me, I suppose I maun gang."

"I'll keep the key till you return," said the former, "and tell Andrew"

(meaning the inner turnkey) "to look after the door till you return, James."

"Ay, do, like a dear," replied the unsuspecting turnkey, handing her the key, and hastening away to attend the call of his superior.

On his departure, the girl went, as she had promised, to the other turnkey; but it was to deliver a very different message from that she had undertaken. To him, in truth, she made precisely the same communication as she had done to his neighbour, with a difference of destination--him she directed to wait his master in the kitchen. This guardian, trusting in the vigilance of him of the outer door, of whose absence he was unaware, made no difficulty whatever of obeying, but instantly ascended to the jailer's kitchen, where he patiently awaited the appearance of his superior. Having thus disposed of the two turnkeys, the girl now, with a beating heart, flew to the door of the apartment in which M'Intyre was confined, applied the key to the lock, turned its huge bolt, and the way was clear.

"Angus M'Intyre," she said, on flinging up the door, "come forth, come forth, and fly instantly for your life! There are none to oppose you."

"In the name of G.o.d, who are you?" said M'Intyre, instinctively obeying the call to liberty and freedom. "I should know that voice," he added, endeavouring to obtain a glimpse of the face of his deliverer, but in vain, as she was carefully hooded, and the place profoundly dark.

"Hus.h.!.+ hus.h.!.+--not a word!" said the latter. "What does it signify to you who I am? Off, off instantly!--you have not a moment to lose. This way, this way." And she hurried the astonished prisoner, though now no longer so, through the deserted pa.s.sage of the jail, till they reached the outer door, to which she applied the key with which its simple guardian had intrusted her, and in the next instant M'Intyre and his deliverer were in the street. On gaining it--

"Now, fly, Angus," said the latter, thrusting, at the same time, a purse of money into his hand. "At the first mile-stone on the Greenock road, you will find a chaise waiting you. In that you will proceed to Greenock, where you will find a s.h.i.+p to sail to-morrow for New York.

Embark on board of her; and you will then, I trust, escape the vengeance of man--it must be your own business, Angus, to deprecate that of your G.o.d." And without waiting for any reply, or permitting herself to be known to her companion, she hastened away in the opposite direction to that she had pointed out to M'Intyre, and disappeared. The latter, bewildered with the suddenness and strangeness of the proceeding which had thus so mysteriously led to his liberation, stood for a second confused, irresolute, and undetermined. His first idea was to pursue this deliverer, and to insist on ascertaining who she was; but even the moment he took to deliberate had put this out of his power, for the night was dark, and she was already out of sight; and where there were so many ready places of concealment, the pursuit was a hopeless one.

M'Intyre perceived this; and aware, at the same time, how necessary it was that he should instantly quit the vicinity of the jail, he hastened to the place where he had been told a chaise would be waiting him. The chaise was there; M'Intyre flung himself into it, reached Greenock in about four hours afterwards, and, before another sun had sunk in the west, he was sailing down the Frith of Clyde, on his way to the opposite sh.o.r.es of the Atlantic.

Three years after the occurrence of the events just related (continued the narrator whom we have already quoted), during which time I had heard nothing more of M'Intyre than that he had effected his escape, nor anything whatever of his deliverer, I was removed, by order of the Board of Excise, to the Island of Skye, where I was settled, perhaps, about a year, when, one day, as I was crossing the country from Portree to Meystead--a place celebrated in the wanderings of Prince Charles--I met a party of ladies and gentlemen coming in the opposite direction. They were a merry squad, with the exception of one of the ladies, who seemed to take but little share in the obstreperous mirth of her companions; and it was owing to this circ.u.mstance, perhaps, that I found her engrossing a greater share of my attention than the others; for, in that hospitable country, we were friends the moment we met, although we had never seen each other before; and the party, having some provisions with them, I was requested to favour them with my company to a dejeune, which, they informed me, they had been on the eve of making before I joined them. Readily accepting their kind invitation, I accompanied my new friends in search of a suitable spot for the proposed entertainment.

This was soon found; and we all sat down on the gra.s.s to partake of the good things provided for the occasion. During the repast, I could not keep my eyes off the lady whose melancholy had first attracted my attention; for I felt an impression that I had seen the face somewhere before; but when, where, or under what circ.u.mstances, I could not at all recollect. She seemed also to recognise me; for there was a marked confusion and agitation, both in her countenance and manner, from the moment I joined the party to which she belonged. Guessing, from these expressions, that it would not be agreeable to her that I should make any attempt at renewing our acquaintance, of whatever nature that might have been, in the presence of her friends, I forbore; but determined, if an opportunity was afforded me, of doing so before we parted, as I felt all that curiosity and uneasiness which such vague and imperfect recognition of a person's ident.i.ty is so apt to create. The opportunity I desired, the lady, of her own accord, subsequently afforded me.

When our repast was concluded, she said, addressing me--

"We are going, sir, to see the falls of Lubdearg, about a mile from this. It is a very magnificent one; and, if you have never seen it before, and are in no great hurry to prosecute your journey, you will perhaps accompany us. My friends here, I am sure, will be glad of such an addition to their party."

The falls she alluded to I had never seen; and for this reason, but still more for that before hinted at, I gladly accepted the proposal of becoming one of the party to Lubdearg. While we were proceeding thither, my inviter contrived to drop a little way behind her friends; which perceiving, and conjecturing that she did so for the especial purpose of affording me an opportunity of speaking with her, I availed myself of it, with a degree of caution that prevented all appearance of connivance, and joined her. Being considerably apart from the others, she said, smiling--

"You have recognised me, I rather think, sir; but do you recollect where and under what circ.u.mstances it was that you saw me?"

"I do not indeed; I have not the most distant idea," I said; "but I certainly do recollect having seen you before."

"And I, too, recollect well of having seen you. It is impossible I should ever forget either you or the occasion that introduced me to you.

Do you," she added, "recollect of a young woman calling on you one morning at your lodgings, to request of you to have a chaise in readiness, on the Greenock road, to aid"--and here she paused a moment, and betrayed great emotion--"the escape," she resumed, "of Angus M'Intyre."

I need hardly say that, short as this sentence was, I knew ere it was half concluded that it was the deliverer of my unhappy friend who stood before me.

"I do, I do, perfectly," I replied--"you are the very person. This is, indeed, strange--most singular--our meeting here again, and in this way.

But who, in Heaven's name, are you?" I added; "that I have never yet known."

The lady smiled sadly. "Did you ever hear your unfortunate friend speak of one Miss Eliza Stewart?" she said.

"Often, often," I replied; "to that lady I always understood he was to have been married, had not that deplorable occurrence taken place, which so miserably changed his destiny, and marred all his prospects in life."

"It was so," said my fair companion, with increased emotion. "I am that person."

"Impossible!"

"It is true; I am Eliza Stewart."

"Then, here is more perplexity and mystery," said I. "How, in all the world, came you to appear to me in the dress and character of a servant girl--you, who are a lady both by birth and education?" (this I knew from M'Intyre) "and how, above all, did you effect the escape of our unfortunate friend?"

The lady again smiled with a melancholy air. "I will inform you of all,"

she said, "in a very few words. At the time of Angus' misfortune, I lived, as you may probably know, with my father at ----, in Skye here.

On hearing of what had taken place, and of Angus' apprehension, I hastened to Glasgow on pretence of visiting a friend, and got into the house of the jailer in the character of a domestic servant. I will not say by whose means I effected this, as it might still bring ruin on their heads." And here my fair informant gave me the details which are already before the reader. "On effecting his escape," she went on, "I immediately resumed my own dress, and returned to my father's house, where it was next to impossible to detect, in his daughter, the servant girl of the Glasgow jailer. Our remote situation, besides, further secured me from the chance of discovery; and I have not yet been discovered, nor do I suppose I ever will now."

"And why," said I, laughingly, "did you not share the fortunes of the man in whom you thus took so deep an interest?"

"No, no," said the heroic girl, with an expression of deep feeling; "I loved M'Intyre, I confess it, with the most sincere and devoted affection--what I did for him proves it; but I could not think of uniting myself to a man whose hand was red with the blood of a fellow-creature; for it cannot be denied that our unfortunate friend, notwithstanding all his good qualities, was--there is no disguising it--a----" Here her emotions prevented her finis.h.i.+ng the sentence--nor did she afterwards finish it; but I had no doubt the word she would have supplied was "murderer."

"Now, sir, you know all," she continued, on recovering from her perturbation; "but you will make no allusion, I beg of you, to anything I have told you, to my friends here, amongst whom are my father, mother, and a sister, who know nothing whatever of the part I acted in effecting M'Intyre's escape."

With this request I promised compliance. We reached the falls of Lubdearg. I parted with Eliza Stewart; and we never met again, as, in a few days afterwards, I left the island; and with this event terminated all connecting circ.u.mstances on my part with "The Skean Dhu."

THE SEVEN YEARS' DEARTH.

It was a good many years before the accession of King William III. to the throne of Britain, that a farmer of the name of William Kerr rented a farm in the parish of Minniegaff, in the county of Wigton, on the great road to Port-Patrick. The farm lay at some distance from the road, at the foot of the hills--a wild and secluded spot, possessing few beauties, save to a person who had been reared in the neighbourhood, whose earliest a.s.sociations were blended with the scenes of his youth.

This farm of Kerr's was of far greater extent than importance, only a few acres of it being in cultivation; but his flock of sheep was pretty extensive, and his black cattle numerous. He was looked upon as a wealthy man at the period of which we speak, had been married for many years, but had no children to enjoy that wealth which increased from year to year. This was the only drawback to his earthly happiness; but he never repined, or let a word escape his lips, to betray the wish of his heart. Even the rude taunts of his more fortunate neighbours he bore with unruffled countenance, though he felt them keenly; and he still loved Grizzel his wife with all the fervour of his first affection--an affection that was returned with usury.