Complete Fictional Works of John Buchan (Illustrated), page 42
But above all it was the hey-day of taverns, great houses of festivity where beside leaping fires a motley crew dined and grew drunk in all good fellowship. The age must be thick with alarums and perils of war to produce the fine flower of tavern-life. It is when a man’s mind is hot with wild news or the expectation of its reception that he leaves his ingle and seeks the steaming hearth and the talk of neighbours. And who can tell of the possibilities which lie in such an evening, of a door flung open and a stranger coming full of unheard-of tales? The inn-lounger is as surely a glutton for the romantic as the adventurer upon the sea.
To such homes of the soul went Francis with more zeal than discretion. There, and not in the female atmosphere of the Monk’s Vennel, he found the things in which his heart delighted. The talk of men in its freedom and brutality was his delight, and in the motley concourse of folk he had matter for a living interest. A strain of inherited vice made the darker side of it soon cease to appall him, and in time he passed from the place of a spectator to that of a partaker in many carousals, a sworn friend to half the riff-raff in the city, the ally of loose women and causeway sots.
Yet in this spring-tide of wild oats there was none of the sower’s zest. After all, he was very much of an amateur in vice, restrained from excess by many bonds of memory, convention, and human kindliness. His course was the recoil from the paths of fireside virtue, the outcome of something uncommon and heroical in a nature run to seed. At moments a sense of the folly of it all oppressed him, but the fatal rhetoric of a boy’s thoughts put the graver reflection to flight. He would regain his self-respect by fancying himself a man of the world, living with a hand close on the springs of life, one who in all folly was something beyond his allies. And in consequence he sank but rarely into brutish drunkenness, — a sin (for the confusion of all doctrines of heredity) which had little hold upon him, — and even from such lapses recovered himself with a certain alertness of spirit. Yet this was but the immaturity of his character, a thing to pass away with years, and in a little Francis might have looked to grow to a blackguard of some quality.
To his mother his life was a source of uncomprehending grief. Her efforts of kindness were now repelled and now met half-way with an inconsistency which confounded all her notions. When her son staggered home in the small hours, or when Mistress Leithen of the Candle Row retailed strange stories of his evil-doing, the unhappy woman was, if anything, less pained than mystified. Maternal affection, which for the glorifying of poor humanity, is strongest in the coarsely sentimental, bade her sorrow, when all the rest of her nature bade her only wonder. So with a patience and a denseness too deep for words, she persisted in her tenderness, bore his lordly humours, and revolted his soul with a thousand nauseous vulgarities, since to the rake the only intolerable coarseness is the respectably plebeian.
Now it chanced that Fate took it upon her to order events for the saving of Francis’ soul. About his eighteenth year he had entered a writer’s office in the city, for no other cause than to give himself some name whereby to describe his life. An odd strain of worldly prudence kept him from neglecting his duties to dismissal point, and in a sort of careful idleness he copied deeds, visited ground for seisin, and collected rents in and out of the town. He had no ill-will to the work, provided it did not bear too hardly upon his time. But meanwhile in the burgh of Dysart, which sits perched on the steep shore of Fife, there lived a Mr. Gregor Shillinglaw, who as the one lawyer in the place had a good livelihood and a busy life. He was growing old, and in the natural course bethought him of a successor. His head clerk, John Henryson, was able and willing for the place, but Mr. Shillinglaw belonged to a school of men who have less respect for long services than for family ties. Once on a time a Birkenshaw had married a distant cousin of his, and the two names had a kinship in his memory. So it fell out that, being in Edinburgh at the office of Trumbull and Gleed, who were Francis’s masters, he saw the lad, heard his name, and was affected with a sudden kindness.
He asked after his business merits. Good, admirable, said Mr. Trumbull, with a smile. And his character? Oh, well, some folk are young and fresh in blood, and the same rule does not hold for all, said the lawyer, amazed at his own heresy, but bound in honour to say nothing to the discredit of his house or servants. Mr. Shillinglaw heard and was satisfied; the hint of gentlemanly vices only increased his friendliness for the young man; so before the week was out Francis received an offer to go to Dysart to a place which with care might bring him to an old age of opulence and respect.
To Dysart Francis went with a mixture of feelings. He had never lived elsewhere than in Edinburgh, and he was glad to make trial of a new habitat on the very edge of the sea. More, he had many deeds to his name in Edinburgh which would scarce bear the inevitable scrutiny which the days must bring. His credit, too, was low, and his debts great; so with a light heart and much hope he betook himself to the dark rooms in the little wind-worn town, where a man’s lips are always salt with the air from the sea, and a roaring East sweeps in the narrow lanes.
The ancient town is now a very little place, unsightly with coal and dingy with stagnant traffic. But in the days of Mr. Shillinglaw it was a bustling port, where skippers from Amsterdam came with strong waters and cheeses and Lord knows what, and carried away beer and tallow, hides and sea-coal. It boasted of a town-house where the noisy burgesses met, and elegant piazzas where foreign merchants walked and chaffered. In the rock-hewn harbour lay at all times twoscore and more of schooners, and the high red-tiled houses looked down upon an eternal stir of shipping and unlading. It was a goodly place to live, for health came with the clean sea-wind and wealth with every tide.
Of Francis’s doings in this place there is scant account save for the brilliant episode which marked his departure. It seems that at first he wrought well under Mr. Shillinglaw’s guidance, and the two would drink their claret of a night in all amity. But untoward events soon thickened in the younger’s path, and, aided by his uncertain temper, he began anew his downward course. From the time when he first saw Nell Durward his doom was assured, and thereafter his master might grieve or storm, but Francis remained untouched. Nell was the provost’s daughter, tall and comely, with bright cheeks and saucy black eyes which captured his roving thoughts. Thenceforth he was her slave, running at her every beck and nod, till her father, with some inkling of how matters stood, resolved to put an end to his daughter’s coquetry, and plainly told the eager lover that Nell was already betrothed to a Baillie of the town, one Gow by name, and would shortly be his wife.
Francis flung himself out of the house, and from that hour till after the celebration of the wedding drank more deeply than he had ever done before, and bade Mr. Shillinglaw and his business go to the devil whence they had come. For three weeks he was the bye-word of the town; then, when all was over, he returned to his right mind and relapsed into decency with some apology for his absence.
But Fate had still further tricks to play on him. It chanced that a yearly dinner was held in the Bunch of Grapes in memory of some former benefactor of the town, and thereafter dancing went on till morning in the roomy upper chamber, where faded silk hangings and a frowning portrait proclaimed antiquity. Hither went Francis in a sober mood, and after the meal drank his toddy with the fathers of the burgh as befitted a grave notary. But after he had his fill of their company and had grown hot with the fumes of spirits, he mounted the stair, and sitting by the fiddlers surveyed the gay scene. Suddenly to the assembly there entered Baillie Gow, with the aforetime Nell Durward blushing on his arm. The devil of boastfulness, born of early and deep potation, drove the man in the direction of his rival. He gaped before him, and then with many abusive words delivered him a moral homily. The blood of Francis, hot at the best, was roused to madness by the man’s conduct and the thought of his own unrewarded love. “Let go his arm, my dear,” he said quietly to the girl, and struck the portly baillie clean on the jaw so that he dropped like a felled ox.
Now Mr. Gow was a great man in the town, and at the sight a party, with the landlord, one Derrick, at their head, made to lay hands on his assailant. But Francis was strong and young, and with a bench he cleared a space around him and fought his way to the door. His head was in a muddle, and his one thought was to reach the street. But at the stair-top the landlord confronted him, and with a cudgel struck him smartly on the face. The blow roused madness to action. With a sudden crazy resolution, Francis drew his knife and stabbed the man in the side, and then breaking through the crowd on the steps reached the open and ran straight for the distant woods.
The remainder of the incident goes with still greater spirit. For three days Francis lay hid among the brackens with the terror of murder on his soul. But none came to seek him, and with the hours his confidence grew, till he summoned his courage and sallied out at the darkening of the fourth day. With infinite labour he avoided observation, and entered the narrow wynds. Now came his chief toil. He must learn of the landlord’s fate to ease his mind and determine his plans. So in much trepidation he betook himself to the only haven he could think of, the house of one Berritch, a man of reputed wealth but no reputation, a former ally of his own in tavern-drinking, and esteemed a trafficker in the contraband.
Thither he crept, and won immediate admittance. He heard with relief that his enemy was all but recovered, that the wound had been a mere scratch, and that his name was free at least from such a stain. But otherwise, Mr. Berritch admonished him, things looked black indeed. Mr. Shillinglaw had repudiated him, and the respectability of the place had made their faces flint against him. It was currently believed that he had returned to the purlieus of Edinburgh.
In such a state of affairs Francis was ripe for an offer, and Mr. Berritch did not fail him. He himself would undertake to bring him to France in one of his boats, and set him down where there was chance and room for likely young lads unburdened with a conscience. He could not remain in Dysart, and the city was but a halting-place on the road to beggary. That night a lugger would sail from the Wemyss Rocks in which he was welcome to a passage.
The conclusion of the episode was yet more varied; for when all had won to the starting-place, word was brought that the Burnt island gaugers had got tidings about Mr. Berritch and his occupation, which would lead them that night to pay a visit to his dwelling. The unfortunate man bowed to fate in a transport of cursing, and set his face to the boat and the sea; but in the nick of time he had mind of valuable monies left in the house, which he would little like to see in the hands of the law. He was at his wits’ end, when Francis, with the uneasy generosity of one in debt, offered to go to fetch them. Accordingly he set out and made his way through the dark and filthy east streets of Dysart, not without some qualms of anxiety. But at the High Street corner he met a man in an advanced stage of drunkenness, stumbling over ash-buckets and suffering from the narrowness of the path. A glance convinced him that it was none other than Baillie Gow, returning from some borough dinner, and flown with wine and talk. A plan grew in Francis’s mind which made him shake with mirth. Slipping his arm through the Baillie’s, he led him to Mr. Berritch’s house and set him in Mr. Berritch’s chair, with Mr. Berritch’s wig on his head and a tumbler of rum at his elbow. Then he secured the gold, and slipped outside the window to wait the result. His patience was little tried, for soon there came the tramp of men down the street, a knocking at the door, a forced entrance, and a swoop upon their prisoner. He heard them read the paper of identification, and give a one-voiced consent to every detail. Then with aching sides and smarting eyes he watched them lift the innocent upon their shoulders; and when their tread died away he betook himself to the cutter in huge delight at his own boyish humour.
With this bravado begins the history of the doings of Mr. Francis Birkenshaw, which he did in the years of our Lord seventeen hundred and forty-five and seventeen hundred and forty-six in the reign of George the Second, King of England. In such a fine fervour of conceit and daring he launched out upon his course. The events of the past weeks seemed like an ancient tale from which he was separated by years of maturity. In a night he had outgrown any vain schemes for a reputable life of good-citizenship. Now he was free to go whither he pleased, and carve his fortune in the manner best suiting him without restraint of prejudice. As the vessel rode on the waters and the wind sang in the sheets, his heart was strengthened with pleasing self-praise, not without a hint of mirth at the comedy of life.
But for all great designs money was needful, and Mr. Berritch himself was the first to mention it. Now the secret of the Birkenshaw payments had always been kept hid from him, and he thought that the family substance came from some fortune of his father’s. There must be some portion remaining to him, he thought, and on this he set his hope. So it was settled that the lugger should lie well into the Lothian coast during the day, and in the evening he should be put ashore to seek his own. Then once again they would set sail for their longer voyage.
The plan was carried out to the letter, and at eight the next night Francis was knocking at the door of his mother’s house. From within came the noise of tongues and women’s laughter, and the cheerful clatter of dishes which marks the close of a meal. His mother opened to him, wiping her mouth with her apron in a way she had, and smirking over her shoulder. At the sight of him she started, and he entered unbidden. The place bore all the marks of comfort, and in the firelight he saw two women of the neighbourhood, old gossips of his sisters and mother. His entrance hushed their talk, and sidelong looks and a half-giggle succeeded. Somehow the sight roused his gorge unspeakably. He, with his mind intent upon high adventure, with the smell of the salt and the fierce talk of men still in his memory, loathed this glosing prosperity, these well-fed women, and the whole pettiness of life. He took his mother aside and demanded the money which was his share. She, good soul, did not tell him the truth, but wrapping herself up in her rags of pride, went to a drawer and gave him a meagre bag of gold. It was the latest payment, and its loss meant straitened living for months. But he knew nothing of this, thought it but his share, and grumbled at its smallness. With the irony which riots in life, at that moment he was pluming himself upon superiority to such narrow souls, when all the while pride in one was making a sacrifice of which he knew nothing. His remnants of filial love made him take a kindly farewell of his mother; and then, with nose in the air and a weathercock of a brain, he shook off the dust of the domestic, and went out to the open world.
With the doorway of his former home, he passed from vice frowned upon and barely loved to vice gilded and set upon a pedestal. A sense of high exhilaration grew upon him. He would follow his own desires, with the aid of a strong hand and a courageous heart. In his then frame of mind the only baseness seemed to lie in settling upon his lees in the warm air of the reputable. A hard conscience and a ready hand were a man’s truest honour, and with this facile catchword he went whistling into a new life.
But at the moment something from the past came to greet him. As he passed a tavern door a girl with the face and attire of the outcast hailed him boisterously and made to link her arm with his. He knew her well for one of his aforetime comrades. Her face was pinched, and the night wind was blowing through her thin frock. But from Francis she got no kindness. His heart at the time was too steeled on his own path for old regrets. With a curse he struck her harshly with his open hand, and watched her stagger back to the causeway. The blow comforted his soul. It was the seal upon his new course, the rubicon which at length he had crossed; and when he came to Musselburgh sands and the lugger, it was with an increased resolution in his fool’s heart.
CHAPTER III. Forth and Tweed.
The wind was already shaking in the sails when he clambered aboard, and the windlass groaned with the lifting anchor. Mr. Berritch cried a cheery greeting from the bow, as Francis, heavy with sleep, tumbled down below to bed. The moon was up, the night airs were fine, and in a little the lugger was heading by the south end of Inchkeith for the swell of the North Ocean.
At dawn Francis was up and sniffing the salt air over the bulwarks. A landsman born, he had little acquaintance with the going down to the sea in ships, and the easy movement and the brisk purpose of the lugger delighted his heart. He was still in the first heat of adventure; the white planking, the cordage, and the tarry smell were all earnests of something new; and with the vanishing smoke and spires he beheld the end of a life crimped and hampered. He felt extraordinary vigour of body and a certain haphazard quality of mind which added breadth to his freedom. But at the last sight of the Pentlands’ back, sentiment woke for one brief moment ere she shook her wings and fled.
He turned from his meditation to find Mr. Berritch at his elbow with a smile and a good-morning. Seen in the first light his face had an ugly look about the eyes and ponderous jaw, a shadow in the lines of his mouth. With him came another, whose face Francis had not seen before, — a lean youth with bleak eyes, a hanging chin, and a smirk always on the verge of his lips.
“Ye came well off frae your venture, Francie,” said Mr. Berritch. “I have to present to ye Mr. Peter Stark, a young gentleman out o’ Dumbarton, bound on the same errand to France as yoursel’. Starkie, this is Mr. Birkenshaw I telled ye o’.”
