And if there should come to
be any question, here is your excuse. Our lives were in danger by
these savages; being answerable for my safety, you chose the part
to bring me from their neighbourhood and detain me the rest of the
time on board your boat: and do you know, Andie?" says I, with a
smile, "I think it was very wisely chosen,"
"The truth is I have nae goo for Neil," says Andie, "nor he for me,
I'm thinking; and I would like ill to come to my hands wi' the man.
Tam Anster will make a better hand of it with the cattle onyway."
(For this man, Anster, came from Fife, where the Gaelic is still
spoken.) "Ay, ay!" says Andie, "Tam'll can deal with them the
best. And troth! the mair I think of it, the less I see we would
be required. The place--ay, feggs! they had forgot the place. Eh,
Shaws, ye're a lang-heided chield when ye like! Forby that I'm
awing ye my life," he added, with more solemnity, and offered me
his hand upon the bargain.
Whereupon, with scarce more words, we stepped suddenly on board the
boat, cast off, and set the lug. The Gregara were then busy upon
breakfast, for the cookery was their usual part; but, one of them
stepping to the battlements, our flight was observed before we were
twenty fathoms from the rock; and the three of them ran about the
ruins and the landing-shelf, for all the world like ants about a
broken nest, hailing and crying on us to return. We were still in
both the lee and the shadow of the rock, which last lay broad upon
the waters, but presently came forth in almost the same moment into
the wind and sunshine; the sail filled, the boat heeled to the
gunwale, and we swept immediately beyond sound of the men's voices.
To what terrors they endured upon the rock, where they were now
deserted without the countenance of any civilised person or so much
as the protection of a Bible, no limit can be set; nor had they any
brandy left to be their consolation, for even in the haste and
secrecy of our departure Andie had managed to remove it.
It was our first care to set Anster ashore in a cove by the
Glenteithy Rocks, so that the deliverance of our maroons might be
duly seen to the next day. Thence we kept away up Firth. The
breeze, which was then so spirited, swiftly declined, but never
wholly failed us. All day we kept moving, though often not much
more; and it was after dark ere we were up with the Queensferry.
To keep the letter of Andie's engagement (or what was left of it) I
must remain on board, but I thought no harm to communicate with the
shore in writing. On Prestongrange's cover, where the Government
seal must have a good deal surprised my correspondent, I writ, by
the boat's lantern, a few necessary words, aboard and Andie carried
them to Rankeillor. In about an hour he came again, with a purse
of money and the assurance that a good horse should be standing
saddled for me by two to-morrow at Clackmannan Pool. This done,
and the boat riding by her stone anchor, we lay down to sleep under
the sail.
We were in the Pool the next day long ere two; and there was
nothing left for me but to sit and wait. I felt little alacrity
upon my errand. I would have been glad of any passable excuse to
lay it down; but none being to be found, my uneasiness was no less
great than if I had been running to some desired pleasure. By
shortly after one the horse was at the waterside, and I could see a
man walking it to and fro till I should land, which vastly swelled
my impatience. Andie ran the moment of my liberation very fine,
showing himself a man of his bare word, but scarce serving his
employers with a heaped measure; and by about fifty seconds after
two I was in the saddle and on the full stretch for Stirling. In a
little more than an hour I had passed that town, and was already
mounting Alan Water side, when the weather broke in a small
tempest. The rain blinded me, the wind had nearly beat me from the
saddle, and the first darkness of the night surprised me in a
wilderness still some way east of Balwhidder, not very sure of my
direction and mounted on a horse that began already to be weary.