John Splendid: The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn

by Neil Munro

  CHAPTER XXX.--ARGILE'S BEDROOM.

  This need for waiting upon his lordship so soon after the great reversewas a sour bite to swallow, for M'Iver as well as myself. M'Iver, hadhe his own way of it, would have met his chief and cousin alone; and hegave a hint delicately of that kind, affecting to be interested only insparing me the trouble and helping me home to Elrigmore, where my fatherand his men had returned three days before. But I knew an officer's dutytoo well for that, and insisted on accompanying him, certain (with somemischievous humour in spoiling his fair speeches) that he dared scarcelybe so fair-faced and flattering to MacCailein before me as he would bealone with him.

  The castle had the stillness of the grave. Every guest had fled asquickly as he could from this retreat of a naked and ashamed soul. Wherepipers played as a custom, and laughter rang, there was the melancholyhush of a monastery. The servants went about a-tiptoe, speaking inwhispers lest their master should be irritated in his fever; the verybanner on the tower hung limp about its pole, hiding the black galleyof its blazon, now a lymphad of disgrace. As we went over the bridgea little dog, his lordship's favourite, lying at the door, weary, nodoubt, of sullen looks and silence, came leaping and barking about us atJohn's cheery invitation, in a joy, as it would appear, to meet any onewith a spark of life and friendliness.

  Argile was in his bed-chamber and between blankets, in the hands of hisphysician, who had been bleeding him. He had a minister for mind andbody, for Gordon was with him too, and stayed with him during ourvisit, though the chirurgeon left the room with a word of caution to hispatient not to excite himself.

  "Wise advice, is it not, gentlemen?" said the Marquis. "As if onestirred up his own passions like a dame waiting on a drunken husband.I am glad to see you back, more especially as Master Gordon was justtelling me of the surprise at Dalness, and the chance that you had beencut down there by the MacDonalds, who, luckily for him and Sonachan andthe others, all followed you in your flight, and gave them a chance ofan easy escape."

  He shook hands with us warmly enough, with fingers moist and nervous.A raised look was in his visage, his hair hung upon a brow of exceedingpallor. I realised at a half-glance the commotion that was within.

  "A drop of wine?"

  "Thank you," said I, "but I'm after a glass in the town." I was yet tolearn sorrow for this unhappy nobleman whose conduct had bittered me allthe way from Lom.

  MacCailein scrutinised me sharply, and opened his lips as it were to saysomething, but changed his mind, and made a gesture towards the bottle,which John Splendid speedily availed himself of with a "Here's one whohas no swither about it. Lord knows I have had few enough of life'scomforts this past week!"

  Gordon sat with a Bible in his hand, abstracted, his eyes staring on awindow that looked on the branches of the highest tree about the castle.He had been reading or praying with his master before the physician hadcome in; he had been doing his duty (I could swear by his stern jaw),and making MacCailein Mor writhe to the flame of a conscience revived.There was a constraint on the company for some minutes, on no one morethan Argile, who sat propped up on his bolsters, and, fiddling with longthin fingers with the fringes of his coverlet, looked every way but inthe eyes of M'Iver or myself. I can swear John was glad enough to escapetheir glance. He was as little at ease as his master, made all thefuss he could with his bottle, and drank his wine with far too great adeliberation for a person generally pretty brisk with the beaker.

  "It's a fine day," said he at last, breaking the silence. "The back ofthe winter's broken fairly." Then he started and looked at me, consciousthat I might have some contempt for so frail an opening.

  "Did you come here to speak about the weather?" asked MacCailein, with asour wearied smile.

  "No," said M'Iver, ruffling up at once; "I came to ask when you aregoing to take us back the road we came?"

  "To--to--overbye?" asked MacCailein, baulking at the name.

  "Just so; to Inverlochy," answered M'Iver. "I suppose we are to givethem a call when we can muster enough men?"

  "Hadn't we better consider where we are first?" said MacCailein. Then heput his fair hand through his ruddy locks and sighed. "Have you nothingto say (and be done with it) about my--my--my part in the affair? Hisreverence here has had his will of me on that score."

  M'Iver darted a look of annoyance at the minister, who seemed to pay noheed, but still to have his thoughts far off.

  "I have really nothing to say, your lordship, except that I'm glad tosee you spared to us here instead of being left a corpse with our honestold kinsman Auchinbreac (_beannachd leas!_) and more gentry of your clanand house than the Blue Quarry will make tombs for in Kilmalieu. If theminister has been preaching, it's his trade; it's what you pay him for.I'm no homilist, thank God, and no man's conscience."

  "No, no; God knows you are not," said Argile, in a tone of pityand vexation. "I think I said before that you were the poorest ofconsciences to a man in a hesitancy between duty and inclination....And all my guests have left me, John; I'm a lonely man in my castle ofInneraora this day, except for the prayers of a wife--God bless and keepher!--who knows and comprehends my spirit And I have one more friendhere in this room------"

  "You can count on John M'Iver to the yetts of Hell," said my friend,"and I am the proud man that you should think it."

  "I am obliged to you for that, kinsman," said his lordship in Gaelic,with a by-your-leave to the cleric. "But do not give your witless vanitya foolish airing before my chaplain." Then he added in the English,"When the fairy was at my cradle-side and gave my mother choice of mygifts, I wish she had chosen rowth of real friends. I could be doingwith more about me of the quality I mention; better than horse and footwould they be, more trusty than the claymores of my clan. It might bethe slogan 'Cruachan' whenever it wist, and Archibald of Argile would bemore puissant than he of Homer's story. People have envied me when theyhave heard me called the King of the Highlands--fools that did not knowI was the poorest, weakest man of his time, surrounded by flatterersinstead of friends. Gordon, Gordon, I am the victim of the Highlandliar, that smooth-tongued----"

  "Call it the Campbell liar," I cried bitterly, thinking of my father."Your clan has not the reputation of guile for nothing, and if yourefused straightforward honest outside counsel sometimes, it was not forthe want of its offering."

  "I cry your pardon," said MacCailein, meekly; "I should have learned todiscriminate by now. Blood's thicker than water, they say, but it's notso pure and transparent; I have found my blood drumly enough."

  "And ready enough to run freely for you," said M'Iver, but halfcomprehending this perplexed mind. "Your lordship should be the last toecho any sentiment directed against the name and fame of Clan Campbell."

  "Indeed they gave me their blood freely enough--a thousand of them lyingyonder in the north--I wish they had been so lavish, those closest aboutme, with truth and honour. For that I must depend on an honest servantof the Lord Jesus Christ, the one man in my pay with the courage toconfront me with no cloaked speech, but his naked thought, though itshould lash me like whips. Oh, many a time my wife, who is none of ourrace, warned me against the softening influence, the blight and rot ofthis eternal air of flattery that's round about Castle Inneraora likea swamp vapour. She's in Stirling to-day--I ken it in my heart thatto-night shell weep upon her pillow because she'll know fate has foundthe weak joint in her goodman's armour again."

  John Splendid's brow came down upon a most perplexed face; this seemedall beyond him, but he knew his master was somehow blaming the world atlarge for his own error.

  "Come now, John," said his lordship, turning and leaning on his arm andlooking curiously at his kinsman. "Come now, what do you think of mehere without a wound but at the heart, with Auchinbreac and all mygallant fellows yonder?"

  "Auchinbreac was a soldier by trade and a good one too," answeredM'Iver, at his usual trick of prevarication.

  "And a flatterer like yourself, you mean," said his lordship. "He andyou learned the lesson i
n the same school, I'm thinking. And as ill-luckhad it, his ill counsel found me on the swither, as yours did whenColkitto came down the glens there to rape and burn. That's the Devilfor you; he's aye planning to have the minute and the man together.Come, sir, come, sir, what do you think, what do you think?"

  He rose as he spoke and put his knees below him, and leaned across thebed with hands upon the blankets, staring his kinsman in the face as ifhe would pluck the truth from him out at the very eyes. His voice roseto an animal cry with an agony in it; the sinister look that did himsuch injustice breathed across his visage. His knuckle and collar-bonesshone blae through the tight skin.

  "What do I think?" echoed M'Iver. "Well, now----"

  "On your honour now," cried Argile, clutching him by the shoulder.

  At that M'Iver's countenance changed: he threw off his soft complacence,and cruelty and temper stiffened his jaw.

  "I'll soon give you that, my Lord of Argile," said he. "I can lie likea Dutch major for convenience sake, but put me on honour and you'll getthe truth if it cost me my life. Purgatory's your portion, Argile, for aSunday's work that makes our name a mock to-day across the enviousworld. Take to your books and your preachers, sir--you're for thecloister and not for the field; and if I live a hundred years, I'll denyI went with you to Inverlochy. I left my sword in Badenoch, but here'smy dagger" (and he threw it with a clatter on the floor); "it's the lasttool I'll handle in the service of a scholar. To-morrow the old big warsfor me; Hebron's troopers will welcome an umquhile comrade, and I'llfind no swithering captains among the cavaliers in France."

  Back sat my lord in bed, and laughed with a surrender shrill anddistraught, until Master Gordon and I calmed him, and there was hiscousin still before him in a passion, standing in the middle of thefloor.

  "Stop, stop, John," he cried; "now that for once I've got the truth fromyou, let us be better friends than ever before."

  "Never the same again," said M'I ver, firmly, "never the same again, foryou ken my estimate of you now; and what avails my courtesy?"

  "Your flatteries, you mean," said Argile, good-natured. "And, besides,you speak only of my two blunders; you know my other parts,--you knowthat by nature I am no poltroon."

  "That's no credit to you, sir--it's the strong blood of Diarmaid; therewas no poltroon in the race but what came in on the wrong side of theblanket I've said it first, and I'll say it to the last, your spirit issmoored among the books. Paper and ink will be the Gael's undoing; mymother taught me, and my mother knew. So long as we lived by our handswe were the world's invincibles. Rome met us and Rome tried us, and hercorps might come in winter torrents, but they never tore us from ourhills and keeps. What Rome may never do, that may paper and sheepskin;you, yourself, MacCailein, have the name of plying pen and ink very wellto your own purpose in the fingers of old lairds who have small skill ofthat contrivance."

  He would have passed on in this outrageous strain without remission, hadnot Gordon checked him with a determined and unabashed voice. He toldhim to sit down in silence or leave the room, and asked him to look uponhis master and see if that high fever was a condition to inflame in afit of temper. John Splendid cooled a little, and went to the window,looking down with eyes of far surmise upon the pleasance and the townbelow, chewing his temper between his teeth.

  "You see, Elrigmore, what a happy King of the Highlands I am," said theMarquis, despondently. "Fortunate Auchinbreac, to be all bye with itafter a moment's agony!"

  "He died like a good soldier, sir," I said; "he was by all accounts aman of some vices, but he wiped them out in his own blood."

  "Are you sure of that? Is it not the old folly of the code of honour,the mad exaltation of mere valour in arms, that makes you think so? Whatif he was spilling his drops on the wrong side? He was against his kingat least, and--oh, my wits, my wits, what am I saying?... I saw you didnot drink my wine, Elrigmore; am I so low as that?"

  "There is no man so low, my lord," said I, "but he may be yet exalted.We are, the best of us, the instruments of a whimsical providence"("What a rank doctrine," muttered the minister), "and Caesar himselfwas sometimes craven before his portents. You, my lord, have the oneconsolation left, that all's not bye yet with the cause you champion,and you may yet lead it to the highest victory."

  Argile took a grateful glance at me. "You know what I am," he said,"not a man of the happy, single mood like our friend Barbreck here, buttossed between philosophies. I am paying bitterly for my pliability, forwho so much the sport of life as the man who knows right well the gaithe should gang, and prays fervently to be permitted to follow it,but sometimes stumbles in the ditch? Monday, oh Monday; I must be atEdinburgh and face them all! Tis that dauntons me." His eyes seemed toswim in blood, as he looked at me, or through me, aghast at the horrorof his situation, and sweat stood in blobs upon his brow. "That," hewent on, "weighs me down like lead. Here about me my people know me, andmay palliate the mistake of a day by the recollection of a lifetime'shonour. I blame Auchinbreac; I blame the chieftains,--they said I musttake to the galley; I blame----"

  "Blame no one, Argile," said Master Gordon, standing up before him, nota second too soon, for his lordship had his hand on the dirk M'Iver hadthrown down. Then he turned to us with ejecting arms. "Out you go," hecried sternly, "out you go; what delight have you in seeing a noblemanon the rack?"

  As the door closed behind us we could hear Argile sob.

  Seventeen years later, if I may quit the thread of my history and takein a piece that more properly belongs to the later adventures of JohnSplendid, I saw my lord die by the maiden. Being then in his tail, Idined with him and his friends the day before he died, and he spoke withexceeding cheerfulness of that hour M'Iver and I found him in bed inInneraora. "You saw me at my worst," said he, "on two occasions; bidetill to-morrow and you'll see me at my best I never unmasked to mortalman till that day Gordon put you out of my room." I stayed and saw himdie; I saw his head up and his chin in the air as behoved hisquality, that day he went through that noisy, crowded, causiedEdinburgh--Edinburgh of the doleful memories, Edinburgh whose ports Inever enter till this day but I feel a tickling at the nape of my neck,as where a wooden collar should lie before the shear fall.

  "A cool enough reception this," said M'Iver, as we left the gate. "Itwas different last year, when we went up together on your return fromLow Germanie. Then MacCailein was in the need of soldiers, now he's inthe need of priests, who gloze over his weakness with their prayers."

  "You are hardly fair either to the one or the other," I said. "Argile,whom I went in to meet to-day with a poor regard for him, turns out abetter man than I gave him credit for being; he has at least the graceto grieve about a great error of judgment, or weakness of the spirit,whichever it may be. And as for Master Gordon, I'll take off my hat tohim. Yon's no type of the sour, dour, anti-prelatics; he comes closer onthe perfect man and soldier than any man I ever met."

  M'Iver looked at me with a sign of injured vanity.

  "You're not very fastidious in your choice of comparisons," said he. "Asfor myself, I cannot see much more in Gordon than what he is paid for--ahabit of even temper, more truthfulness than I have myself, and that's adubious virtue, for see the impoliteness that's always in its train! Addto that a lack of any clannish regard for MacCailein Mor, whom he treatsjust like a common merchant, and that's all. Just a plain, stout, fozy,sappy burrow-man, keeping a gospel shop, with scarcely so much of aman's parts as will let him fend a blow in the face. I could march fourmiles for his one, and learn him the A B _ab_ of every manly art."

  "I like you fine, man," I cried; "I would sooner go tramping the glenswith you any day than Master Gordon; but that's a weakness of theimperfect and carnal man, that cares not to have a conscience at hiscoat-tail every hour of the day: you have your own parts and he his,and his parts are those that are not very common on our side of thecountry--more's the pity."

  M'Iver was too busy for a time upon the sudden rupture with Argile topay very much heed to my defence of
Master Gordon. The quarrel--to callthat a quarrel in which one man had all the bad temper and the othernothing but self-reproach--had soured him of a sudden as thunderturns the morning's cream to curd before noon. And his whole demeanourrevealed a totally new man. In his ordinary John was very pernickettyabout his clothing, always with the most shining of buckles and buttons,always trim in plaiding, snod and spruce about his hair and his hosen, areal dandy who never overdid the part, but just contrived to be pleasantto the eye of women, who, in my observation, have, the most sensible ofthem, as great a contempt for the mere fop as they have for the sloven.It took, indeed, trimness of apparel to make up for the plainness ofhis face. Not that he was ugly or harsh-favoured,--he was too genialfor either; he was simply well-favoured enough to pass in a fair, as thesaying goes, which is a midway between Apollo and plain Donald But whatwith a jacket and vest all creased for the most apparent reasons, aplaid frayed to ribbons in dashing through the wood of Dalness, broguesburst at the toes, and a bonnet soaked all out of semblance to itself byrains, he appeared more common. The black temper of him transformed hisface too: it lost the geniality that was its main charm, and out of hiseyes flamed a most wicked, cunning, cruel fellow.

  He went down the way from the castle brig to the "arches cursing withgreat eloquence. A soldier picks up many tricks of blasphemy in a careerabout the world with foreign legions, and John had the reddings ofthree or four languages at his command, so that he had no need to repeathimself much in his choice of terms aboat his chief. To do him justicehe had plenty of condemnation for himself too.

  "Well," said I, "you were inclined to be calm enough with MacCaileinwhen first we entered his room. I suppose all this uproar is over hischarge of flattery, not against yourself alone but against all thepeople about."

  "That's just the thing," he cried, turning round and throwing his armsfuriously about "Could he not have charged the clan generally, and letwho would put the cap on? If yon's the policy of Courts, heaven helpprinces!"

  "And yet you were very humble when you entered," I protested.

  "Was I that?" he retorted. "That's easy to account for. Did you everfeel like arguing with a gentleman when you had on your second-bestclothes and no ruffle? The man was in his bed, and his position as hecocked up there on his knees was not the most dignified I have seen; buteven then he had the best of it, for I felt like a beggar before him inmy shabby duds. Oh, he had the best of us all there! You saw Gordon hadthe sense to put on a new surtout and clean linen and a freshly dressedperuke before he saw him; I think he would scarcely have been so boldbefore Argile if he had his breek-bands a finger-length below his belt,and his wig on the nape of his neck as we saw him in Glencoe."

  "Anyhow," said I, "you have severed from his lordship; are you reallygoing abroad?"

  He paused a second in thought, smiled a little, and then laughed as ifhe had seen something humorous.

  "Man," said he, "didn't I do the dirk trick with a fine touch ofnobility? Maybe you thought it was done on the impulse and without anycalculation. The truth was, I played the whole thing over in my mindwhile he was in the preliminaries of his discourse. I saw he was workingup to an attack, and I knew I could surprise him. But I must confessI said more than I intended. When I spoke of the big wars and Hebron'stroopers--well, Argile's a very nice shire to be living in."

  "What, was it all play-acting then?"

  He looked at me and shrugged his shoulders.

  "You must be a singularly simple man, Elrigmore," he said, "to ask thatof any one. Are we not play-acting half our lives once we get a littlebeyond the stage of the ploughman and the herd? Half our tears and halfour laughter and the great bulk of our virtues are like your way ofcocking your bonnet over your right ear; it does not come by nature, andit is done to pleasure the world in general Play-acting! I'll tell youthis, Colin, I could scarcely say myself when a passion of mine isreal or fancied now. But I can tell you this too; if I began in play torevile the Marquis, I ended in earnest I'm afraid it's all bye with meyonder. No more mine-managing for me; I struck too close on the marrowfor him to forget it."

  "He has forgotten and forgiven it already," I cried "At least, let ushope he has not forgotten it (for you said no more than was perhapsdeserved), but at least it's forgiven. If you said to-morrow that youwere sorry for your temper----"

  "Said ten thousand fiends in Hell!" cried M'Iver. "I may be vexed Iangered the man; but I'll never let him know it by my words, if hecannot make it out from my acts."