About my clear duty to my friend, the lawyer had no doubt. I must help him out of the county at whatever risk; but in the case of James, he was of a different mind.
“Mr. Thomson,” says he, “is one thing, Mr. Thomson’s kinsman quite another. I know little of the facts, but I gather that a great noble (whom we will call, if you like, the D. of A.)* has some concern and is even supposed to feel some animosity in the matter. The D. of A. is doubtless an excellent nobleman; but, Mr. David, timeo qui nocuere deos. If you interfere to balk his vengeance, you should remember there is one way to shut your testimony out; and that is to put you in the dock. There, you would be in the same pickle as Mr. Thomson’s kinsman. You will object that you are innocent; well, but so is he. And to be tried for your life before a Highland jury, on a Highland quarrel and with a Highland Judge upon the bench, would be a brief transition to the gallows.”
* The Duke of Argyle.
Now I had made all these reasonings before and found no very good reply to them; so I put on all the simplicity I could. “In that case, sir,” said I, “I would just have to be hanged — would I not?”
“My dear boy,” cries he, “go in God’s name, and do what you think is right. It is a poor thought that at my time of life I should be advising you to choose the safe and shameful; and I take it back with an apology. Go and do your duty; and be hanged, if you must, like a gentleman. There are worse things in the world than to be hanged.”
“Not many, sir,” said I, smiling.
“Why, yes, sir,” he cried, “very many. And it would be ten times better for your uncle (to go no farther afield) if he were dangling decently upon a gibbet.”
Thereupon he turned into the house (still in a great fervour of mind, so that I saw I had pleased him heartily) and there he wrote me two letters, making his comments on them as he wrote.
“This,” says he, “is to my bankers, the British Linen Company, placing a credit to your name. Consult Mr. Thomson, he will know of ways; and you, with this credit, can supply the means. I trust you will be a good husband of your money; but in the affair of a friend like Mr. Thomson, I would be even prodigal. Then for his kinsman, there is no better way than that you should seek the Advocate, tell him your tale, and offer testimony; whether he may take it or not, is quite another matter, and will turn on the D. of A. Now, that you may reach the Lord Advocate well recommended, I give you here a letter to a namesake of your own, the learned Mr. Balfour of Pilrig, a man whom I esteem. It will look better that you should be presented by one of your own name; and the laird of Pilrig is much looked up to in the Faculty and stands well with Lord Advocate Grant. I would not trouble him, if I were you, with any particulars; and (do you know?) I think it would be needless to refer to Mr. Thomson. Form yourself upon the laird, he is a good model; when you deal with the Advocate, be discreet; and in all these matters, may the Lord guide you, Mr. David!”
Thereupon he took his farewell, and set out with Torrance for the Ferry, while Alan and I turned our faces for the city of Edinburgh. As we went by the footpath and beside the gateposts and the unfinished lodge, we kept looking back at the house of my fathers. It stood there, bare and great and smokeless, like a place not lived in; only in one of the top windows, there was the peak of a nightcap bobbing up and down and back and forward, like the head of a rabbit from a burrow. I had little welcome when I came, and less kindness while I stayed; but at least I was watched as I went away.
Alan and I went slowly forward upon our way, having little heart either to walk or speak. The same thought was uppermost in both, that we were near the time of our parting; and remembrance of all the bygone days sate upon us sorely. We talked indeed of what should be done; and it was resolved that Alan should keep to the county, biding now here, now there, but coming once in the day to a particular place where I might be able to communicate with him, either in my own person or by messenger. In the meanwhile, I was to seek out a lawyer, who was an Appin Stewart, and a man therefore to be wholly trusted; and it should be his part to find a ship and to arrange for Alan’s safe embarkation. No sooner was this business done, than the words seemed to leave us; and though I would seek to jest with Alan under the name of Mr. Thomson, and he with me on my new clothes and my estate, you could feel very well that we were nearer tears than laughter.
We came the by-way over the hill of Corstorphine; and when we got near to the place called Rest-and-be-Thankful, and looked down on Corstorphine bogs and over to the city and the castle on the hill, we both stopped, for we both knew without a word said that we had come to where our ways parted. Here he repeated to me once again what had been agreed upon between us: the address of the lawyer, the daily hour at which Alan might be found, and the signals that were to be made by any that came seeking him. Then I gave what money I had (a guinea or two of Rankeillor’s) so that he should not starve in the meanwhile; and then we stood a space, and looked over at Edinburgh in silence.
“Well, good-bye,” said Alan, and held out his left hand.
“Good-bye,” said I, and gave the hand a little grasp, and went off down hill.
Neither one of us looked the other in the face, nor so long as he was in my view did I take one back glance at the friend I was leaving. But as I went on my way to the city, I felt so lost and lonesome, that I could have found it in my heart to sit down by the dyke, and cry and weep like any baby.
It was coming near noon when I passed in by the West Kirk and the Grassmarket into the streets of the capital. The huge height of the buildings, running up to ten and fifteen storeys, the narrow arched entries that continually vomited passengers, the wares of the merchants in their windows, the hubbub and endless stir, the foul smells and the fine clothes, and a hundred other particulars too small to mention, struck me into a kind of stupor of surprise, so that I let the crowd carry me to and fro; and yet all the time what I was thinking of was Alan at Rest-and-be-Thankful; and all the time (although you would think I would not choose but be delighted with these braws and novelties) there was a cold gnawing in my inside like a remorse for something wrong.
The hand of Providence brought me in my drifting to the very doors of the British Linen Company’s bank.
THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE
A WINTER’S TALE
This novel was published in 1889, with the Shakespearean subtitle ‘A Winter’s Tale’ (possibly to reflect the macabre parallels between the end of Shakespeare’s play and Stevenson’s novel). The second edition of the novel also included a preface, in which a fictional version of Stevenson is handed the narrative in manuscript form by a lawyer friend.
The story is narrated by Ephraim Mackellar, steward of the Scottish estate of Durrisdeer, owned by the Durie family. During the Jacobite rising, which splits loyalties across the Scottish nation, the Durie family decide that one son will join the uprising while the other will support the loyalist cause – a pragmatic move that ensures the continuation of the family’s status whatever the outcome of the rebellion. A coin toss determines that the older son James (the eponymous Master) will join the uprising, while the younger son Henry will fight for the loyalists. The novel follows the fortunes of the two brothers and relates the disastrous consequences of this early decision.
Stevenson wrote most of the novel whilst wintering in a cabin in the Saranac Mountains and the latter parts of the novel contain a memorable depiction of the North American wilderness.
Cover of the first edition
CONTENTS
PREFACE
CHAPTER I. — SUMMARY OF EVENTS DURING THIS MASTER’S WANDERINGS.
CHAPTER II. SUMMARY OF EVENTS (continued)
CHAPTER III. — THE MASTER’S WANDERINGS.
CHAPTER IV. — PERSECUTIONS ENDURED BY MR. HENRY.
CHAPTER V. — ACCOUNT OF ALL THAT PASSED ON THE NIGHT ON FEBRUARY 27TH, 1757.
CHAPTER VI. — SUMMARY OF EVENTS DURING THE MASTER’S SECOND ABSENCE.
CHAPTER VII. — ADVENTURE OF CHEVALIER BURKE IN INDIA.
CH
APTER VIII. — THE ENEMY IN THE HOUSE.
CHAPTER IX. — MR. MACKELLAR’S JOURNEY WITH THE MASTER.
CHAPTER X. — PASSAGES AT NEW YORK.
CHAPTER XI. — THE JOURNEY IN THE WILDERNESS.
NARRATIVE OF THE TRADER, MOUNTAIN.
CHAPTER XII. — THE JOURNEY IN THE WILDERNESS (continued).
Poster for the 1953 film version
To Sir Percy Florence and Lady Shelley
Here is a tale which extends over many years and travels into many countries. By a peculiar fitness of circumstance the writer began, continued it, and concluded it among distant and diverse scenes. Above all, he was much upon the sea. The character and fortune of the fraternal enemies, the hall and shrubbery of Durrisdeer, the problem of Mackellar’s homespun and how to shape it for superior flights; these were his company on deck in many star-reflecting harbours, ran often in his mind at sea to the tune of slatting canvas, and were dismissed (something of the suddenest) on the approach of squalls. It is my hope that these surroundings of its manufacture may to some degree find favour for my story with seafarers and sea-lovers like yourselves.
And at least here is a dedication from a great way off: written by the loud shores of a subtropical island near upon ten thousand miles from Boscombe Chine and Manor: scenes which rise before me as I write, along with the faces and voices of my friends.
Well, I am for the sea once more; no doubt Sir Percy also. Let us make the signal B. R. D.!
R. L. S.
Waikiki, May 17, 1889
PREFACE
Although an old, consistent exile, the editor of the following pages revisits now and again the city of which he exults to be a native; and there are few things more strange, more painful, or more salutary, than such revisitations. Outside, in foreign spots, he comes by surprise and awakens more attention than he had expected; in his own city, the relation is reversed, and he stands amazed to be so little recollected. Elsewhere he is refreshed to see attractive faces, to remark possible friends; there he scouts the long streets, with a pang at heart, for the faces and friends that are no more. Elsewhere he is delighted with the presence of what is new, there tormented by the absence of what is old. Elsewhere he is content to be his present self; there he is smitten with an equal regret for what he once was and for what he once hoped to be.
He was feeling all this dimly, as he drove from the station, on his last visit; he was feeling it still as he alighted at the door of his friend Mr. Johnstone Thomson, W.S., with whom he was to stay. A hearty welcome, a face not altogether changed, a few words that sounded of old days, a laugh provoked and shared, a glimpse in passing of the snowy cloth and bright decanters and the Piranesis on the dining-room wall, brought him to his bed-room with a somewhat lightened cheer, and when he and Mr. Thomson sat down a few minutes later, cheek by jowl, and pledged the past in a preliminary bumper, he was already almost consoled, he had already almost forgiven himself his two unpardonable errors, that he should ever have left his native city, or ever returned to it.
“I have something quite in your way,” said Mr. Thomson. “I wished to do honour to your arrival; because, my dear fellow, it is my own youth that comes back along with you; in a very tattered and withered state, to be sure, but — well! — all that’s left of it.”
“A great deal better than nothing,” said the editor. “But what is this which is quite in my way?”
“I was coming to that,” said Mr. Thomson: “Fate has put it in my power to honour your arrival with something really original by way of dessert. A mystery.”
“A mystery?” I repeated.
“Yes,” said his friend, “a mystery. It may prove to be nothing, and it may prove to be a great deal. But in the meanwhile it is truly mysterious, no eye having looked on it for near a hundred years; it is highly genteel, for it treats of a titled family; and it ought to be melodramatic, for (according to the superscription) it is concerned with death.”
“I think I rarely heard a more obscure or a more promising annunciation,” the other remarked. “But what is It?”
“You remember my predecessor’s, old Peter M’Brair’s business?”
“I remember him acutely; he could not look at me without a pang of reprobation, and he could not feel the pang without betraying it. He was to me a man of a great historical interest, but the interest was not returned.”
“Ah well, we go beyond him,” said Mr. Thomson. “I daresay old Peter knew as little about this as I do. You see, I succeeded to a prodigious accumulation of old law-papers and old tin boxes, some of them of Peter’s hoarding, some of his father’s, John, first of the dynasty, a great man in his day. Among other collections, were all the papers of the Durrisdeers.”
“The Durrisdeers!” cried I. “My dear fellow, these may be of the greatest interest. One of them was out in the ‘45; one had some strange passages with the devil — you will find a note of it in Law’s Memorials, I think; and there was an unexplained tragedy, I know not what, much later, about a hundred years ago—”
“More than a hundred years ago,” said Mr. Thomson. “In 1783.”
“How do you know that? I mean some death.”
“Yes, the lamentable deaths of my Lord Durrisdeer and his brother, the Master of Ballantrae (attainted in the troubles),” said Mr. Thomson with something the tone of a man quoting. “Is that it?”
“To say truth,” said I, “I have only seen some dim reference to the things in memoirs; and heard some traditions dimmer still, through my uncle (whom I think you knew). My uncle lived when he was a boy in the neighbourhood of St. Bride’s; he has often told me of the avenue closed up and grown over with grass, the great gates never opened, the last lord and his old maid sister who lived in the back parts of the house, a quiet, plain, poor, hum-drum couple it would seem — but pathetic too, as the last of that stirring and brave house — and, to the country folk, faintly terrible from some deformed traditions.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Thomson. “Henry Graeme Durie, the last lord, died in 1820; his sister, the honourable Miss Katherine Durie, in ‘27; so much I know; and by what I have been going over the last few days, they were what you say, decent, quiet people and not rich. To say truth, it was a letter of my lord’s that put me on the search for the packet we are going to open this evening. Some papers could not be found; and he wrote to Jack M’Brair suggesting they might be among those sealed up by a Mr. Mackellar. M’Brair answered, that the papers in question were all in Mackellar’s own hand, all (as the writer understood) of a purely narrative character; and besides, said he, ‘I am bound not to open them before the year 1889.’ You may fancy if these words struck me: I instituted a hunt through all the M’Brair repositories; and at last hit upon that packet which (if you have had enough wine) I propose to show you at once.”
In the smoking-room, to which my host now led me, was a packet, fastened with many seals and enclosed in a single sheet of strong paper thus endorsed:
Papers relating to the lives and lamentable deaths of the late Lord Durisdeer, and his elder brother James, commonly called Master of Ballantrae, attainted in the troubles: entrusted into the hands of John M’Brair in the Lawnmarket of Edinburgh, W.S.; this 20th day of September Anno Domini 1789; by him to be kept secret until the revolution of one hundred years complete, or until the 20th day of September 1889: the same compiled and written by me, Ephraim Mackellar,
For near forty years Land Steward on the estates of his Lordship.
As Mr. Thomson is a married man, I will not say what hour had struck when we laid down the last of the following pages; but I will give a few words of what ensued.
“Here,” said Mr. Thomson, “is a novel ready to your hand: all you have to do is to work up the scenery, develop the characters, and improve the style.”
“My dear fellow,” said I, “they are just the three things that I would rather die than set my hand to. It shall be published as it stands.”
“But it’s so bald,” objected Mr. Thomson.
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sp; “I believe there is nothing so noble as baldness,” replied I, “and I am sure there in nothing so interesting. I would have all literature bald, and all authors (if you like) but one.”
“Well, well,” add Mr. Thomson, “we shall see.”
CHAPTER I. — SUMMARY OF EVENTS DURING THIS MASTER’S WANDERINGS.
The full truth of this odd matter is what the world has long been looking for, and public curiosity is sure to welcome. It so befell that I was intimately mingled with the last years and history of the house; and there does not live one man so able as myself to make these matters plain, or so desirous to narrate them faithfully. I knew the Master; on many secret steps of his career I have an authentic memoir in my hand; I sailed with him on his last voyage almost alone; I made one upon that winter’s journey of which so many tales have gone abroad; and I was there at the man’s death. As for my late Lord Durrisdeer, I served him and loved him near twenty years; and thought more of him the more I knew of him. Altogether, I think it not fit that so much evidence should perish; the truth is a debt I owe my lord’s memory; and I think my old years will flow more smoothly, and my white hair lie quieter on the pillow, when the debt is paid.
The Duries of Durrisdeer and Ballantrae were a strong family in the south-west from the days of David First. A rhyme still current in the countryside —
Complete Works of Robert Louis Stevenson Page 94