That night at supper Effie told her fellow-servants of Sandie’s weird words, and they took counsel together whether his mother should be told about it or not, and they decided only to speak to her if anything untoward happened to old Elspeth. It was on Thursday that Effie had been sent to Elspeth McFie’s cottage, and she resolved to go there again on her own account on the following Sunday afternoon. Her native superstitions were strong upon her, though she had never imparted them to her young charge, and she drew near to Elspeth’s cottage with a boding heart. It scarcely surprised her when she entered to find old Elspeth lying dead on the bed, with coins on her eyes and a white cloth bound round her head, precisely as Sandie had seen her on Thursday.
Two women were in the room with the dead, eager to tell how Elspeth had taken to her bed on Thursday evening, refused bit or sup, and had died early that morning. Effie trembled, but merely asked of what old Elspeth had died, for three days before she seemed in no likelihood of death. But the only account the women could give of her sudden death was that she appeared to have had no illness at all, and that she had said “I’m no a sick woman, but a dying, and I maun gae!”
Effie hastened home to tell her mistress everything, repeating faithfully every word that old Elspeth and Sandie had said on the previous Thursday, and Mrs. Galbraith listened with a white and awe-struck face.
“Ye’ll just say naething about it, Effie; it’ll be a sair prejudice against the poor bairn, and stand in his way, gin folks think Sandie has the second sight,” and Effie did not think it necessary to mention that every servant in the house was acquainted with the result of her visit to old Elspeth’s cottage. But she hinted that if she continued to wait on such an awesome bairn, that might see the death tokens on her face any day, and fright her into an early grave, her wages should be raised in proportion to the danger of her service.
When Mrs. Gaibraith told her husband of Sandie’s ghastly remark, its tragic result, and the child’s unconsciousness in the matter, he disguised the fears that possessed him beneath a bluster of wrath, and berated her and Effie soundly. “It stands to reason that the bairn canna speak o’ what he does na ken, and you and Effie, but mair likely Effie than you — for I was used to think you a woman o’ sense—hae been telling Sandie auld wives’ tales about the second sight, till he thinks it a fine thing to practise what ye’ve taught him, and the auld doitered fule Elspeth dies out o’ sheer fright in consequence, and ye maun see for your ain sel’ what your ain folly has brought about!”
But Mrs. Galbraith protested that neither she nor Effie had ever uttered a word about the second sight in the boy’s hearing, and David, who in his heart believed his wife, though he did not deem it consistent with his dignity to own as much, abruptly ended the unpleasant affair by saying peremptorily, “I’ll no permit the bairn to be tauld any mair ungodly superstitions and auld wives’ tales. Effie may gang to the deil, and Sandie sall be wi’ me in his walks and rides, and I’se warrant ye’ll hear naething from him but what he learns fra’ me, guid sense and sound doctrine!”
And Effie was dismissed, to her own great relief, and from that day forth Sandie became his father’s outdoor companion, to the visible benefit of his health and spirits.
But no one was so really alarmed at Sandie’s uncanny remark and its consequences as David Galbraith himself. His grandmother, a Highland woman, had had the second sight, and his father had told him how she lived to become the terror of her family. Her premonitions of death and calamity were unfailingly true, and the spirit within her never enlightened her as to how the impending evil might be averted. She was simply the medium of announcing approaching doom. What if her ghostly gift had descended to her grandson, a barren heritage, that would make him shunned by his kind!
Poor Alison Galbraith, finding her husband irritable and unreasonable on the subject of Sandie’s weird speech, sought comfort in pouring out her fears to their minister, the Rev. Ewan McFarlane, who gave ear to her with as much patience as could be expected from a man whose chief business it was in life to speak and not to listen.
He drew the very worst inference from what he heard. “It’s a clear case o’ the second sight, and I canna but fear that there may be maur to come. When the uncanny spirit lights on a body there’s na predicting what its manifestation may be, and for aught that we ken it may be you or me that Sandie’ll see the death tokens on neist. And if ye continue to bring him to the kirk, I wad request that ye’ll no let him sit glowering at me, for though sudden death wad doubtless be sudden glory to me, it wad no be consistent wi’ the dignity of a minister o’ the Free Kirk that he suld be harried untimely into his grave by an uncanny bairn, that wad hae been burnt for a warlock in times gane by. And if I was spared such a sair visitation, the bairn might yet be permitted to wark a certain perturbation of spirit in me, that wad cause me to curtail the word of God, and bring my discourse to a premature end, to the grievous loss of them that hear. And, Mistress Gaibraith, let me tell ye, ye’ll fa’ into disrepute wi’ your neighbors gin Sandie sees bawbies on your minister’s honored ’een, and aught came of it to his prejudice!”
In the following spring David Galbraith’s youngest brother Colin returned, after an absence of ten years, to spend a few months with his relations in Scotland. His industry had been prospered in Australia, and he was in a better position than he could have attained by any exertions of his own in the old country. He and his nephew struck up a warm friendship together, and it was a pretty sight to see them golfing on the links at North Berwick, the strong man accommodating his play to that of the puny boy by his side, and restraining his speech so that not a word fell from his lips but what was fit for a child to hear.
One day when they had played till Sandie was tired they sauntered down to the beach, Uncle Colin to sit on the rocks smoking his morning pipe, his nephew to perch beside him and amuse himself with the shells and seaweed that abound there. Presently Sandie grew weary of sitting still, threw away the handful of shells he had picked up, and proposed that they should go farther along the sands to where the children were bathing. “And gie me your hand, Uncle Colin, and I’ll tell ye something while we walk that I canna just understand mysel’. I’ve seen an unco’ strange thing; I’ve seen your house in Australia!”
“Hoot, mon! what havers are ye talking? Ye’ve been dreaming!” said Uncle Colin cheerily.
“Na, I saw it. It was no dream; I ken weel the difference between dreaming and seeing. Your house has na slates on the roof, like our house ; it was theckit like a hay-rick, and it had a wide place round it covered with another little theckit roof, and windows like big glass doors opened on it. And there was fire all about, and tall grass all ableeze, and sheep rinning hither and thither frighted, and a man with a black beard and a gun in his hand ran out o’ the house and shouted, ‘O’Grady, save the mare and foal! if they’re lost the master will never forgi’e ye!’ What ails ye, Uncle Colin, that ye look sae white?” and the boy looked up in his uncle’s face with wonder.
“It’s no canny to see such a sight, Sandie! What do you ken o’ bush fires? and ye’ve never seen a picture of my house; and who tauld ye that my groom is an Irishman named O’Grady? for I’ve tauld naebody here, and the man with the black beard is my Scotch shepherd.”
“There was nae need to tell me onything about it, Uncle Colin, for I saw it a’; but if the man at the door had na shouted O’Grady, then I suld na hae kenned his name.”
Colin made a poor attempt at laughter, that he might hide from the child how shocked and startled he was ; but as soon as they reached home he told his brother about his son’s vision, and heard from him in return the story of Sandie and old Elspeth. A few days later Colin Gaibraith received a telegram from his head shepherd informing him of the heavy loss he had just sustained from a very serious bush fire, and both he and David were convinced that Sandie was an uncanny bairn.
Colin returned to Australia immediately afterwards, and as he parted from his brother and sister-in-law he said
with a melancholy smile, “If ony mischance befa’s me, ye’ll ken as sune as I do mysel’. Your awesome bairn will see it a’, and ye may tak’ for gospel aught tauld ye by ane that has the second sight.”
One fine afternoon, some three weeks after Colin had sailed, David having just then no particular work to keep him on the farm all day, proposed for a great treat to row Sandie to the Bass Rock. Oat-cutting would shortly begin, and then he would not have a spare hour from morning to night. But today he and his son would enjoy a holiday together, and Sandie was to take with him the small gun that his father gave him on his last birthday, for he was now nine years of age, and high time that he set about learning to kill something or other. All the latent boy seemed developed in the delicate child by the possession of the small fowling-piece, and he blazed away at the rats under the hayricks, and at the sparrows on the roof, to the peril alike of the poultry and of the bedroom windows, “Mother, mother, I’ll shoot ye a gannet and mak’ ye a cushion o’ the down!” he shouted in wild excitement as he set forth on the expedition.
Mrs. Galbraith stood on the doorstep watching her husband and son leave the house together, David a stout, tall man in the prime of late middle life, red-faced and grey-haired, and Sandie a lanky lad with pale, freckled face, but with more vigor in his step than the fond mother had ever expected to see. He carried his gun over his shoulder and strode along by his father’s side, glancing up at him frequently to try to imitate his every look and gesture. David Galbraith was fond of rowing, and as it was a very calm day he dismissed the man in charge of the boat, and taking the oars himself said it would do him good to row as far as the Bass Rock and back again. The sea was like a mill-pond, a glassy stretch of water with here and there a wind flaw wrinkling its smooth surface. There was not a wave that could have displaced a pebble on the beach, and great masses of olive-green seaweed floated motionless in its clear depths. To the left, high above them, stood the ruins of Tantallon Castle, bathed in August sunshine, its grey walls taking warmth and color from the glow of light that softened and beautified its rugged outline. Before them the sullen mass of the Bass Rock towered above the blue water, circled by countless thousands of sea birds, the glitter of whose white wings was seen as silvery flashes of light, from a distance too great to distinguish the birds themselves.
They were near enough to the shore to hear voices and laughter borne over the water from the grassy inclosure before Tantallon Castle, and lowing of cattle in the pastures, and as they neared the Bass Rock these sounds were exchanged for the squealing of wild fowl and the clang of their wings. To Sandie’s delight he was allowed to shoot from the boat, which he did with as little danger to the birds as to the fishes, and the only condition his father imposed was that he should fire with his back towards him, “till your aim is mair preceese, man.”
Though it soon became evident even to the sanguine Sandie that he would bring home neither gannet nor kittiwake, it was a rapturous delight to be rowed about the island by his father, who told him the name of every bird he saw, and pointed out their nests on the precipitous face of the rock. Then David rested on his oars, and the boat scarcely moved on the still water while Sandie ate the oat cake and drank the milk provided for him by his mother, and his father took a deep draft from his flask till his face grew crimson.
“Father, gie me a drink, too,” said Sandie, stretching out his hand.
“Na, na; ye’ll stick to your milk-drinking till ye hae built up a strong frame, and then ye may tak’ as much whusky as ye wull to keep it in guid repair.”
And now the boat was turned landward once more, and they soon lost sound of the clang of the sea birds’ wings, and the lowing of kine was again heard, and David rowed slowly past the rock of Tantallon. After chattering for hours Sandie had fallen silent, and sat leaning his arm on the gunwale of the boat looking into the limpid water, dipping his hand into a soft swelling wave, and scattering a shower of glittering drops from his fingers. Suddenly he ceased his idle play, and kneeling in the bottom of the boat, clung firmly to the side with both hands, leaned over and gazed intently in the water. His father, who was always on the alert where his son was concerned, at once noticed the change that had come over him, rowed quicker, and said cheerily, “What are ye glowering at, man? Did ye never see a herring in the sea before?”
Sandie neither spoke nor stirred, and David took comfort in thinking that after all the lad could see nothing uncanny in the water; it was just some daft folly or other he was after, best unnoticed. But when Sandie did speak it was to utter words for which he was unprepared.
“Father, I see Uncle Colin in the water wi’ his face turned up to me, and his ’een wide open, but he canna see wi’ them.” And the boy did not raise his head, but continued to gaze into the water. Drops of sweat broke out on Galbraith’s brow, and he lifted the dripping oars high in the rowlocks and leaned towards Sandie, his red face now as white as the boy’s.
“Whether it’s God or the deil speaks in ye I dinna ken, but ye’il drive me mad wi’ your gruesome clavers! Hand up, man! and fling yoursel’ back in the boat, where ye’ll see naething waur than yoursel’.”
But Sandie did not stir. “It’s Uncle Colin that I see floating in the water, lappit in seaweed, and he’s nae sleeping, for his ’een stare sae wide;” and Galbraith, who would not have looked over the gunwale of the boat for his life, with an oath plunged the oars deep into the water, and rowed with furious strokes.
“Ye’ve struck the oar on his white face!” shrieked the boy, and fell back crying in the boat.
A heavy gloom settled on the Galbraiths, and this last hideous vision of Sandie’s they kept strictly to themselves ; they did not seek counsel of their minister or of anyone. They were certain that Colin was drowned. It was a mere question of time when they could hear how it had happened, but hear it they assuredly would. And Sandie, too, was gloomy and depressed. “The bairn has frighted himself this time as weel as ithers,” said his father, “and sma’ blame to him; but I wad rather follow him to the kirkyard than that he suld grow up wi’ the second sight! It may hae been a’ varra weel in a breeckless, starving Hielander a hundred years ago, but it’s no consistent for a well-fed Lowlander in these days o’ trousers and high farming. How is Sandie to do justice to the land and mind the rotation of crops if he goes daft wi’ the second sight?”
The oat harvest was plentiful and got together in fine condition, but neither David nor his wife had any heart to enjoy it. They simply lived through each day waiting for the tidings that must come; nor had they long to wait. Nearly a month after Sandie’s vision David read in the newspaper of the safe arrival of his brother’s ship at its destination. It reported a prosperous voyage with but one casualty during its course, which occurred on the twenty-fourth day after sailing, when a passenger booked for Sydney had mysteriously fallen overboard in perfectly calm weather, and was drowned. The gentleman’s name was Mr. Colin Gaibraith, and his sudden untimely end had cast a gloom over the ship’s company. So far the newspaper report, which, brief as it was, was all that David and Alison could ever learn of their poor brother’s fate. They carefully compared the dates, and found that Colin had been drowned three days after Sandie had seen the vision of the body in the sea.
“I winna tell the bairn that puir Colin is dead,” said David gloomily.
“Ye’ll just tell the bairn he’s dead, but you’ll say naething of drowning.”
“Ye maun do as ye think best, but I canna mention puir Colin’s name to him.” And it was from his mother that Sandie heard of his Uncle Colin’s death. He listened gravely and thoughtfully to the tidings.
“Yes, it was him that I saw in the water,” and that was all that he had to say about the death of his favorite uncle; he asked no question and made no further remark.
From this time forward a great change came over David Galbraith. From being wholly matter-of-fact and little inclined to believe more than his senses could attest, he became credulous and superstitious. He tremble
d at omens, and was unnerved for his day’s work if his dreams over night were unpropitious. He disliked being out on dark nights, and cast uneasy glances over his shoulder as though he heard steps behind him. At times when he was riding he thought that he heard some one following hard on his heels, and he would gallop for miles and reach home, horse and rider both in a sweat of fear. And Sandie, the unconscious cause of the evil change in his father, mutely wondered what had come over him. David scarcely let the boy out of his sight, though his society was a torment to him, and he was always wondering what would be the next shock he would receive. Unhappily he tried to restore tone to his shaken nerves by drinking, and the habit grew quickly on him, to his good wife’s great distress ; and times were now so changed that Sandie was often more frightened of his father than his father was of him. Mrs. Galbraith proposed sending Sandie to stay with some relations of her own at Linlithgow, thinking that it would do her husband good to have the strain of the boy’s constant society removed for a while. But he would not hear of it, and merely said, “The bairn sall bide at hame. It’s my ain weird, and I maun dree it.”
Some two years passed by in which Sandie had no visions, and grew steadily healthier and stronger and more like other boys of his age, so that his mother began to think they should make a man of him yet. But though his father noticed the physical improvement in his son with pride, nothing could persuade him that the dreaded gift had departed from him. In vain his wife tried to convince him that there was no further cause for anxiety. He shook his head and said, “Ye’ll no get rid of an ill gift sae lightly. It’s a fire that burns low, but it’ll burst into flame for a’ that.”
The Second Macabre Megapack Page 26