The Black Colonel

by James Milne

  _VI--The Finger of Fate_

  Here I was in a double tangle of private affairs, for I had the BlackColonel's designs upon Marget Forbes to handle, and I had her mistakennotion of my doings to disperse. It was a drumly outlook for one whosechief equipment was honesty of purpose, with, I am afraid, little ofthe arts of human diplomacy.

  Marget had all the woman's acute anxiety when a man's act seemedhidden, or, at least, uncertain, even if he was no more to her than akinsman. It is from those delicate things that half our troublesspring, because, as between man and woman, they cannot be explained inwords. They must be left to reveal themselves, and meanwhile they maydestroy sweet possibilities or gracious relationships.

  My difficulty with the Black Colonel was still more complicated, for itwas as if a hair-rope of many strands, such as the Highlanders made,enwound us. We were public enemies, sworn to causes which could haveno dealings with each other. Yet we had met secretly; and though thatmattered little to him it might easily ruin me, or, at all events, mymilitary career.

  But, may be, I could remove that danger by a simple report to mysuperiors saying what had happened. Could I? No; I could not, for awoman's reputation was, all unknown to her, engaged in the affair, andthat takes us directly to Marget Forbes and the Black Colonel's designsupon her name and estates.

  I knew he would not stop at the sending to me of his letter, andgetting no immediate answer, which was the course I had taken, if onlybecause his last throw with affairs was involved. Therefore I lookedfor some further act, and, having regard to the difficulty of personalmeetings, and his amiable weakness for writing, as something in whichhe excelled, I was not surprised when it came in the form of anotherdispatch, also borne secretly by the vagrant Red Murdo.

  We actually had an old clanish knowledge of each other, this fellow andI, because, although he was a Farquharson, the croft on which hispeople dwelt was near the Gordon estate of Balmoral. We had playedwith each other as boys, for the feudal system of the clans wascommunal and democratic. It was, to take one illustration, customaryfor the sons of chiefs to have foster-brothers adopted from thecommonalty, companions in peace time, comrades and defenders in wartime.

  When then, Red Murdo, who had been lurking in a peat-moss near CorgarffCastle, surprised me, out-of-doors, one day, it was with the friendlysalutation, "Good-morning, Captain Ian."

  "Hullo," I said, "isn't it dangerous for you to be here again?"

  "Not when it's to see you, but I wis gettin' weary waitin' in this damphole, an' the Cornel, he'll be wonderin' why I'm no' back."

  "Well, my friend," said I coldly; "I won't keep you from him."

  "But, I've a word to say to ye for him, and something to gie ye. I'mto say that he expects to hear from ye in satisfaction of his letter.But if you need remindin', will ye study, as conveyin' his feelin's andintents, a plain copy, made by him, which I've carried in my sporran,of my Earl Mar's known epistle to the first Jock Forbes of Inverernan,near by Corgarff."

  With this mysterious message haltingly said, as if the Black Colonelhad drilled it into his man, which was, no doubt, the truth. Red Murdoheld me out a crumpled sheet of paper.

  "Tak' it, sir," he added, "an', as advice from a humble man who wishesye no ill, obleege the Black Cornel if you can, or he'll be tryin'other means. You an' I ken him, Captain, ken him weel, I'm thinkin',an' it disna' dae to neglect him, as I've found mysel' at varioustimes."

  It was a famous and familiar document with which I had been served, or,rather, with a fair copy of it, in the Black Colonel's best round-hand;but its use by him to convey his sentiments and intentions to me wasquaintly original. Here was he, framing himself in the words ofurgency and high consequence, which the Earl of Mar, when that noblemanwas raising the "Standard on the Braes o' Mar," flung, like a fierycross, at Jock Forbes of Inverernan. You will perceive the lordlyegotism of the Black Colonel when I give you the missive, as I read itmyself, with its new, intimate and individual bearing, immediately RedMurdo had disappeared.

  "Jock," it opened, "ye was right not to come with the hundred men yesent up tonight, when I expected four times that number. It is apretty thing, when all the Highlands of Scotland are now rising uponthe King and the country's account, as I have accounts from them sincethey were with me, and the gentlemen of the neighbouring homelandsexpecting us down to join them, that my men should only be refractory.

  "Is not this the thing we are about which they have been wishing thesetwenty-six years? And now, when it is come, and the King and thecountry's cause is at stake, will they for ever sit still and see allperish? I have used gentle means too long and shall be forced to putother means into execution.

  "I have sent you, enclosed, an order for the Lordship of Kildrummy,which you are immediately to intimate to all my vassals; if they giveready obedience it will make some amends, and, if not, you may tellthem from me that it will not be in my power to save them--were Iwilling?--from being treated as enemies by those who are ready soon tojoin me; and they may depend on it that I will be the first to proposeand order their being so.

  "Particularly let my own tenants in Kildrummy know that if they comenot forth with their best arms, that I will send a party immediately toburn what they shall miss taking from them. And they may believe thisonly a threat, but by all that's sacred, I'll put it into execution,that it may be an example to others.

  "You are to tell the gentlemen that I'll expect them in their bestaccoutrements, on horseback, and no excuse to be accepted of. Go aboutthis with diligence, and come yourself and let me know your having doneso. All this is not only as ye will be answerable to me, but to yourKing and country."

  Straight writing enough! And that was why the Black Colonel had sentme the historic epistle, laughing in his sleeve, I had no doubt, at theslim originality of his method. He was for gentle means, if he couldso win his ends and Marget, but if they answered not, then, like myLord Mar with Jock Forbes of Inverernan, he would be "forced to putother means into execution." While I was the immediate target for histhreat, I quite saw that the Black Colonel was aiming at a larger prizebehind me.

  But what could he, a "broken man," a fugitive from justice, the justiceof the Hanoverian though it was, do to compel anybody to his schemesand ambitions? That was to forget his place of notoriety, which gaveits own power, among the people of the Aberdeenshire Highlands.Whenever, in going about the hills and the valleys, I met a simple manof the soil he would touch his bonnet in salute to me, never to myuniform, and, after a little, remark in his soft Gaelic, "So the BlackColonel is still defying you all--a tremendous lad, isn't he?" Thiswould be said with a gleam in the eye, to give it delicacy, a bearingof personal courtesy which I did not miss because I was liked formyself, and we all like to be liked for ourselves.

  You will apprehend by now, perhaps, that I knew my Highland men,whether I found them digging peats in the moss, or gathering in theirskimp harvest of unopened corn, so that it should escape the hungrygrouse and the coming winter. They were wholly kindly, as follows fromsimple living, generous in their narrow outlook, and yet stronglyindividual. They had, as a people, character, which is the noblestgift of the gods, for everything else depends on it, and hardlyanything can be achieved without it.

  They took a pride in the Black Colonel, as one of themselves, and inhis deeds as a fighter who, on many occasions, had reversed the sayingabout being willing to wound but afraid to strike. He had, theyadmitted, wrong ways at times, and if these could not openly bedefended, still they were almost forgiven a man with his back to thewall where a shot, or a stab, might find him any day or any night.

  Withal, too, he bore about him a touch of romance, a gallantatmosphere, and your Highlander, loving to sit on a stile and look atthe sun, will pardon much for that. Thus there was a general sympathywith the Black Colonel, which he could draw upon either as a veil toconceal his doings, or for active help, and it was this knowledge whichcaused me to be apprehensive.

  For, though thirty years h
ad passed since his lordship of Marperemptorily wrote to the chief of Inverernan, our Highland life hadnot changed vitally. The same rude passion ran through it, as likemists hung over the Slock of Morvan and the gaping chasm in the side ofLochnagar. Civilization remained primitive, love and hatred could runhigh on the ebbing Jacobite tide, and the common round was still verymuch what a strong hand could do and a weak one could not do.Affections and hatreds bloom even more strongly in times of ordeal thanin times of tranquillity, perhaps because the moral reins governingthem have grown worn, and so become slacker.

  It should be said, however, of the Scottish Highlands, that the chiefs,at least, those of the northern ridge of the Grampians, were humane intheir doings, even kindly, and certainly they were never fond of takinga clansman's life on the gallows-tree. Their whole code was againstthat ignoble death, unless when an enemy had played them unfair, or avassal had proved himself traitor, and then they swiftly slipped a lifeto the other world, holding this world to have no use for it.

  Possibly, too, they found the sight of a corpse dangling from a treeuncanny, a vision armed with threats which made them hold theirhangman's hand, for, while crafty enough, they were superstitious to adegree. They let the gallows-tree stand grim and expectant on thehill-side, a terror to foes and a clan discipline, and, when necessary,found a way to their desires by the short dirk or the long sword.

  Moreover, at the time of my writing, we were between the immediatebutchery of Culloden, a red and rueful business, and the insecurity oftenure in life and home, which was to follow. It was a rough markingof time, when national elements were in the mill, as well as thosewhich go to the chronicle of the Black Colonel, Marget Forbes, andmyself.

  Here was I, on the edge of such happenings as assail one when he findssubtle intrigue on the one side and innocent misunderstanding on theother. It is always hard enough to manage such elements, but let themget out of hand and a miracle is needed for salvation. Also you haveto find the miracle, and I composed myself to search for it in thelittle things, the natural things of the situation. They have a knackof conducting you to the heart of a problem, if you will only havesimple faith and follow them, and be not otherwise, which ispresumption.

  Faith and miracles go hand in hand, in story as in fact, and when one'smind, working rapidly, if unconsciously, has got an issue down to apoint where it can be expressed in a word, a decision has been taken.If it be a human decision, the hills, which grow strangely motheringand kind to their people, seem to know it, for they talk to each otherof everything but their own secrets; and they knew that I had decidedupon my course of action.