Dr. Sam Johnson, Detector

by Lillian de la Torre

  “I shall be happy to be instructed,” replied Dr. Johnson civilly.

  “Pray tell me,” I enquired, “is the Isle of Raasay rich in fauna?”

  “We have blackcock, moorfowl, plovers, and wild pigeons in abundance,” replied Dr. MacLeod.

  JOHNSON: “And of the four-footed kind?”

  MACQUEEN: “We have neither rabbits nor hares, nor was there ever any fox upon the island until recently; but now our birds are hunted, and one sees often the melancholy sight of a little heap of discarded feathers where the brute has supped.”

  BOSWELL: “How came a fox to Raasay? By swimming the channel from the mainland?”

  MACLEOD: “We cannot believe so, for a fox is a bad swimmer. We can only suppose that some person brought it over out of pure malice.”

  JOHNSON: “You must set a trap for him.”

  MACQUEEN: “I think to do so, for the remains of his hunting betray where he runs.”

  BOSWELL: “Now had you but horses on the island, we should give Reynard a run.”

  This said, by mutual consent we all arose. Dr. Johnson and the Laird strolled off with Mr. Angus MacQueen to behold the stars of these northern latitudes. Dr. MacLeod, yawning, sought his bed; young Colin disappeared from my side like a phantom into the night; and I was left alone to the pleasing task of arranging my notes of the evening’s discourse.

  The morrow dawned wet and stormy, being one of those Hebridean days of which Dr. Johnson complained that they presented all the inconveniencies of tempest without its sublimities. Our enforced confinement was made pleasant by the learned discourse of the Reverend Donald MacQueen and his no less learned son; till, the storm abating, the younger man left us near sundown, to inspect his sea-gage at the edge of the island. He parted from Dr. Johnson on terms of mutual respect, and promised to bring him some specimens of petrifications.

  The night came on with many brilliant stars; and we congratulated ourselves on the prospect of a fair dawn for the promised ramble about the island.

  Colin was at my bedside next morning between five and six. I sprung up, and rouzed my venerable companion. Dr. Johnson quickly equipped himself for the expedition, and seized his formidable walking-stick, without which he never stirred while in Scotland. This was a mighty oaken cudgel, knotted and gnarled; equipped with which the doughty philosopher felt himself the equal of any man.

  We took a dram and a bit of bread directly. A boy of the name of Stewart was sent with us as our carrier of provisions. We were five in all: Colin MacQueen, Dr. MacLeod, the lad Stewart, Dr. Johnson, and myself.

  “Pray, sir, where is Mr. Angus MacQueen?” enquired Dr. Johnson.

  “Still on the prowl,” said his brother carelessly.

  “Observing the stars, no doubt,” said Dr. MacLeod. “No matter, we shall surely encounter him in our peregrinations.”

  We walked briskly along; but the country was very stony at first, and a great many risings and fallings lay in our way. We had a shot at a flock of plovers sitting. But mine was harmless. We came first to a pretty large lake, sunk down comparatively with the land about it. Then to another; and then we mounted up to the top of Duncaan, where we sat down, ate cold mutton and bread and cheese and drank brandy and punch. Then we had a Highland song from Colin, which Dr. Johnson set about learning, Hatyin foam foam eri. We then walked over a much better country, very good pasture; saw many moorfowl, but could never get near them; descended a hill on the east side of the island; and so came to a hut by the sea. It was somewhat circular in shape, the door unfastened.

  We called a blessing on the house and entered. At the far end an old woman was huddled over a peat fire. As we entered, she dropped the steaming breeks she had been drying before the glowing peat, and redded up for company by shuffling them hastily under the bedstead.

  “Well, Kirstie,” Colin MacQueen greeted her, “here’s Dr. Johnson come all the way from London to ask you about your gift of the second sight.”

  To our utter astonishment the wizened old creature dropped to her knees and began to keen in a dreadful voice, rocking herself to and fro and wringing her hands.

  “Come, come, my good creature,” said the humane Doctor, “there’s no occasion for such a display, I’m sure,” and he benevolently insinuated half-a-crown into her clenched claw-like hand.

  The aged Sybil peeped at it briefly, and stowed it away about her person; but she continued to keen softly, and presently her words became audible:

  “Alas, ’tis no gift, but a curse, to have seen what I have seen, poor Rory gone, and my own son drowned, and now this very day—” The keening rose to a wail.

  “We are causing too much distress by our enquiries,” muttered my friend.

  But the aged crone caught him by the wrist.

  “It is laid on me to tell no less than to see.”

  “What have you seen today, then?” enquired Dr. MacLeod soothingly.

  “Come,” said Colin roughly, “there is nothing to be gained by lingering.”

  “Angus! Angus! Angus!”

  “What of Angus?” asked Dr. Johnson with apprehension.

  “I have heard his taisk! I have seen him lying broken and dead! He’s gone, like Rory, like my own son that’s drowned. Ai! Ai!”

  “Come away,” cried Colin, and flung out at the door. My friends complied, and I followed them, but not before I had bestowed some small charity upon the pathetic aged creature.

  Colin led the way, walking heedlessly and fast. My friend and I perforce dropped behind.

  “This is most remarkable,” said Dr. Johnson. “If we should indeed find that the young man has met with a misfortune—which Heaven for fend—”

  “We may speak as eye-witnesses of this often-doubted phænomenon,” said I, concluding his statement.

  “Nevertheless, sir,” pronounced the learned philosopher, “man’s intellect has been given him to guard against credulity. Let us take care not to fall into an attitude of superstitious belief in the old dame’s powers. As yet her allegation is unsupported.”

  By this time we were come to the cave. It lies in a section of the coast where the cliffs mount up to a threatening height, with a deep sound under, for a reef of jagged rocks some way out takes the pounding of the sea.

  Dr. Johnson shewed especial curiosity about the minerals of the island. Ever solicitous for the improvement of human comfort, he enquired whether any coal were known on the island, “for,” said he, “coal is commonly to be found in mountainous country, such as we see upon Raasay.”

  “See,” he continued, “this vein of black sand, where otherwise the sand is white.”

  He gathered a handful; it stained his hand, and he cast it away.

  “It is surely powdered coal,” concluded my learned friend, punching at the deposit with his sturdy stick.

  “Sir,” I ventured, “it more nearly resembles charcoal.”

  “Coal or charcoal, ’tis all one,” returned my friend. “Did I live upon Raasay, I should try whether I could find the vein, for there’s no fire like a coal fire.”

  “Come, let us enter the cave,” cried Colin MacQueen impatiently.

  To my surprise the ghillie who carried our provisions unconditionally refused to enter the cave, alleging it to be haunted; a circumstance which was confirmed to his untutored mind by a strange echo from within, as of footsteps walking, that seemed to sound over the breakers.

  “I’ll not go in,” said the lad stubbornly, “’tis full of wild-fire these days, and something walks there.”

  “’Tis your fox that walks there,” observed Dr. Johnson, poking at a pile of feathers hard by the entrance.

  “Well, my lad, if you won’t come you may e’en stay here,” said Colin MacQueen impatiently. “I fear neither fox nor fox-fire, and I’m for the cave. Come, gentlemen.”

  He led the way up a sloping incline and through a low entrance-way. Dr. Johnson had to stoop his great frame as he crowded through. Within, our footsteps rattled on the pebbly path. Colin carried a
torch, which gleamed upon the rising roof and upon the petrifications that hung from it, formed by drops that perpetually distil therefrom. They are like little trees. I broke off some of them.

  The cave widened and grew lofty as we progressed. Dr. Johnson was much struck by the absolute silence, broken only by the noise of our advance, which reechoed ahead of us.

  I drew Colin’s attention to certain places on the floor, where partitions of stone appeared to be human work, shewing indeed the remains of desiccated foliage with which they had once been filled.

  “In the days of the pirates,” he explained, “this cave was a place of refuge. These are what is left of the beds. Here,” he continued, “the cave divides. The left-hand arm slopes down to the sea, where a wide opening provided shelter for boats and a hiding-place for oars. Half-way down, there is a fresh spring. We take the right-hand turning, gentlemen.”

  “In times past,” contributed Dr. MacLeod as we ascended the right-hand slope, “the cave sometimes served as a refuge for malefactors; but it invariably proved a trap.”

  “How so, sir?” I asked, “with a fresh spring, escape by sea or land, and the unexplored fastnesses of the cave to lurk in?”

  There was a puff of air, and the torch with which Colin was leading the way was suddenly extinguished. At first the blackness was pitchy.

  “You may proceed without fear,” spoke Colin out of the darkness, “provided you always keep the wall of the cave at your left hand. I will endeavour to restore the light.”

  “Colin knows this cave as he knows his own house,” Dr. MacLeod assured us.

  We groped our way forward.

  “Thus it was, in darkness on this ascent, that men waited to take or destroy the outlaw,” Dr. MacLeod took up his narrative. “Just around this bend we come into light.”

  He spoke truly, for already a faint ray was diluting the darkness. As we rounded the bend we saw, ahead and close at hand, an irregular opening through which we could glimpse the sky.

  “Whoever takes shelter in the innermost recesses of this cave,” said Dr. MacLeod, “must pass by that opening whenever thirst drives him down to the spring below. A marksman stationed at the bend can pick him off as he passes against the light.”

  “That’s the Kelpie’s Window,” said Colin at my elbow. I started, and then in the uncertain light perceived him where he leaned in a little recess striking a light with flint and steel.

  “Press on,” said Colin, “I’ll come behind with the torch.”

  I own it oppressed me with gloomy thoughts to climb in the darkness this path where savage and lawless men of the past had died. My venerable companion is of more intrepid mould; he and Dr. MacLeod pressed forward undismayed.

  “I was on this path not three months since,” pursued the physician, “when Black Fergus the murderer took shelter in these caves.”

  “Did you take him?” enquired Dr. Johnson with interest.

  “We did not,” said Dr. MacLeod. “We waited here in the dark, off and on by relays, for three days and three nights.”

  “Did not he come down?”

  “When he came, he came running; and before we could take aim, he had flung himself into the sea.”

  I was powerfully struck by this narration. I seemed to see the hunted figure, driven by thirst to a watery grave.

  We attained the top of this sinister incline, and stood in the Kelpie’s Window, a sheer 100 feet above the black waters of the Kelpie Pool. Height makes me flinch; I retreated behind a rock which jutted out beside the opening.

  Dr. Johnson stood firm and viewed the craggy descent with curiosity. The cliff fell away almost perpendicular, but much gashed and broken with spires and chimneys of rock.

  “From this point Black Fergus flung himself into the sea,” mused Dr. Johnson. “’Tis a fearful drop. His body must have been much battered by those jagged rocks below.”

  “We never recovered his body,” replied Dr. MacLeod. “He had sunk before we reached the window, and he rose no more.”

  Colin came behind us with the torch alight.

  “He must rise to the surface in the evolution of time,” said Dr. Johnson. “—What is that at the edge of the Kelpie Pool?”

  The physician stared fixedly below.

  “It is certainly a body,” he pronounced.

  “’Tis Black Fergus,” cried I, peeping in my turn.

  Colin leaned boldly out to see.

  “That is never Black Fergus,” he said. “—Good God! ’Tis my brother!”

  He turned and plunged down the dusky slope, carrying the torch with him.

  “Wait, sir!” cried Dr. Johnson.

  “I fear he is right,” said Dr. MacLeod quietly, “that broad sun-hat is certainly Angus’s. I must go to him.”

  He in his turn ran down the slope, following the diminishing gleam of Colin’s torch.

  It was indeed the unfortunate young tutor. His grief-stricken brother drew the body gently to land, and we made shift among us to bear it to the mouth of the cave. The terrified ghillie wrung his hands and babbled about the Kelpie; but Dr. MacLeod bade him hold his tongue and run to the big house for bearers.

  “Poor lad,” said Dr. MacLeod, “those petrifications have been the death of him. He must have overbalanced and fallen from the Kelpie’s Window.”

  “I don’t understand it,” cried poor Colin. “Angus had no fear of height; he could climb like a cat.”

  “Nevertheless, he fell from the Kelpie’s Window and drowned in the Kelpie Pool,” I said with a shudder.

  “Not drowned,” said the physician, “he was dead when he hit the water. He must have struck his head as he fell; his skull is shattered.”

  The bearers arriving, we carried the unfortunate young man to his patron’s house and laid him down.

  This sad occurrence, as may be imagined, cast a pall over Raasay; all retired early, with solemn thoughts of the mutability of human affairs.

  The night was advanced when I awoke with a start and was astounded to behold my venerable companion risen from bed and accoutered for walking in his wide brown cloth greatcoat with its bulging pockets, his Hebridean boots, and his cocked hat firmly secured by a scarf. I watched while he stole forth from the chamber, then rose in my turn and made haste to follow.

  Lighted by a fine moon, the sturdy philosopher crossed the island at a brisk pace. I caught him up as we neared the opposite coast. As I came up with him he whirled suddenly and threw himself in an attitude of defence, menacing me truculently with his heavy staff.

  “Sir, sir!” I expostulated.

  “Is it you, you rogue!” exclaimed he, relaxing his pugnacity.

  “What means this nocturnal expedition, sir?” I ventured to enquire.

  “Only that I have a fancy to interrogate old Kirstie farther about the second sight,” responded he.

  “You do well,” I approved, “for we have had a convincing if tragic exhibition of her powers.”

  “Have not I warned you against an attitude of credulity?” said the learned Doctor severely. “I must understand more of her powers before I may say I have seen a demonstration of the second sight.”

  “What more can you ask?” I replied.

  By now we were within sight of old Kirstie’s hut. Without replying, Dr. Johnson astounded me by striking up an Erse song in a tuneless bellow.

  “Sir, sir, this is most unseemly!” I expostulated.

  “Hatyin foam foam eri,” chanted Dr. Johnson lustily, striding along vigorously.

  A boat was drawn up in a cove; Dr. Johnson rapped it smartly with his stick as we passed it. Then with a final triumphant “Tullishole!” he thundered resoundingly on the door of the hut.

  The little old crone opened for us without any delay, and dropped us a trepidatious curtsey. The close apartment reeked of the remains of the cocky-leeky standing at the hearth. We had interrupted breakfast, for a half-consumed bowl of the stewed leeks and joints of fowl stood on the rude table.

  “So, ma’am,” sa
id Dr. Johnson bluntly, “Angus MacQueen is dead like his brother.”

  The old beldame began to wail, but Dr. Johnson most unfeelingly cut her short.

  “We found him dead in the Kelpie Pool with his head broke.”

  “He should never have gone in the cave!” whispered the aged Sybil. “He had my warning!”

  “There’s Something lives in that cave,” said Dr. Johnson solemnly.

  “Ay! Ay!”

  “There’s Something wicked lives in that cave, that comes forth to kill the blackcock by night, and hides in the upper reaches by day.”

  “Ay!”

  “Have you seen it in your visions?”

  “Ay, a mortal great ghostie that eats the bones of men … Alas! Alas!” the keening broke forth afresh.

  “Then, ma’am,” said the intrepid philosopher, “I have a mind to see this ghostie.”

  Hefting his heavy stick, Dr. Johnson left the hut. The woman burst forth into a clamour of warning, admonition, and entreaty, to which my friend paid little heed. Having bestowed a small gratuity, which served to intermit the old dame’s ululations, I hurried after the venerable Doctor.

  I caught him up at the cove. The declining moon was bright and clear.

  “That is MacQueen’s boat,” I recognized it. “Who has brought it here?”

  My only answer was a touch on the arm.

  “Be quiet,” said my friend in my ear. “Take this—” he pressed a pistol in my hand, “and when we come to the cave—”

  “You will never go into the cave at this hour!” I gasped.

  “You need only go as far as the fork. Watch what I do, but take care not to reveal your presence. I have a mind to conjure up the Kelpie.”

  There was no gainsaying my learned friend. So it was done. I own it was rather a relief than otherwise, after the pitchy blackness of the first ascent, to come in sight of the moonlight streaming through the Kelpie’s Window. I shrank gratefully into the shelter of the shoulder of rock where Colin had stood that morning. I thought no shame to breathe a prayer for the intercession of St. Andrew, patron of Scotland.

  My lion-hearted friend mounted steadily, till at last I saw him stand in bold relief against the moonlit sky in the ill-omened Kelpie’s Window. He stood foursquare without shrinking, his cocked hat tied firmly to his head, his heavy stick lost in the voluminous skirts of his greatcoat. What incantation he recited I know not.