Music in the Hills (Drumberley Book 2)

by D. E. Stevenson

  Music In The Hills

  D. E. Stevenson

  © D. E. Stevenson 1950

  D. E. Stevenson has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1950 by Collins.

  This edition published in 2015 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Foreword

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty One

  Chapter Thirty Two

  Foreword

  Prefaces are seldom necessary but, in the case of Music in the Hills, there are a few explanations to be made about the location of the story, the characters and their conversations.

  Mureth and Drumburly and the river that links them are not any one farm or town or river in the Scottish Borders but a composite picture, an artistically true one, I hope, which will appeal to those who know the country and will serve as an introduction to those unacquainted with its beauties.

  The characters in the story are imaginary, not drawn from real life. It is necessary to emphasise this because the Scottish Border Country is a small world, somewhat isolated on account of its hilly nature, and, as is natural in a small world, many of its inhabitants know one another – or at least know of one another – but I can only assure them in all sincerity that if they think they recognise a character in this story as the portrait of a real person they are mistaken.

  It has been difficult to choose names with a local flavour without using names belonging to individuals. I have tried to accomplish this well-nigh impossible feat. If I have failed I apologise here and now.

  In depicting the speech of the district I have ignored dialectic spelling and relied upon Lowland Scots idiom and turn of phrase to convey the desired effect. Dialect is tiresome to read and I see no great advantage in writing it. Those who know the Scottish Borders need no guide to the local dialect, and those who have not heard it for themselves could never appreciate the sound of it from the written word.

  Here and there, in this novel, there may be a Scots expression unfamiliar to one who happens to have been born in some other part of the world, but in every case the context makes the meaning clear. For instance when Daniel has sprained his ankle and announces that he ‘hirpled’ down to the road end it is obvious to the intelligent reader that his gait was unsound.

  As regards the pronunciation of the place names, Drumburly should be Drum burly with equal emphasis on the first two syllables. Mureth should be Mure eth, the first syllable accented and to rhyme with endure.

  Lastly, although this novel is in reality a sequel to Vittoria Cottage, it is complete in itself and can be read quite separately and without any reference to its predecessor.

  D. E. STEVENSON

  Chapter One

  Spring had come to the valley. The House of Mureth lay sleeping in its sheltered nook like an old grey tabby. There were trees round the house, fine old beeches and a few gnarled oaks, their branches tipped with buds, so that from afar they seemed to be shrouded in a pale-green mist. The little burn, leaping down the hillside, dawdled through the garden and then quickened its pace and threw itself with glad abandon into the river below… it was like a child at play who suddenly catches sight of his mother and runs to her arms. Such a happy laughing child was Mureth Burn, and useful too, for the old house was supplied with its clear water and lighted by its power, and the garden was made fruitful and pleasant by its wanderings. Birds came to bathe and to drink, alighting upon a convenient stone and preening their feathers; they came at all times of the year, for even in winter when the ground was hard as iron Mureth Burn still ran. Jock Johnstone, who had lived at Mureth all his life, could not remember a winter when the burn was completely frozen. The spring was slightly warm where it bubbled out of the hillside high above the house and it had no time to freeze before it reached the river.

  Jock Johnstone had been born in Mureth House – so had his father and grandfather – it was a pity he had no children to carry on the tradition, to run about the old place and waken it to life with noise and laughter, but in other ways he was fortunate and knew it. For one thing he had Mamie, and no man had a wife that suited him better, for another he had health and strength (his fifty years sat very lightly upon him), and for a third he had one of the most prosperous farms in the country; hills and moors for his sheep, lush meadows by the river for his cows, a fine steading with barns and byres and, last but not least, half a dozen neat cottages for his men.

  Jock Johnstone was fortunate but his circumstances were not entirely due to luck, for although he had inherited good property he had improved it by his own efforts. He had drained the low-lying holms and built fine new byres, and he had renovated the old tumble-down cottages and brought them up to date. This last had seemed an extravagance at the time, for he could have used the money to improve his herd, but Mamie had insisted that the cottages must be improved; water must be laid on, windows must be enlarged, baths and sinks and stoves must be installed. Jock had spent a small fortune on the cottages and had received little thanks for it (and a good deal of chaff from his friends), but now he was reaping the benefit of the outlay; now, when good farm-hands were as valuable as diamonds – and much scarcer – there was never any difficulty in getting the pick of them for Mureth Farm. Every shepherd’s wife in the county had a covetous eye upon the comfortable, well-found Mureth Cottages.

  Recently Jock Johnstone had had to advertise for a new shepherd and had a sheaf of letters in reply. He had shown them to Mamie.

  ‘That’s your doing,’ he had said. ‘Duncan of Crossraggle has been trying to get a shepherd for weeks.’

  ‘Mind you choose a nice one,’ Mamie told him with a smile.

  Jock had chosen his man and the shepherd was moving in on this particular spring morning. Mamie Johnstone walked up to the little cottage on the hill to welcome the newcomer.

  Well Cottage was the nicest cottage on the farm, Mamie thought, for it stood by itself in a dimple of green grass near the spring. There was a little garden surrounded by a wire fence to keep out the rabbits, and a wood of conifers sheltered it from the east. Mamie arrived in time to see the furniture being carried in; everything looked clean and good, it was thoroughly sound old-fashioned, cottage furniture. Mamie was pleased, for the cottages were her pride and joy and she was aware that people who owned good stuff were usually good stuff themselves.

  A small, thin, wiry-looking man was directing operations; he was wearing a very neat brown suit and shining brown shoes. Mamie Johnstone herself was anything but neat, for she had been working in the garden and was suitably attired for the job. A striped blue and white butcher’s apron covered her old tweed skirt and blue pullover; red, knitted socks and hob-nailed sho
es caked with mud, completed her costume. Her light-brown hair had become loosened from the coil at the back of her neck and was blowing about in the breeze, her cheeks were rosy and her deep-blue eyes were sparkling.

  Mamie did not go forward at once, for she was a shy person and she was afraid of appearing inquisitive or interfering. Of course, she must see these people sometime and make friends with them, but perhaps it would be better to wait until they had settled in. Perhaps it would be better to come back in the afternoon and have a chat with the shepherd’s wife.

  She hesitated and at that moment the small brown man looked up. He waved to the men to continue their task and came over to speak to her. In spite of Mrs. Johnstone’s curious attire there was something about her which proclaimed her identity.

  ‘It’s a fine morning,’ he said as he approached. ‘I’m lucky to have it fine for moving. I’m Daniel Reid. You’ll be Mrs. Johnstone, I’m thinking.’

  He was a very curious-looking man with a brown weather-beaten face and a large nose and bushy eyebrows – rather an ugly man, but in spite of his ugliness Mamie liked him. She shook hands with him and welcomed him to Mureth.

  ‘I hope you’ll be happy here,’ she said gravely. ‘I came up to see if there was anything you wanted. Mr. Johnstone had to go to Dumfries.’

  ‘There’s nothing, thank you. It’s a fine wee house. I’ll get settled in half no time.’

  ‘Perhaps Mrs. Reid,’ began Mamie, looking round somewhat vaguely.

  ‘Mrs. Reid?’

  ‘I mean your wife.’

  He chuckled. ‘There’s no Mrs. Reid.’

  ‘But who looks after you?’

  ‘I look after myself,’ said Daniel Reid firmly.

  Mamie was surprised. She was pretty certain that Jock would not have engaged the man if he had known there was no wife, for Jock always said that men settled down better and worked better if they were well looked after at home. And the cottage was so nice! What a pity to have no woman living in it, to keep it properly, to clean and scrub and take a pride in it!

  ‘I’ll keep it spick and span as a new pin,’ said Daniel, smiling at her. ‘There’s no woman on earth so pernickety as me.’

  ‘But I never said,’

  ‘You’ll see,’ Daniel told her. ‘If there’s another cottage on the place as neat as mine I’ll eat my boots.’ They both laughed. Mamie decided that this was a very unusual sort of shepherd. What was his history? Did Jock know what a very extraordinary man he had chosen? Would Jock like him? Jock was a dear, of course, but he liked people to be ordinary – as opposed to extraordinary.

  ‘But I hope you won’t be lonely, living here all by yourself,’ Mamie said doubtfully.

  ‘I’ll not be lonely,’ Daniel assured her. He looked round as he spoke, looked at the green-fawn, rolling hills and the blue sky with its high, white clouds; looked down towards the shining river winding its way between the fertile meadows. ‘No, I’ll not be lonely,’ he repeated softly.

  It was Mamie’s turn to read his thoughts. ‘Yes, it is beautiful,’ she agreed.

  ‘And homelike,’ nodded Daniel. ‘I’ve been all over the world and now I’ve come back to Mureth.’

  ‘Come back?’

  ‘I was born here in the wee cottage in the steading. My father was Mr. Johnstone’s cow-man. That was old Mr. Johnstone, of course. I often thought I’d like to come back and now I’ve come.’

  Mamie was too surprised to speak… And yet why should she be surprised? It was quite natural, really.

  ‘Maybe I should have mentioned it to Mr. Johnstone,’ continued Daniel in doubtful tones. ‘I thought of mentioning it in my letter, and then I thought – och well, I thought I’d as like be taken, or not taken, on my own merits. That’s the truth.’

  Mamie nodded.

  ‘I thought I’d leave it,’ he said. ‘I thought maybe I’d just tell him one day when we were on the hill, but you’ll tell him. It’s better that way. Maybe he’ll remember me; there were three of us and I was the middle one. I was rising twelve when Father died and we went to Edinburgh to live with our grandmother… but you’ll not be interested in all this, Mrs. Johnstone.’

  ‘Of course I’m interested! Mr. Johnstone will be interested too – and pleased. I wonder if he’ll remember you. How old was he when you left Mureth?’

  ‘The same age as myself,’ replied Daniel, with a twinkle. ‘Many’s the time I’ve worn his breeks, aye, and his shoes, too, when he’d done with them. He was always bigger than me.’

  Mamie smiled. It was funny to think of this tiny man wearing Jock’s out-grown garments. Jock was so tall and broad-shouldered, a giant of a man.

  ‘I’ve seen you, too,’ Daniel continued. ‘Many’s the time I’ve seen you at the kirk with your father and mother – Mr. and Mrs. Armstrong. There were three of you –three wee girls – and you were the youngest.’

  ‘There were four of us – four girls – but Harriet was much younger. How funny to think you should remember us!’

  They were silent for a few moments. Mamie was looking back and remembering those far-off days when she, Jean and Caroline used to drive in to Drumburly Kirk with their father and mother every Sunday morning. Mr. Armstrong was one of the first in the County to give up his horses and replace them with a motor car, an Argyle, with brass fittings which glittered and gleamed in the sunshine. Mamie had never liked that motor car; it was high off the road and swayed about a good deal and made her feel slightly seasick, and the wild rush through the air frightened her. The others liked it, of course. They enjoyed the stir it made. Goodness, how long ago it seemed!

  ‘What happened to your brothers?’ asked Mamie at last.

  ‘Alexander lives in Edinburgh,’ replied Daniel. ‘He’s married and has two children. He was always the clever one and he’s worked hard and done well for himself. He’s respectable,’ declared Daniel, with a grin. ‘He’s a wee bit ashamed of me, to tell the truth. You see, I’ve been a rolling stone all my life. I’ve rolled all over the world. I’ve seen things and done things and enjoyed myself fine – but I’m not exactly a success by Alexander’s standard.’

  Mamie nodded. She had wondered why Daniel Reid was ‘ different’ and now she knew. He had travelled widely and had made the most of his experiences. It was curious that in spite of his long sojourn in foreign parts he still retained his Lowland Scottish accent. Of course he spoke much less broadly than the ordinary, stay-at-home country folk (whose speech was so broad as to be almost unintelligible even to Mamie, who had lived amongst them all her life), but he phrased his sentences in the Lowland Scots manner and his speech was enlivened by the good old Scots expressions, for which there is no satisfactory translation in the English language.

  ‘And what happened to your other brother?’ Mamie asked.

  ‘He was apprenticed to a butcher in Edinburgh,’ replied Daniel. ‘It was a good opening, but he didn’t make the best of it. I couldn’t just say what he’s doing now. We’ve lost sight of Jed.’

  ‘Jed?’

  ‘Jedidiah, his name is,’ said Daniel, smiling. ‘Mother was a great one for the Bible; but Jed was easier when you were in a hurry. That was the way it got shortened down.’

  It was time for Mamie to go home and let Daniel Reid get on with his work so she said good-bye and told him to come to the house for his tea. Lizzie would give him tea in the kitchen – it would save him the trouble of making it for himself – and Jock could see him afterwards and have a talk with him.

  Daniel accepted the invitation gratefully. ‘That would be fine, if it wouldn’t be a bother,’ he said. ‘Lizzie will be the cook, I suppose.’

  ‘Yes, she’s been with us for years,’ Mamie told him. ‘She was evacuated from Glasgow at the beginning of the war and she’s been here ever since. She has two children; they go to school at Drumburly, but they’ll be back at teatime. Don’t be late,’ she added as she turned away.

  ‘I’ll be there on the dot,’ said Daniel. ‘And thank you kindly, Mrs. J
ohnstone.’

  It really was a lovely day. The sun was warm and golden; the larks were singing; the buds upon the hedges were bursting open and showing little frills of pale-green lace. There was a curious sort of excitement in the air, thought Mamie as she went down the hill; it was akin to the feeling in a theatre before the curtain goes up… and of course that was just what it was! Winter was over and the curtain was rising for summer and all the pleasant things which summer brings; summer on the farm, long light evenings, warmth, fruitfulness.

  Mamie thought of all this, not clearly but vaguely. She was full of the joy of spring. Daniel Reid was part of her happiness. Mamie liked him. She hoped sincerely that he was good at sheep. If he were not good at his job Jock would not keep him and that would be a pity, for Daniel Reid was the right kind of person to live at Mureth. Mureth was so isolated that it mattered a lot what sort of people lived here. It was not like a town where you could pick and choose amongst your neighbours and have your own friends. Every one of the twenty-odd people who lived at Mureth contributed to the atmosphere of the place. It was not so bad in summer when people could go into Drumburly and meet outside friends or see a picture, but in winter when Mureth was more or less cut off from the rest of the world it was sometimes rather difficult. People got on each other’s nerves, they formed little cliques. One day they were close friends and the next – for no sensible reason – they were deadly enemies. Mamie often thought that Mureth, in winter was like a desert island with a company of wrecked mariners thrown together upon it. Jock did not notice the undercurrents of feeling in the place, or if he noticed them he passed them off with a laugh. What did it matter if Mrs. Dunne and Mrs. Bell were not on speaking terms? If a man were good at his job and a woman kept her house clean Jock asked no more… but Mamie asked a good deal more. Mamie would have weeded out the malcontents, she would have made Mureth a Utopia if she could have had her way. People who grumbled and quarrelled and were uncharitable to one another were unfit to live upon Mureth soil.