by Jess Smith
Already a lone monarch of the glen was sniffing the air. Snow began to fly in on a brisk wind. Granny’s wee hands worked faster. She had other worries though; a tiny baby moved inside her womb, ready to add to her already large family. ‘Oh, forgive me, Lord, but if I’d the “evil eye”, its nae guessing who’d be getting its stare this day.’ She stood up and punched a cold air, giving the long ribbons of reek coming from the fires of her old campsite a hate-fuelled gaze.
The lodge wasn’t built only for a few well-heeled gentry. There had to be accommodation for staff and guests alike: it featured sixteen good-sized rooms on three floors. Already Grand-dad was eyeing up some long velvet green curtains containing as much material as would clothe a regiment of Gurkhas. He’d put them to another use—blankets of velvet would warm even the dead. Granny needed something to cheer her up. ‘Boys, help me get these down,’ he asked, pointing to pelmets almost touching the ceiling.
Wullie and Mathew gathered some boards and built a kind of scaffolding, while something caught Daddy’s eye elsewhere. He and Thomas had descended to the kitchen down a long stone spiral staircase with iron handrails.
‘What dae ye think they were for?’ Daddy asked his cousin. His eye followed a row of wires that were strung together, leading around the ceiling and joining a line of wee brass bells. Daddy’s cousin had noticed that the wires went further than the kitchen. They followed them from room to room. Further investigation revealed that a single tassel, when pulled, tightened the wire and rang a bell. Each bell had a number corresponding to one of the rooms in the house, and whoever wanted a servant to appear would pull a tassel to ring one of the bells, so that a member of staff would know which room to go to.
Daddy was fondling the bells and smiling broadly. ‘I think you and me should have a fag before we go upstairs,’ he told Thomas, smiling from ear to ear. He lit a cigarette and eagerly puffed away on a full-strength Capstan.
‘You’ve something going on in that head o’ yours, Charlie Riley—what is it?’
‘Come upstairs and I’ll tell everybody.’
‘Faither, there’s a lot o’ brass in the kitchen, can me and Thomas gather it up?’
Grand-dad wasn’t keen. ‘It’s no stuck ontae the walls is it? I don’t want you pulling breasts of chimneys doon and getting hurt.’
My father assured him, ‘No, Da, it’s only a row o’ brass bells. I’ll bag them up for you.’ He called over to the other lads, ‘Matthew, I’ll need you to help, you too, Wullie.’ They had their hands full, though. ‘Just as soon as we dislodge yon pelmet and unhook the curtains from the metal rings,’ Matthew said.
My father’s eyes lit up: he liked the idea forming in his head, ‘Metal rings, can we take them as well, Faither?’
‘Aye, of course, the factor says to take whatever we want.’
This news made him do a wee leap in the air.
‘What the hell’s the leprechaun jig for, Charlie, have you forgotten Jock’s Road faces us when we’ve gutted this place?’
‘Oh, Jock’s Road doesn’t bother me, Da, because I have a plan.’
Grand-dad waved his hand in a dismissive gesture, and went outside to fill and smoke his pipe, leaving the boys to plan something daft, no doubt. Whatever it was didn’t concern him in the least. It was only lads’ capers; he had far more serious business to worry him.
‘Listen now, boys,’ said Daddy, gathering them in a circle. ‘I need all the brass bells, plus wires and tassels, and those metal rings up there will come in handy. Get going now—gather the lot.’
Without a word the boys worked like Trojans, until every bell, plus metal rings and wires, were all tied up in a big jute sack.
‘Tell us, Charlie, what you’re planning,’ asked his brother.
‘All in good time, Wullie, first get soup and bread into yourselves, because it’s going tae be a long night. Now, yon MacSpits will be ontae the moor beating, so while they’re away, let us plan the end o’ them.’
Granny instructed them to wind her home-made puttees around their ankles before setting off, and further warned them not to go near the wild folk. Daddy promised, and then turned to his mates. ‘We’ll need the bag-fu’ o’ bells, so carry it between you.’
Daddy was always a wee control-freak, but as a planner he was hotter than a July lizard basking on a stone. ‘Mammy, us boys will not be hame for supper, so dinnae worry because it’s a mission we’re on, a secret yin.’
‘A mission hoose ye’ll be in if we don’t get back down country, for this nippy breeze is full of snow,’ she warned, tying the last leg tight with her home-made puttees.
When the MacSpits’ campsite came into view, Daddy sat down under cover of unburnt clumps of heather, and told his fellow soldiers what was to be done.
‘Now, boys, this is as long a shot as I’ve ever taken, but it just might work. Wullie, Matthew, go to the far end of the forest, take all the wiring, arrange it between as many trees as it will reach. Leave some back. Thomas, me and you will go ahent, slipping bells onto the wires. The metal rings we’ll place on the ground in a long row, joined by the remaining wire. But whatever you do, make sure you don’t accidentally ring the wee bells, that will come later. Have you got that clear?’
‘Only thing I see clear is you’ve lost the heed. God sake, brither, whit stupid way o’ daein is that?’ said Wullie, shaking his head. But Daddy, who he looked up to, had a plan, so he followed his instructions, though still of the mind he’d gone loopy.
The lads worked stealthily among the bushes and branches, making certain each bell was hidden from any curious eye that may stray too far into the thicket. Daddy took a ball of string from his pocket and went back through the bell trees. ‘I’ve tied a piece of this twine to each bell; now I’ll leave it hanging free, and hope thon MacSpits don’t find it.’ Still not understanding, Thomas said, ‘Cousin, would you tell us what difference these bells will make?’
‘The difference will all depend on how good your storytelling is round thon campfire later on.’ Thomas’s bottom lip fell so far it could have swallowed his feet, but then he jumped and shouted, ‘Away you go, boy, there’s no way under a crescent moon dae I sit at the fire of thon MacSpits and tell tales!’
‘So you want my poor mother and sisters tae trek the long miles ower Jock’s Road, tae look in heavy snaw drifts for a campsite down by the Blackwater?’
‘Never mind scraping ma soul, I want tae know what my stories will have tae dae with bells!’
Wullie’s face broke into a broad smile. ‘I ken whit you are doing, brither; you’re putting the skitters intae the MacSpits, are ye no?’
Thomas went deathly pale. ‘Do you mean I’ve tae tell them a fearty tale?’
‘Yes, cousin, the scariest tale you’ve ever told. Every time you reach a right ghostly bit, give a wind whistle, like a kind of long low one. We’ll be hidden in among the bushes, and when we hear your whistle we’ll tug on the bells. Matthew will rattle the rings. As long as there’s plenty peeve in your audience it will work.’ He thought for a moment, then added, ‘let’s hope there is plenty peeve, because the Devil loves a frightened drunk, and I’m banking on it. Aye, and here’s a toast tae the Devil, because by the time we’ve finished wi’ them Macspits, he’ll need tae widen hell!’ They each held an invisible glass to the heavens. Daddy slapped Thomas’s back, then added, ‘I’ve seen collie dogs cowed under sheep’s bellies after hearing you tell a story, lad, but the night I want to hear a kelpie gallop intae a loch wi’ it’s tail curled atween its shaking legs.’
‘Cousin,’ says he, ‘I’ll turn a black witch white!’
Thomas approached his quarry with shaking knees, ‘Hello MacSpits, how are ye daein this fine night? Can I sit awhile at yer fire?’
Already clouds of layered grey and yellow floated in strips across the moon. Some gave an atmosphere of mystery, others heralded snow.
‘Aye, boy, sit doon and gi’es yer crack.’ A tall man crawled through an opening in his tent and pus
hed thick hairy arms into a torn jacket; rammed a hand inside his pocket, rummaged through the bits and pieces in there, then pulled out a hanky which had been wrapped around a clay pipe. He pushed the pipe into his mouth, then blew his nose on the hanky.
‘Man, it’s a cauld night for sure, laddie, kin ye hand me a lighted stick frae the fire.’
He sat down so near the fire Thomas thought his legs would burst into flames as he handed him the stick.
‘Are you a kin tae big Wullie?’ he asked, puffing away so much on the pipe his face disappeared into a white cloud. ‘It’s just that I’m sure you came by wi’ thon Riley lads.’
‘Na. My father is a spare ghillie helping oot on the estate. I’m just oot for a walk, saw the smoke from yer fire and thought I’d come among ye.’ Thomas wasn’t the best liar, because his face usually beamed red when he told one, but the fire was making his face red already, so he’d escape detection. It worried him that this man was the only MacSpit to be seen. No wild women and brown whisky. What good would it do telling tales to one man, and he with no whiff of the cratur off him either? It was hardly likely that the bells plan would put the frighteners on him. Yet his orders had to be followed: after all, the troops were in place, with frozen hands poised to yank on those wee brass bells. He decided to start. But before he began, his companion, with the clouds of puff hiding his face, said, ‘Ye ken, son, ye tell me ye’re a ghillie’s son, but ah see a tinker in ye.’
‘No, mister, honest—I’m just a country yokel, with no such blood as yer ain.’
‘Well, far be it frae me tae upset ye laddie, but ah think ye’ve been reared on lies. Have a word wi’ yer mother, cause she’d ken the truth.’ From under canvas came a wheen of giggles bursting into laughter, but Thomas would not be swayed from his purpose, or angered.
‘Dae ye ken there was a terrible murder took place in this wood, mister?’ he said with a quivering voice.
‘Ye don’t say?’ The old man turned sullen-faced, and always wary of such tales, changed the subject back to Thomas’s true identity, repeating his question.
‘Aye, ah dae say, and according tae the estate workers, spilt blood got splattered for miles. Some say her head was wrenched frae her neck and flung among the bushes. The auld fat cook at my bothy telt me the lady still searches for it, and can be heard wailing and screaming—the heed that is.’ He gave thought to what his imagination was conjuring up, and shivered. ‘Why the hell am I feart? It’s my ain story, but by God I’m good the night, pity there’s only an audience o’ one.’
His pipe-puffing friend lifted one hand in the air and said, ‘stop right there, laddie, before another word. Aggie, Dill, Moo, Peerie, weans, laddies, come on oot o’ yer kips and hear this laddie. Come and hear him telling ghost tales. Oh, he’s guid, quick noo.’ His left leg in a jig-like fashion kicked out at the nearest tent. ‘Hurry, get yer claithes ontae yersels, or I’ll lift yez in the air wi’ ma tackety boots.’
Thomas, even in the poor light, managed to count twenty bodies crawling from beneath canvas covers. They jostled themselves close into his side, almost dislodging his seat from under him. Tiny eyes, big round eyes, bums shuffling from hip to hip warming each other, and even three dogs launched themselves at his feet, slavers from their jaws drooling onto his boots. Coughs and splutters aimed at the fire sent blue flames upwards like Guy Fawkes night. This told him that all the booze had been drained earlier in the day. He had an audience that Shakespeare would have died for—half drunk and half sober. This was better than he’d imagined: no, truth be told, he’d never had as eager an audience, and what an atmosphere.
‘Listen now tae the whistling heather wind lifting branches with a slow motion; see the silver moon, bluish pale, the kind you’d see when death is searching. But not lifeless death, oh no: I speak o’ the kind that slithers around bare necks of those sat huddled close in a lonely wood-end, with shadows flitting frae tree tae tree. We’ll soon hear the voices, as they get nearer us in the woods: strange, cackling, deep-throated and waiting. Hold hands, because if they see one of you unprotected—’ he drew this out in a voodoo kind of chant, then howled, ‘hot breath, then ye’re awa.’
‘Oh, lord roast ye, laddie, I near shit maself.’ It was the old woman he’d met earlier, who thankfully had been far too drunk to remember him. She yanked a blanket from off the shoulders of two youngsters, who in turn yanked it back. At that she lifted a stick from the fire, sending sparks in every direction, and brought it hard down onto their backs. ‘Granny, fer fuck sake, half ma hair got burnt wi’ ye there,’ squealed the one nearest her.
‘Well, get another cover, I’m listening tae the laddie’s tale.’
‘Dear me,’ he thought, ‘I haven’t begun yet—what will happen when the bells start I shudder tae think.’
Soon, when all that could be heard was a far off hoolit twit-twitting out there in the night, he began again. Such was the atmosphere he could feel the excitement himself: he felt his lungs fill up in his own rib-cage as the haunting took life from his vivid imagination.
‘Her lover, like herself, was of royal blood, but he had no claim to her. That belonged to Sir Boris Bogley. Her father, a greedy auld Duke, lost her tae him one night efter a card game.’
‘Oh, the bastard, fancy selling yer ain lassie,’ whispered a female voice.
‘God bliss me, if some auld man wid gi’e me lowie fer you, I’d be a contented faither.’
‘Who in their right mind wid gi’e lowie fer her? She’s twa een that stare at her nose and different-sized feet,’ mocked a male, who was obviously not in fear of losing his ears, because the female flew at them, tugging and screaming.
‘Hey, that’ll do! Now, carry on, laddie.’ The old woman touched Thomas gently on the arm.
Before he continued, he thought on the others standing in the forest on guard, freezing, and decided to hurry his tale. ‘Well, one night this secret lover that the woman had was overheard telling an Irish dragoon soldier he was going tae enjoy her maidenheid. Now, did this rat o’ a soldier no’ go and clype tae Sir Boris. Anger raging through him, he mounted his horse and set aboot scouring this wid in the hope o’ catching them red-handed.’ Thomas got slowly to his feet, the dogs’ heads following his movements as he pointed to a nearby tree. Its branches were moving from side to side like giant arms. He lowered his voice and spoke with a toff’s haughty tones, ‘ “I see you, and death will come to both of you for deceiving my honour.” Boris lifted his great broadsword now into the night air, and chopped it into the young lover’s neck. His head fell awkwardly down, eyes staring from their sockets into the terrified face of his lost love. Blood splattered over the lassie. She trembled, unable through shock to move. She looked into his face of the demon on horseback who’d killed him and swore he’d never rest. “For this night’s action you’ll find sleep impossible for evermore. I shall bring evil from hell to seek you out.”
“You will have to go there with him, then,” he laughed, and the sword fell for the second time. Her beautiful head with its deep auburn hair rolled under a yew tree and settled next to that of her lover.
Boris spurred his horse, laughing hysterically, and galloped away like a fiend.
An army of dragoons scoured the countryside, but neither he nor his horse were ever seen again.
Thomas straightened his spine, lifted an arm toward the night sky and gave a long, low whistle. Then, for every ear to hear, the bells began to ring. Jingle, jingle, tring-a-ling, came the sounds from somewhere deep in the forest.
‘What the hell was that? Eh lad! That ringing, whit is it?’
‘I fear it might be the demons from hell searching for Boris,’ he spoke with a shivering sound, and continued. ‘Ye see, after the murder it was thought he had gone abroad, but auld shrivelled wives say the water kelpie stole him. It’s just a mystery, because naebody kens whit happened tae him after that.’ Another low long whistle, and this time Daddy, Wullie and Matthew all pulled together. Screams and howls come from the frig
htened listeners. Then Daddy gave the metal rings a shake. A voice murmured, ‘That sounds like chains! Oh Mammy, them devils and goblins are in the woods, they’ll haunt the life oot o’ us. I dinna like this place!’
‘Me neither, Da,’ called another one, adding that a shooter at the beating was called Boris, and adding that he’d not go back.
Thomas acted; this was exactly the response he needed. ‘Aye, but no jist demons come in among these pairts. Oh no! If ye stare long enough intae the bushes, ye’ll see the headless lassie. Hear her wailing. She holds her lover’s head, rotted wi’ maggots, flesh stripped aff it like streaky bacon, and she screams for the soul o’ Boris.’
Suddenly the old woman rose to her feet in a trance-like state and called out to the night, ‘Spirits, awa noo, fer we dinna ken onything aboot Boris, go away an no frighten ma family.’
Thomas put his arm around her, gave another long whistle and waited. This time the bells were louder, the sound of chains dragging ever nearer.
‘That’s enough fer me, come morning I’m off. I’ll not sleep another minute in this place.’
‘Aye, I dare say the winter kin get mighty cauld up here. We’ll pack first thing.’
‘Never mind the morning, I’m pitting ma stuff intae bags right this minute.’
Thomas listened with the greatest satisfaction as all the MacSpits worked themselves up into wrecks of fear and dread. His work completed, he slipped away under cover of darkness to join the lads, helping them to ring bells and pull chains until a hoody crow flew over heralding the first light of early morning.
Not wishing to interfere in the migration of the MacSpits, they went back by a long way round to tell Granny that her campsite awaited, and to inform Grand-dad that the estate would need his expertise and they’d have to do some beating.
It took a while to clean the site, since its past inhabitants had left in haste, but that chore was a welcome one. Thankfully, Granny’s washing line was still in its place from the previous year. Grand-dad and the lads built the tent’s rib-cage, tying it together with wire. Canvas was criss-crossed to keep out draughts, heavy stones placed to anchor the tent and prevent damage. First a bed of straw was strewn over the floor, followed by those green velvet curtains to provide a carpet fit for a Queen. The wee three-legged stove stood proud in the centre with its chimney expertly placed through the roof.