‘Have you had an accident, old woman?’
‘I’ve been here a long, long time.’
‘Will you pe a witch or a wood fairy, I’m wondering?’
‘I was doing the washing and I fell down this pit. I was doing the washing for my lady.’
‘Will you just pe a poor washerwoman, then?’
‘I want to go home.’
‘And where will your home pe?’
‘Up the mountain from the Black Glen.’
‘Ach,’ the man said, ‘fetch a rope, Tougal. Isn’t she one of us?’
They whisked her up as swiftly and as easily as if she had been a feather in the wind.
Once back in the woods, she saw that the trees and bushes were moving with people. Surprised, she hopped around, leaning on her crutch and stamping this way and that. Huge men with tangled hair and beards like bushes gripped giant swords and shields with spikes sticking out. There were women camp-followers and doxies dressed in a hotchpotch of different clothes: a soldier’s red jacket, a kilt, a beggar’s blue coat, tartan trews, yellow breeches, tattered shirts and shawls, cocked hats and tam-o’-shanters. All of them, men and women, were filthy, their hair dark and matted, and skin reddened with long exposure to the elements.
‘Flora!’ one of the rescuers shouted, ‘you will pe taking care of the washerwoman.’
He looked like her father. A strong erect man with hair like fire. She said to him. ‘Let me go with you. You can’t go away without me again.’
‘Ach, well,’ his voice gentled, ‘you will not pe liking Glasgow. Such a place of tirty traitors there never was the like. Flora will keep you safe here until we return.’
‘I want to go home. Back to the mountains.’
‘Ach, now, is that not where we will all pe going? Just you pe resting here for a wee while.’
She allowed herself to be led away by the woman in the red coat that had once belonged to an English soldier.
‘I’ve a drop porridge on the fire. You can share it because they’ll bring us plenty food when they get back from Glasgow.’
Jessie felt sad at the mention of Glasgow. She could not think why. Yet the sadness grew, became unbearable, came rolling towards her like a black snowball growing bigger and bigger. She whimpered and cursed and skittered around.
‘Where’s my washing? Who’s stolen it? Bloody thieves and vagabonds. You’ll have me locked in the Tolbooth. What have you done with my lady’s fine linen?’
‘Hold your wheesht!’ Flora said. ‘Or I’ll get a bloody sword and cut your other leg off.’
‘They’ll lock me away in the Tolbooth.’
‘No, they’ll not. Here, sup your porridge.’
With difficulty Jessie manoeuvred herself on to the ground and did as she was told. But in between sups she nodded her frizzy head and muttered to herself: ‘I laid it out on the field beside the burn, mistress. Aye, that’s what I did. Bonny and bright it was. White against the green.’
The wood fire in front of which she was squatting crackled and belched black smoke. Hunched low over the porridge bowl she ignored it, but red fingers of light reflected in her eyes and trembled over her face accentuating its hollows.
Flora said: ‘I saw no linen by the burn. You’re havering, woman.’ She was eating a small bird, tearing at its flesh with her teeth. Every now and again she stopped to wipe her mouth with the back of her sleeve or to slide her hand inside her coat and absent-mindedly scratch herself.
‘I spread it out and the wind dried it.’
‘It was your own fault for wandering away. You should have stayed and watched it. What made you come into the woods?’
Jessie shook her head. ‘I don’t know.’
‘The fall’s taken your mind.’
‘There were frogs and toads and beetles loupin’ all over me the whole night. They scuttled down my neck.’ She shuddered and twitched about. ‘Crawling inside my clothes the whole night they were. I screamed at them and flung myself this way and that, but they just kept on loupin’ and scuttling and crawling.’
The porridge finished, she put down the bowl and peered about. It was beginning to get dark again and a cold wind was blowing clouds across the moon. Tall trees swayed and danced like long-fingered witches. Everywhere she looked were crowds of men in tartan, some standing, some sitting, some lying sleeping rolled in plaids. There were hundreds and hundreds of them. She had never seen so many Highlanders all together before. Then there came the sound of the pipes and she spied a piper swaggering along. Behind him there strutted a youth who was barely more than a child. Something about his freckled face and aggressive air disturbed Jessie. She struggled up, bewildered and not knowing what to do. Then suddenly like a dagger plunging in her breast came the memory of Gav and Regina.
‘My bairns!’
Flora got up, wiping her hands down the front of her coat.
‘Stop your noise, madwoman.’
‘I must hurry away.’
‘Where the hell do you think you’re hurrying to?’
‘To Glasgow.’
‘Not before the Highland army, you’re not.’
Jessie tried to hop in one direction and then in another, but everywhere she turned, Flora laughing, pranced round to bar her path.
‘Out of my way, you dirty harlot.’
‘Dirty harlot, is it? You ugly one-legged old crone. If you don’t sit down I’ll knock you down.’
Jessie kept a grip on her crutch, but her free hand shot out and caught Flora by the throat and with strength born of desperation, and years of wringing heavy washing, she crashed the younger woman’s head against a tree. Then she bounded away as fast as she could, but Flora was only dazed for a second or two before recovering her wits and lurching after her.
‘You ungrateful old cow!’ She grabbed Jessie’s frizzy hair and hauled her backwards, knocking her off balance and thumping her to the ground. Before Jessie could do anything to defend herself she grabbed her crutch and battered her over the head with it. She might have killed her had it not been for one of the men who came striding over and flung the crutch into the thicket.
Through a red haze of blood Jessie watched Flora return to squat by the fire. She felt ill and it reminded her of the time she lay ill in Tannery Wynd with the smallpox. One of the drunken soldiers who had come to visit the harlots upstairs had wandered into her house instead and despite her screams and struggles had managed to rape her. She chuckled to herself now, for he had later got the pox himself and died of it. That had been many years ago, perhaps twelve or thirteen.
‘What are you snickering at, madwoman?’ Flora called out.
Jessie laughed again. Then lying on her side with blood trickling over her eyes she began to automatically sing a song that was very familiar to her. She had often crooned it to Regina as they lay together in the hole-in-the-wall bed. But she had no recollection of that now.
‘Homeward ye’re travellin’
In the soft hill-rain,
The day long by
That ye wearied o’ the glen
No ring upon yer hand,
No kiss upon yer mou’,
Quiet noo.
Cold was the sky above ye,
The road baith rough and steep.
No further shall ye wander
Nor greet yersel’ tae sleep,
My ain wild lass,
My bonnie hurtit doo,
Quiet, quiet noo.’
* * *
‘Times are no’ what they used to be, no.’ There was a stiffness about the minister, as if his arms were wooden and screwed high in his shoulders.
‘Will you say a few words over the dram, minister?’
Ramsay and the minister, who always kept their hats on in the house, now respectfully removed them and held them against their chests while the Reverend Blackadder cried out with feeling.
‘Oh Lord, Lord, bless this whisky and make us duly grateful for its warmth and health-giving properties and the fellowship it brings betwe
en man and man. Amen. Amen.’
They drank down the whisky, smacked their lips, then replaced their hats. The minister continued:
‘Only the other day I heard about farmer folk talking about corns and markets in the kirkyard. On the Sabbath. Oh, the devil is busy nowadays. It’s sad times we’re living in, Ramsay.’
Annabella smoothed a hand up her hair and gave it a little pat. ‘Talking about corns and markets? Gracious heaven, what’s so wicked about that?’
Her father said: ‘You see what I mean, Blackadder. Another wee dram?’
‘God bless you, merchant.’
Ramsay signalled to Big John, who lumbered over to splash the glasses full again. The minister raised his:
‘And may you always prosper. Mistress Annabella, did you not know that even asking, listening to, or telling news on the Holy Day is sinful?’
‘Indeed I did not, sir. I am cruelly confused.’
‘But God is good. Just fill up my glass again, lad. God is generous. He has in His goodness given us a variety of delights for the Sabbath, so that if we weary of one, another may be our recreation.’
‘Delights?’ Annabella frisked in her chair, flounced out her gown and sparkled mischievously at the minister over the top of her fan. ‘Delights, sir?’
‘Indeed, indeed. If you weary of listening to preaching, then you may recreate yourself in prayer. If you weary of that, recreate yourself with singing God’s praises. If you weary of that, recreate yourself with meditating.’
‘And what delights would you have me meditate upon, I wonder?’
‘Oh, Mistress Annabella. Yes, another wee drop would go down very well. Oh, Mistress Annabella. Many are the delights of fruitful meditation. In the morning, as you put on your robes, think of the soul’s nakedness.’
She gave a little gasp and fluttered her fan.
‘Nakedness, minister?’
‘… and need of the robes of righteousness. And when you comb your head, think of your sins, which are more than the hairs thereon. Then …’ He plumped his palms on the table and his shoulders pushed up to his ears as he leaned forward. ‘Then, at night when you see yourself stripped of clothing …’
‘Minister!’
‘Think, Mistress Annabella, think! …’
‘Indeed I am thinking, sir.’
‘Naked came I into the world …’
‘Naked? Sir, sir, you are disconcerting me!’
‘And naked shall I return. And when you lie down in bed.’
‘And when I lie down in bed?’
‘And cover yourself with blankets, let it remind you of your lying in the cold grave and being covered with earth. Thank you, Ramsay, I will take a drap more.’
He relaxed back and watched his glass becoming golden coloured with warm appreciative eyes.
‘Many and varied are the Good Lord’s delights. Och, yes.’
Annabella began to feel unbearably restless. Her eyes sped over the room while all the time she agitated furiously with her fan. She wished the long-visaged melancholy idiot would leave so that she could get to her bed. But she knew that once there it would not be the grave and the cold earth she would be thinking about. ‘God help me!’ she shot up a fervent prayer. ‘Send me a handsome, daring, passionate, devilish darling of a man.’
But the Reverend Blackadder was in no hurry to leave and it was a long time and many glasses of whisky later before his goodbyes were said. He was very drunk as usual and Big John had to hoist him over his broad shoulder and carry him home. His capacity for drink was the subject of much admiration among his flock.
‘Aye,’ they said. ‘There’s no much wrong with a man who can take a good dram.’
The minister held on to his hat.
‘Goodnight to you, merchant.’
‘Goodnight to you, minister.’
‘And a verra good night to you, Mistress Annabella.’
She flounced into a low curtsy, holding her skirts wide.
‘Minister.’
Afterwards her father said: ‘The verra man for you.’
‘Papa!’ she groaned.
‘The verra man.’
‘I don’t understand you. Really I don’t. I might get somebody with money.’
‘Aye, aye. But money’s no what you need the most, Annabella.’
She laughed. ‘On that we can agree, Papa. But the minister’s not got anything I either need or want.’
‘He’s a fine honest man of God.’
‘Maybe, Papa. Maybe.’
‘No maybes about it.’
‘To tell the honest truth, Papa, I don’t care what he is.’
‘Well, you’d better start caring, for he’s asked to wed you.’
She stamped her foot. ‘It’s monstrous and damnable.’
‘Mind your wicked tongue. It’s the minister you need to put the fear of God in you.’
‘I will not ever, ever marry that odious creature. I will not, sir.’
‘Aye, weel, you’ve got a few days’ grace. It would not be verra ladylike to jump at him.’
‘Jump at him? The very idea. Papa, am I not the most beautiful woman in Glasgow and the most spirited?’
‘A spirited horse has to be broken.’
‘Oh, pooh! A spirited horse is marvellously exciting.’
‘Compose yourself, woman. It’s time for our prayers. Away and tell your brother and the servants.’
Annabella swept past him and manoeuvred her hoops sideways out of the door. She was heartily sick of prayers.
‘Douglas, are you there?’ she called in the direction of the other bedroom. ‘Time for the reading.’
He appeared holding his candle and she immediately detected a languor about him.
‘What ails you?’ she asked.
‘Not what ails me, sister. What ails my Griselle.’
‘What ails her then?’
‘That I do not know. Perhaps it’s only my sensitive imagination but I fear her affections have cooled a little. I must waste no time in pressing my case. She must marry me post-haste. I cannot bear to be flustered like this any longer.’
‘I wish you happiness. But was Griselle ever warm, Douglas? I cannot imagine it. She is surely a cold calculating fish like her mother.’
‘How dare you miscall a lady, you ignorant strumpet.’
‘How dare you miscall a lady, sir,’ Annabella said, and snuffed out his candle with a quick rap of her fan, leaving them both in darkness.
Then Douglas took pleasure in informing her:
‘Papa’s promised you to the minister.’
A foreboding like a black cloud of fear came drifting towards her. It made her heart quail and her mouth go dry. Never before had she allowed herself to think of marriage to the Reverend Blackadder as something that could actually happen. It took all her courage and spirit to prevent herself from floundering under her father’s gloomy talk. All her life she had been subjected to the bleak and depressing philosophy that everything gay or beautiful or enjoyable must be wicked and punished with the utmost severity. She could not believe this to be right and had often risked the pillory or worse herself by marching up to culprits being punished for some moral misdemeanour and helping them. Many a sustaining sup of whisky she had held to grateful mouths. Many times, to her father’s horror and fury, had she stood in front of the stocks and bawled abuse at the citizens in an attempt to shame them for pelting victims for no other reason than for kissing on a Sunday or actually laughing on that day.
Oh, sins of sins—loving and laughing on the Sabbath! She felt more like weeping than laughing now. But she swallowed down her tears, then tossing back her head and holding herself with nonchalant dignity, she swept past her brother saying:
‘Pox on the bloody minister!’
6
‘QUIN,’ said Quin, ‘is verra pleased. Quin has never needed the help of Auld Nick the whole day. Not as a green ghost, nor a giant bee, nor even a black dog called Spider.’
‘Will you let us go now?’
Gav asked.
‘Go? Go?’ Quin danced from one foot to the other and cocked his head. ‘Go where?’
‘Home.’
‘Where’s home?’
‘Tannery Wynd.’
‘You’re telling lies to Quin again.’
Regina dragged herself out of her lethargy. She was exhausted with standing around and wandering about all day. She longed for her mother. She longed to cling close to her mother’s skirts and feel safe. She longed to sink into sleep under her mother’s warm plaid.
‘No, he isn’t. We do live in Tannery Wynd.’
Quin scratched his head and blinked his eye.
‘You were sleeping on the stairs for a wee change, eh?’
‘We went to the door yesterday.’ Regina palmed away tears that unexpectedly overflowed. ‘And our mammy wasn’t in.’
‘Quin had a mammy once. Quin had a father as well. What do you think of that, eh?’
The children were suitably impressed.
‘Where are they now?’ Gav asked.
‘With Auld Nick. That’s what the minister told me after they were hangit. “They’ve gone to the devil, Quin,” he says. “They’ve gone to hell. They’ve sunk into the pit.” “But, ach, Quin,” says Auld Nick, says he, “you deal fair with me and I’ll deal fair with them!” ’
Regina said, ‘Come with us and we’ll show you where we live.’
‘Yes,’ Gav nodded excitedly. ‘Come on, Quin. Mammy’ll give you porridge, too.’
Quin rubbed his torn ear and made his hair straggle about. ‘Quin doesn’t know what Auld Nick will do about this.’
‘We’ll run quick down Tannery Wynd so he won’t catch us. Regina and me always do that, don’t we, Regina?’
‘Yes, and Mammy will let us in and we’ll be all right, you’ll see.’
‘Quin’s remembered something.’
‘What?’
‘It’s Christmas Eve.’
‘Does that mean we can go?’
‘You stay with Quin. Quin’ll go.’
The children laughed and wept with relief and jumped up and down and clapped their hands. Quin laughed too and cocked his misshapen face to one side and watched them, thumping his hands together as if he were marking time to a merry dance.
The Tobacco Lords Trilogy Page 7