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16 - Kidnapped - Robert Louis Stevenson · Classic Adventure Books Library

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Chapter sixteen, The lad with the Silver Button. Across Morven. There is
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a regular ferry from torres Say to Kinloch Aleeen on the mainland, both shores
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of the sound, or in the country of the strong clan of the Mcleans,
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and the people that passed the ferry with me were almost all of that
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clan. The skipper of the boat, on the other hand, was called
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neil Roy Macrob, And since Macrob was one of the names of Allan's clansmen,
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and Allan himself had sent me to that ferry, I was eager to
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come to private speech of neil Roy in the crowded boat. This was,
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of course impossible, and the passage was a very slow affair. There was
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no wind, and as the boat was wretchedly equipped, we could pull but
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two oars on one side and one on the other. The men gave way,
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however, with a good will, the passengers taking spells to help them,
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and the whole company giving the time in Gaelic boat's songs. And what
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were the songs and the sea and the good nature and spirit of all concern
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and the bright weather. The passage was a pretty thing to have seen.
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But there was one melancholy part. In the mouth of lach Aline, we
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found a great sea going ship at anchor, and this I supposed at first
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to be one of the King's cruisers, which were kept along that coast both
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summer and winter, to prevent communication with the French. As we got a
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little nearer, it became plain she was a ship of merchandise. And what
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still more puzzled me. Not only her decks, but the sea beach also
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were quite black with people, and skiffs were continually plying to and fro between
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them. Yet nearer, and there began to come to our ears a great
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sound of mourning, the people on board and those on the shore crying and
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lamenting one to another so as to pierce the heart. Then I understood this
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was an emigrant ship bound for the American colonies. We put the ferryboat alongside,
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and the exiles leaned over the bulwarks, weeping and reaching out their hands
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to my fellow passengers, among whom they counted some near friends. How long
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this might have gone on I do not know, for they seemed to have
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no sense of time. But at last the captain of the ship, who
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seemed near beside himself and no great wonder in the midst of this crying and
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confusion, came to the side and begged us to depart. Thereupon Neil sheered
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off, and the chief singer in our boat struck into a melancholy air,
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which was presently taken up both by the emigrants and their friends upon the beach,
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so that it sounded from all sides like a lament for the dying.
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I saw the tears run down the cheeks of the men and women in the
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boat, even as they bent at the oars. And the circumstances and the
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music of the song, which is one called lach Abra no More, were
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highly affecting, even to myself. At Kinloch Aleen, I got Neil Roy
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upon one side on the beach and said, I made sure he was one
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of Appin's men. And what for, no, said he. I am
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seeking somebody, said I, and it comes in my mind that you will
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have news of him. Alan breck Stewart is his name. And very foolishly,
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instead of showing him the button, I sought to pass a shilling in
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his hand. At this he drew back. I am very much affronted,
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he said, And this is not the way that one gentleman should behave to
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another at all. The man you asked for is in France, but if
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he were in my sporn, says he, and your belly full of shillings
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that would not hurt a hair upon his body. I saw I had gone
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the wrong way to work, and without wasting time upon apologies, showed him
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the button lying in the hollow of my palm. Hahuil. Wuil said Neil,
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and I think you might have begun with that end of the stick whatever.
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But if you are the lad with silver button, all is well,
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and I have the word to see that you come safe. But if you
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will pardon me to speak plainly, says he, there is a name that
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you should never take into your mouth, and that is the name of Alan
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Breck. And there is a thing that you would never do, and that
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is to offer your dirty money to a heilen gentleman. It was not very
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easy to apologize, for I could scarce tell him what was the truth that
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I had never dreamed he would set up to be a gentleman until he told
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me so. Neil, on his part, had no wish to prolong his
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dealings with me, only to fulfill his orders and be done with it,
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and he made haste to give me my route. This was to lie the
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Knight in king Lacheleen and the public inn, to cross Morvan the next day
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to Ardgour, and lie the Knight in the house of one John of the
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Claymore, who was warned that I might come the third day to be set
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across one lock at Korn and another at Balak foolish, and then asked my
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way to the house of James of the Glens at Okhrn Endure of Appen.
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There was a good deal of faring, as you hear the sea in all
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this part, running deep into the mountains and winding about their roots. It
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makes the country strong to hold and difficult to travel, but full of prodigious,
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wild and dreadful prospects. I had some other advice from Neil to speak
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with no one by the way, to avoid Whigs, Campbell's and the Red
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soldiers. To leave the road and lie in a bush if I saw any
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of the latter coming, for it was never chancey to meet in with them,
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And in brief to conduct myself like a robber or a Jacobite agent,
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as perhaps Neil thought me. The inn at Kinloch Aleen was the most beggarly
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vile place that ever. Pigs were stied in, full of smoke, vermin
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and silent highlanders. I was not only discontented with my lodging, but with
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my for my mismanagement of Neil, and thought I could hardly be worse off,
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but very wrongly, as I was soon to see. For I had
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not been half an hour at the inn, standing in the door most of
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the time to ease my eyes from the peat smoke. When a thunder storm
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came close by, the springs broke in the little hill on which the inn
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stood, and one end of the house became a running water. Places of
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public entertainment were bad enough all over Scotland in those days. Yet it was
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a wonder to myself when I had to go from the fireside to the bed
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in which I slept, weeding over the shoes. Early in my next day's
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journey, I overtook a little stout solemn man, walking very slowly with his
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toes turned out, sometimes reading in a book and sometimes marking the place with
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his finger, and dressed decently and plainly in something of a clerical style.
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This I found to be another Catechist, but of a different order from the
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blind Man of Mull, being indeed one of those sent out by the Edinburgh
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Society for propagating Christian knowledge to evangelize the more savage places of the Highlands.
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His name was Henderlund. He spoke with a broad south country tongue, which
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I was beginning to weary for the sound of. And besides common country ship,
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we soon found we had a more particular bond of interest. For my
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good friend, the Minister of Essendean had translated into the Gaelic in his by
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time a number of hymns and pious books, which Henderlund used in his work
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and held in great esteem. Indeed, it was one of these he was
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carrying and reading when we met. We fell in company at once, our
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ways, lying together as far as to Kingerloch. As we went, he
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stopped and spoke with all the wayfarers and workers that we met or passed.
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And though of course I could not tell what they discoursed about, yet I
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judge mister Hendelin must be well liked in the country side, for I observed
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many of them to bring out their mulls and share a pinch of snuff with
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him. I told him as far in my affairs as I judge wise,
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as far that is, as they were none of Allan's, and gave balicoulish
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as the place I was traveling to to meet a friend, for I thought
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Akharan or even Duror would be too particular and might put him on the scent.
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On his part, he told me much of his work and the people
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he worked among, the hiding priests and Jacobites, the Disarming Act, the
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dress, and many other curiosities of the time and place. He seemed moderate,
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blaming Parliament in several points, and especially because they had framed the act
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more severely against those who wore the dress than against those who carried weapons.
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This moderation put it in my mind to question him of the red Fox and
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the app and tenants, questions which I thought would seem natural enough in the
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mouth of work one traveling to that country. He said it was a bad
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business. It's wonderful, said he. Where the tenants find the money for
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their life is mere starvation. You don't carry such a thing as snuff,
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do you, mister Balfour. No, well, I'm better wanting it.
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But these tenants, as I was saying, are doubtless partly driven to it.
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James Stewart Endure, that's him. They call James of the Glens,
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his half brother to Ardshield, the captain of the clan, and he is
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a man much looked up to and drives very hard. And then this one
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they call Alan Breck. Ah, I cried, what of him? What
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of the wind that bloweth where it listeth? Said Henderlen. He's here in
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a way, here to day and gone tomorrow a fair heather cat. He
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might be glowering at the two of us out of yon Windbush. And I
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wouldn't wonder you now carry such a thing a snuff? Will you told him
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now? And that he had asked the same thing more than once. It's
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highly possible, said he, sighing. But it seems strange you shouldn't carry
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it, However, I was saying this. Alan Breck is a bold,
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desperate customer, and well kent to be James's right hand. His life is
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forfoot already. He would boggle at nehin and maybe if a tenant body were
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to hang back, he would get a dirk in his way. You make
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a poor story of it all, mister Hendlen, said I if it is
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all fear upon both sides. I care to hear no more of it,
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nah, said mister Henderlen. But there's love too, and self denial that
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should put the like of you and meat to shame. There's something fine about
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it, No, perhaps Christian, but humanly fine. Even Alan breck By
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all that I hear is a chield to be respected. There's many a lion's
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snack draw sits closing kirk in our own part of the country, and stands
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well in the world's eye. And maybe he is a far worse man,
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mister Balfour, than Yon misguided shadder of man's blood. II II we might
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take a lesson by them. You'll perhaps think I've been too long in the
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highlands, he added, smiling to me. I told him not at all,
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that I had seen much to admire among the highlanders. And if he
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came to that, mister Campbell himself was a highlander, I said he that's
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true. It's a fine blood. And what is the King's agent about,
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I asked Colin Campbell, says Handelen, putting his head in a bees bike.
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He is to turn the tenants out by force, I hear, said,
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I yes, says he. But the business is gone back and forth,
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as folks say. First James of the Glens rode to Edinburgh and got
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some lawyer, a Stewart. In no doubt they all hang together like bats
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and a steeple, and had the proceedings staid. And then Colin Campbell came
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in again and had the upper hand before the barons of Exchequer. And now
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they tell me the first of the tenants are to flit tomorrow. It's to
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begin at Durer under James's very windows, which doesna seem wise by my humble
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way of it. Do you think they'll fight? I asked, Well,
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says Henderland. They're disarmed, or supposed to be, for there's still a
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good deal of cold iron lying by in quiet places. And then Colin Campbell
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has the soldiers coming. But for all that, if I was his lady
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wife, I wouldn't be well pleased till I got him home again. They're
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queer customers, the appen Stuarts. I asked if they were worse than their
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neighbors. No, they said he And that's the worst part of it.
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For if Colin Roy can get his business done and appen, he has it
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all to begin again. In the next country, which they call Memoir,
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and which is one of the countries of the Camerons. He's king's factor upon
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both, and from both he has to drive out the tenants. And indeed,
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mister Balfour, to be open with you, it's my belief that if
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he escapes the one lot, he'd get his death by the other. So
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we continued talking and walking the great part of the day, until at last
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mister Hendelen, after expressing his delight in my company and satisfaction at meeting with
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a friend of mister Campbell's, whom says he and would make the bold to
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call that sweet singer of our confident in Zion, propose that I should make
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a short stage and lie the night in his house a little beyond Kingerloch.
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To say truth, I was overjoyed, for I had no great desire for
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John of the Claymore, and since my double misadventure first with a guide and
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next with the gentleman's skipper, I stood in some fear of any highland stranger.
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Accordingly, we shook hands upon the bargain and came in the afternoon to
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a small house standing alone by the shore of the line Loch the sun was
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already gone from the desert mountains of Ardgour upon the hither side, but shone
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on those of append On the farther. The loch lay as still as a
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lake. Only the gulls were crying round the sides of it, and the
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whole place seemed solemn and uncouth. We had no sooner come to the door
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of mister Henderlen's dwelling than to my great surprise, for I was now used
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to the politeness of Highlanders. He burst rudely past me, dashed into the
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room, bought up a jar in a small horn spoon, and began ladling
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snuff into his nose in most excessive quantities than he had a hearty fit of
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sneezing, and looked round upon me with a rather silly smile. It's a
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vow I took, says he. I took a vow upon me that I
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would not carry it. Doubtless it's a great privation. But when I think
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upon the martyrs, not only to the Scottish Covenant, but to other points
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of Christianity, I think shame to mind it. As soon as we had
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eaten and porridge, and why were the best of the good man's diet.
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He took a grave face and said he had a duty to perform by mister
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Campbell, and that was to inquire into my state of mind towards God.
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I was inclined to smile at him, since the business of the snuff,
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but he had not spoken long before he brought the tears into my eyes.
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There are two things that men should never weary of goodness and humility. We
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get none too much of them in this rough world, among cold, proud
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people. But mister Henderland had their very speech upon his tongue. And though
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I was a good deal puffed up with my adventures and with having come off,
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as the saying is, with flying colors, yet he soon had me
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on my knees beside, a simple, poor old man, and both proud
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and glad to be there. Before we went to bed, he offered me
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sixpence to help me on my way out of a ganty's store he kept in
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the turf wall of his house, at which excess of goodness I knew not
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what to do. But at last he was so earnest with me that I
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thought it the more mannerly part to let him have his way, and so
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left him poorer than myself. End of chapter