Chapter XXVI

End of the Flight: We Pass the Forth

The month, as I have said, was not yet out, but it was already far through August, and beautiful warm weather, with every sign of an early and great harvest, when I was pronounced able for my journey. Our money was now run to so low an ebb that we must think first of all on speed; for if we came not soon to Mr. Rankeillor’s, or if when we came there he should fail to help me, we must surely starve. In Alan’s view, besides, the hunt must have now greatly slackened; and the line of the Forth and even Stirling Bridge, which is the main pass over that river, would be watched with little interest.

The first night, accordingly, we pushed to the house of a friend of Duncan’s, where we slept the twenty-first of the month, and whence we set forth again about the fall of night to make another easy stage. The twenty-second we struck Allan Water, and followed it down; and coming to the edge of the hills saw the whole Carse of Stirling underfoot, as flat as a pancake, with the town and castle on a hill in the midst of it, and the moon shining on the Links of Forth.

‘Now,’ said Alan, ‘I kenna if ye care, but ye’re in your own land again. We passed the Hieland Line in the first hour; and now if we could but pass yon crooked water, we might cast our bonnets in the air.’

In Allan Water, near by where it falls into the Forth, we found a little sandy islet, overgrown with burdock, butter-bur and the like low plants, that would just cover us if we lay flat. Here it was we made our camp, within plain view of Stirling Castle, whence we could hear the drums beat as some part of the garrison paraded.

As soon as the dusk began to fall, we waded ashore and struck for the Bridge of Stirling, keeping to the fields and under the field fences.

The bridge is close under the castle hill, an old, high, narrow bridge with pinnacles along the parapet; and you may conceive with how much interest I looked upon it, not only as a place famous in history, but as the very doors of salvation to Alan and myself. It was all mighty still, and there seemed to be no guard upon the passage.

I was for pushing straight across; but Alan was more wary. ‘It looks unco’ quiet,’ said he; ‘but for all that we’ll lie down here cannily behind a dyke, and make sure.’

So we lay for about a quarter of an hour, whiles whispering, whiles lying still and hearing nothing earthly but the washing of the water on the piers. At last there came by an old, hobbling woman with a crutch stick. The woman was so little, and the night still so dark, that we soon lost sight of her; only heard the sound of her steps, and her stick, and a cough that she had by fits, draw slowly farther away.

And just then – ‘Who goes?’ cried a voice, and we heard the butt of a musket rattle on the stones. I must suppose the sentry had been sleeping, so that had we tried, we might have passed unseen; but he was awake now, and the chance forfeited.

‘This’ll never do,’ said Alan. ‘This’ll never, never do for us, David.’

And without another word, he began to crawl away through the fields; and a little after, being well out of eyeshot, got to his feet again, and struck along a road that led to the eastward.

‘Well?’ said I.

‘Well,’ said Alan, ‘what would ye have? They’re none such fools as I took them for. We have still the Forth to pass, Davie – weary fall the rains that fed and the hillsides that guided it!’

‘And why go east?’ said I.

‘Ou, just upon the chance!’ said he. ‘If we cannae pass the river, we’ll have to see what we can do for the firth.’

‘There are fords upon the river, and none upon the firth,’ said I.

‘To be sure there are fords, and a bridge forbye,’ quoth Alan; ‘and of what service, when they are watched?’

‘Well,’ said I, ‘but a river can be swum.’

‘By them that have the skill of it,’ returned he; ‘but for my own part, I swim like a stone. But there’s such a thing as a boat.’

‘Ay, and such a thing as money,’ says I. ‘But for us that have neither one nor other, they might just as well not have been invented.’

‘David,’ says he, ‘ye’re a man of small invention and less faith. But let me set my wits upon the hone, and if I cannae beg, borrow, nor yet steal a boat, I’ll make one! So deave me with no more of your nonsense, but walk (for that’s what you’ve got to do) – and let Alan think for ye.’

All night, then, we walked through the north side of the Carse under the high line of the Ochil mountains; and by Alloa and Clackmannan and Culross, all of which we avoided: and about ten in the morning, mighty hungry and tired, came to the little clachan of Limekilns. This is a place that sits near in by the water-side, and looks across the Hope to the town of the Queensferry. Smoke went up from both of these, and from other villages and farms upon all hands. The fields were being reaped; two ships lay anchored, and boats were coming and going on the Hope. It was altogether a right pleasant sight to me; and I could not take my fill of gazing at these comfortable, green, cultivated hills and the busy people both of the field and sea.

For all that, there was Mr. Rankeillor’s house on the south shore, where I had no doubt wealth awaited me; and here was I upon the north, clad in poor enough attire of an outlandish fashion, with three silver shillings left to me of all my fortune, a price set upon my head, and an outlawed man for my sole company.

In Limekilns we entered a small change-house, which we only knew to be a public by the wand over the door, and bought some bread and cheese from a good-looking lass that was the servant. This we carried with us in a bundle, meaning to sit and eat it in a bush of wood on the sea-shore, that we saw some third part of a mile in front. As we went, I kept looking across the water and sighing to myself; and though I took no heed of it, Alan had fallen into a muse. At last he stopped in the way.

‘Did ye take heed of the lass we bought this of?’ says he, tapping on the bread and cheese.

‘To be sure,’ said I, ‘and a bonny lass she was.’

‘Ye thought that?’ cries he. ‘Man, David, that’s good news.’

‘In the name of all that’s wonderful, why so?’ says I. ‘What good can that do?’

‘Well,’ said Alan, with one of his droll looks, ‘I was rather in hopes it would maybe get us that boat.’

‘If it were the other way about, it would be liker it,’ said I.

‘That’s all that you ken, ye see,’ said Alan. ‘I don’t want the lass to fall in love with ye, I want her to be sorry for ye, David; to which end there is no manner of need that she should take you for a beauty. Let me see’ (looking me curiously over). ‘I wish ye were a wee thing paler; but apart from that ye’ll do fine for my purpose – ye have a fine, hang-dog, ragand-tatter, clappermaclaw kind of a look to ye, as if ye had stolen the coat from a potato-bogle. Come; right about, and back to the change-house for that boat of ours.’

I followed him, laughing.

‘David Balfour,’ said he, ‘ye’re a very funny gentleman by your way of it, and this is a very funny employ for ye, no doubt. For all that, if ye have any affection for my neck, ye will perhaps be kind enough to take this matter responsibly.

‘Well, well,’ said I, ‘have it as you will.’

As we got near the clachan, he made me take his arm and hang upon it like one almost helpless with weariness; and by the time he pushed open the change-house door, he seemed to be half-carrying me. The maid appeared surprised (as well she might be) at our speedy return; but Alan had no words to spare for her in explanation, helped me to a chair, called for a tass of brandy with which he fed me in little sips, and then breaking up the bread and cheese helped me to eat it like a nursery-lass. It was small wonder if the maid were taken with the picture we presented, of a poor, sick, overwrought lad and his most tender comrade. She drew quite near, and stood leaning with her back on the next table.

‘What’s like wrong with him?’ said she at last.

Alan turned upon her, to my great wonder, with a kind of fury. ‘Wrong?’ cries he. ‘He’s walked more hundreds of miles than he has hairs upon his chin, and slept oftener in wet heather than dry sheets. Wrong enough, I would think,’ and he kept grumbling to himself as he fed me, like a man ill-pleased.

‘He’s young for the like of that,’ said the maid.

‘Over young,’ said Alan, with his back to her.

‘He would be better riding,’ says she.

‘And where could I get a horse to him?’ cried Alan, turning on her with the same appearance of fury. ‘Would ye have me steal?’ I thought this roughness would have sent her off in dudgeon, as indeed it closed her mouth for the time. But my companion knew very well what he was doing.

‘Ye neednae tell me,’ she said at last – ‘ye’re gentry.’

‘Well,’ said Alan, softened a little (I believe against his will) by this artless comment, ‘and suppose we were? Did ever you hear that gentrice put money in folk’s pockets?’

She sighed at this, as if she were herself some disinherited great lady. ‘No,’ says she, ‘that’s true indeed.’

Somehow at this I could hold in no longer, and bade Alan let me be, for I was better already. My voice stuck in my throat, for I ever hated to take part in lies; but my very embarrassment helped on the plot, for the lass no doubt set down my husky voice to sickness and fatigue.

‘Has he nae friends?’ said she, in a tearful voice.

‘That has he so!’ cried Alan, ‘if we could but win to them! – friends and rich friends, beds to lie in, food to eat, doctors to see to him – and here he must tramp in the dubs and sleep in the heather like a beggarman.’

‘And why that?’ says the lass.

‘My dear,’ said Alan, ‘I cannae very safely say; but I’ll tell ye what I’ll do instead,’ says he, ‘I’ll whistle ye a bit tune.’ And with that he leaned pretty far over the table, and in a mere breath of a whistle, but with a wonderful pretty sentiment, gave her a few bars of ‘Charlie is my darling.’

‘Wheesht,’ says she, and looked over her shoulder to the door.

‘That’s it,’ said Alan.

‘And him so young!’ cries the lass.

‘He’s old enough to —’ and Alan struck his forefinger on the back part of his neck, meaning that I was old enough to lose my head.

‘It would be a black shame,’ she cried, flushing high.

‘It’s what will be, though,’ said Alan, ‘unless we manage the better.’

‘Poor lamb!’ says she, then she touched me on the shoulder with a little friendly touch, as much as to bid me cheer up.

‘I’m thinking ye have rather a long tongue,’ she said at last to Alan.

‘Ay,’ said Alan; ‘but ye see I ken the folk I speak to. I’ll tell ye what ye would do, ye would help.’

‘I couldnae,’ said she, shaking her head. ‘Na, I couldnae.’

‘No,’ said he, ‘but if ye could?’

She answered him nothing.

‘Look here, my lass,’ said Alan, ‘there are boats in the Kingdom of Fife. Now if we could have the use of a boat to pass under cloud of night into Lothian, and some secret, decent kind of a man to bring that boat back again and keep his counsel, there would be two souls saved. If we lack that boat, we have but three shillings left in this wide world; and where to go, and how to do, and what other place there is for us except the chains of a gibbet – I give you my naked word, I kenna! Shall we go wanting, lassie? Are ye to lie in your warm bed and think upon us, when the wind gowls in the chimney and the rain tirls on the roof? Are ye to eat your meat by the cheeks of a red fire, and think upon this poor sick lad of mine, biting his finger ends on a blae muir for cauld and hunger? Sick or sound, he must aye be moving; with the death grapple at his throat he must aye be trailing in the rain on the lang roads; and when he gants his last on a rickle of cauld stanes, there will be nae friends near him but only me and God.’

At this appeal, I could see the lass was in great trouble of mind, being tempted to help us, and yet in some fear she might be helping malefactors; and so now I determined to step in myself and to allay her scruples with a portion of the truth.

‘Did ever you, hear,’ said I, ‘of Mr. Rankeillor of the Ferry?’

‘Rankeillor the writer?’ said she. ‘I daur say that!’

‘Well,’ said I, ‘it’s to his door that I am bound, so you may judge by that if I am an ill-doer; and I will tell you more, that though I am indeed, by a dreadful error, in some peril of my life, King George has no truer friend in all Scotland than myself.’

Her face cleared up mightily at this, although Alan’s darkened.

‘That’s more than I would ask,’ said she. ‘Mr. Ran-keillor is a kennt man.’ And she bade us get clear of the clachan as soon as might be, and lie close in the bit wood on the sea-beach. ‘And ye can trust me,’ says she, ‘I’ll find some means to put you over.’

At this we waited for no more, but shook hands with her upon the bargain and set forth again from Limekilns as far as to the wood. It was a small piece of perhaps a score of elders and hawthorns and a few young ashes, not thick enough to veil us from passersby upon the road or beach. Here we must lie, however, making the best of the brave warm weather and the good hopes we now had of a deliverance, and planing more particularly what remained for us to do.

The day came to an end with the same brightness; the night fell quiet and clear; lights came out in houses and hamlets and then, one after another, began to be put out; but it was past eleven, and we were long since strangely tortured with anxieties, before we heard the grinding of oars upon the rowing-pins. At that, we looked out and saw the lass herself coming rowing to us in a boat. She had trusted no one with our affairs, not even her sweetheart, if she had one; but as soon as her father was asleep, had left the house by a window, stolen a neighbour’s boat, and come to our assistance single-handed.

I was abashed how to find expression for my thanks; but she was no less abashed at the thought of hearing them; begged us to lose no time and to hold our peace, saying (very properly) that the heart of our matter was in haste and silence; and so, what with one thing and another, she had set us on the Lothian shore not far from Carriden, had shaken hands with us, and was out again at sea and rowing for Limekilns, before there was one word said either of her service or our gratitude.

Even after she was gone, we had nothing to say, as indeed nothing was enough for such a kindness. Only Alan stood a great while upon the shore shaking his head.

‘It is a very fine lass,’ he said at last. ‘David, it is a very fine lass.’ For my part, I could say nothing, she was so simple a creature that my heart smote me both with remorse and fear: remorse because we had traded upon her ignorance; and fear lest we should have anyway involved her in the dangers of our situation.