The Eagle Cliff. Robert Michael Ballantyne
pool. Strange to say the rod was not broken; but when I scrambled ashore, I found that the grilse was gone!”
“How unfortunate! You were not hurt, I hope?”
“Not in the least. There was plenty of depth for a dive; besides, I’m used to it.”
It became quite evident to John Barret that his new friend was “used to” a good many more things besides tumbling into the river, for as they went slowly along the winding footpath that led them through the peat-hags, MacRummle tripped over a variety of stumps, roots, and other excrescences which presented themselves in the track, and which on several occasions brought him to the ground. The old gentleman, however, had a fine facility in falling. Being slow in all his movements, he usually subsided rather than fell; a result, perhaps, of laziness as well as of unwillingness to struggle against fate. His frequent staggerings, also, on the verge of dark peat holes, caused his companion many a shock of alarm and many a start forward to prevent a catastrophe, before they gained the high road. They reached it at last, however, rather breathless, but safe.
MacRummle’s speech, like his movements, was slow. His personal courage, considering the dangers he constantly and voluntarily encountered, was great.
“You’ve been in again, Mac, I see,” exclaimed the laird heartily, extending his hand to his old friend with the view of hauling him up on the seat beside him. “Mind the step. Now then!”
“Yes, I’ve been in, but the weather is warm! Stop, stop! Don’t pull quite so hard, Allan; mind my rheumatic shoulder. Give a shove behind, Mr Barret—gently—there. Thankee.”
The old man sat down with something of a crash beside his friend. Barret handed him his rod, put the basket under his feet, and sprang up on the seat behind.
Returning at a swift pace by the road they had come, they soon reached Kinlossie, where the laird drove into the back yard, so as to deliver the still dripping MacRummle at the back door, and thus prevent his leaving a moist track from the front hall to his bedroom. Having got rid of him, and given the dog-cart in charge to the groom, Mr Gordon led his young friend round to the front of the house.
“I see your friends have already arrived,” said the laird, pointing to the waggonette which stood in the yard. “No doubt we shall find them about somewhere.”
They turned the corner of the mansion as he spoke, and certainly did come on Barret’s friends, in circumstances, however, which seemed quite unaccountable at first sight, for there, in front of the open door, were not only Bob Mabberly, Giles Jackman, Skipper McPherson, James McGregor, Pat Quin, and Robin Tips, but also Mrs Gordon, the two boy Gordons—named respectively, Eddie and Junkie—Duncan, the butler, and little Flora, with a black wooden doll in her arms, all standing in more or less awkward attitudes, motionless and staring straight before them as if petrified with surprise or some kindred feeling.
Barret looked at his host with a slight elevation of his eyebrows.
“Hush!” said the laird, softly, holding up a finger of caution. “My boy Archie is behind that laurel bush. He’s photographing them!”
“That’ll do,” in a loud voice from Archie, disenchanted the party; and while the operator rushed off to his “dark closet,” the laird hurried forward to be introduced to the new arrivals, and give them hospitable greeting.
That evening the host and his wife entertained their guests to a genuine Highland feast in the trophied hall, and at a somewhat later hour Duncan, the butler, and Elsie, the cook, assisted by Roderick, the groom, and Mary, the housemaid, held their share of high revelry in the kitchen, with Quin, Tips, and “Shames” McGregor.
“You have come to the right place for sport, gentlemen,” said the laird, as he carved with vigour at a splendid haunch of venison. “In their seasons we have deer and grouse on the hills; rabbits, hares, partridges, and pheasants on the low grounds. What’ll you have, Mr Mabberly? My dear, what have you got there?”
“Pigeon pie,” answered Mrs Gordon.
“Mac, that will suit your taste, I know,” cried the host with a laugh.
“Yes, it will,” slowly returned MacRummle, whose ruddy face and smooth bald head seemed to glow with satisfaction now that he had got into dry garments. “Yes, I’m almost as fond of pie as my old friend Robinson used to be. He was so fond of it that, strange though it may seem to you, gentlemen, he had a curious predilection for pie-bald horses.”
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