The Short Stories of John Buchan (Complete Collection). Buchan John
you ‘re willing.’
“‘Yes, by God, I am that,’ I said, for the savoury smell of the broth was rising to my nostrils. The other smiled at this as if well-pleased.
“I have tasted many soups, but I swear there never was one like that. It was as if all the good things in the world were mixed thegether—whisky and kale and shortbread and cockyleeky and honey and salmon. The taste of it was enough to make a body’s heart loup with fair gratitude. The smell of it was like the spicy winds of Arabia, that you read about in the Bible, and when you had taken a spoonful you felt as happy as if you had sellt a hundred yowes at twice their reasonable worth. Oh, it was grand soup!
“‘What Stewarts did you say you corned from?’ I asked my entertainer.
“‘Oh,’ he says, ‘I’m connected with them all, Athole Stewarts, Appin Stewarts, Rannoch Stewarts, and a’. I’ve a heap o’ land thereaways.’
“‘Whereabouts?’ says I, wondering. ‘Is’t at the Blair o’ Athole, or along by Tummel side, or wast the Loch o’ Rannoch, or on the Muir, or in Benderloch?’
“‘In all the places you name,’ says he.
“‘Got damn,’ says I, ‘then what for do you not bide there instead of in these stinking lawlands?’
“At this he laughed softly to himself. ‘Why, for maybe the same reason as yoursel, Mr. Duncan. You know the proverb, “A’ Stewarts are sib to the Deil.”’
“I laughed loudly, ‘Oh, you’ve been a wild one, too, have you? Then you ‘re not worse than mysel. I ken the inside of every public in the Cowgate and Cannongate, and there’s no another drover on the road my match at fechting and drinking and dicing.’ And I started on a long shameless catalogue of my misdeeds. Mr. Stewart meantime listened with a satisfied smirk on his face.
“‘Yes, I’ve heard tell of you, Mr. Duncan,’ he says. ‘But here’s something more, and you ‘ll doubtless be hungry.’
“And now there was set on the table a round of beef garnished with pot-herbs, all most delicately fine to the taste. From a great cupboard were brought many bottles of wine, and in a massive silver bowl at the table’s head were put whisky and lemons and sugar. I do not know well what I drank, but whatever it might be it was the best ever brewed. It made you scarce feel the earth round about you, and you were so happy you could scarce keep from singing. I wad give much siller to this day for the receipt.
“Now, the wine made me talk, and I began to boast of my own great qualities, the things I had done and the things I was going to do. I was a drover just now, but it was not long that I would be being a drover. I had bought a flock of my own, and would sell it for a hundred pounds, no less; with that I would buy a bigger one till I had made money enough to stock a farm; and then I would leave the road and spend my days in peace, seeing to my land and living in good company. Was not my father, I cried, own cousin, thrice removed, to Maclean o’ Duart, and my mother’s uncle’s wife a Rory of Balnacrory? And I am a scholar too, said I, for I was a matter of two years at Embro’ College, and might have been roaring in the pulpit, if I hadna liked the drink and the lasses too well.
“‘See,’ said I, ‘I will prove it to you;’ and I rose from the table and went to one of the bookcases. There were all manner of books, Latin and Greek, poets and philosophers, but in the main, divinity. For there I saw Richard Baxter’s ‘Call to the Unconverted,’ and Thomas Boston of Ettrick’s ‘Fourfold State,’ not to speak of the Sermons of half a hundred auld ministers, and the ‘Hind let Loose,’ and many books of the covenanting folk.
“‘Faith,’ I says, ‘you’ve a fine collection, Mr. What’s-your-name,’ for the wine had made me free in my talk. ‘There is many a minister and professor in the Kirk, I ‘ll warrant, who has a less godly library. I begin to suspect you of piety, sir.’
“‘Does it not behove us,’ he answered in an unctuous voice, ‘to mind the words of Holy Writ that evil communications corrupt good manners, and have an eye to our company? These are all the company I have, except when some stranger such as you honours me with a visit.’
“I had meantime been opening a book of plays, I think by the famous William Shakespeare, and I here broke into a loud laugh. ‘Ha, ha, Mr. Stewart,’ I says, ‘here’s a sentence I’ve lighted on which is hard on you. Listen!’ The Devil can quote Scripture to advantage.’
“The other laughed long. ‘He who wrote that was a shrewd man,’ he said,’ but I ‘ll warrant if you ‘ll open another volume, you ‘ll find some quip on yourself.’
“I did as I was bidden, and picked up a white-backed book, and opening it at random, read: ‘There be many who spend their days in evil and wine-bibbing, in lusting and cheating, who think to mend while yet there is time; but the opportunity is to them for ever awanting, and they go down open-mouthed to the great fire.’
“‘Psa,’ I cried, ‘some wretched preaching book, I will have none of them. Good wine will be better than bad theology.’ So I sat down once more at the table.
“‘You ‘re a clever man, Mr. Duncan,’ he says, ‘and a well-read one. I commend your spirit in breaking away from the bands of the kirk and the college, though your father was so thrawn against you.’
“‘Enough of that,’ I said, ‘though I don’t know who telled you.’ I was angry to hear my father spoken of, as though the grieving him was a thing to be proud of.
“‘Oh, as you please,’ he says; ‘I was just going to say that I commended your spirit in sticking the knife into the man in the Pleasaunce, the time you had to hide for a month about the backs o’ Leith.’
“‘How do you ken that?’ I asked hotly. ‘You’ve heard more about me than ought to be repeated, let me tell you.’
“‘Don’t be angry,’ he said sweetly; ‘I like you well for these things, and you mind the lassie in Athole that was so fond of you. You treated her well, did you not?’
“I made no answer, being too much surprised at his knowledge of things which I thought none knew but myself.
“‘Oh, yes, Mr. Duncan. I could tell you what you were doing to-day, how you cheated Jock Gallowa out of six pounds, and sold a horse to the farmer of Hay path that was scarce fit to carry him home. And I know what you are meaning to do the morn at Glesca, and I wish you well of it.’
“‘I think you must be the Devil,’ I said blankly.
“‘The same, at your service,’ said he, still smiling.
“I looked at him in terror, and even as I looked I kenned by something in his eyes and the twitch of his lips that he was speaking the truth.
“‘And what place is this, you…’ I stammered.
‘“Call me Mr. S.,’ he says gently, ‘and enjoy your stay while you are here and don’t concern yourself about the lawing.’
“‘The lawing!’ I cried in astonishment,‘and is this a house of public entertainment?’
“‘To be sure, else how is a poor man to live?’
“‘Name it,’ said I, ‘and I will pay and be gone.’
“‘Well,’ said he,’ I make it a habit to give a man his choice. In your case it will be your wealth or your chances hereafter, in plain English your flock or your—’
“‘My immortal soul,’ I gasped.
“‘Your soul,’ said Mr. S., bowing, ‘though I think you call it by too flattering an adjective.’
“‘You damned thief,’ I roared, ‘you would entice a man into your accursed house and then strip him bare!’
“‘Hold hard,’ said he, ‘don’t let us spoil our good fellowship by incivilities. And, mind you, I took you to witness to begin with that you sat