The Short Stories of John Buchan (Complete Collection). Buchan John
ower his broo, and his face was thin and white as a ghaist’s. His claes fell loose about him, and he sat wi’ his hand on his auld stick and his chin on his hand, hearin’ nocht and glowerin’ afore him. He never saw nor kenned me till I shook him by the shoulders, and cried him by his name.
“Whae are ye?” says he, in a thin voice that gaed to my hert.
“Ye ken me fine, ye auld fule,” says I. “I’m Jock Rorison o’ the Redswirehead, whaur ye’ve stoppit often.”
“Redswirehead,” he says, like a man in a dream, “Redswirehead! That’s at the tap o’ the Clachlands Burn as ye gang ower to the Dreichil.”
“And what are ye daein’ here? It’s no your countryside ava, and ye ‘re no fit noo for lang trampin’.”
“No,” says he, in the same weak voice and wi’ nae fushion in him, “but they winna hae me up yonder noo. I’m ower auld and useless. Yince a’body was gled to see me, and wad keep me as lang ‘s I wantit, and had aye a guid word at meeting and paining. Noo it’s a’ changed, and my wark’s dune.”
I saw fine that the man was daft, but what answer could I gie to his havers? Folk in the Callowa Glens are as kind as afore, but ill weather and auld age had put queer notions intil his heid. Forbye, he was seeck, seeck unto death, and I saw mair in his ee than I likit to think.
“Come in by and get some meat, man,” I said. “Ye ‘re famishin’ wi’ cauld and hunger.”
“I canna eat,” he says, and his voice never changed. “It’s lang since I had a bite, for I’m no hungry. But I’m awfu’ thirsty. I cam here yestereen, and I can get nae water to drink like the water in the hills. I maun be settin’ out back the morn, if the Lord spares me.”
I mindit fine that the body wad tak nae drink like an honest man, but maun aye draibble wi’ burn water, and noo he had got the thing on the brain. I never spak a word, for the maitter was bye ony mortal’s aid.
For lang he sat quiet. Then he lifts his heid and looks awa ower the grey sea. A licht for a moment cam intil his een.
“Whatna big water’s that?” he said, wi’ his puir mind aye rinnin’ on waters.
“That’s the Solloway,” says I.
“The Solloway,” says he; “it’s a big water, and it wad be an ill job to ford it.”
“Nae man ever fordit it,” I said.
“But I never yet cam to the water I couldna ford,” says he. “But what’s that queer smell i’ the air? Something snell and cauld and unfreendly, no like the reek o’ bogs and hills.”
“That’s the salt, for we ‘re at the sea here, the mighty ocean.”
He keepit repeatin’ the word ower in his mouth. “The salt, the salt, I’ve heard tell o’ it afore, but I dinna like it. It’s terrible cauld and unhamely.”
By this time an onding o’ rain was comin’ up frae the water, and I bade the man come indoors to the fire. He followed me, as biddable as a sheep, draggin’ his legs like yin far gone in seeckness. I set him by the fire, and put whisky at his elbow, but he wadna touch it.
“I’ve nae need o’ it,” said he. “I’m fine and warm;” and he sits staring at the fire, aye comin’ ower again and again, “The Solloway, the Solloway. It’s a guid name and a muckle water.” But sune I gaed to my bed, being heavy wi’ sleep, for I had traivelled for twae days.
The next morn I was up at six and out to see the weather. It was a’ changed. The muckle tides lay lang and still as our ain Loch o’ the Lee, and far ayont I saw the big blue hills o’ England shine bricht and clear. I thankit Providence for the day, for it was better to tak the lang miles back in sic a sun than in a blast of rain.
But as I lookit I saw some folk comin’ up frae the beach cairryin’ something atween them. My hert gied a loup, and “some puir, drooned sailor-body,” says I to mysel’, “whae has perished in yesterday’s storm.” But as they came nearer I got a glisk which made me run like daft, and lang ere I was up on them I saw it was Yeddie.
He lay drippin’ and white, wi’ his puir auld hair lyin’ back frae his broo and his duds clingin’ to the legs. But out o’ the face there seemed to have gone a’ the seeckness and weariness. His een were stelled, as if he had been lookin’ forrit to something, and his lips were set like a man on a lang errand. And mair, his stick was grippit sae firm in his hand that nae man could loose it, so they e’en let it be.
“Then they tellt me the tale o’ ‘t, how at the earliest licht they had seen him wanderin’ alang the sands, juist as they were putting out their boats to sea. They wondered and watched him, till of a sudden he turned to the water and wadit in, keepin’ straucht on till he was oot o’ sicht. They rowed a’ their pith to the place, but they were ower late. Yince they saw his heid appear abune water, still wi’ his face to the ither side; and then they got his body, for the tide was rinnin’ low in the mornin’. I tell’t them a’ I kenned o’ him and they were sair affected. ‘Puir cratur,’ said yin, ‘he’s shurely better now.’
“So we brocht him up to the house and laid him there till the folk i’ the town had heard o’ the death. Syne I got a wooden coffin made and put him in it, juist as he was, wi’ his staff in his hand and his auld duds about him. I mindit o’ my sworn word, for I was yin o’ the four that had promised, and I ettled to dae his bidding. It was three-and-twenty mile to the hills, and thirty to the lanely tap whaur he had howkit his grave. But I never heedit it. I’m a strong man, weel-used to the walkin’, and my hert was sair for the puir auld man I had kenned sae well. Now that he had gotten deliverance from his affliction, it was mine to leave him in the place he wantit. Forbye he wasna muckle heavier than a bairn.
“It was a long road, a sair road, but I did it, and by seven o’clock I was at the edge o’ the muirlands. There was a braw mune, and a’ the glens and taps stood out as clear as mid-day. Bit by bit, for I was gey tired, I warstled ower the rigs and up the cleuchs to the Gled-head, syne up the stany Gled-cleuch to the lang grey hill which they ca’ the Hurlybackit. By ten I had come to the cairn, and black i’ the yellow licht I saw the grave. So there I buried him, and though I’m no a releegious man, I couldna help sayin’ ower him the guid words o’ the Psalmist,
“Like streams of water in the South
Our bondage, Lord, recall.’”
This was the shepherd’s tale, and I heard it out in silence.
So if you go from the Gled to the Aller, and keep far over the north side of the Muckle Muneraw, you will come in time to a stony ridge which ends in a cairn. There you will see the whole hill-country of the south, a hundred lochs, a myriad streams, and a forest of hill-tops. There on the very crest lies the old man, in the heart of his own land, at the fountain-head of his many waters. If you listen you will hear a hushed noise as of the swaying in trees or a ripple on the sea. It is the sound of the rising of burns, which, innumerable and unnumbered, flow thence to the silent glens forevermore.
THE MOOR-SONG
THE TALE OF THE RESPECTABLE WHAUP AND THE GREAT GODLY MAN
This is a story that I heard from the King of the Numidians, who with his tattered retinue encamps behind the peat-ricks. If you ask me where and when it happened I fear that I am scarce ready with an answer. But I will vouch my honour for its truth; and if any one seek further proof, let him go east the town and west the town and over the fields of Nomansland to the Long Muir, and if he find not the King there among the peat-ricks, and get not a courteous answer to his question, then times have changed in that part of the country, and he must continue