Complete Works of Robert Louis Stevenson (Illustrated) (332 page)

At last, at the level of York Place, we parted with mutual civilities, and I was free to pursue my way, through the mobs of people returning from church, to my lodgings in St. James’ Square.

Almost at the house door whom should I overtake but my landlady in a dress of gorgeous severity, and dragging a prize in her wake: no less than Rowley, with the cockade in his hat, and a smart pair of tops to his boots!  When I said he was in the lady’s wake I spoke but in metaphor.  As a matter of fact he was squiring her, with the utmost dignity, on his arm; and I followed them up the stairs, smiling to myself.

Both were quick to salute me as soon as I was perceived, and Mrs. McRankine inquired where I had been.  I told her boastfully, giving her the name of the church and the divine, and ignorantly supposing I should have gained caste.  But she soon opened my eyes.  In the roots of the Scottish character there are knots and contortions that not only no stranger can understand, but no stranger can follow; he walks among explosives; and his best course is to throw himself upon their mercy — ’Just as I am, without one plea,’ a citation from one of the lady’s favourite hymns.

The sound she made was unmistakable in meaning, though it was impossible to be written down; and I at once executed the manoeuvre I have recommended.

‘You must remember I am a perfect stranger in your city,’ said I.  ‘If I have done wrong, it was in mere ignorance, my dear lady; and this afternoon, if you will be so good as to take me, I shall accompany
you
.’

But she was not to be pacified at the moment, and departed to her own quarters murmuring.

‘Well, Rowley,’ said I; ‘and have you been to church?’

‘If you please, sir,’ he said.

‘Well, you have not been any less unlucky than I have,’ I returned.  ‘And how did you get on with the Scottish form?’

‘Well, sir, it was pretty ‘ard, the form was, and reether narrow,’ he replied.  ‘I don’t know w’y it is, but it seems to me like as if things were a good bit changed since William Wallace!  That was a main queer church she took me to, Mr. Anne!  I don’t know as I could have sat it out, if she ‘adn’t ‘a’ give me peppermints.  She ain’t a bad one at bottom, the old girl; she do pounce a bit, and she do worry, but, law bless you, Mr. Anne, it ain’t nothink really — she don’t
mean
it.  W’y, she was down on me like a ‘undredweight of bricks this morning.  You see, last night she ‘ad me in to supper, and, I beg your pardon, sir, but I took the freedom of playing her a chune or two.  She didn’t mind a bit; so this morning I began to play to myself, and she flounced in, and flew up, and carried on no end about Sunday!’

‘You see, Rowley,’ said I, ‘they’re all mad up here, and you have to humour them.  See and don’t quarrel with Mrs. McRankine; and, above all, don’t argue with her, or you’ll get the worst of it.  Whatever she says, touch your forelock and say, “If you please!” or “I beg pardon, ma’am.”  And let me tell you one thing: I am sorry, but you have to go to church with her again this afternoon.  That’s duty, my boy!’

As I had foreseen, the bells had scarce begun before Mrs. McRankine presented herself to be our escort, upon which I sprang up with readiness and offered her my arm.  Rowley followed behind.  I was beginning to grow accustomed to the risks of my stay in Edinburgh, and it even amused me to confront a new churchful.  I confess the amusement did not last until the end; for if Dr. Gray were long, Mr. McCraw was not only longer, but more incoherent, and the matter of his sermon (which was a direct attack, apparently, on all the Churches of the world, my own among the number), where it had not the tonic quality of personal insult, rather inclined me to slumber.  But I braced myself for my life, kept up Rowley with the end of a pin, and came through it awake, but no more.

Bethiah was quite conquered by this ‘mark of grace,’ though, I am afraid, she was also moved by more worldly considerations.  The first is, the lady had not the least objection to go to church on the arm of an elegantly dressed young gentleman, and be followed by a spruce servant with a cockade in his hat.  I could see it by the way she took possession of us, found us the places in the Bible, whispered to me the name of the minister, passed us lozenges, which I (for my part) handed on to Rowley, and at each fresh attention stole a little glance about the church to make sure she was observed.  Rowley was a pretty boy; you will pardon me if I also remembered that I was a favourable-looking young man.  When we grow elderly, how the room brightens, and begins to look as it ought to look, on the entrance of youth, grace, health, and comeliness!  You do not want them for yourself, perhaps not even for your son, but you look on smiling; and when you recall their images — again, it is with a smile.  I defy you to see or think of them and not smile with an infinite and intimate, but quite impersonal, pleasure.  Well, either I know nothing of women, or that was the case with Bethiah McRankine.  She had been to church with a cockade behind her, on the one hand; on the other, her house was brightened by the presence of a pair of good-looking young fellows of the other sex, who were always pleased and deferential in her society and accepted her views as final.

These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home from church — if church it could be called — I adopted a most insidious device to magnify her interest.  I took her into the confidence, that is, of my love affair, and I had no sooner mentioned a young lady with whom my affections were engaged than she turned upon me a face of awful gravity.

‘Is she bonny?’ she inquired.

I gave her full assurances upon that.

‘To what denoamination does she beloang?’ came next, and was so unexpected as almost to deprive me of breath.

‘Upon my word, ma’am, I have never inquired,’ cried I; ‘I only know that she is a heartfelt Christian, and that is enough.’

‘Ay!’ she sighed, ‘if she has the root of the maitter!  There’s a remnant practically in most of the denoaminations.  There’s some in the McGlashanites, and some in the Glassites, and mony in the McMillanites, and there’s a leeven even in the Estayblishment.’

‘I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to that,’ said I.

‘Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel’!’ she cried.

‘Why, my dear madam!  I only — ’ I began.

‘You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,’ she interrupted.

On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our idyll with avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish of cream; and, strange to say — and so expansive a passion is that of love! — that I derived a perhaps equal satisfaction from confiding in that breast of iron.  It made an immediate bond: from that hour we seemed to be welded into a family-party; and I had little difficulty in persuading her to join us and to preside over our tea-table.  Surely there was never so ill-matched a trio as Rowley, Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount Anne!  But I am of the Apostle’s way, with a difference: all things to all women!  When I cannot please a woman, hang me in my cravat!

CHAPTER XXVIII — EVENTS OF MONDAY: THE LAWYER’S PARTY

By half-past eight o’clock on the next morning, I was ringing the bell of the lawyer’s office in Castle Street, where I found him ensconced at a business table, in a room surrounded by several tiers of green tin cases.  He greeted me like an old friend.

‘Come away, sir, come away!’ said he.  ‘Here is the dentist ready for you, and I think I can promise you that the operation will be practically painless.’

‘I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,’ I replied, as I shook hands with him.  ‘But at least there shall be no time lost with me.’

I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of drovers and their cattle, to having used a false name, to having murdered or half-murdered a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the moors, and to having suffered a couple of quite innocent men to lie some time in prison on a charge from which I could have immediately freed them.  All this I gave him first of all, to be done with the worst of it; and all this he took with gravity, but without the least appearance of surprise.

‘Now, sir,’ I continued, ‘I expect to have to pay for my unhappy frolic, but I would like very well if it could be managed without my personal appearance or even the mention of my real name.  I had so much wisdom as to sail under false colours in this foolish jaunt of mine; my family would be extremely concerned if they had wind of it; but at the same time, if the case of this Faa has terminated fatally, and there are proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am not going to stand by and see them vexed, far less punished; and I authorise you to give me up for trial if you think that best — or, if you think it unnecessary, in the meanwhile to make preparations for their defence.  I hope, sir, that I am as little anxious to be Quixotic, as I am determined to be just.’

‘Very fairly spoken,’ said Mr. Robbie.  ‘It is not much in my line, as doubtless your friend, Mr. Romaine, will have told you.  I rarely mix myself up with anything on the criminal side, or approaching it.  However, for a young gentleman like you, I may stretch a point, and I dare say I may be able to accomplish more than perhaps another.  I will go at once to the Procurator Fiscal’s office and inquire.’

‘Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,’ said I.  ‘You forget the chapter of expenses.  I had thought, for a beginning, of placing a thousand pounds in your hands.’

‘My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my bill,’ said Mr. Robbie severely.’

‘It seemed to me,’ I protested, ‘that coming to you almost as a stranger, and placing in your hands a piece of business so contrary to your habits, some substantial guarantee of my good faith — ’

‘Not the way that we do business in Scotland, sir,’ he interrupted, with an air of closing the dispute.

‘And yet, Mr. Robbie,’ I continued, ‘I must ask you to allow me to proceed.  I do not merely refer to the expenses of the case.  I have my eye besides on Todd and Candlish.  They are thoroughly deserving fellows; they have been subjected through me to a considerable term of imprisonment; and I suggest, sir, that you should not spare money for their indemnification.  This will explain,’ I added smiling, ‘my offer of the thousand pounds.  It was in the nature of a measure by which you should judge the scale on which I can afford to have this business carried through.’

‘I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,’ said he.  ‘But the sooner I am off, the better this affair is like to be guided.  My clerk will show you into the waiting-room and give you the day’s
Caledonian Mercury
and the last
Register
to amuse yourself with in the interval.’

I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone.  I saw him descend from a cab at the door, and almost immediately after I was shown again into his study, where the solemnity of his manner led me to augur the worst.  For some time he had the inhumanity to read me a lecture as to the incredible silliness, ‘not to say immorality,’ of my behaviour.  ‘I have the satisfaction in telling you my opinion, because it appears that you are going to get off scot free,’ he continued, where, indeed, I thought he might have begun.

‘The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two men, Todd and Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it had not been for their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr. Ducie — or Mr. St. Ivey, as I believe I should now call you.  Never a word would either of the two old fools volunteer that in any manner pointed at the existence of such a person; and when they were confronted with Faa’s version of the affair, they gave accounts so entirely discrepant with their own former declarations, as well as with each other, that the Fiscal was quite nonplussed, and imaigined there was something behind it.  You may believe I soon laughed him out of that!  And I had the satisfaction of seeing your two friends set free, and very glad to be on the causeway again.’

‘Oh, sir,’ I cried, ‘you should have brought them here.’

‘No instructions, Mr. Ducie!’ said he.  ‘How did I know you wished to renew an acquaintance which you had just terminated so fortunately?  And, indeed, to be frank with you, I should have set my face against it, if you had!  Let them go!  They are paid and contented, and have the highest possible opinion of Mr. St. Ivey!  When I gave them fifty pounds apiece — which was rather more than enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may think — the man Todd, who has the only tongue of the party, struck his staff on the ground.  “Weel,” says he, “I aye said he was a gentleman!”  “Man, Todd,” said I, “that was just what Mr St. Ivey said of yourself!”‘

‘So it was a case of “Compliments fly when gentlefolk meet.”‘

‘No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone out of your life, and a good riddance!  They are fine fellows in their way, but no proper associates for the like of yourself; and do you finally agree to be done with all eccentricity — take up with no more drovers, or tinkers, but enjoy the naitural pleesures for which your age, your wealth, your intelligence, and (if I may be allowed to say it) your appearance so completely fit you.  And the first of these,’ quoth he, looking at his watch, ‘will be to step through to my dining-room and share a bachelor’s luncheon.’

Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop the same theme.  ‘You’re, no doubt, what they call a dancing-man?’ said he.  ‘Well, on Thursday night there is the Assembly Ball.  You must certainly go there, and you must permit me besides to do the honours of the ceety and send you a ticket.  I am a thorough believer in a young man being a young man — but no more drovers or rovers, if you love me!  Talking of which puts me in mind that you may be short of partners at the Assembly — oh, I have been young myself! — and if ye care to come to anything so portentiously tedious as a tea-party at the house of a bachelor lawyer, consisting mainly of his nieces and nephews, and his grand-nieces and grand-nephews, and his wards, and generally the whole clan of the descendants of his clients, you might drop in to-night towards seven o’clock.  I think I can show you one or two that are worth looking at, and you can dance with them later on at the Assembly.’