The Desperate Journey (3 page)

“Five weeks,” he said unhappily.

“But where shall we go? Where shall we go?” Kirsty cried desperately. Her mother smoothed her hair.

“Do not weep, my bairn. There will be a way found for us,” she said with simple faith, as though, for a moment, the curtain which hid the future had been lifted for her.

For the next few weeks the children seemed to lead much their usual life; herding and milking the cows and feeding the hens. Their mother continued to make butter and cheese and “crowdie”, the soft cheesy curds that David liked so much, but James Murray no longer worked in his fields. He was frequently away at the market at Dornoch, and when he came back there was always one animal fewer in the byre. Then came the day when he sold the pig.

“Did you get a good price for him?” Kate asked anxiously.

“Fair enough, considering there were others with pigs to sell.” James handed the money over to her and she put it in the chest which stood beside their bed.

“There will soon be enough,” she said, when she rose from her knees beside it.

“Enough for what, Mother?” Kirsty asked.

“Enough for the journey we shall have to take.”

“We shall not go till we are forced,” James Murray burst out fiercely. “Factor Sellar shall not turn me out of my house easily.”

“Oh, James, you will not do him violence? You must not lift your hand to him or he will have you in prison. He is only waiting for that excuse,” Kate warned her husband.

“I shall do nothing foolish,” James promised her.

The time drew near when the notice to quit the croft would expire. Then, on 10 May, the day before they were due to leave, James Murray’s brother John arrived on his horse from Dornoch. He wore a troubled face.

“James, can you come at once to Dornoch? Our mother is very
ill and the doctor thinks the end cannot be far.”

James Murray’s mother kept house for John, a bachelor. John was a carpenter and joiner, employed by many of the owners of big houses in Sutherland.

James looked at his brother in dismay. “Och, John, this is bad news indeed, and it comes at a bad time for us. You know that tomorrow I have to clear out of this house?”

John looked helplessly at his brother. “What will you do, then? Mother is asking for you all the time. Must I go back and tell her you cannot come?”

James made up his mind quickly. “No, you shall not do that. She has been a good mother to us.”

“If she is wanting you, then you
must
go,” Kate said at once.

“But what will you do about this house when Mr Sellar comes tomorrow to turn you out of it?” John asked.

“I will write him a letter telling him of my mother’s illness and asking him to give us a few days longer. Surely, in the name of mercy he will do that, for the Murrays have been tenants of the Sutherlands for generations.”

“Aye, surely, surely! A week cannot make much difference to him.”

“I will tell him that if he will grant me this favour for my mother’s sake, I will go out quietly when the time comes. Though it goes ill with me, John, to give up this house tamely.”

“Aye, it is a sad thing that is happening to folk hereabout. Every market day in Dornoch there are fewer folk there. There’s a many have gone across the sea to America.”

“Things have come to a pass indeed when the Countess of Sutherland thinks more of sheep on her hills than of men,” James said bitterly. “But Kate will give you a bite to eat while I write my letter. Davie, will you saddle the horse for me?”

James took inkhorn and quill and paper from a cupboard. When he had finished writing the letter, he handed it to John to read.

“Aye, that’s respectful enough and states your case clearly,” his brother said. “The factor will be a hard man if he does not grant your request, James.”

Davie came in to say the horse was ready. James folded the letter.

“I would send it to Patrick Sellar at Dunrobin, but it might be lost or delayed if it passes through too many hands. Instead I will trust it to you, Davie. Be watching for the factor early tomorrow morning, and give him the letter as soon as he reaches the door.”

“I will do that, Father.”

“Be mannerly and respectful,” his father told him. “I know you have a high temper, but keep it in check. Remember, when I am not here, you stand in my place. Look after your mother and sister. See no harm comes to them.”

James Murray went out to mount his horse and the children and Kate followed him to the door.

“I shall be back, Kate, as soon as may be,” James called as he rode away.

That night, as Kate and the children ate their simple supper of oatcake and cheese, Davie stared into the glowing embers of the peat fire, thinking of the next day.

“Mother, is the money quite safe that my father got for the cows and the pig?” he asked suddenly.

“It lies at the bottom of the kist.” She pointed to the plain oak chest that held her linen and blankets.

“Will it be safe there?” Davie asked anxiously.

“Why, laddie? Why should it not be safe?”

“There will be rough men come with Mr Sellar to put us out of the house. If they carry out the furniture, who is to say whether they will put their hands inside the kist or no?”

Kate stared at her son. “But the letter from your father? – that will make everything all right. When Mr Sellar reads it, then they will go away without touching the furniture.”

“It is that I do not trust Mr Sellar!” the boy blurted out. “It would be better for the money to be hidden safely outside the house.”

“Where would you hide it, then?” Kate Murray looked only half-convinced.

“There is a flat stone in the burn. We could put the bag of money under that. No one would look for it there. I think my father would have thought it was a wise thing to do.”

Kate rose and went to the chest and lifted out the sheepskin bag. “We will put it where you say, Davie, but we will all go to see where it lies, so we cannot be mistaken when we go to get it again.”

Davie took the lantern and lighted it from the candle. Even in the darkness Davie had no trouble in finding the big flat stone. While Kirsty held the lantern, he heaved it up and Kate thrust the bag into the hollow beneath it. Davie let the stone down again and stamped it into place.

“And now we will go to our beds,” Kate said. “It will soon be the morn, and who is to know how soon the factor will be here. We must be up and ready for him.”

Davie lay for a time that night with his eyes staring into the darkness. A strange shiver of foreboding tingled down his spine. He thought with relief of the money safely beneath the stone, and then, with the ease of childhood, he fell asleep. He was wakened by his mother shaking his shoulder.

“Come, Davie! Get you up! The light is growing over the treetops in the Balblair Woods. Your breakfast is ready.”

She set the bowls of porridge and the pitcher of milk on the table. They ate in silence, having no heart to talk, thinking of their father in Dornoch, and of what might be coming to them. When they had finished, Kate washed and stacked the bowls. “Now we will wait and see what happens,” she said, standing at the door and shading her eyes as she looked down the hillside towards the road from Golspie.

They had not long to wait. Round the Drummuie Wood came
a small procession on horseback, headed by Patrick Sellar. After them rumbled two carts from the estate of Dunrobin carrying axes and sledge hammers.

“Here they come!” Davie exclaimed tensely.

“Why are they bringing hammers and axes?” Kirsty asked.

Davie scowled, but said nothing. At the market in Dornoch he had heard ugly stories of what happened to the houses of tenants who were thrust from their homes. The determined band rode up to the house.

“Where is James Murray?” Patrick Sellar demanded. Davie stepped forward.

“My grandmother is dying, and my father has had to go to her in Dornoch. He told me to give you this letter.”

Sellar snatched the letter from him and scowled as he read the contents. “A likely story!” he snorted. “This is only a fine trick to delay matters.” He flung the letter to the ground.

“Indeed, sir, it’s true, it’s true!” Kate cried. “My husband’s brother came to fetch him to Dornoch last night. His mother is at death’s door. Will you not give us a few days longer to bide here till he returns? It cannot be long.”

“Not another day! Not another hour! Get your furniture out of there!”

Kate Murray reeled back as though he had struck her. Davie flushed with anger. He bit his lips to keep back the words.

“Nay, nay, sir!” his mother cried to Sellar. “How can you expect a poor weak woman with two weans to carry out heavy loads? Give us but time, and I will get word to my husband in Dornoch.”

“James Murray has had all the past two months to remove his furniture. He should have done it then. No more time at all shall he have! Well, are you going to lift out your wretched possessions?”

“This is our house, that Murrays built long ago with their own hands. They shaped the roof timber and set it in its place and with
their own hands they laid the thatch. Think you we shall tamely give it up to you, factor? It is not yours to take!” Kate turned abruptly into the house, and Davie and Kirsty followed her; but instead of making any effort to remove the furniture, she sat down in a chair and motioned Davie to occupy his father’s chair on the other side of the hearth, and Kirsty to take the stool at her feet.

The factor’s face grew dark with anger. “Into the house with you, men, and bring out all their things! There is no need to be overcareful how you handle them. They are not worth much, and if James Murray wished them to be treated tenderly, he should have seen to them himself.”

The men needed no second bidding. They plunged into the house and flung cupboard and table and beds through the door. Davie sprang to his feet.

“You will be sorry for this!” he shouted, but Sellar gave him a cuff across the mouth.

“No impudence from you, you brat!”

A crash drowned Davie’s reply. Kirsty wailed, “Oh, Mother! The wedding china
your
mother gave you!”

The wedding china had been cherished and handed down from generation to generation, only used on special occasions. Some day it would have been Kirsty’s. Her mother went white to her lips, but she still sat defiantly in her chair. Next the linen chest was flung out and the lid sprang open and the contents were trampled into the mud of the farmyard. Kirsty could stand it no longer. She rushed from the house and gathered up the bedcovers and blankets and the one fine white linen tablecloth that Kate had woven herself when she was a lass. Still Kate said nothing, looking with terrible eyes at the factor who stood watching in the doorway. Under those unflinching eyes he grew uncomfortable.

“There is no need to be over rough,” he said to his men. “Now, Mistress Murray, if you and your son will rise from your chairs, they shall be carried out with care.”

“Then you must carry us out with them too, for go from this house on my own legs I will not!” Kate Murray said with determined dignity.

“Remove them!” Patrick Sellar ordered.

The men seized Davie and carried him kicking and struggling from the house. When he would have rushed back into the house, one of them gave him a push which sent him sprawling flat on his face on the trampled ground. They turned their attention to Kate Murray. She rose proudly to her feet.

“The first one of you to lay a finger on me will feel my nails on his face!” she said. Before her the men fell back muttering. No one wanted to be the first.

“We’ve had enough of this defiance!” Sellar shouted, his temper rising. “Light a torch at the embers of that fire and set it to the thatch! If she will not come out, let her roast alive!”

One of the men snatched up a torch of resin and pine they had brought with them for the purpose of firing the house, and thrust it among the glowing peat. It burst at once into flame. He snatched it out, jumped on the remaining chair and thrust the torch in among the timbers and the thatch. It went up like a bonfire. With the smoke eddying round them the men rushed from the house. Still Kate Murray stood as if turned to stone. Suddenly Davie realised his mother’s peril, and he rushed in and tugged at her arm.

“Come out, Mother! It will only be minutes before the roof falls about our heads!”

Still she stared about her as though bereft of understanding. Davie plucked at her hand. “Mother! Mother! Come out! If you do not, we shall both die here!”

It was only the realization of Davie’s peril that brought her to her senses. As the smoke swirled about them and bits of burning thatch fell at their feet, she ran from the house with him.

“I thought that would smoke out the vixen and her cub!” Sellar mocked.

Kate Murray drew herself up to her full height and she was a tall woman. “A vixen, am I, Patrick Sellar?” she began, pointing her finger at him. “Then hear what a vixen has to say to you this day!” Her voice sounded so terrible that all the men fell silent.

“Today you have shown no mercy to the suffering. Look then for a day when suffering will visit your own house and there will be no mercy for you. You have laid your hands on those who were defenceless, but your time will come when there will be none to stand beside you when you are in need. You have put fire to this house, but that fire and smoke rises to heaven to cry for your punishment. Never will you go easily again! Never will you be free of the evil you have done! It will be remembered long after you are dust in the grave!” A gust of wind sent the smoke eddying round her in ghostly fashion. Patrick Sellar turned pale and stepped backward away from her, then made an effort to recover himself.

“You – you dark witch!” he cried. “Don’t you dare lay curses on me or I will have you whipped for it!”

She fixed him again with her dark glittering eyes, and his gaze fell. “Have you not brought enough destruction on this house?” she asked him fearlessly. “Go on your way! You have done that for which you came.” She turned her back on him with contempt. For a moment he seemed about to reply angrily, then he flung himself on his horse.

“Gather up your gear, men, and come after me,” he shouted over his shoulder.

Kate Murray and her children stood watching the men as they clattered away down the hill. Behind them the smoke from the burning thatch was swept across the country by the wind from the sea. Again and again came the crash of the timbers as the roof rafters fell into the house and a shower of sparks shot up. Suddenly, as though her legs would support her no longer, Kate Murray sank to the ground, keening softly to herself. “My bairns! My bairns! What will your father say to this? What a homecoming for him!”