Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 January 1893 — The Master of Ballantrae [ARTICLE]

The Master of Ballantrae

CHAPTER X— Continued. “Thty say be of the English side," I whispered, “and think! the best we could then hope is to begin this over again.” — —- “I know, I know," he said. “Yet ; it must come to a plunge at last." And he suddenly plucked out his coin, shook it in his dosed bands, looked at it and then lay down with his faee in the dusk Additions by Mr. Macjcellar—l drop the Chevalier's narrative at this point because the couple quarreled 'and bad separated ooJhe same day, and the Chevalier’s account of the quarrel seems to me (as I must confess) quite incompatible writh the nature of either of the men. Henceforth they wandered alone, undergoing extraordinary sufferings, until first one and then the other St. Only two things are to be noted. And first (as most imE>rtant for my purpose) that the aster, in the course of his miseries, buried his treasures at a point never since discovered, but of which he took a drawing in his own blood on the lining of his hat. And second, that on his coming thus penniless to the fort he was welcomed like a brother by the Chevalier, who thence paid his way to France. The simplicity of Mr. Burke's character leads him at this point to praise the master exceedingly; to an eye more worldly wise it would seem it was the Chevalier alone that was to be commended. I have the more pleasure in pointing to this really noble trait of my esteemed correspondent as I fear I may have wounded him immediately before. I have refrained from comments on any of his extraordinary and (in my eyes) immoral opinions, for I knpw him to be jealous of respect. But his version of the quarrel is really more than I can reproduce, for I know the Master myself, and a man more insusceptible of fear is not conceivable. 1 regret this oversight of the Chevalier’s, and all the more because the tenor of his narrative (set aside a few flourishes) strikes me as highly ingenuous. , - x f CHAPTER xr. ~ PERSECUTIONS ENDURED BY MR. HENRY. You can guess on, what part of his adventures the colonel principally dwelt. Indeed, if we had heard ft all, it is to be thought the current of this business had’ been wholly altered; but the pirate ship was very fntly touched upon. Nor did hear the ' Colonel to an end, even of that which he was willing to disclose; for Mr. Henry, having for some while been plunged in a brown study rose at last from his seat (reminded thecolonel there were matters that must be attended to) bade me follow; him immediately to-: the office. Once there he sought no longer to dissemble his concern, walking to and fro in the room with a contorted face’, and passing his hand repeatedly upon his brow. “We have some business," he began and there broke off, declared we must have wine and sent for a magmum of the best. This was extremely foreign to his habitudes; and what was still more so. when the wine had come, he gulped down one glass after another like a man careless of appearance. Butdriuk steadied him. “You will scarce be surprised, Mackellar," he said, “when I tell you that my brother, whose safety we are all rejoiced to learn, stands somewhat in need of money." I told him I had misdoubted as much; but the time was unfortunate as the stock was low. “Not mine,” shys he. “There is the money for the mortgage." I reminded him it was Mrs. Henry’s. “I will be answerable to my wife" he cried violently. “And then, there is the mortgage” said I. “I know," said he; “it is on that I would consult vou.” I showed him how unfortunate a time it was to divert his money from its destination; and how by so doing we must lose the profits of onr past economies, aud plunge back the estate into the mire. I even took the liberty to plead with him; and when he still opposed me with a shake of the head aud a bitter dogged smile, my zeal quite carried me beyond my place. ‘ This is midsummer madness." Cried I;“and I for one will bfe no party to it.” “You SDeak as though I did it for pleasure,’ 1 says he. “But I have a child now; and besides I love order; and to say the honest truth, Mackeilar, I had begun to take a pride in the estates.” He gloomed for a moment. “But what would you have?" he went on. “Nothing is mine, nothing. This day’s news has knocked the bottom out of my life. I have only the name and the shadow of things; only the shadow; there is do substance in my rights.” “They will provo substantial enough before the court," said I. He looked at rne with a burning eye, and seemed to repress the word upon bis lips; and I repented what I had said, for I saw that while he spoke of the estate he had still a side-thought to his marriage. And then, of a sudden, he twitched the letter from his pocket, where it lav all crumpled, smoothed it violently on the table, and read these words to me with a trembling tongue. “‘My dear Jacob’—This isi how he begins !" cries he—“My dear I '*■': *

BY ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

Jacob, I once called you so, you may remember, and ymrbave now done the business, and fiung my heels as high as Criffel. ’ What do you think of that, Mackellar,” says he “from an only brother? I declare to God I liked him very well; X was always stanch to him; and this is how he writes! But I will not.si} down under the imputation” (walking to and fro) “lam as good as he. I am a better man than he, I call on God to prove it! I cannot give him all the monstrous sum he asks; he knows the estate to be incompetent; but I will give him what I have, and it is more than he expects. I have borne all this too long. See what he writes •fartherog; read It for~your know you are a niggardly dog” A niggardly dog! I, niggardly? Is that true, Mackellar? You think it is?" I really thought he would have struck meal that. “Oh, you all think so! Well, you shall see, and he shall see, and God shall see. If I ruin the estate and Igo barefoot, I shall stuff this bloodsucker. Let him ask allall, and he shall have it! It is all his by rights. Ah!” he cried, “and I foresaw all this and worse, when he would not let me go.” He poured out another glass or wine and was about to take it to his lips, when I made so bold as to lay a finger on his arm. He stopped a moment. “You are right," he said, and flung the glass and all in the fire-place. “Come, let us count the money. I durst no longer oppose him; indeed, I was very much affected by the sight of so much disorder in a man usually so controlled; and we sat down together,counted the<money and made it up in packets for the greater ease of Colonel Burke, who was to be the bearer. This done Mr. Henry returned to the hall, where he and my old lord sat all night through with their guest. A little before dawn I was called and set out with the colonel. He would- scarce have liked a iess responsible couvoy, for he was a man who valued himself ; nor could we afford him one more dignified, for Mr. Henry must not appear with the free-traders. It was a bitter morning of wind, and as we went down through the long shrubbery, the colonel ( held himself muffled in his cloak. “Sir," said I, “this is a great sum of money that your friend requires. I must suppose his necessities to be very great. ‘ ‘We must suppose so,” says he, I thought dryly, but perhaps it was the cloak about his mouth. “I am only a servant of the family,” said I. “You may deal openly with me. I think we are likely to get little good by him?” “Mv dear man,” said thecolonel, “Ballantrae is a gentleman of the most eminent natural abilities, and a man that 1 admire and revere to the very ground he treads on.” And then he seemed to me to pause like one in a difficulty. “But for all that,” said I, “we are likely to get little good by him.” “Sura, and you can have it your own way, my dear man,” said the colonel. By this time we had come to the side of the creek, where the boat awaited him. “Well,” said he, “I am sure I am very much your debtor for all your civilty, Mr. Whatever-your-name-is; and just as a last word, and since you show so much intelligent interest, I will mention a small circumstance that may be of use to the family. For I believe my friend omitted to mention that he has the largest pension on the Scots Fund of any refugee in Paris; and it’s the more disgraceful, sir,” cries the colonel, warming, “because there is not one dirty penny for myself." He cocked his hat at me, as if I had been to blame for this partiality; then changed again into his usual swaggeriug civilty, shook me by the hand and set off down to the boat, with the money under his arms, and whistling as he went the pathetie air of “Shule Aroon.” It was the first time I had heard that tune; I was to hear it again, words and all, as you shall learn; but I remember how that little stave of it ran in my head after the free traders bade him “Weeshit, in the deil’s name," and the grating of the oars had taken its place, and I stood watching the dawn creeping on the sea and the boat drawing away and the lugger lying with her foresail backed awaiting it. The gap made in our money was a sore embarrassment, and among the other consequences it had this; that I must ride to Edinburgh and there raisea new loan on very questionable terms to keep the old afloat, and was thus for close upon three weeks absent from the bouse of Durrisdeer. What passed in the interval I had none to tell me, but I found Mrs. • Hetarv upon my return much changed in her demeanor; the old folks with mv lord tor the most part pertermitted; a certain deprecation toward her husband, to whom I thought she addressed herself more often; and for one thing she was now greatly wrapped up in Miss Katharine. You would think the change was agreeable to Mr. Henry! no such matter! To the contrary, every circumstance of alteration was a stab to him; he read in each the avowal of her truant j fancies; that constancy to the master of which she was proud while she , supposed him dead she had to blush j for now she knew he was alive, aud : these blushes were the hated spring 'of her new conduct. lam to conceal I no truth, and I will say here plainly II think this was the period in which _L .al, .u~. - —s- -.-.. a... - -i— —>— —— -

Mr. Henry showed the worst, He contained himself, indeed, in public, but there was a deep seated irritation visible underneath. With me, from whom he had less concealment, h#was often grossly unjust; and even forhis wife he would sometimes hove a sharp retort, perhaps when she had ruffled him with some unwonted perhaps upon an tangible occasion the mere habitual tenor of the man’s annoyances bursting spontaneously forth. When he would thus forget himself (aching so out of keeping with the terms of their relation) there went a shock through the whole company and the pair would look on each other in a kind of pained amazement. All the time, too, while he was injuring himself by this defect of temper he was hurting his position by a silence, of which I scarce know whether to say it was the child of generosity or pride. The free traders came again and again bringing messengers :from the master, and none departed empty handed. I never durst reason with Mr. ! Henry: he gave what was asked of him in a kind of noble rage. Perhaps because Tie knew he was by nature inclined to the parsimonious, he took a back foremost pleasure in the recklessness with whieh he supplied his brother’s exigence. Perhaps the falsity of the position would have spurred an humbler man into.the same excesses. But the estate (if I may say so) groaned under it; our daily expenses wqre shorn lower and dower; the stables were emptied, all .but four roadsters; servants were discharged, which raised a dreadful murmuring in the country and heated up the old disfavor upon Mr. Henry, and at last the yearly visit to Edinburgh must be discontinued; This was in 1756. You are to suppose that for seven years this bloodsucker had been drawing the life’s blood from Durrisdeer, and that all this time my patron had held his peace. It was an effect of devilish malice in the master that he addressed Mr. Henry alone upon the matter of his demands, and there was never a word to my lord. The family had look oh wouefering at our economies. They had lamented, I have no doubt, that my patron had become so great a miser, a fault always despicable, but in the young abhorrent; and Mr. Henry was not as yet thirty years of age. Still he had managed the business of Durrisdeer almost from a boy; and they bore with these changes in a silence as proud and bitter as his own, until the coping stone of the Edinburg visit. At this time, I believe my patron and his wife were rarely together save at meals. Immediately on the back of Colonel Burke’s announcement, Mrs- Heifry made palpable advances; you might say she had laid a sort of timid court to her husband, different indeed from her former manner of unconcern and distance. I never had the heart to blame Mr. Henry because he recoiled from these advances; nor yet to censure the wife, when she was cut to the quick by their rejection. But the result was an entire estrangement, so that (as 1 say) they rarely spoke except at meals. Even the matter of the of the Edinburgh visit was first broached at table; and it chanced that Mrs. Henry was that day ailing and querulous. She had no*sooner understood her husband’s meaning than the red flew in her face. “At last,” she cried, “this is too much! Heaven knows what pleasure I have in my life, that I should be denied my only consolation. These shameful proclivities must be trod down; we are already a mark and an eye sore in the neighborhood; I will not endure this tresh insanity.” “I can not afford it,” says Mr, Henrv. - “Afford?” she cried. “For shame! But I have money of my own.' r “That is all mine by marriage," he snarled, and instantly left the room. My old lord threw up his hands to heaven, and he and his daughter, withdrawing io the chimney, gave me a broad hint to be gone. I found Mr. Henry in his usual retreat, the steward’s room, perched on the end of the table and plunging his penknife in it, with a very ugly countenance. “Mr. Henry,” said I, do yourself too much injustice; aud it is time this should cease." “Oh!” cries he, “nobody minds here. They think it only natural. I have shameful proclivities. lam a niggardly dog,” and he drove his knife up to the hilt. 0 “But I will show that fellow,” he cried with an oath, “I will show him which is the more generous.” “This is no generosity,” said I, “this is only pride.” “Do you think I want morality?” he asked. I thought he wanted help, and I should give it him, witty-nllly;"and no sooner was Mrs. Henry gone to her room, than I presented myself at her door and sought admittance. She openly showed her wonder. “What do you want with me, Mr. Mackellar?” said she. “The Lord knows, madam,” says I, “I have never troubled you before with any freedoms; but this thing lies too hard upon my conscience, and it will out Is it possible that two people can be so blind as you and my lord? and have jived all these years with a noble gentleman like Mr. Henry and understand so little of his nature?" “What does this mean?" she cried “Do you not know where his money goes to? his —and yours —and the money for the very wine he does not drink* at table?" I went on. “To Paris—to that man! Eight thousand pounds has he had of us in seven* years, and my patron fool enough to keep it cecretr “Eight thousand poundsl" she re-

peated. “It is impossible, the estate is not sufficient. ” 1H 'God .knows how we have sweated farthings to produce it," said I. “But eight thousand and sixty is the sum, besides odd shillings. And if you can tfarnk my patrotl~lmiserTy after that, this shall be my la&t interference.” ‘ You need say no more, Mr. Mackellar,” said she. “You have done most properly in what you too modestly call your interference./ I am much to blame; you must think me indeed a very unobservant wife” — looking upon me with a strange smile —“but I shall put this right at once. The master was always of a very thoughtless nature; but his heart is excellent; he is the soul of generosity, I shall write to him myself.* You can not think how you have pained me by this communication.” “Indeed, mtidam, I had hoped to have pleased you.” said I. for 1 raged to see her still thinking of the master. ‘‘And pleased,” said she, ‘‘and pleased me of course.” what I watched) I had the satisfaction to see Mr. Henry come from his wife’s room in a state most unlike himself; for his face was all bloated with weeping, and yet he seemed to me to walk upon the air. By this, I was sure his wife had made him full amends for once, “Ah,” thought!, to myself, “I have done a brave stroke this day." On the morrow, as I was seated at my books, Mr. Henry came in softly behind me, took me by the shoulders and shook me in a manner of playfulness. “I find you are a faithless fellow after all,” says he; which was his only reference to my part, but the tone he spoke in was more to me than any eloquence of protestation. Nor was this all I had effected; for when the next messenger came (as he did not long afterward) from the master, he got nothing away with him but a letter. For some while back, it had been I myself who had conducted these affairs; Mr. Henry not setting pen to-paper, and I only in the dr} r est and most formal terms. But this letter I did not even see; it would scarce be pleasant reading, for Mr. Henry felt he had his wife behind him for ODce, aud I observed, on the day it was dispatched, he had a very gratified expression. Things went better now in the family, though it could scarce be pretended they went well. There was now at least no misconception; there was kindness upon all sides; and I believe my patron and his wife might again have drawn together, if he could but have pocketecLhis prideT and she forgot (what was the ground of all) her brooding on another man. It is wonderful how a private thought leaks out; it is wonderful to me now how we should all have followed the current of her sentiments; and, while she bore herself quietly, and had a very even disposition, yet we should have known whenever her fancy ran to Paris. And would not any one have thought that my disclosure must have rooted up that idol? I think there is the devil in women; all these years past, never a sight of the man, little enough kindness to remember (by all accounts) even while she had him, the notion of his death intervening, his heartless rapacity laid bare to her; that all should not do, and she must still keep the best place in her heart for this accursed fellow, is a thing to make a plain man rage. I had never much natural sympathy for the passion of love; but this unreason in my patron’s wife disgusted me outright with the whole matter. I remember checking a maid, because she sung some bairnly kickshaw while my mind was thus engaged; and mj- asperity brought about my ears the enmity of all the petticoats about the house, of which I recked very little, but it amused Mr. Henry, who rallied me much upon our joint unpopularity, It is strange enough (for my own mother was certainly one of the salt of the earth, and my aunt Dickson, who paid my fees at the university, a very notable woman) but I have never had much toleration for the female sex, possibly not much understanding; and being far from a bold man, I have ever shunned their company. Not only do I see no cause to regret this diffidence in myself, but have invariably remarked the most unhappy consequences following those who were less wise. So much I thought proper to set down, lest I show myself unjust to Mrs. Henry. And, besides, the remark arose naturally, ou a reperusal of the letter which was the next step in these affairs, and reached me, to my sincere astonishment, by a private hand, some week or so after the departure of the last messenger. [Letter from Col. Tlurkefafterward Chevalier) to Mr. Mackellar.] “Troyes in Champagne, July 12,1796. “Mr Dear Sir. —You will doubtless .be surprised to receive a com/ munication from one so little known to you: but on the occasion I had the good fortune to rencontre you at Durrisdeer, 1 remarked jrou for a young man of a solid gravity of character; a qualification which I profess I admire and revere next to natural genius or the bold, chivalrous spirit Of the soldier. I was, besides, interested in.the noble family which yofti have the honor to serve, or (to speak more by the book), to be the bumble and respected friend of; and a conversation i had the pleasure to have with you very early in the morning has remained much upon my mind. “Being the other day in Paris, on a visit from this famous city where I am in garrison, I took occasion to inquire your name (which I profess I bad forgot) at my friend the master of B ; and, a* fair opportunity oc-

curring, I write to inform yon o what’s new. “The master of B (when w< bad last some talk of him together was in receipt, as I think I then; tok you, of a highly advantageous pension on the Scots Fund. Henext received a company, and was soon after advanced to a-regiment of hit own. Mv dear sir, Ido not offer t< explain this circumstance; any mor< than why T, myself, who have rid a! the right hand of princes, should br fubbea off with a pair of colorsand sent to rot in a hole at the bottom of the province. Accustomed as lam to courts, I can not but feel it is mi atmosphere for a plain soldier; and I could neyer hope to advance by similar means, even could I stoop to the endeavor. But our friend has a par ticular aptitude to succeed by means of ladies; and if all be true that I have heard, he enjoyed a remarkable protection. It is like this turned against him, for When I had the honor to shake him by the hand he was but newly released from the Bastile. where he bad been cast on a seated letter; and, though now r&- - and his pension. Mydear sir, the loyalty of a plain Irishman will ultimately succeed in the place of craft; as I am sui-e a gentleman of your probity will agree. “Now, sir. the master is a man whose genius I admire beyond expression; and, besides, be is my friend; but I thought a little word of this revolution in hig fortunes would not come amiss, for in my opinion the man’s desperate. He spoke when I .saw him of a tx-ip to India (whither I am myself in some hope of accompanying my illustrious countryman, Mr. Lally); but for this he would require (as I understood) more money than was readily at his command. You may have heard a military proverb; that it is a good thing to make a bridge of gold to a flying enemy? I trust you will take my meaning; and 1 subscribe myself, with proper respects to my Lord Durrisdeer, to his son, and to the beauteous Mrs. Durie, “My dear sir, “Your obedient humble servant, Francis Burice.” (to be continued.)