janet arnside was a widow and lived in a small cottage not far from the hall. she had a son who had been very ill; and aline had been in the habit of coaxing elspeth to get her small delicacies to take round to them as they were very poor, or she would buy things with her own money.
when she reached the cottage the old woman came forward and seized her by both hands. “bless your bonnie face,” she said, “i am glad to see you.”
“how is john getting on?” said aline.
“oh, he’s quite a new creature, thanks to all you have done for us, my dear. when i see him swinging along with great strides i say to myself,—now if it had not been for our little st. aline where would my boy have been?”
“oh, you must not thank me, janet, and i really do not like you to call me that, you must thank elspeth and master mowbray.”
“ay, true, hinnie, the master has been very good and has always said that we were welcome to a few things, but, there now, when i asked mistress mowbray, she said that she had something else to think of than attend to any gaberlunzie body that came round the doors. and where should i have been with my laddie105 if it had not been for you with your sweet face and your kind heart?”
even janet arnside realised that aline’s was no ordinary beauty as she watched the lightfooted graceful child moving round her room and setting things straight, or helping her to cook for her sick boy, or sitting, as she was then, with the sunshine coming through the open door and throwing up the outline of her beautiful form against the dark shadows within the cottage.
“ah, but mistress mowbray is very busy, janet, she has a great deal to manage in that huge place. it is elspeth, dear old elspeth, who looks after all the sick folk and you should try and go up and thank her, now that your son is better and you are able to leave him.”
“ay, mistress aline, that should she,” said a voice from the door as john entered, “but it is our little mistress here that should be getting most of the thanks, i trow.” the boy pushed back the little window shutter as he spoke that he might the better see the child. she was for him his conception of the heavenly angels and during his long illness he used in his delirium to confuse her with the messengers from above who were to take him to the other land. he had been ill for a weary while and had had more than one relapse but she had been a constant visitor when opportunity allowed, and had often soothed him to sleep when even his mother could do nothing. he worshipped aline in a curious half-fatherly way, although he was only some four years her senior, and the dream of his life at that time was to be of assistance to her some day.
aline was just on the point of going when they heard rough angry voices passing along the road, so she shrank106 back into the shadowy recesses of the cottage;—“i tell you what it is,” one of the voices was saying, “if you do not help me i’ll see that you never forget it.”
“now, there you are again,” the other voice replied, “you never can keep a civil tongue in your head.”
“why that is andrew woolridge and thomas carluke,” aline exclaimed. “what are they doing down here?”
andrew and thomas were two of the men from the hall and aline knew that at this time of day they ought to be at work.
“they are up to no good i’ll be bound,” said janet.
“andrew woolridge seems to be doing a good thing for himself somehow, mother,” said john. “i wonder where he got all that meal he has been bringing home from the mill lately; i saw him with a boll early this morn and he brought two bolls yesterday and two the day before.”
“ay, john, and i saw him the day before that with a boll.”
“he must have enough for the winter and some to sell too, if he has been going on at that rate, mother.”
“ay, that must be, but i should not like to be the one to ask him where he got the oats he has been so busy carrying to the mill.”
“it is time i was going,” said aline, and bidding them good-bye, she turned homeward, pondering on her way what she had heard.
“i fancy that the oats will come from holwick,” she thought to herself. “i wonder if he is still taking them,” and she resolved that she would herself keep an eye on andrew and thomas.
107
she had not long to wait. that very evening she managed to slip out near the granary at dusk when the outside servants went home. thomas slept in the hall, but she saw him going to the gate and talking to andrew very quietly.
the moat ran round the east side of the hall, but there was a narrow ledge of stone at the foot of the wall on that side, some eight feet above the water, which went from the northeast corner where the granary was, as far as the drawbridge. it was possible to climb on to it from the drawbridge and walk along it with some difficulty. what purpose it was intended to serve was not clear. the drawbridge was never drawn up till the last of the servants had departed. andrew went outside, but dark as it was, aline without coming near, saw that apparently he did not cross the bridge. thomas ran back and made his way to the granary. aline followed, her heart beating violently, and saw him produce a key and unlock the granary door. she waited a moment wondering which would be the best thing to do and then decided to go back to the drawbridge. she turned round and was just in time to see the dark figure of andrew emerge from the left and cross the bridge with a heavy bundle on his shoulder and vanish into the night. it was all very quietly managed, he had evidently crept along the high ledge, and as aline passed through the archway to the upper quadrangle she heard thomas behind her breathing heavily, but she did not look round.
at first she thought that she would go and tell master mowbray at once, but then she hesitated. in those days it might be a hanging matter for andrew and she also108 had some scruples about playing the part of an eavesdropper. she finally decided that she would speak to andrew herself, but was very nervous about it; as andrew was a great big man and from what she knew of him and from the way she had heard him speak to thomas on the previous night, she guessed that he would stop at nothing.
she watched for him the next day, but no opportunity presented itself. he was always with the other servants. but late in the evening she saw him in the quadrangle evidently waiting for thomas. she was shaking with excitement and the darkness added to her nervousness, but she approached him and said in as steady a voice as she could muster, “andrew, i want to speak to you. it is something very serious; there has been grain taken from the granary.”
“what of that?” he replied, determined to brazen it out.
aline had hoped that her point blank assertion would have made him confess at once and the way would have been easier for her; it was very difficult to go on with this great burly bullying ruffian scowling at her. however, her mind was made up and she had to go through with it. “i know who has taken it,” she said firmly, “and i want you to promise me that you will not take any more and that also you will replace as much as you have taken away.”
“oh, do you, my fine young lady? you are not the mistress of this hall, not by a long way, i reckon. who are you indeed? a penniless scot that no one would listen to. i should like to see you go with your tales to mistress mowbray. she’d soon turn you upside down109 and spoil that pretty skin of yours,” he growled coarsely.
“but i shall find it my duty to tell master mowbray,” said aline.
“oh, that is the way the land lies, you miserable tell-tale, is it?”
aline felt herself blush, as the retort stung, but she knew she was right, and she only said, “but i should not tell any one if you would give back the grain.”
“would you not?” he said fiercely; “well, i’ll see you never get the chance, you little she-devil.” as he spoke he stepped forward and placed his great hand over her mouth and lifting her up as though she were a mere nothing, he ran with her to the gate and on to the middle of the drawbridge. “no one will miss you in this house, you blethering babe, and they will just think that you have somehow fallen in, playing round in the dark. mistress mowbray would give me a month’s pay, if i dared ask for it, you wretched brat.”
she was absolutely powerless in his strong arms and he raised her above his head and flung her into the moat. she struck the side of the bridge as she fell and then dropped into the dark water. andrew did not wait, but ran some way into the gloom of the night and then stood to listen whether any hue and cry was raised. not a sound was to be heard and after about a quarter of an hour he dimly could distinguish his fellow servants walking home. obviously they were unconscious that anything unusual had happened and he was able to breathe freely as he muttered to himself, “that was well done, she will tell no tales now.” he crept back to the moat and peered in. all was still and black and the110 moat gave no sign of the horrible deed that had just taken place in its waters. hardened wretch that he was, he could not help a shudder as he thought of what lay under that inky surface.
