CHAPTER I

TELLS OF A RUGBY THREE-QUARTER

Mr Dickson McCunn laid down the newspaper, took his spectacles from his
nose, and polished them with a blue-and-white spotted handkerchief.

“It will be a great match,” he observed to his wife. “I wish I was there
to see. These Kangaroos must be a fearsome lot.” Then he smiled
reflectively. “Our laddies are not turning out so bad, Mamma. Here’s
Jaikie, and him not yet twenty, and he has his name blazing in the
papers as if he was a Cabinet Minister.”

Mrs McCunn, a placid lady of a comfortable figure, knitted steadily. She
did not share her husband’s enthusiasms.

“I know fine,” she said, “that Jaikie will be coming back with a
bandaged head and his arm in a sling. Rugby in my opinion is not a game
for Christians. It’s fair savagery.”

“Hoots, toots! It’s a grand ploy for young folk. You must pay a price
for fame, you know. Besides, Jaikie hasn’t got hurt this long time back.
He’s learning caution as he grows older, or maybe he’s getting better at
the job. You mind when he was at the school we used to have the doctor
to him every second Saturday night…. He was always a terrible bold
laddie, and when he was getting dangerous his eyes used to run with
tears. He’s quit of that habit now, but they tell me that when he’s real
excited he turns as white as paper. Well, well! we’ve all got our queer
ways. Here’s a biography of him and the other players. What’s this it
says?”

Mr McCunn resumed his spectacles.

“Here it is. ‘J. Galt, born in Glasgow. Educated at the Western Academy
and St Mark’s College, Cambridge … played last year against Oxford in
the victorious Cambridge fifteen, when he scored three tries…. This is
his first International … equally distinguished in defence and
attack…. Perhaps the most unpredictable of wing three-quarters now
playing….’ Oh, and here’s another bit in ‘Gossip about the Teams.'” He
removed his spectacles and laughed heartily. “That’s good. It calls him
a ‘scholar and a gentleman.’ That’s what they always say about
University players. Well, I’ll warrant he’s as good a gentleman as any,
though he comes out of a back street in the Gorbals. I’m not so sure
about the scholar. But he can always do anything he sets his mind to,
and he’s a worse glutton for books than me. No man can tell what may
happen to Jaikie yet…. We can take credit for these laddies of ours,
for they’re all in the way of doing well for themselves, but there’s
just the two of them that I feel are like our own bairns. Just Jaikie
and Dougal–and goodness knows what will be the end of that red-headed
Dougal. Jaikie’s a douce body, but there’s a determined daftness about
Dougal. I wish he wasn’t so taken up with his misguided politics.”

“I hope they’ll not miss their train,” said the lady. “Supper’s at
eight, and they should be here by seven-thirty, unless Jaikie’s in the
hospital.”

“No fear,” was the cheerful answer. “More likely some of the Kangaroos
will be there. We should get a telegram about the match by six o’clock.”

So after tea, while his wife departed on some domestic task, Mr McCunn
took his ease with a pipe in a wicker chair on the little terrace which
looked seaward. He had found the hermitage for which he had long
sought, and was well content with it. The six years which had passed
since he forsook the city of Glasgow and became a countryman had done
little to alter his appearance. The hair had indeed gone completely from
the top of his head, and what was left was greying, but there were few
lines on his smooth, ruddy face, and the pale eyes had still the
innocence and ardour of youth. His figure had improved, for country
exercise and a sparer diet had checked the movement towards rotundity.
When not engaged in some active enterprise, it was his habit to wear a
tailed coat and trousers of tweed, a garb which from his boyish
recollection he thought proper for a country laird, but which to the
ordinary observer suggested a bookmaker. Gradually, a little
self-consciously, he had acquired what he considered to be the habits of
the class. He walked in his garden with a spud; his capacious pockets
contained a pruning knife and twine; he could talk quite learnedly of
crops and stock, and, though he never shouldered a gun, of the prospects
of game; and a fat spaniel was rarely absent from his heels.

The home he had chosen was on the spur of a Carrick moor, with the sea
to the west, and to south and east a distant prospect of the blue
Galloway hills. After much thought he had rejected the various country
houses which were open to his purchase; he felt it necessary to erect
his own sanctuary, conformable to his modest but peculiar tastes. A farm
of some five hundred acres had been bought, most of it pasture-fields
fenced by dry-stone dykes, but with a considerable stretch of broom and
heather, and one big plantation of larch. Much of this he let off, but
he retained a hundred acres where he and his grieve could make
disastrous essays in agriculture. The old farm-house had been a
whitewashed edifice of eight rooms, with ample outbuildings, and this
he had converted into a commodious dwelling, with half a dozen spare
bedrooms, and a large chamber which was at once library, smoking-room,
and business-room. I do not defend Mr McCunn’s taste, for he had a
memory stored with bad precedents. He hankered after little pepper-box
turrets, which he thought the badge of ancientry, and in internal
decoration he had an unhallowed longing for mahogany panelling, like a
ship’s saloon. Also he doted on his vast sweep of gravel. Yet he had on
the whole made a pleasing thing of Blaweary (it was the name which had
first taken his fancy), for he stuck to harled and whitewashed walls,
and he had a passion for green turf, so that, beyond the odious gravel,
the lawns swept to the meadows unbroken by formal flower-beds. These
lawns were his special hobby. “There’s not a yard of turf about the
place,” he would say, “that’s not as well kept as a putting-green.”

The owner from his wicker chair looked over the said lawns to a rough
pasture where his cows were at graze, and then beyond a patch of
yellowing bracken to the tops of a fir plantation. After that the ground
fell more steeply, so that the tree-tops were silhouetted against the
distant blue of the sea. It was mid-October, but the air was as balmy as
June, and only the earlier dusk told of the declining year. Mr McCunn
was under strict domestic orders not to sit out of doors after sunset,
but he had dropped asleep and the twilight was falling when he was
roused by a maid with a telegram.

In his excitement he could not find his spectacles. He tore open the
envelope and thrust the pink form into the maid’s face. “Read it,
lassie–read it,” he cried, forgetting the decorum of the master of a
household.

“Coming seven-thirty,” the girl read primly. “Match won by single
point.” Mr McCunn upset his chair, and ran, whooping, in search of his
wife.

* * * * *

The historian must return upon his tracks in order to tell of the great
event thus baldly announced. That year the Antipodes had despatched to
Britain such a constellation of Rugby stars that the hearts of the home
enthusiasts became as water and their joints were loosened. For years
they had known and suffered from the quality of those tall young men
from the South, whom the sun had toughened and tautened–their superb
physique, their resourcefulness, their uncanny combination. Hitherto,
while the fame of one or two players had reached these shores, the teams
had been in the main a batch of dark horses, and there had been no exact
knowledge to set a bar to hope. But now Australia had gathered herself
together for a mighty effort, and had sent to the field a fifteen most
of whose members were known only too well. She had collected her sons
wherever they were to be found. Four had already played for British
Universities; three had won a formidable repute in international matches
in which their country of ultimate origin had entitled them to play.
What club, county, or nation could resist so well equipped an enemy?
And, as luck decided, it fell to Scotland, which had been having a
series of disastrous seasons, to take the first shock.

That ancient land seemed for the moment to have forgotten her prowess.
She could produce a strong, hard-working and effective pack, but her
great three-quarter line had gone, and she had lost the scrum-half who
the year before had been her chief support. Most of her fifteen were new
to an international game, and had never played together. The danger lay
in the enemy halves and three-quarters. The Kangaroos had two halves
possessed of miraculous hands and a perfect knowledge of the game. They
might be trusted to get the ball to their three-quarters, who were
reputed the most formidable combination that ever played on turf. On the
left wing was the mighty Charvill, an Oxford Blue and an English
International; on the right Martineau, who had won fame on the
cinder-track as well as on the football-field. The centres were two
cunning brothers, Clauson by name, who played in a unison like Siamese
twins. Against such a four Scotland could scrape up only a quartet of
possibles, men of promise but not yet of performance. The hosts of
Tuscany seemed strong out of all proportion to the puny defenders of
Rome. And as the Scottish right-wing three-quarter, to frustrate the
terrible Charvill, stood the tiny figure of J. Galt, Cambridge
University, five foot six inches in height and slim as a wagtail.

To the crowd of sixty thousand and more that waited for the teams to
enter the field there was vouchsafed one slender comfort. The weather,
which at Blaweary was clear and sunny, was abominable in the Scottish
midlands. It had rained all the preceding night, and it was hoped that
the ground might be soft, inclining to mud–mud dear to the heart of our
islanders but hateful to men accustomed to the firm soil of the South.

The game began in a light drizzle, and for Scotland it began
disastrously. The first scrimmage was in the centre of the ground, and
the ball came out to the Kangaroo scrum-half, who sent it to his
stand-off. From him it went to Clauson, and then to Martineau, who ran
round his opposing wing, dodged the Scottish full-back, and scored a
try, which was converted. After five minutes the Kangaroos led by five
points.

After that the Scottish forwards woke up, and there was a spell of
stubborn defence. The Scottish full-back had a long shot at goal from a
free kick, and missed, but for the rest most of the play was in the
Scottish twenty-five. The Scottish pack strove their hardest, but they
did no more than hold their opponents. Then once more came a quick heel
out, which went to one of the Clausons, a smart cut-through, a try
secured between the posts and easily converted. The score was now ten
points to nil.

Depression settled upon the crowd as deep as the weather, which had
stopped raining but had developed into a sour _haar_. Followed a period
of constant kicking into touch, a dull game which the Kangaroos were
supposed to eschew. Just before half-time there was a thin ray of
comfort. The Scottish left-wing three-quarter, one Smail, a Borderer,
intercepted a Kangaroo pass and reached the enemy twenty-five before he
was brought down from behind by Martineau’s marvellous sprinting. He had
been within sight of success, and half-time came with a faint hope that
there was still a chance of averting a runaway defeat.

The second half began with three points to Scotland, secured from a
penalty kick. Also the Scottish forwards seemed to have got a new lease
of life. They carried the game well into the enemy territory, dribbling
irresistibly in their loose rushes, and hooking and heeling in the grand
manner from the scrums. The white uniforms of the Kangaroos were now
plentifully soiled, and the dark blue of the Scots made them look the
less bedraggled side. All but J. Galt. His duty had been that of
desperate defence conducted with a resolute ferocity, and he had
suffered in it. His jersey was half torn off his back, and his shorts
were in ribbons: he limped heavily, and his small face looked as if it
had been ground into the mud of his native land. He felt dull and
stupid, as if he had been slightly concussed. His gift had hitherto been
for invisibility; his fame had been made as a will-o’-the-wisp; now he
seemed to be cast for the part of that Arnold von Winkelreid who drew
all the spears to his bosom.

The ball was now coming out to the Scottish halves, but they mishandled
it. It seemed impossible to get their three-quarters going. The ball
either went loose, or was intercepted, or the holder was promptly
tackled, and whenever there seemed a chance of a run there was always
either a forward pass or a knock-on. At this period of the game the
Scottish forwards were carrying everything on their shoulders, and their
backs seemed hopeless. Any moment, too, might see the deadly echelon of
the Kangaroo three-quarters ripple down the field.

And then came one of those sudden gifts of fortune which make Rugby an
image of life. The ball came out from a heel in a scrum not far from the
Kangaroo twenty-five, and went to the Kangaroo stand-off half. He
dropped it, and, before he could recover, it was gathered by the
Scottish stand-off. He sent it to Smail, who passed back to the Scottish
left-centre, one Morrison, an Academical from Oxford who had hitherto
been pretty much of a passenger. Morrison had the good luck to have a
clear avenue before him, and he had a gift of pace. Dodging the Kangaroo
full-back with a neat swerve, he scored in the corner of the goal-line
amid a pandemonium of cheers. The try was miraculously converted, and
the score stood at ten points to eight, with fifteen minutes to play.

Now began an epic struggle, not the least dramatic in the history of the
game since a century ago the Rugby schoolboy William Webb Ellis first
“took the ball in his arms and ran with it.” The Kangaroos had no mind
to let victory slip from their grasp, and, working like one man, they
set themselves to assure it. For a little their magnificent
three-quarter line seemed to have dropped out of the picture, but now
most theatrically it returned to it. From a scrimmage in the Kangaroo
half of the field, the ball went to their stand-off and from him to
Martineau. At the moment the Scottish players were badly placed, for
their three-quarters were standing wide in order to overlap the faster
enemy line. It was a perfect occasion for one of Martineau’s deadly
runs. He was, however, well tackled by Morrison and passed back to his
scrum-half, who kicked ahead towards the left wing to Charvill. The
latter gathered the ball at top-speed, and went racing down the
touch-line with nothing before him but the Scottish right-wing
three-quarter. It seemed a certain score, and there fell on the
spectators a sudden hush. That small figure, not hitherto renowned for
pace, could never match the Australian’s long, loping, deadly stride.

Had Jaikie had six more inches of height he would have failed. But a
resolute small man who tackles low is the hardest defence to get round.
Jaikie hurled himself at Charvill, and was handed off by a mighty palm.
But he staggered back in the direction of his own goal, and there was
just one fraction of a second for him to make another attempt. This time
he succeeded. Charvill’s great figure seemed to dive forward on the top
of his tiny assailant, and the ball rolled into touch. For a minute,
while the heavens echoed with the shouting, Jaikie lay on the ground
bruised and winded. Then he got up, shook himself, like a heroic,
bedraggled sparrow, and hobbled back to his place.

There were still five minutes before the whistle, and these minutes were
that electric testing time, when one side is intent to consolidate a
victory and the other resolute to avert too crushing a defeat. Scotland
had never hoped to win; she had already done far better than her
expectations, and she gathered herself together for a mighty effort to
hold what she had gained. Her hopes lay still in her forwards. Her backs
had far surpassed their form, but they were now almost at their last
gasp.

But in one of them there was a touch of that genius which can triumph
over fatigue. Jaikie had never in his life played so gruelling a game.
He was accustomed to being maltreated, but now he seemed to have been
pounded and smothered and kicked and flung about till he doubted whether
he had a single bone undamaged. His whole body was one huge ache. Only
the brain under his thatch of hair was still working well…. The
Kangaroo pack had gone down field with a mighty rush, and there was a
scrum close to the Scottish twenty-five. The ball went out cleanly to
one of the Clausons, but it was now very greasy, and the light was bad,
and he missed his catch. More, he stumbled after it and fell, for he had
had a punishing game. Jaikie on the wing suddenly saw his chance. He
darted in and gathered the ball, dodging Clauson’s weary tackle. There
was no other man of his side at hand to take a pass, but there seemed
just a slender chance for a cut-through. He himself of course would be
downed by Charvill, but there was a fraction of a hope, if he could gain
a dozen yards, that he might be able to pass to Smail, who was not so
closely marked.

His first obstacle was the Kangaroo scrum-half, who had come across the
field. To him he adroitly sold the dummy, and ran towards the right
touch-line, since there was no sign of Smail. He had little hope of
success, for it must be only a question of seconds before he was
brought down. He did not hear the roar from the spectators as he
appeared in the open, for he was thinking of Charvill waiting for his
revenge, and he was conscious that his heart was behaving violently
quite outside its proper place. But he was also conscious that in some
mysterious way he had got a second wind, and that his body seemed a
trifle less leaden.

He was now past the half-way line, a little distance ahead of one of the
Clausons, with no colleague near him, and with Charvill racing to
intercept him. For one of Jaikie’s inches there could be no hand-off,
but he had learned in his extreme youth certain arts not commonly
familiar to Rugby players. He was a most cunning dodger. To the yelling
crowd he appeared to be aiming at a direct collision with the Kangaroo
left-wing. But just as it looked as if a two-seater must meet a
Rolls-Royce head-on at full speed, the two-seater swerved and Jaikie
wriggled somehow below Charvill’s arm. Then sixty thousand people stood
on their seats, waving caps and umbrellas and shouting like lunatics,
for Charvill was prone on the ground, and Jaikie was stolidly cantering
on.

He was now at the twenty-five line, and the Kangaroo full-back awaited
him. This was a small man, very little taller than Jaikie, but immensely
broad and solid, and a superlative place-kick. A different physique
would have easily stopped the runner, now at the very limits of his
strength, but the Kangaroo was too slow in his tackle to meet Jaikie’s
swerve. He retained indeed in his massive fist a considerable part of
Jaikie’s jersey, but the half-naked wearer managed to stumble on just
ahead of him, and secured a try in the extreme corner. There he lay with
his nose in the mud, utterly breathless, but obscurely happy. He was
still dazed and panting when a minute later the whistle blew, and a
noise like the Last Trump told him that by a single point he had won
the match for his country.

There was a long table below the Grand Stand, a table reserved for the
Press. On it might have been observed a wild figure with red hair
dancing a war dance of triumph. Presently the table collapsed under him,
and the rending of timber and the recriminations of journalists were
added to the apocalyptic din.

* * * * *

At eight o’clock sharp a party of four sat down to supper at Blaweary.
The McCunns did not dine in the evening, for Dickson declared that
dinner was a stiff, unfriendly repast, associated in his mind with the
genteel in cities. He clung to the fashions of his youth–ate a large
meal at one o’clock, and a heavy tea about half-past four, and had
supper at eight from October to May, and in the long summer days
whenever he chose to come indoors. Mrs McCunn had grumbled at first,
having dim social aspirations, but it was useless to resist her
husband’s stout conservatism. For the evening meal she was in the habit
of arraying herself in black silk and many ornaments, and Dickson on
occasions of ceremony was persuaded to put on a dinner jacket; but
to-night he had declined to change, on the ground that the guests were
only Dougal and Jaikie.

There were candles on the table in the pleasant dining-room, and one
large lamp on the sideboard. Dickson had been stubborn about electric
light, holding that a faint odour of paraffin was part of the amenities
of a country house. A bright fire crackled on the hearth, for the
October evenings at Blaweary were chilly.

The host was in the best of humours. “Here’s the kind of food for hungry
folk. Ham and eggs–and a bit of the salmon I catched yesterday! Did you
hear that I fell in, and Adam had to gaff me before he gaffed the fish?
Everything except the loaf is our own providing–the eggs are our hens’,
the ham’s my own rearing and curing, the salmon is my catching, and the
scones are Mamma’s baking. There’s a bottle of champagne to drink
Jaikie’s health. Man, Jaikie, it’s an extraordinary thing you’ve taken
so little hurt. We were expecting to see you a complete lameter, with
your head in bandages.”

Jaikie laughed. “I was in more danger from the crowd at the end than
from the Kangaroos. It’s Dougal that’s lame. He fell through the
reporters’ table.”

He spoke with the slight sing-song which is ineradicable in one born in
the west of Scotland, but otherwise he spoke pure English, for he had an
imitative ear and unconsciously acquired the speech of a new
environment. One did not think of Jaikie as short, but as slight, for he
was admirably proportioned and balanced. His hair was soft and light and
unruly, and the small wedge of face beneath the thatch had an air of
curious refinement and delicacy, almost of wistfulness. This was partly
due to a neat pointed chin and a cherubic mouth, but chiefly to large
grey eyes which were as appealing as a spaniel’s. He was the incarnation
of gentleness, with a hint of pathos, so that old ladies longed to
mother him, and fools occasionally despised him–to their undoing. He
had the look of one continually surprised at life, and a little lost in
it. To-night his face from much contact with mother earth had something
of the blue, battered appearance of a pugilist’s, so that he seemed to
be a cherub, but a damaged cherub, who had been violently ejected from
his celestial home.

The fourth at the table, Dougal Crombie, made a strong contrast to
Jaikie’s elegance. The aforetime chieftain of the Gorbals Die-hards had
grown into a powerful young man, about five feet ten inches in height,
with massive shoulders and a fist like a blacksmith’s. Adolescence had
revised the disproportions of boyhood. His head no longer appeared to be
too big for his body; it was massive, not monstrous. The fiery red of
his hair had toned down to a deeper shade. The art of the dentist had
repaired the irregularities of his teeth. His features were rugged but
not unpleasing. But the eyes remained the same, grey-green, deep-set,
sullen, smouldering with a fierce vitality. To a stranger there was
something about him which held the fancy, as if a door had been opened
into the past. Even so must have looked some Pictish warrior, who brewed
heather-ale, and was beaten back from Hadrian’s Wall; even so some
Highland cateran who fired the barns of the Lennox; even so many a
saturnine judge of Session and heavy-handed Border laird. Dougal in
appearance was what our grandfathers called a “Gothic survival.” His
manner to the world was apt to be assertive and cynical; he seemed to be
everlastingly in a hurry, and apt to jostle others off the footpath. It
was unpleasant, many found, to argue with him, for his eye expressed a
surly contempt; but they were wrong–it was only interest. Dougal was
absorbed in life, and since his absorption was fiercer than other
people’s, it was misunderstood. Therefore he had few friends; but to
those few–the McCunns, Jaikie, and perhaps two others–he was attached
with a dog-like fidelity. With them he was at his ease and no longer
_farouche_; he talked less, and would smile happily to himself, as if
their presence made him content. They gave him the only home life he had
ever known.

* * * * *

Mr McCunn spoke of those who had years before acknowledged Dougal’s
sway.

“You’ll want to have the last news,” he said. “Bill’s getting on grand
in Australia. He’s on his own wee farm in what they call a group
settlement, and his last letter says that he’s gotten all the roots
grubbed up and is starting his first ploughing, and that he’s doing fine
with his hens and his dairy cows. That’s the kind of job for Bill–there
was always more muscle than brains in him, but there’s a heap of common
sense…. Napoleon’s in a bank in Montreal–went there from the London
office last July. He’ll rise in the world no doubt, for he has a great
head for figures. Peter Paterson is just coming out for a doctor, and he
has lifted a tremendous bursary–I don’t mind the name of it, but it
will see him through his last year in the hospitals. Who would have said
that Peter would turn out scientific, and him such a through-other
laddie?… But Thomas Yownie is the big surprise. Thomas, you mind, was
all for being a pirate. Well, he’ll soon be a minister. He had aye a
grand voice, and they tell me his sermons would wile the birds from the
trees…. That’s the lot, except for you and Jaikie. Man, as Chief
Die-hard, I’m proud of my command.”

Dickson beamed on them affectionately, and they listened with a show of
interest, but they did not share his paternal pride. Youth at twenty is
full of hard patches. Already to the two young men the world of six
years ago and its denizens had become hazy. They were remotely
interested in the fates of their old comrades, but no more. The day
would come when they would dwell sentimentally on the past: now they
thought chiefly of the present, of the future, and of themselves.

“And how are you getting on yourself, Dougal?” Dickson asked. “We read
your things in the paper, and we whiles read about you. I see you’re
running for Parliament.”

“I’m running, but I won’t get in. Not yet.”

“Man, I wish you were on a better side. You’ve got into an ill nest. I
was reading this very morning a speech by yon Tombs–he’s one of your
big men, isn’t he?–blazing away about the sins of the boorjoysee.
That’s just Mamma and me.”

“It’s not you. And Tombs, anyway, is a trumpery body. I have no use for
the intellectual on the make, for there’s nothing in him but vanity. But
see here, Mr McCunn. The common people of this land are coming to their
own nowadays. I know what they need and I know what they’re thinking,
for I come out of them myself. They want interpreting and they want
guiding. Is it not right that a man like me should take a hand in it?”

Dickson looked wise. “Yes, if you keep your head. But you know fine,
Dougal, that those who set out to lead the mob are apt to end by
following. You’re in a kittle trade, my man. And how do you manage to
reconcile your views with your profession? You’ve got a good job with
the Craw papers. You’ll be aspiring some day to edit one of them. But
what does Mr Craw say to your politics?”

The speaker’s eye had a twinkle in it, but Dougal’s face, hitherto as
urbane as its rugged features permitted, suddenly became grim.

“Craw!” he cried. “Yon’s the worst fatted calf of them all: Yon’s the
old wife. There’s no bigger humbug walking on God’s earth to-day than
Thomas Carlyle Craw. I take his wages, because I give good value for
them. I can make up a paper with any man, and I’ve a knack of
descriptive writing. But thank God! I’ve nothing to do with his shoddy
politics. I put nothing of myself into his rotten papers. I keep that
for the _Outward_ every second Saturday.”

“You do,” said Dickson dryly. “I’ve been reading some queer things
there. What ails you at what you call ‘modern Scotland’? By your way of
it we’ve sold our souls to the English and the Irish.”

“So we have.” Dougal had relapsed again into comparative meekness. It
was as if he felt that what he had to say was not in keeping with a
firelit room and a bountiful table. He had the air of being a repository
of dark things which were not yet ready for the light.

“Anyway, Scotland did fine the day. It’s time to drink Jaikie’s health.”

This ceremony over, Dickson remained with his glass uplifted.

“We’ll drink to your good health, Dougal, and pray Heaven, as the Bible
says, to keep your feet from falling. It would be a sad day for your
friends if you were to end in jyle…. And now I want to hear what you
two are proposing to do with yourselves. You say you have a week’s
holiday, and it’s a fortnight before Jaikie goes back to Cambridge.”

“We’re going into the Canonry,” said Jaikie.

“Well, it’s a fine countryside, the Canonry. Many a grand day I’ve had
on its hill burns. But it’s too late for the fishing…. I see from the
papers that there’s a by-election on now. Is Dougal going to sow tares
by the roadside?”

“He would like to,” said Jaikie, “but he won’t be allowed. We’ll keep to
the hills, and our headquarters will be the Back House of the Garroch.
It’s an old haunt of ours.”

“Fine I know it. Many a time when I’ve been fishing Loch Garroch I’ve
gone in there for my tea. What’s the wife’s name now? Catterick? Aye, it
was Catterick, and her man came from Sanquhar way. We’ll get out a map
after supper and you’ll show me your road. The next best thing to
tramping the hills yourself is to plan out another man’s travels.
There’s grand hills round the Garroch–the Muneraw and the Yirnie and
the Calmarton and the Caldron…. Stop a minute. Doesn’t Mr Craw bide
somewhere in the Canonry? Are you going to give him a call in, Dougal?”

“That’s a long way down Glen Callowa,” said Jaikie. “We mean to keep to
the high tops. If the weather holds, there’s nothing to beat a Canonry
October.”

“You’re a pair of desperate characters,” said Dickson jocosely. “You’re
going to a place which is thrang with a by-election, and for ordinary
you’ll not keep Dougal away from politics any more than a tyke from an
ash-bucket. But you say you’re not heeding the election. It’s the high
hills for you–but it’s past the time for fishing, and young legs like
yours will cover every top in a couple of days. I wish you mayna get
into mischief. I’m afraid of Dougal with his daftness. He’ll be for
starting a new Jacobite rebellion. ‘Kenmure’s on and awa’, Willie.'”

Mr McCunn whistled a stave of the song. His spirits were soaring.

“Well, I’ll be at hand to bail you out…. And remember that I’m old,
but not dead-old. If you set up the Standard on Garroch side, send me
word and I’ll on with my boots and join you.”