And in our life alone does Nature live.
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE,
Samuel Grant might cheerfully have strangled his beloved Muriel but true love has ever steered between the rocks of passion and exasperation.
The boat had navigated towards vexation at her reaction to his proffered gift.
He had expected little cries of delight translating into a sidelong glance towards the room where the bouncier mattress had its domain. However in his haste, Samuel had reckoned without his banging upon the door to be answered by a squat purposeful little maid who looked at his form as if a stray dog had fetched him up upon the doorstep.
Upon his insistence she had ferried him to her mistress who was sitting somewhat listlessly in the drawing room.
Her demeanour changed at the sight of him as if a bumblebee had shot up her skirts. Ellen the maid was shooed from the room and once Muriel was certain the coast was clear, she, in nothing that could be mistaken for loving tones, hissed,
Samuel caught sight of himself in a cunningly sited mirror and realised that his normal faultless presentation was a trifle compromised.
The silver hair was standing on end, his clothes dishevelled; the canary yellow neckerchief had worked loose from its moorings and was hanging limply over the lapels of his jacket as if signalling quarantine.
All this of course the result of his headlong rush after grabbing the prize while Seth and the giant sailor had got to grips and given Samuel the chance to prove a hero.
At a cost.
All he could hope for was that Moxey would somehow be debilitated by the giant and either die or lose his memory.
None such very likely.
But in the meantime he might raise the money, with a little contribution from his beloved Muriel, and offer Seth enough to avoid his vengeance.
Her reaction, however, after he had related a rather altered version of his daring deeds, was not hopeful.
‘How much did you pay this man?’
‘Five pounds, Moumou.’
Samuel could not have cared less. It was dawning on him that he had risked his neck for next to nothing.
‘And where did you meet him?’
‘In a tavern,’ he muttered to her formal tones.
Muriel gazed at the brooch in her hand. It certainly appeared unscathed though she would give it a good clean.
‘And you wish me to reimburse you, sir?’
‘It is a matter of life and death,’ Samuel replied loudly, growing heartily sick of the charade. ‘And I might remind you, madam, that the life might be yours and the death mine.’
There was enough underlying truth in his tone that her face softened and she almost forgave him the intrusion that shrieked to a watching neighbour or any acquaintance of Ellen’s who might be a confidante, that Mistress Grierson had entertained a man with a loose cravat.
Almost.
But it is a sad fact that just when a man thinks a woman has run out of foolish moves, she can always find another.
‘What about the rest?’ she asked.
‘Whit?’
‘The rest of my stolen valuables?’
‘
This came out in a strangled indignant yelp and might surely have warned Muriel that a limit had been reached but by now she had the bit between her teeth and perhaps earlier misgivings about the company Samuel kept had resurfaced.
‘Ye said ye didnae care about such!’
Samuel glared at her and she glared back, forgetting that the imaginary maid might be pressing her avid ear against the keyhole.
‘
‘It was busy,’ he retorted sullenly.
‘Busy?’
Again they locked eyes and it is possible that given a passage of time, her lips may have quirked in humour at his wild hair and askew neckwear like a grumpy little boy at a birthday party; he may have, on seeing this, risked sweeping her into his arms, a breathless kiss, a tremor in the limbs, five pounds pressed in his hands along with softer rewards, a heroic action recognised, receiving due adulation.
All this was possible, but every moment has a wealth of possibilities only one of which is manifested in the given world. Unfortunately, what came was not romantic recompense.
Three loud bangs at the door. Samuel knew in his bones that the law was a-calling.
He suddenly grabbed Muriel close anyway and gave her a resounding buss full on the lips.
‘Keep them occupied,’ said he, and darted out into the garden through the French windows.
Samuel suddenly felt heroic again; that kiss had done wonders. He measured the wall that led to freedom with a cool eye. There was a garden table nearby and he hauled it across so that the edge crunched to the wall, clambered aboard and parked his belly on the top then lowered his legs over the other side, preparing to drop.
Two hands seized his ankles.
‘Ye’ll do yerself a mischief, Samuel,’ said James McLevy. ‘Let me lower ye down like a king in state.’
When the inspector hauled Samuel round the front and the door was hammered once again, the wee maid Ellen opened up with a frown to see more traffic passing through.
‘Like Waverley Station,’ she announced.
‘Indeed you have it, Ellen,’ said McLevy breezily. ‘I cannot argue the point but where would we be without the trains?’
Ellen noted the firm grasp McLevy had on Samuel’s arm just above the elbow.
‘Ye’ll know yer way,’ she said dourly.
‘Oh, lead me on,’ the inspector replied. ‘A guide, a buckler and example.’
This quote from Burns sailed over Ellen’s head but as she marched grimly up the hall followed by the two, a few random memories from the visit she’d paid to her mother the night before came into her mind.
Cut the throat across with her sharp scissors, she being a dressmaker by trade. The reason never known but madness hinted. The boy had found her slumped in her recess bed and sat there for hours, surrounded by blood and death.
She led them into the drawing room where her mistress stood stiffly beside an equally uncomfortable Conan Doyle, made a brief curtsey and got to hell out of there.
Ellen was devoid of two character traits that make up a strong part of the Scots nature.
Nosiness and malice.
She was content to leave what was not her business to remain so on the principle of
