Kidnapped

it, not only as a place famous in history, but as the very doors of salvation to Alan and myself. The moon was not yet up when we came there; a few lights shone along the front of the fortress, and lower down a few lighted windows in the town; but it was all mighty still, and there seemed to be no guard upon the passage. I was for pushing straight across; but Alan was more wary. 'It looks unco' quiet,' said he; 'but for all that we'll lie down here cannily behind a dyke, and make sure.' So we lay for about a quarter of an hour, whiles whispering, whiles lying still and hearing nothing earthly but the washing of the water on the piers. At last there came by an old, hobbling woman with a crutch stick; who first stopped a little, close to where we lay, and bemoaned herself and the long way she had travelled; and then set forth again up the steep spring of the bridge. The woman was so little, and the night still so dark, that we soon lost sight of her; only heard the sound of her steps, and her stick, and a cough that she had by fits, draw slowly farther away. 'She's bound to be across now,' I whispered. 'Na,' said Alan, 'her foot still sounds boss[32] upon the bridge.' And just then ? 'Who goes?' cried a voice, and we heard the butt of a musket rattle on the stones. I must suppose the sentry had been sleeping, so that had we tried, we might have passed unseen; but he was awake now, and the chance forfeited. 'This'll never do,' said Alan. 'This'll never, never do for us, David.' And without another word, he began to crawl away through the fields; and a little after, being well out of eye-shot, got to his feet again, and struck along a road that led to the eastward. I could not conceive what he was doing; and indeed I was so sharply cut by the disappointment, that I was little likely to be pleased with anything. A moment back and I had seen myself knocking at Mr. Rankeillor's door to claim my inheritance, like a hero in a ballad; and here was I back again, a wandering, hunted blackguard, on the wrong side of Forth. 'Well?' said I. 'Well,' said Alan, 'what would ye have? They're none such fools as I took them for. We have still the Forth to pass, Davie ? weary fall the rains that fed and the hillsides that guided it!' 'And why go east?' said I. 'Ou, just upon the chance!' said he. 'If we cannae pass the river, we'll have to see what we can do for the firth.' 'There are fords upon the river, and none upon the firth,' said I. 'To be sure there are fords, and a bridge forbye,' quoth Alan; 'and of what service, when they are watched?' 'Well,' said I, 'but a river can be swum.' 'By them that have the skill of it,' returned he; 'but I have yet to hear that either you or me is much of a hand at that exercise; and for my own part, I swim like a stone.' 'I'm not up to you in talking back, Alan,' I said; 'but I can see we're making bad worse. If it's hard to pass a river, it stands to reason it must be worse to pass a sea.' 'But there's such a thing as a boat,' says Alan, 'or I'm the more deceived.' 'Ay, and such a thing as money,' says I. 'But for us that have neither one nor other, they might just as well not have been invented.' 'Ye think so?' said Alan. 'I do that,' said I. 'David,' says he, 'ye're a man of small invention and less faith. But let me set my wits upon the hone, and if I cannae beg, borrow, nor yet steal a boat, I'll make one!' 'I think I see ye!' said I. 'And what's more than all that: if ye pass a bridge, it can tell no tales; but if we pass the firth, there's the boat on the wrong side ? somebody must have brought it ? the country-side will all be in a bizz ?-' 'Man!' cried Alan, 'if I make a boat, I'll make a body to take it back again! So deave me with no more of your nonsense, but walk (for that's what you've got to do) ?and let Alan think for ye.' All night, then, we walked through the north side of the Carse under the high line of the Ochil mountains; and by Alloa and Clackmannan and Culross, all of which we avoided: and about ten in the morning, mighty hungry and tired, came to the little clachan of Limekilns. This is a place that sits near in by the water-side, and looks across the Hope to the town of the Queensferry. Smoke went up from both of these, and from other villages and farms upon all hands. The fields were being reaped; two ships lay anchored, and boats were coming and going on the Hope. It was altogether a right pleasant sight to me; and I could not take my fill of gazing at these comfortable, green, cultivated hills and the busy people both of the field and sea. For all that, there was Mr. Rankeillor's house on the south shore, where I had no doubt wealth awaited me; and here was I upon the north, clad in poor enough attire of an outlandish fashion, with three silver shillings left to me of all my fortune, a price set upon my head, and an outlawed man for my sole company. 'O, Alan!' said I, 'to think of it! Over there, there's all that heart could want waiting me; and the birds go over, and the boats go over ? all that please can go, but just me only! O, man, but it's a heart-break!' In Limekilns we entered a small change- house, which we only knew to be a public by the wand over the door, and bought some bread and cheese from a good-looking lass that was the servant. This we carried with us in a bundle, meaning to sit and eat it in a bush of wood on the sea-shore, that we saw some third part of a mile in front. As we went, I kept looking across the water and sighing to myself; and though I took no heed of it, Alan had fallen into a muse. At last he stopped in the way. 'Did ye take heed of the lass we bought this of?' says he, tapping on the bread and cheese. 'To be sure,' said I, 'and a bonny lass she was.' 'Ye thought that?' cries he. 'Man, David, that's good news.' 'In the name of all that's wonderful, why so?' says I. 'What good can that do?' 'Well,' said Alan, with one of his droll looks, 'I was rather in hopes it would maybe get us that boat.' 'If it were the other way about, it would be liker it,' said I. 'That's all that you ken, ye see,' said Alan. 'I don't want the lass to fall in love with ye, I want her to be sorry for ye, David; to which end there is no manner of need that she should take you for a beauty. Let me see' (looking me curiously over). 'I wish ye were a wee thing paler; but apart from that ye'll do fine for my purpose ? ye have a fine, hang- dog, rag-and-tatter, clappermaclaw kind of a look to ye, as if ye had stolen the coat from a potato-bogle. Come; right about, and back to the change-house for that boat of ours.' I followed him, laughing. 'David Balfour,' said he, 'ye're a very funny gentleman by your way of it, and this is a very funny employ for ye, no doubt. For all that, if ye have any affection for my neck (to say nothing of your own) ye will perhaps be kind enough to take this matter responsibly. I am going to do a bit of play-acting, the bottom ground of which is just exactly as serious as the gallows for the pair of us. So bear it, if ye please, in mind, and conduct yourself according.' 'Well, well,' said I, 'have it as you will.' As we got near the clachan, he made me take his arm and hang upon it like one almost helpless with weariness; and by the time he pushed open the change-house door, he seemed to be half carrying me. The maid appeared surprised (as well she might be) at our speedy return; but Alan had no words to spare for her in explanation, helped me to a chair, called for a tass of brandy with which he fed me in little sips, and then breaking up the bread and cheese helped me to eat it like a nursery-lass; the whole with that grave, concerned, affectionate countenance, that might have imposed upon a judge. It was small wonder if the maid were taken with the picture we presented, of a poor, sick, overwrought lad and his most tender comrade. She drew quite near, and stood leaning with her back on the next table. 'What's like wrong with him?' said she at last. Alan turned upon her, to my great wonder, with a kind of fury. 'Wrong?' cries he. 'He's walked more hundreds of miles than he has hairs upon his chin, and slept oftener in wet heather than dry sheets. Wrong, quo' she! Wrong enough, I would think! Wrong, indeed!' and he kept grumbling to himself as he fed me, like a man ill-pleased. 'He's young for the like of that,' said the maid. 'Ower young,' said Alan, with his back to her. 'He would be better riding,' says she. 'And where could I get a horse to him?' cried Alan, turning on her with the same appearance of fury. 'Would ye have me steal?' I thought this roughness would have sent her off in dudgeon, as indeed it closed her mouth for the time. But my companion knew very well what he was doing; and for as simple as he was in some things of life, had a great fund of roguishness in such affairs as these. 'Ye neednae tell me,' she said at last ? 'ye're gentry.' 'Well,' said Alan, softened a little (I believe against his will) by this artless comment, 'and suppose we were? Did ever you hear that gentrice put money in folk's pockets?' She sighed at this, as if she were herself some disinherited great lady. 'No,' says she, 'that's true indeed.' I was all this while chafing at the part I played, and sitting tongue-tied between shame and merriment; but somehow at this I could hold in no longer, and bade Alan let me be, for I was better already. My voice stuck in my throat, for I ever hated to take part in lies; but my very embarrassment helped on the plot, for the lass no doubt set down my husky voice to sickness and fatigue. 'Has he nae friends?' said she, in a tearful voice. 'That has he so!' cried Alan, 'if we could but win to them! ? friends and rich friends, beds to lie in, food to eat, doctors to see to him ? and here he must tramp in the dubs and sleep in the heather like a beggarman.' 'And why that?' says the lass. 'My dear,' said Alan, 'I cannae very safely say; but I'll tell ye what I'll do instead,' says he, 'I'll whistle ye a bit tune.' And with that he leaned pretty far over the table, and in a mere breath of a whistle, but with a wonderful pretty sentiment, gave her a few bars of 'Charlie is my darling.' 'Wheesht,' says she, and looked over her shoulder to the door. 'That's it,' said Alan. 'And him so young!' cries the lass. 'He's old enough to??' and Alan struck his forefinger on the back part of his neck, meaning that I was old enough to lose my head. 'It would be a black shame,' she cried, flushing high. 'It's what will be, though,' said Alan, 'unless we manage the better.' At this the lass turned and ran out of that part of the house, leaving us alone together. Alan in high good humour at the furthering of his schemes, and I in bitter dudgeon at being called a Jacobite and treated like a child. 'Alan,' I cried, 'I can stand no more of this.' 'Ye'll have to sit it then, Davie,' said he. 'For if ye upset the pot now, ye may scrape your own life out of the fire, but Alan Breck is a dead man.' This was so true that I could only groan; and even my groan served Alan's purpose, for it was overheard by the lass as she came flying in again with a dish of white puddings and a bottle of strong ale. 'Poor lamb!' says she, and had no sooner set the meat before us, than she touched me on the shoulder with a little friendly touch, as much as to bid