“ ‘That’s Clachlands Mains,’ says I, ‘and that’s Nether Fallo, and the Back o’ the Muneraw. Gudesake, sic a spate it maun hae been up the muirs to work siccan a destruction!’ I keepit coont o’ the stock, and feegured to mysel what the farmer-bodies wad lose. The thocht that I wad keep a’ my ain was some kind o’ comfort.
“But about the hour o’ twae the mune cloudit ower, and I saw nae mair than twenty feet afore me. I got awesome cauld, and a sort o’ stound o’ fricht took me, as I lookit into that black, unholy water. The nowt shivered sair and drappit their heids, and the fire on the ither side seemed to gang out a’ of a sudden, and leave the hale glen thick wi’ nicht. I shivered mysel wi’ something mair than the snell air, and there and then I wad hae gien the price o’ fower stirks for my ain bed at hame.
“It was as quiet as a kirkyaird, for suddenly the roar o’ the water stoppit, and the stream lay still as a loch. Then I heard a queer lappin’ as o’ something floatin’ doun, and it sounded miles aff in that dreidfu’ silence. I listened wi’ een stertin’, and aye it cam’ nearer and nearer, wi’ a sound like a dowg soomin’ a burn. It was sae black, I could see nocht, but somewhere frae the edge o’ a cloud, a thin ray o’ licht drappit on the water, and there, soomin’ doun by me, I saw something that lookit like a man.
“My hert was burstin’ wi’ terror, but, thinks I, here’s a droonin’ body, and I maun try and save it. So I waded in as far as I daured, though my feet were sae cauld that they bowed aneath me.
“Ahint me I heard a splashin’ and fechtin’, and then I saw the nowt, fair wild wi’ fricht, standin’ in the water on the ither side o’ the green bit, and lookin’ wi’ muckle feared een at something in the water afore me.
“Doun the thing came, and aye I got caulder as I looked. Then it was by my side, and I claught at it and pu’d it after me on to the land.
“I heard anither splash. The nowt gaed farther into the water, and stood shakin’ like young birks in a storm.
“I got the thing upon the green bank and turned it ower. It was a drooned man wi’ his hair hingin’ back on his broo, and his mouth wide open. But first I saw his een, which glowered like scrapit lead out o’ his clay-cauld face, and had in them a’ the fear o’ death and hell which follows after.
“The next moment I was up to my waist among the nowt, fechtin’ in the water aside them, and snowkin’ into their wet backs to hide mysel like a feared bairn.
“Maybe half an ’oor I stood, and then my mind returned to me. I misca’ed mysel for a fule and a coward. And my legs were sae numb, and my strength sae far gane, that I kenned fine that I couldna lang thole to stand this way like a heron in the water.
“I lookit round, and then turned again wi’ a stert, for there were thae leaden een o’ that awfu’ deid thing staring at me still.
“For anither quarter-hour I stood and shivered, and then my guid sense returned, and I tried again. I walkit backward, never lookin’ round, through the water to the shore, whaur I thocht the corp was lyin’. And a’ the time I could hear my hert chokin’ in my breist.
“My God, I fell ower it, and for one moment lay aside it, wi’ my heid touchin’ its deathly skin. Then wi’ a skelloch like a daft man, I took the thing in my airms and flung it wi’ a’ my strength into the water. The swirl took it, and it dipped and swam like a fish till it gaed out o’ sicht.
“I sat doun on the grass and grat like a bairn wi’ fair horror and weakness. Yin by yin the nowt came back, and shouthered anither around me, and the puir beasts brocht me yince mair to mysel. But I keepit my een on the grund, and thocht o’ hame and a’ thing decent and kindly, for I daurna for my life look out to the black water in dreid o’ what it micht bring.
“At the first licht, the herd and twae ither men cam’ ower in a boat to tak me aff and bring fodder for the beasts. They fand me still sitting wi’ my heid atween my knees, and my face like a peeled wand. They lifted me intil the boat and rowed me ower, driftin’ far down wi’ the angry current. At the ither side the shepherd says to me in an awed voice—
“ ‘There’s a fearfu’ thing happened. The young laird o’ Manorwater’s drooned in the spate. He was ridin’ back late and tried the ford o’ the Cauldshaw foot. Ye ken his wild cantrips, but there’s an end o’ them noo. The horse cam’ hame in the nicht wi’ an empty saiddle, and the Gled Water rinnin’ frae him in streams. The corp’ll be far on to the sea by this time, and they’ll never see’t mair.’
“ ‘I ken,’ I cried wi’ a dry throat, ‘I ken; I saw him floatin’ by.’ And then I broke yince mair into a silly greetin’, while the men watched me as if they thocht I was out o’ my mind.”
So much the farmer of Clachlands told me, but to the countryside he repeated merely the bare facts of weariness and discomfort. I have heard that he was accosted a week later by the minister of the place, a well-intentioned, phrasing man, who had strayed from his native city with its familiar air of tea and temperance to those stony uplands.
“And
