I had dinner with my uncle in the Candleriggs, and sat with him late afterwards casting up accounts, so it was not till nine o"clock that I set out on my way to my lodgings. These were in the Saltmarket, close on the river front, and to reach them I went by the short road through the Friar"s Vennel. It was an ill-reputed quarter of the town, and not long before had been noted as a haunt of coiners; but I had gone through it often, and met with no hindrance.
In the vennel stood a tall dark bit of masonry called Gilmour"s Lordship, which was pierced by long closes from which twisting stairways led to the upper landings. I was noting its gloomy aspect under the dim February moon, when a man came towards me and turned into one of the closes. He swung along with a free, careless gait that marked him as no townsman, and ere he plunged into the darkness I had a glimpse of fiery hair. It was the stranger who had accosted me in Parlane"s alley, and he was either drunk or in wild spirits, for he was singing:--
"We"re a" dry wi" the drinkin" o"t, We"re a" dry wi" the drinkin" o"t.
The minister kissed the fiddler"s wife, And he couldna preach for thinkin" o"t."
The ribald chorus echoed from the close mouth.
Then I saw that he was followed by three others, bent, slinking fellows, who slipped across the patches of moonlight, and eagerly scanned the empty vennel. They could not see me, for I was in shadow, and presently they too entered the close.
The thing looked ugly, and, while I had no love for the red-haired man, I did not wish to see murder or robbery committed and stand idly by.
The match of the afternoon had given me a fine notion of my prowess, though. Had I reflected, my pistol was in its case at home, and I had no weapon but a hazel staff. Happily in youth the blood is quicker than the brain, and without a thought I ran into the close and up the long stairway.
The chorus was still being sung ahead of me, and then it suddenly ceased. In dead silence and in pitchy darkness I struggled up the stone steps, wondering what I should find at the next turning. The place was black as night, the steps were uneven, and the stairs corkscrewed most wonderfully. I wished with all my heart that I had not come, as I groped upwards hugging the wall.
Then a cry came and a noise of hard breathing. At the same moment a door opened somewhere above my head, and a faint glow came down the stairs. Presently with a great rumble a heavy man came rolling past me, b.u.t.ting with his head at the stair-side. He came to anchor on a landing below me, and finding his feet plunged downwards as if the devil were at his heels. He left behind him a short Highland knife, which I picked up and put in my pocket.
On his heels came another with his hand clapped to his side, and he moaned as he slithered past me. Something dripped from him on the stone steps.
The light grew stronger, and as I rounded the last turning a third came bounding down, stumbling from wall to wall like a drunk man. I saw his face clearly, and if ever mortal eyes held baffled murder it was that fellow"s. There was a dark mark on his shoulder.
Above me as I blinked stood my red-haired friend on the top landing. He had his sword drawn, and was whistling softly through his teeth, while on the right hand was an open door and an old man holding a lamp.
"Ho!" he cried. "Here comes a fourth. G.o.d"s help, it"s my friend the marksman!"
I did not like that naked bit of steel, but there was nothing for it but to see the thing through. When he saw that I was unarmed he returned his weapon to its sheath, and smiled broadly down on me.
"What brings my proud gentleman up these long stairs?" he asked.
"I saw you entering the close and three men following you. It looked bad, so I came up to see fair play."
"Did ye so? And a very pretty intention, Mr. What"s-your-name. But ye needna have fashed yourself. Did ye see any of our friends on the stairs?"
"I met a big man rolling down like a football," I said.
"Ay, that would be Angus. He"s a clumsy stot, and never had much sense."
"And I met another with his hand on his side," I said.
"That would be little James. He"s a fine lad with a skean-dhu on a dark night, but there was maybe too much light here for his trade."
"And I met a third who reeled like a drunk man," I said.
"Ay," said he meditatively, "that was Long Colin. He"s the flower o"
the flock, and I had to pink him. At another time and in a better place I would have liked a bout with him, for he has some notion of sword-play."
"Who were the men?" I asked, in much confusion, for this laughing warrior perplexed me.
"Who but just my cousins from Glengyle. There has long been a sort of bicker between us, and they thought they had got a fine chance of ending it."
"And who, in Heaven"s name, are you," I said, "that treats murder so lightly?"
"Me?" he repeated. "Well, I might give ye the answer you gave me this very day when I speired the same question. But I am frank by nature, and I see you wish me well. Come in bye, and we"ll discuss the matter."
He led me into a room where a cheerful fire crackled, and got out from a press a bottle and gla.s.ses. He produced tobacco from a bra.s.s box and filled a long pipe.
"Now," said he, "we"ll understand each other better. Ye see before you a poor gentleman of fortune, whom poverty and a roving spirit have driven to outland bits o" the earth to ply his lawful trade of sea-captain. They call me by different names. I have pa.s.sed for a Dutch skipper, and a Maryland planter, and a French trader, and, in spite of my colour, I have been a Spanish don in the Main. At Tortuga you will hear one name, and another at Port o" Spain, and a third at Cartagena.
But, seeing we are in the city o" Glasgow in the kindly kingdom o"
Scotland, I"ll be honest with you. My father called me Ninian Campbell, and there"s no better blood in Breadalbane."
What could I do after that but make him a present of the trivial facts about myself and my doings? There was a look of friendly humour about this dare-devil which captured my fancy. I saw in him the stuff of which adventurers are made, and though I was a sober merchant, I was also young. For days I had been dreaming of foreign parts and an Odyssey of strange fortunes, and here on a Glasgow stairhead I had found Ulysses himself.
"Is it not the pity," he cried, "that such talents as yours should rust in a dark room in the Candleriggs? Believe me, Mr. Garvald, I have seen some pretty shots, but I have never seen your better."
Then I told him that I was sailing within a month for Virginia, and he suddenly grew solemn.
"It looks like Providence," he said, "that we two should come together.
I, too, will soon be back in the Western Seas, and belike we"ll meet.
I"m something of a rover, and I never bide long in the same place, but I whiles pay a visit to James Town, and they ken me well on the Eastern Sh.o.r.e and the Accomac beaches."
He fell to giving me such advice as a traveller gives to a novice. It was strange hearing for an honest merchant, for much of it was concerned with divers ways of outwitting the law. By and by he was determined to convoy me to my lodgings, for he pointed out that I was unarmed; and I think, too, he had still hopes of another meeting with Long Colin, his cousin.
"I leave Glasgow the morrow"s morn," he said, "and it"s no likely we"ll meet again in Scotland. Out in Virginia, no doubt, you"ll soon be a great man, and sit in Council, and hob-n.o.b with the Governor. But a midge can help an elephant, and I would gladly help you, for you had the goodwill to help me. If ye need aid you will go to Mercer"s Tavern at James Town down on the water front, and you will ask news of Ninian Campbell. The man will say that he never heard tell of the name, and then you will speak these words to him. You will say "The lymphads are on the loch, and the horn of Diarmaid has sounded." Keep them well in mind, for some way or other they will bring you and me together."
Without another word he was off, and as I committed the gibberish to memory I could hear his song going up the Saltmarket:--
"The minister kissed the fiddler"s wife, And he couldna preach for thinkin" o"t."
CHAPTER V.
MY FIRST COMING TO VIRGINIA.
There are few moments in life to compare with a traveller"s first sight of a new land which is destined to be for short or long his home. When, after a fair and speedy voyage, we pa.s.sed Point Comfort, and had rid ourselves of the revenue men, and the tides bore us up the estuary of a n.o.ble river, I stood on deck and drank in the heady foreign scents with a boyish ecstasy. Presently we had opened the capital city, which seemed to me no more than a village set amid gardens, and Mr. Lambie had come aboard and greeted me. He conveyed me to the best ordinary in the town which stood over against the Court-house. Late in the afternoon, just before the dark fell, I walked out to drink my fill of the place.
You are to remember that I was a country lad who had never set foot forth of Scotland. I was very young, and hot on the quest of new sights and doings. As I walked down the unpaven street and through the narrow tobacco-grown lanes, the strange smell of it all intoxicated me like wine.
There was a great red sunset burning over the blue river and kindling the far forests till they glowed like jewels. The frogs were croaking among the reeds, and the wild duck squattered in the dusk. I pa.s.sed an Indian, the first I had seen, with c.o.c.k"s feathers on his head, and a curiously tattooed chest, moving as light as a sleep-walker. One or two townsfolk took the air, smoking their long pipes, and down by the water a negro girl was singing a wild melody. The whole place was like a mad, sweet-scented dream to one just come from the unfeatured ocean, and with a memory only of grim Scots cities and dour Scots hills. I felt as if I had come into a large and generous land, and I thanked G.o.d that I was but twenty-three.
But as I was mooning along there came a sudden interruption on my dreams. I was beyond the houses, in a path which ran among tobacco-sheds and little gardens, with the river lapping a stone"s-throw off. Down a side alley I caught a glimpse of a figure that seemed familiar.
"Twas that of a tall, hulking man, moving quickly among the tobacco plants, with something stealthy in his air. The broad, bowed shoulders and the lean head brought back to me the rainy moorlands about the Cauldstaneslap and the mad fellow whose prison I had shared. Muckle John had gone to the Plantations, and "twas Muckle John or the devil that was moving there in the half light.
I cried on him, and ran down the side alley.
But it seemed that he did not want company, for he broke into a run.