The Standard Bearer

I was about to answer when Mary interrupted.

“Nay, father,” she cried, looking him fearlessly in the face; “it was I that proffered my love. He would not ask me, though I tried to make him. I had to tell him that I loved him, and make him ask me to marry him!”

Was it fancy that the flicker of a smile passed at that moment over the grim countenance of the Bull?

His wife was again about to speak, but he turned fiercely on her and bade her be silent.

“And now,” he said, turning to his daughter, “what do you propose to do with your man when ye have ‘speered’ him?”

He used the local country expression for a proposal of marriage. “I will marry him here and now,” she said; adding hastily, “that is, if he will have me.”

“Ye had better speer him that too!” said her father, grimly.

“I will do better,” cried Mary Gordon. “I will acknowledge him!”

And holding up my hand in hers she cried aloud: “I take you for my husband, Quintin MacClellan!” She looked up at me with a challenge in her eye.

“My wife!” was all that I could utter.

“Well,” said Sandy, “that is your bed made, my lassie. You have both said it before witnesses. You must take him now, whether ye will or not!

“Hugh,” he cried, with a sudden roar towards the servants’ quarters. And from the haymow in the barn where he had been making a pretence of work a retainer appeared with a scared expression on his face.

“Run over to the cot-house at the road-end and tell the minister lad that the Dumfries Presbytery deposed to come to the Earlstoun and that smartly, else I will come down and fetch him myself!”

The man was already on his way ere the sentence was ended, and when the Laird roared the last words after him he fairly seemed to jump.

He was out of sight among the trees a moment after.

“Now,” said Alexander Gordon, “Mary and you have proclaimed yourselves man and wife. Ye shall be soundly married by a minister, and then ye shall go your ways forth. Think not that I will give you the worth of a boddle either in gear or land. Ye have asked me no permission. Ye have defied me. I say not that I will disown ye. But, at least, I owe you nothing.”

“Father,” said Mary, “did I ask you for aught, or did Quintin?”

“Nay,” said he, grimly, “not even for my daughter.”

“Then,” said she, “do not refuse that for which you have not been asked!”

“And how may you propose to live?” her father went on triumphantly. “Ye would not look at him when he had kirk and glebe, manse and stipend. And now ye take him by force when he is no better than a beggar at the dykeback. That it is to be a woman!”

She kindled at the words.

“And what a thing to be a man! Ye think that a woman’s love consists in goods and gear, comfortable beds and fine apparelling!”

“Comfortable beds are not to be lightlied,” said her father; “as ye will find, my lass, or a’ be done.”

She did not heed him, but flashed on with her defiance.

“You, and those like you, think that the way to win a woman is to bide till ye have made all smooth, so that there be not a curl on the rose-leaves, nor yet a bitter drop in the cup. Even Quintin there thought thus, till he learned better.”

She did not so much as pause to smile, though I think her father did – but covertly.

“No!” she cried, “I love, and because I love I will (as you say floutingly) be ready to lie at a dykeback like a tinkler’s wench. I will follow my man through the world because he is my man – yes, all the more because he is injured, despised, one who has had little happiness and no satisfaction in life. And now I will give him these things. I – I only will make it all up to him. With my love I can do it, and I will!”

Her father nodded menacingly.

“Ye shall try the dykebacks this very nicht, my lass! And ye shall e’en see how ye like them, after the fine linen sheets and panelled chambers of the Earlstoun.”

But her mother broke out at last.

“No, my bairn!” she cried. “Married or single ye shall not go forth from us thus!”

“Hold your tongue, woman!” roared the Bull, shaking the very firmament with his voice.

“Be not feared, my lass; ye shall have your mother’s countenance, though your father cast you off,” said Janet Gordon, nodding at us with unexpected graciousness.

“Hold your peace, I tell you!”

“Aye, Sandy, when I have done!”

“Though he turn you to the doorstep I will pray for you,” she went on; “and for company on the way I will give you a copy of my meditations, which are most meet and precious.”

Her husband laughed a quick, mocking laugh.

“A bundle of clean sarks wad fit them better – but here comes the minister.”

I turned about somewhat shamefacedly, and there, bowing to the Laird of Earlstoun, was young Gilchrist of Dunscore, whom the Presbytery of Dumfries had lately deposed. He was about to begin a speech of congratulation, but the Bull broke through.

“Marry these two!” he commanded.

And with his finger he pointed at Mary and myself, as if he had been ordering us for immediate execution.

“But – ” began the minister.

Instantly an astonishing volume of sound filled the house.

“But me no buts! Tie them up this moment! Or, by the Lord, I will eviscerate you with my sword!”

And with that he snatched his great basket-hilted blade from the scabbard, where it swung on a pin by the side of the door.

So, with a quaking minister, my own head dazed and uncertain with the whirl of events, and Mary Gordon giving her father back defiant glance for glance, we were married decently and in order.

“Now,” said Alexander Gordon, so soon as the “Amen” was out, “go to your chamber with your mother, Mistress Mary! Take whatever ye can carry, but no more, and get you gone out of this house with the man you have chosen. I will teach you to be fond of dykebacks and of throwing yourself away upon beggarly, broken men!”

And he frowned down upon her, as with head erect and scornful carriage she swept past him – her mother trotting behind like a frightened child.

I think Alexander Gordon greatly desired to say something to me while he and I stood waiting for her return. For he kept shifting his weight from one foot to the other, now turning to the window, anon humming half a tune and breaking off short in the midst. But ever as he came towards me with obvious intent to speak, he checked himself, shaking his head sagely, and so resumed again his restless marching to and fro.

Presently my lass came down with a proud high look on her face, her mother following after, all beblubbered with tears and wringing her hands silently.