'Buckle it on, and take it with you,' said the Earl, 'lest looking long upon it my heart should smite me, and I want it back again.'
So I thanked him and presently was gone without great ceremony, lest, indeed, it should be so.
'Stay the night at Cassillis,' he cried after me. 'I have a letter to send to my eame the Tutor in the morning.'
CHAPTER XI
SWORD AND SPIT
The house of Cassillis is not a great place for size, to be so famous. But the Earl has many castles, to which he goes oftentimes – specially to the grand house of the new style which he is building at the Inch, and from which he means to assert his overlordship of the Lairds of Galloway, which, as I see it, is likely to breed him trouble – more than if he had stayed here at home and flairdied his old gammer mistress into good humour.
So, leaving his presence, I went to see that Dom Nicholas had the best of food and bedding, passing through the grooms and men-at-arms in the bravery of my Damascus sword, walking carelessly as though I wore suchlike every day – a thing I liked well to do. I also made them change the straw for better, though, indeed, there was little to find fault with. But it is always best when one goes first into the stables of the great to speak loud, to cry, 'Here, sirrah, what means this?' And then order fresh bedding to be brought, and that instantly. Thus I made myself respected, and so walked out, while the grooms bowed, pulling the while at my moustache and pressing upon the hilt of my sword, so that the point stood out at the proper angle behind with my cloak a-droop over it, as I have said.
Then, on my way back to the house, I must needs pass – or so I made it appear – through the kitchens, where I found my tyrant Venus-of-the-fiery-face in the act of cooking the supper.
Seeing me lean against the baking board, dressed so cap-à-pie, she came and brushed me a place to sit upon. Then she asked, 'Would I be pleased to drink a cup of sack – rare and old?'
So, seeing her set on it, I denied her not; but sat down, unbuckling my weapon for ease's sake, and throwing it down with clank of blade and jingle of buckle on the clear-scoured boards of the great deal table in the midst. The Lord forgive me for caring so mightily about these things and so little for going to church! Some good day, doubtless, I shall change about. And in the meanwhile, what would you?
Were you that chance to read never eighteen and thought you not well of yourself, having a new sword? If not, the Lord pity you. It is little ye ken.
But all the while I longed to hear more of Sir Thomas Tode, and if it might be, to see him. So I asked of the lady of the pans where her husband was.
She set her thumb over her shoulder, pointing to a narrow door as of an aumrie or wall press.
'He is in there,' she said shortly.
'And what else is there in there?' said I, laughing, for what was I the wiser?
'Half a bullock is in there,' she said, laughing also. 'That is the meat-cupboard. It is fine and caller, and he is not troubled with flies upon his miserable bald head.'
'The meat-safe,' cried I, much astonished; 'and what does a reverend chaplain and a knight in the meat-safe?'
'The old dotard will not quit his maundering about the Black Vaut of Dunure to every one that comes near. He got hold of a silly chapman in the yard that came with fish from Ayr, and I declare he must sit down and prate by the hour of the Black Vaut of Dunure. So I shut him up in the meat-safe. Faith, I will give him Black Vaut of Dunure ere I have done with him. The Black Vaut of Cassillis and the company of the dinner roast will set him better.'
'And what says my lord to your using his chaplain so?'
The lady gazed at me a moment in a kind of wilderment. Then she broke into the vulgar speech of the country, which, because I learned to write English as those at the Queen's Court do, I have used but seldom in this chronicle – though, of course, not for lack of knowledge.
'Sain me,' she said, 'this may be a queer, uncanny world, but it is surely no come to that o't yet, that a wife mauna check and chastise her ain man. Guid Lord, no – life wadna be worth leevin' – see till this – ' she said.
And taking a key from her pocket she rapidly unlocked the door of the meat-closet.
Sir Thomas was discovered sitting most forlornly within, upon the corner of a great chest, with many pieces of meat depending from hooks about his head. His wife, reaching in from the step, took him by the top-knot of hair as by a handle, and pulled him out upon the floor of the kitchen with one movement of her arm.
'It's a guid's mercy,' she cried, 'that yince ye war a papish monk wi' a shaven crown, for the place that ye keepit bare sae lang has ripened late, after a' the lave o' the crap has been blawn awa' wi' the wind.'
I had been endeavouring to explain to myself the strangeness of the wisp upon Sir Thomas's head, but the words of his wife made clear the matter. It was but the retarded growth of his long fallow tonsure.
'An' it's a de'il o' a queer thing,' said Mistress Tode, 'that turning your coat ootside in should turn your hair inside oot! Heard ye ever the mak' o' that?'
'It was all owing to – ' began Sir Thomas Tode, looking at his wife with a cringing shamefacedness that was most entertaining.
'Oh, I ken,' interrupted his wife, 'it was owing to the Black Vaut o' Dunure, nae doot! I declare I canna haud ye aff it. I jaloose that it maun hae been owing to the Black Vaut o' Dunure that Mary Greg, a decent cook woman and a deacon in her trade, took up wi' the likes o' you – that mak's yoursel' nae better than a mountibank wi' your yammer-yammering like a corn-crake aboot black vauts and roasted abbots. Fegs, I declare I could roast ye yoursel'. Ye are that muckle thocht and care to me, but ye wadna pay for the trouble. Even the Earl himsel' couldna mak' a profit oot o' you – an' a' folk kens that he wad drive a flea to London market for the sake o' the horns and hide!'
'Wheesht, wheesht, honest woman!' said Sir Thomas Tode, 'wha kens wha may be listenin' – maybe the Countess her very sel'.'
'Faith, an' I carena,' cried the brave cook, tossing her head, 'she is a backstairs body at ony gate, but she canna fear me – na, brawly no'. I ken ower muckle. I ken things the Earl doesna ken. Certes an' serve him richt – a young man like him – but three-an'-twenty, to mairry his grandmither. Though guid kens Mary Greg is no the woman to speak, that mairried nocht better than an auld skeleton hung on strings – for nae sounder reason than that it is the custom for the cook in a decent big hoose to tak' up wi' the chaplain.'
The kitchen began to fill, and I bethought me that I should be going; for it was not seemly that a gentleman and a squire should collogue overly long with all the orra serving-men and women in a great house. But before I could lift my sword and depart, there came in a dark, burly man with a sharp-cleft eagle's face on him, his eyes very close together, and a contemptuous sneer that was liker a snarl, on his face.
'Good e'en to ye, John Dick,' said the cook. 'Mind ye keep the peace, ye wull-cat, for there are to be no collieshangies in my kitchen!'
A voice called something querulously down the stairs.
'Coming the noo, my leddy,' cried Mrs Tode, the cook of Cassillis, 'I am juist pittin' on the pot – '
And she vanished up the stair.
As soon as she was gone, Sir Thomas appeared to wake up from a dream. He looked eagerly around him.
'She will no be back for a while,' he said. 'I might have a chance. I maun tell you of the roasting of the abbot. Man, I saw it – I was there. I held him on the ribs o' the grate. I set him on the brander, and poured the oil on him that he might be roasted in sop. Oh, man, ye think I am a fool. Ever since that day, never hae I been alone without seeing the face o' him, crying out for them to ding whingers into him, or blaw him up wi' powder to ease him – the auld Earl girnin' at him like a wild cat, and hunkering low to watch, with his hands on his knees. Oh, young men, never you put your hand to the torture of man, for it bides with you in the brain –