Читать книгу Land Of The Leal - James Barke - Страница 19

Sam MacKitteroch died peacefully in his sleep. His death was not discovered till late in the afternoon. The news spread quickly. Sam had given offence to no one and many had cause to be grateful to his memory. For an old man without kith or kin the turn-out at his funeral was one of the largest that had ever foregathered in the parish of Kirkcolm. Sir Thomas MacCready who was held up in his carriage by the cortege was indignant when he found out how socially unimportant the corpse was.

Sam’s death was felt most keenly by Andrew Ramsay and the Reverend John Ross. Many remarked that the minister had never preached a better sermon in his life. But Sam’s death disturbed the minister more deeply than any one suspected. It brought him face to face with his own personal problems. So much so that, in less than a month, he was buried beside his old cronie.

It was late one night in the autumn when he had rung for the maid, Mary Sloan, and requested her to go to MacHaffie’s for a bottle of rum. The minister had been more than usually gloomy during the past few days but the maid did not worry overmuch. She was well used to his moods. When he came round from a bout of drinking his liverish ill-temper was something to be avoided. Mary knew that he had been drinking continuously for three days: no doubt the rum was intended to bring him round.

Nothing unusual happened on the outward journey. The night was oppressively dark and sultry. Mary felt difficulty in breathing. She was glad to be out in the open for it was dreadfully stuffy in the manse.

Bob MacHaffie had his joke with Mary: he managed a kiss and a cuddle in the shadow of the back door. But Mary could not stay. The minister was in a black mood: she would need to hurry back… maybe if Bob could come round later …

Bob MacHaffie winked.

‘So the auld beggar thinks the rum will put a lining on his guts, does he? Well, we’ll see. Hold on and I’ll get him a bottle.’

Bob retired to his pantry and mixed some five gills of rum – his eyelid came down in a heavy wink. If this rum didn’t put a lining on his stomach at least it would put him to sleep …

‘Aye …. so he’s been salving his conscience, has he?’

‘He’s hardly tasted a bite for three days.’

‘Fine! I’ll be round in an hour. You’ll no’ need to worry much about the Reverend John to-night.’

Mary was very lonesome in the manse. There was no one to speak to and there was little pleasure in cooking food that was never eaten. There was the constant dread of the minister breaking out into one of his violent abusive fits …

She had just turned into the narrow winding lane that led to the manse when a huge ball of fire shot past her and disappeared.

Mary Sloan felt the strength leave her limbs. She could not cry out: her throat muscles were paralysed. She managed to get to the door of the manse and close it behind her. Her breathing came in spasmodic gasps and she clutched the bottle tightly to her bosom.

She had scarcely recovered her breathing when the minister called to her from the study. Somehow she was glad to hear the sound of his voice. Instinctively she stumbled forward to answer the summons.

She found the Reverend John Ross standing at the window looking out towards the Loch. He did not seem to hear her as she entered the room. She waited for a moment and then coughed discreetly. She noticed how untidy were the papers on his desk and how books were piled everywhere – many of them open. It was a dirty untidy room; but he would not allow her to redd it and she could only dust it in his presence.

The minister seemed transfixed. She could see by the cast of his head that he was looking into the distance. What could he see in the darkness?

When she could bear the tension no longer she blurted out:

‘Here’s your bottle, sir.’

The minister turned sharply. His eyes seemed to burn and glow.

‘Ah, my bottle! What kept you?’

‘Kept me? Nothing, sir. I ran there and back: only a big ball o’ fire nearly killed me as I turned into the lane.’

The minister raised his head slightly as if listening. He turned slowly and gazed intently into the recess beyond the fireplace.

‘So you’ve come at last, have you?’

Mary Sloan cast a frightened glance into the recess but there was nothing save the darkness of the shadows where the light of the fire and the shaded oil lamp did not reach. She felt she wanted to run.

‘That will be all you’ll be wanting of me to-night, sir?’

The Reverend John Ross turned his head slowly in her direction and she saw that the light had died in his eyes. They were sunk and lustreless and the colour seemed to have drained from his cheeks. It semed impossible that such a change could have come over a man in the turn of his head.

‘Aye … that will be all, Mary. Bolt the doors and see that the windows are made fast. Go to bed. You hear me? Go to bed! No matter what you may hear do not move from your room. Do you understand me?’

‘Yes, sir. Is that all?’

‘No, that is not all. In the morning, at the hour of seven, go to the Suie and tell Andrew Ramsay to come to me.’

‘Go to Andrew Ramsay at seven o’clock and tell him you want him?’

‘That is correct. But see that you do not enter this room, or any other room, before you go: let yourself out quietly by the back door. Now go to bed and remember to pay attention to what I have said. Good-night!’

Mary Sloan turned and hurried from the room. But she took care in her flight to close the door. She had scarcely reached her room when she was almost blinded by a teriffic sheet of flame. The cry had not strangled in her throat when she felt the earth being torn asunder beneath her feet and the heavens crashing downwards.

No one in Galloway could recall such a storm of lightning and thunder and rain. Flash consumed flash; all the drums of heaven rolled and crashed till the very earth rocked and swayed on its spinning axis; the clouds burst and torrential cascading rain poured down on the land.

The call of the flesh, strong as it was to Bob MacHaffie, could not triumph over his fear of the unleashed elements. Nor could he console himself in drink for the end of the world might well be nigh and the terror of being catapulted into eternity was stronger than all the combined strength of strong drink. He crouched, trembling and afraid, in the cellar.

The morning sun rose on a stricken world staggering under the burden of shock and destruction.

Andrew Ramsay slipped on his well-worn jacket and came quietly with Mary Sloan. There was a resignation, a weariness about him, that was not altogether the result of a sleepless night. It did not seem as if sleep would ever again refresh and re-invigorate him. His head was bent forward over his chest: his eyes seemed to be closed in meditation.

He was not surprised at the summons. Of late the minister had been very queer. He had seemed to be more of his old self at the grave of Sam MacKitteroch than he had been for a long time. And yet something seemed to have passed from him into that grave. In the pulpit his voice was cold and passionless. He spoke with little conviction or authority either on Heaven or Hell. Going about the parish he recognised people with difficulty: his salutations seemed to come from afar off. But no one passed comment. The Reverend John Ross had always been a queer man …

Andrew Ramsay alone had any inkling of his minister’s trouble. But it was no more than an inkling. John Ross had lost his bearings, was drifting on the dark uncharted waters of unbelief. He had lost faith: he had lost hope: he was no longer in direct communion with his Maker. He was trembling on the brink of Hell.

But the minister’s trouble was capable of more rational explanation. He had no roots. He had no real part in the life of the community. He preached sermons, he baptised children, he gave the last rites. But he did not live with the people and the people looked on him as something above and apart from their day-to-day existence. His life was lived in the manse with his books. Once a week he foregathered with his leading elders and talked and drank. But since Sam MacKitteroch died it was brought home to him that his life had neither purpose nor significance: that there was nothing for him but to grow old and lonely and die. Already his eyesight was failing so that he had difficulty in reading by candle-light. Physical desire burned very low in him. Strange and morbid fancies began to take possession of his mind. More and more he sought relief in the bottle. But alcohol only increased his morbidity. The conception of the Devil began to fill his night-thoughts. He had never been pious, never felt himself in direct communion with his God. The Almighty had never been more to him than a theological and quasi-philosophical abstraction.

In the uselessness and idleness and terrible loneliness of his days and nights the mind of John Ross became slowly deranged …

Andrew Ramsay found his body in the study. The throat had been gashed with a razor. The minister had made several attempts before he had succeeded in mortally wounding himself. There was blood everywhere. It had gushed over his desk, his books and his papers. Still bleeding, he had staggered round the room…

Now that he saw what had happened Andrew Ramsay was not surprised; but he felt sick and weak. There was no doubt that this was the Devil’s work. He remembered with significance many strange sayings of John Ross.

He drew the back of his coat sleeve across his face. Tears were in his eyes. Many a pleasant Sabbath they had spent together in the Auld Kirk vestry …

He locked the study door. Taking the key with him he went down to the kitchen and sent Mary Sloan for Doctor Gebbie. There was no need for any one to know what had happened to the minister. Not even Sir Thomas MacCready or the Presbytery must know. David MacGhie, the undertaker, could be trusted. David was an elder himself and would understand. Doctor Gebbie was also a man of some understanding and sympathy. He had managed to save Richard’s name from the shame of suicide.

Andrew Ramsay sat alone in the manse kitchen waiting for the doctor. Of his intimate friends and cronies, the companions of his youth, there remained only William MacGeoch. He brooded, as he had brooded since the death of Richard, on the transitoriness of life. Life was pain and anguish and heart-break. It was hard to believe that the Father could treat His children so. God might not be mocked: but for all that the wicked seemed to flourish like the green bay tree. What sin had Richard and John Ross committed that they had not? For if John Ross had been tempted by the Power of Darkness it did not seem that the Lord had struggled for his soul. But maybe the Father had long ceased to care for His children. Maybe there was nothing between man and nature, between life and death, but what man’s mind put there. Andrew Ramsay could not be sure.