Then I knew that I was lost indeed. For by the flickering light of a dying fire of driftwood I could see that I was again in the cave of Sawny Bean, in the same wide hall with the strange narrow hams a-swing on the roof, the tubs of salt meat festering under the eaves, and the wild savage crew dancing about me.
What wonder that my heart fainted within me to be thus left alone in that den of hideous things, and especially to think of the free birds going to their beds on the cliffs above me and the fishing solan geese circling and balancing home to the lonely rock of Ailsa.
'Ha, Sir Launcelot Kennedy,' said a mocking voice, as the deafening turmoil quieted a little, 'you are near your honours now—that is, if there be such bauble dignities either in heaven or hell. The Treasure of Kelwood in hand, John Mure's life out of hand—and there on the shelf (as it were) are your broad acres and your bonny lady!'
I was silent, for I knew that nothing could avail me now. It was useless to waste words.
'But ere all that comes to pass,' he went on, 'there are sundry little formalities to be gone through.—Oh, we are right dainty folk here in Sawny Bean's mansion. You shall be kept warm and cherished tenderly. There are here twenty sonsier queans than the one whose heart you desire. Warmly shall they welcome, sweetly shall they cherish handsome Sir Launcelot. Their embracements shall sting you more than all sweethearting raptures.'
Again he pauses to observe the effect of his words.
'You that so lately held me in chase, like a steer that has escaped from the shambles. Now you yourself are in the thills. You that have crossed me a thousand times in my plans since that frore night in Sir Thomas Nesbitt's yard in Maybole, you shall now be crossed in a new fashion. You that wagged tongue so merrily at another's expense, you shall see your tongue wag upon the redhot brander to an unkenned tune.
'You that have ridden so fast and so far, you shall ride your last ride—ride slowly, very slowly,' cried the fiend in my ear, 'for I shall hoard every drop of your blood as John of Cassillis hoards his gold rose nobles. I shall husband every minute of your life, as though they were the hours of young bridal content.
'Ye have bruised my old face indeed with your oaken staff, but I will cherish yours, that is youthful and blooming. Tenderly shall we take off the coverture of hide, the tegument of beauty. Sawny Bean has famous skill in such surgery. Gently will we lay you down in the swarming nest of the patient ant. We have read how Scripture bids the sluggard go to the ant, for if that makes him not lively, nothing will. I have ofttimes commented on the passage at family worship. And I must see that the young and headstrong, like you, my Lord Launcelot, give heed to that which is commanded.'
But in spite of all his terrible threatenings, I bode still and answered him never a word. They laid logs of driftwood upon the fire, till the whole inside of the cave grew bright and clear; and all the monstrous deformity of the women and the cruel hideousness of the men were made apparent as in broad daylight. Some of them were painted and stained like demons, and danced and leaped through the fire like them, too. For such monsters have not been heard of, much less seen, in the history of any country as were Sawny Bean and his crew in the cave upon the seashore of Bennanbrack.
'Bring me a knife,' cried John Mure from where he sat, for he appeared like a chief devil among a company of gibbering lubber fiends. He had still his grey cloak about him. His plumed hat was upon his head, and he looked, save for the eyes of him in which the fires of hell burned, a civil, respectable, well-put-on man of means and substance. As, indeed, save for his evil heart he might have been, for he came of as good a family as the Earl of Cassillis, or, as it might be, as I myself, Launcelot Kennedy of Kirrieoch.
So when Auchendrayne asked for a knife, Sawny Bean himself, the ruffian kemper, low-browed, buck-toothed, and inhuman, brought it to him with a grin. He made as if he would have set it in me to the hilt. But John Mure stayed him.
'Bide,' he said, 'not so fast. There is long and sweet pleasuring to come before that—such slow, relishing delight, such covetous mouseplay of the brindled cat, such luxurious tiger-licking of the delicate skin till it be raw, such well-conceited dainty torments as when one would bite his love and be glad of it. He shall taste them all, this frolic squire of errant-dames, this gamesome player upon pipes, this curious handler of quaint love tunes. Ere we pluck the red rose of his life, he shall sate himself with new delicious experience—rarer than the handling of many maidens' tresses.'
I was moved to speak to him.
'I ask not mercy,' said I, 'for I own that I would have killed you if I could. But as you are a valiant man, give me a sword and let me make a stand for it against you all, that as I have lived so I may also die fighting.'
But he mocked me, hurrying on in his heady turmoil of words.
'"If I be a man," you say—who said that I was a man? Do I act as other men? Is my knowledge like that of other men? Do I company with other men? Call you that a man?' (He pointed to Sawny Bean, who for wantonness sat on an upturned tub, striking with a keen-edged knife at the legs of all that came by for mere delight of blood, storming at them meantime with horrid imprecations to approach nearer and be flicked.) 'Or call you these men?' (He showed me some of the younger cannibal race gnawing like kennelled dogs at horrid bones.) 'Nay, my dainty wanton, you shall not enter Hell through the brave brattle of warring blades, nor yet handling your rapier like a morris-dancer. But as the blood drains to the white from the stricken calf, so shall they whiten your flesh for the tooth, and so reluctantly shall your life drip from you drop by drop.'
And I declare that this scornful fiend telling me of tortures in choice words made me scunner more than the prick of the knife. For the abhorred invention quickened the imagination and set the nerves agate.
So that I was honestly glad when he took knife in hand—a shoemaker's curved blade with a keen cutting edge.
'Strip him naked!' he cried. And very cheerfully so they did, smiting me the meantime with the broad of their hand.
Then John Mure leaned over me delicately, and made as though he would have traced with his knife the jointing of my limbs, saying, 'Thus and thus shall the she-tribe dismember your body when the torture of the ant's nest is ended.' And again 'Here is toothsome eating, Sawny Bean, thou chief lover of dainty vivers.'
Then, as the evil man went on with his pitiless jestings, his grey cloak began to waver before me, his face to glow like fire, and I fainted or dwamed away till the sharp knife pricked me into consciousness again.
Yet Auchendrayne overdid his threatening, for the too sharp relish of the words issued in tranced dulness ere the matter came to action. And of torture there was none that I can now remember or bear the mark of—save only the slight scores of the knife which he made when he showed me where they would joint and haggle my body.
Indeed, I mind no more till I came to myself, lying on my back, with the cave all empty save for John Mure—who sat, as before, with his hand to his ear listening.
But there sounded a great and furious uproar down by the cave mouth, the deep baying of bloodhounds, the fierce cry of many voices striving for mastery, and above all the shrieks of the smitten.
Surely, I thought, there is a battle fierce and fell at the cave's mouth. John Mure sat and listened for a long space, and presently he looked over at me.
'I will even make sure of him, come what may,' he said.
And with that he took the knife and came nearer to smite me in the breast, and I lay as one dead already, waiting for the stroke.
But even in that moment as I held my breath a ravening hound darted within the cave, overleaped the embers of the fire, and pinned the grey-haired murderer to the earth by the throat. He struck out desperately, but the dog held him fast. Another and another came in, till, as it seemed, he was in danger of being torn to pieces of dogs.
But me they minded not at all, for (as I say) I lay as one dead.
* * * * *
And this is the story of the chase as Nell told it to me when all was over.
As they of the King's company looked from the shore towards the south, there in the distance was John Mure on his horse disappearing into the wood, and I (as it seemed) at his very heels. Both of us were leaning far forward, like men that run a race. And because she knew that I carried no equipment with me, Nell leaped upon a horse with a sword laid before her crosswise on the saddle.
Whereupon I turned to Nell and called her the bravest maid in broad Scotland, with other names as I could mind them. But she set her head aside, and would content me nothing (though I was minded for kindness), saying only, 'If you do not desire to hear the tale, then I am saved the fash of telling it. 'Tis no time for fooling,' said she, 'when I am speaking of the saving of your life.'
'Nell,' said I (for I was nettled at her indifference), 'thou art an unseasoned lass, skilless in love's mysteries.'
'I want none of Kate Allison's love-skilling at second hand,' said Nell, harking back like a pretty shrew on her former taunts. 'Since ye are so wise, unriddle me the manner of your saving from the cave of Sawny Bean, and I am content to yield me to your teaching in the mysteries.'
Yet even with this fair promise I could not, but desired her instead to continue her tale-telling.
'Well,' said she, 'Robert Harburgh it was who, next after me, took horse—and not far behind either. For he had but to disentangle the bridle from his arm, while I had to beguile another to lend me his horse.
'So, in a little, we were all after you, and we took the wood in the very place you entered. But naught could we find save the trail of you all confused among the trees. Then what a chasing hither and thither there followed. Even the King searched for you like any common man, and puffed and blew upon his purple cheeks like the Dominie on his pipes. And he that had been our companion, this same Dominie, went about everywhere, seeking and crying each time that he came near to me, "Reckless loon, reckless loon, well he deserves to be unbreeched and soundly paid for this hardiness."
'Then we utterly lost you, and I believe they would have given up the search. But I minded me of the dogs that James of Chapeldonnan keeps for his own purposes, which on my way to Ailsa I had seen his wife feed. So I told the Earl John of them, and he had James Bannatyne brought, and bade him bring them to set on the trail, promising him his life if the matter were brought to a good issue.
'And so Robert Harburgh and a few swords were sent to Chapeldonnan with James Bannatyne—with his life upon it if he played them false, and Robert Harburgh's sword near his ribs each time that he faltered or failed to remember. And the good wife, seeing her man in such deadly case, came back herself to plead with the King for him.
'So the Chapeldonnan pack was laid on the trail, and fine well-hungered bloodhounds they were. But so soon as I heard the first deep bay, when, with noses on the ground, they took the line of the shore, it went to my heart that since you were the last to enter the wood the dogs would first seize you. So I cried a word to Robert Harburgh, and we two that loved you spurred horses and sped on well-nigh level with the dogs.
'And through all the windings and wimplings of your path we followed till we came to the shore, where, together with the King's oaken staff which had been in your hand, we found the place all trampled with naked feet and stains of blood. So we traced you across the shore grass to the sand and over the sand into the sea, with a company of bare feet and many stains of blood.
'Then for a moment I knew not what to think. But Marjorie, my sister, cried out, "It is the vile wretches of Sawny Bean's band who have taken him to the Cave of Death!"
'Then I remembered that the entrance to the cavern was among the rocks, and yet because of the gladness that was in our hearts when we issued forth, I had taken no very great pains to mind the exact place. Nor was the Dominie aught the wiser. For he had been wholly intent on blowing upon his pipes. But Marjorie minded better than any of us the cleave in the rocks, and showed us to a nearness where the cave entrance was. But the tide had flowed in, and we had perforce to wait and calm our impatience as best we might till it went back again, ere we could follow into the cave mouth. But by this time it was dark, so that the men-at-arms had to find rosin torches and set them alight.
'Thus with the flambeaux blazing and the smoke wavering red overhead we took our way along the wet edge of the sea. But the tide had washed away all traces of blood and feet. Up and down the coast we wandered trying every covert. And yet for our lives we could not hit upon the right cave's entrance. The dogs ran yelping and nosing here and there, but for long nothing came of it.
'Then Earl John and the King himself threatened James Bannatyne to reveal the place. But he denied that he had any knowledge of the cave. And whether he spoke truth or no I cannot say. But his wife went to the King and holding his bridle rein, she said, "Well do I ken, your Majesty, that my man's life is forfeit, but he is my husband. And at least, so far as it concerns him and me, betwixt barn-door and bed-stock I can rule him as a wife should. Gin I persuade him to lead you to the spot, will ye on your word, give me my ain man's life?"
'So the King promised, though Earl John hung a little on the form of the words. Then went the goodwife of Chapeldonnan to her husband. And what she said to him I know not, for they spake privily and apart. But though at first he shook his head and denied, as I could see, that he had any knowledge of the Cave of Death, yet in a little while he took some other thought and ran forward to grip one of the dogs.
'Then went James Bannatyne on ahead, with all of us hotfoot after him, with the torches and the swords.'
'And you also, Nell,' said I,' 'were you lurking with the men-at-arms, and which had you, a sword or a torch?'
'I had both,' said Nell Kennedy, shortly. And went on with her tale as if she had been speaking of milking-stools.
'James Bannatyne took the dog into all the wide cave mouths and made him smell the walls and floor above the tide mark, talking to the brute all the time and encouraging him. But for a long time it was still in vain.
'At last the other dog which had been left to itself, bayed out suddenly from among the rocks, where it had found a dark and dismal archway with a wide pool of water in it, which we had passed time and again without suspicion. And at the entrance to this place we found the second hound, with tail erected, baying up the cave mouth from the edge of the pool.
'Then so soon as James Bannatyne brought in his well-taught dog, it began to smell hither and thither with erected ears and bristling hair. Presently it swam away into the darkness. And because the men hesitated to go after the beast, I took the water to show them the way.'
Hearing which, I had made my acknowledgments.
But Nell said, 'No, no; hear my tale first.'
'Then with me there came Robert Harburgh, and after him the Earl and all his company with their torches. The pool proved shallow, and after many turns and windings we came to a wide place—indeed, to the same beach with sand and dripping fingers of stone where we had first found ourselves. And here also we passed the remains of our boat, for it was to this point that we had rowed that night when we took refuge in the lion's den. The savages had broken most of it up for firewood, yet enough remained so that I knew it again.
'But ere the men-at-arms had time to gather behind us, a host of wild creatures armed with stones, knives, and sheath-whittles burst upon us, yelling like demons of the pit. Women also there were, some half clad and some wholly without cleading. And then and there was a fight such as you, Launce, love to tell about, but I have no skill in. For the men-at-arms shot, and we that had but swords struck, while the wild folk shouted and the savage women bit and tore with their nails till the cavern was full of confused noise and the red reek of burning torches. But ever as the slain rolled among our feet they gripped to pull us down, so that in the intervals of his fighting Robert Harburgh went hither and thither "making siccar," as he said, with a coup de grace for each poor clawing wretch.
'And in the narrow doorway through which you found the way, stood the chief himself, with his eyes fiery-red, and his hair about his face. He gripped a mighty axe in his hand, and with it he stood ready to cleave all that came against him. Even the men hesitated at his fearsome aspect. And it was small wonder. But I knew that there was no other way to the innermost cave, so I cried to them to overpass the rabble and drive forward at all hazards.
'How it came about I know not, but a moment after I found myself opposite to Sawny Bean himself and engaging him with your sword—just for all the world as if it had been in the armoire room of Culzean on a rainy day, and you again teaching me the fence of blade against Lochaber axe. But though I had not wholly forgotten my skill, doubtless the giant had soon made an end of me, for he struck fiercely every way. But sudden as the heathcat springs on the hill, the little Dominie leaped upon him and drove his sword into his heart. So that Sawny Bean fell with Dominie Mure upon his breast. Then because he was not able to pull out his sword again, being too close, the Dominie gripped his dagger and struck again and again, panting. And between each blow he cried out the name of a lass—"Mary Torrance! Mary Torrance!" he said.
'Then it was that the hounds over-leaped the two of them struggling there in the arch and sprang on, and after them came Robert Harburgh and I. We two first entered the murky place of death. The dogs were mouthing and gripping the Grey Man. But you lay naked upon the sand as it had been dead.'
This was the matter of Nell's tale, and I will now in turn take up mine own part in it, from the time at which the dogs gripped my remorseless enemy, and as it had been, the life went out from me.