Old Mortality (Unabridged). Walter Scott

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СКАЧАТЬ Now comes your turn, young man; what think you of the matter in hand?”

      “I should have little objection to answer you,” said Henry, “if I knew what right you had to put the question.”

      “The Lord preserve us!” said the old housekeeper, “to ask the like o’ that at a trooper, when a’ folk ken they do whatever they like through the haill country wi’ man and woman, beast and body.”

      The old gentleman exclaimed, in the same horror at his nephew’s audacity, “Hold your peace, sir, or answer the gentleman discreetly. Do you mean to affront the king’s authority in the person of a sergeant of the Life-Guards?”

      “Silence, all of you!” exclaimed Bothwell, striking his hand fiercely on the table —“Silence, every one of you, and hear me!— You ask me for my right to examine you, sir (to Henry); my cockade and my broadsword are my commission, and a better one than ever Old Nol gave to his roundheads; and if you want to know more about it, you may look at the act of council empowering his majesty’s officers and soldiers to search for, examine, and apprehend suspicious persons; and, therefore, once more, I ask you your opinion of the death of Archbishop Sharpe — it’s a new touch-stone we have got for trying people’s metal.”

      Henry had, by this time, reflected upon the useless risk to which he would expose the family by resisting the tyrannical power which was delegated to such rude hands; he therefore read the narrative over, and replied, composedly, “I have no hesitation to say, that the perpetrators of this assassination have committed, in my opinion, a rash and wicked action, which I regret the more, as I foresee it will be made the cause of proceedings against many who are both innocent of the deed, and as far from approving it as myself.”

      While Henry thus expressed himself, Bothwell, who bent his eyes keenly upon him, seemed suddenly to recollect his features.

      “Aha! my friend Captain Popinjay, I think I have seen you before, and in very suspicious company.”

      “I saw you once,” answered Henry, “in the public-house of the town of —.”

      “And with whom did you leave that public-house, youngster?— Was it not with John Balfour of Burley, one of the murderers of the Archbishop?”

      “I did leave the house with the person you have named,” answered Henry, “I scorn to deny it; but, so far from knowing him to be a murderer of the primate, I did not even know at the time that such a crime had been committed.”

      “Lord have mercy on me, I am ruined!— utterly ruined and undone!” exclaimed Milnwood. “That callant’s tongue will rin the head aff his ain shoulders, and waste my gudes to the very grey cloak on my back!”

      “But you knew Burley,” continued Bothwell, still addressing Henry, and regardless of his uncle’s interruption, “to be an intercommuned rebel and traitor, and you knew the prohibition to deal with such persons. You knew, that, as a loyal subject, you were prohibited to reset, supply, or intercommune with this attainted traitor, to correspond with him by word, writ, or message, or to supply him with meat, drink, house, harbour, or victual, under the highest pains — you knew all this, and yet you broke the law.” (Henry was silent.) “Where did you part from him?” continued Bothwell; “was it in the highway, or did you give him harbourage in this very house?”

      “In this house!” said his uncle; “he dared not for his neck bring ony traitor into a house of mine.”

      “Dare he deny that he did so?” said Bothwell.

      “As you charge it to me as a crime,” said Henry, “you will excuse my saying any thing that will criminate myself.”

      “O, the lands of Milnwood!— the bonny lands of Milnwood, that have been in the name of Morton twa hundred years!” exclaimed his uncle; “they are barking and fleeing, outfield and infield, haugh and holme!”

      “No, sir,” said Henry, “you shall not suffer on my account.— I own,” he continued, addressing Bothwell, “I did give this man a night’s lodging, as to an old military comrade of my father. But it was not only without my uncle’s knowledge, but contrary to his express general orders. I trust, if my evidence is considered as good against myself, it will have some weight in proving my uncle’s innocence.”

      “Come, young man,” said the soldier, in a somewhat milder tone, “you’re a smart spark enough, and I am sorry for you; and your uncle here is a fine old Trojan, kinder, I see, to his guests than himself, for he gives us wine and drinks his own thin ale — tell me all you know about this Burley, what he said when you parted from him, where he went, and where he is likely now to be found; and, d — n it, I’ll wink as hard on your share of the business as my duty will permit. There’s a thousand merks on the murdering whigamore’s head, an I could but light on it — Come, out with it — where did you part with him?”

      “You will excuse my answering that question, sir,” said Morton; “the same cogent reasons which induced me to afford him hospitality at considerable risk to myself and my friends, would command me to respect his secret, if, indeed, he had trusted me with any.”

      “So you refuse to give me an answer?” said Bothwell.

      “I have none to give,” returned Henry.

      “Perhaps I could teach you to find one, by tying a piece of lighted match betwixt your fingers,” answered Bothwell.

      “O, for pity’s sake, sir,” said old Alison apart to her master, “gie them siller — it’s siller they’re seeking — they’ll murder Mr Henry, and yoursell next!”

      Milnwood groaned in perplexity and bitterness of spirit, and, with a tone as if he was giving up the ghost, exclaimed, “If twenty p — p — punds would make up this unhappy matter”—“My master,” insinuated Alison to the sergeant, “would gie twenty punds sterling”—“Punds Scotch, ye b — h!” interrupted Milnwood; for the agony of his avarice overcame alike his puritanic precision and the habitual respect he entertained for his housekeeper.

      “Punds sterling,” insisted the housekeeper, “if ye wad hae the gudeness to look ower the lad’s misconduct; he’s that dour ye might tear him to pieces, and ye wad ne’er get a word out o’ him; and it wad do ye little gude, I’m sure, to burn his bonny fingerends.”

      “Why,” said Bothwell, hesitating, “I don’t know — most of my cloth would have the money, and take off the prisoner too; but I bear a conscience, and if your master will stand to your offer, and enter into a bond to produce his nephew, and if all in the house will take the test-oath, I do not know but”—“O ay, ay, sir,” cried Mrs Wilson, “ony test, ony oaths ye please!” And then aside to her master, “Haste ye away, sir, and get the siller, or they will burn the house about our lugs.”

      Old Milnwood cast a rueful look upon his adviser, and moved off, like a piece of Dutch clockwork, to set at liberty his imprisoned angels in this dire emergency. Meanwhile, Sergeant Bothwell began to put the test-oath with such a degree of solemn reverence as might have been expected, being just about the same which is used to this day in his majesty’s custom-house.

      “You — what’s your name, woman?”

      “Alison Wilson, sir.”

      “You, Alison Wilson, solemnly swear, certify, and declare, that you judge it unlawful for subjects, under pretext of reformation, or any other pretext whatsoever, to enter into Leagues and Covenants”— Here the СКАЧАТЬ