Chapter 28

THE HILL BEFORE DARKNESS FELL--SCENE OF THE IMPENDING CATASTROPHE.

"You are better now?" I heard Gavin ask, presently.

He thought that having been taken ill suddenly I had waved to him
for help because he chanced to be near. With all my wits about me
I might have left him in that belief, for rather would I have
deceived him than had him wonder why his welfare seemed so vital
to me. But I, who thought the capacity for being taken aback had
gone from me, clung to his arm and thanked God audibly that he
still lived. He did not tell me then how my agitation puzzled him,
but led me kindly to the hill, where we could talk without
listeners. By the time we reached it I was again wary, and I had
told him what had brought me to Thrums, without mentioning how the
story of his death reached my ears, or through whom.

"Mr. McKenzie," he said, interrupting me, "galloped all the way
from the Spittal on the same errand. However, no one has been hurt
much, except the piper himself."

Then he told me how the rumor arose.

"You know of the incident at the Spittal, and that Campbell
marched off in high dudgeon? I understand that he spoke to no one
between the Spittal and Thrums, but by the time he arrived here he
was more communicative; yes, and thirstier. He was treated to
drink in several public-houses by persons who wanted to hear his
story, and by-and-by he began to drop hints of knowing something
against the earl's bride. Do you know Rob Dow?"

"Yes," I answered, "and what you have done for him."

"Ah, sir!" he said, sighing, "for a long time I thought I was to
be God's instrument in making a better man of Rob, but my power
over him went long ago. Ten short months of the ministry takes
some of the vanity out of a man."

Looking sideways at him I was startled by the unnatural brightness
of his eyes. Unconsciously he had acquired the habit of pressing
his teeth together in the pauses of his talk, shutting them on
some woe that would proclaim itself, as men do who keep their
misery to themselves.

"A few hours ago," he went on, "I heard Rob's voice in altercation
as I passed the Bull tavern, and I had, a feeling that if I failed
with him so should I fail always throughout my ministry. I walked
into the public-house, and stopped at the door of a room in which
Dow and the piper were sitting drinking. I heard Rob saying,
fiercely, 'If what you say about her is true, Highlandman, she's
the woman I've been looking for this half year and mair; what is
she like?' I guessed, from what I had been told of the piper, that
they were speaking of the earl's bride; but Rob saw me and came to