Wilton, Q.C.; or, Life in a Highland Shooting Box

Front matter

WILTON, Q.C; OR, LIFE IN A HIGHLAND SHOOTING BOX. "A WINTER JAUNT TO NORWAY." CONTAINING PERSONAL ACCOUNTS OF NANSEN, IBSEN, BJORNSEN, BRANDES, &c. By MRS. ALEC TWEEDIE TWENTY-SIX ILLUSTRATIONS. Second and Cheaper Edition, ys. 6d. Spectator (four columns of review) : " The pages from start to finish are really a treat.' Times: " Bree2y and entertaining." Queen : " A most interestingly written account of a most adventurous journey." Daily Telegraph: "Will well repay perusal." Pall Mall Gazette: " Courageous sketching from nature." Field : " Pleasantly written book ; lively and entertaining style," London : Bliss, Sands, and Foster. BY THE SAME Al'THOR. "A GIRL'S RIDE IN ICELAND." Second Edition, vith numerous Illustrations. Price §s. Athena-um -. "A most attractive little volume A spirited account of a spirited jaunt."

Daily Telegraph : " A very pretty and clever little volume." Graphic: "A great deal of useful information and shrewd observation is broueht together rn compact space. s Illustrated London Neivs : "Pleasing and instructive." Morning Post: " Better worth reading than many more pretentious volumes/ -truth : "A bright, direct, unaffected and charming little work." Horace Cox, Windsor House, Bream's Buildings, Chancery Lane, E.C. WILTON, Q.C; OR, LIFE IN A HIGHLAND SHOOTING BOX BY MRS. ALEC TWEED I E {nee Harley), K AUTHOR OF "A Winter's Jaunt to Norway" (With personal Accounts of Nansen, Ibsen, Bjornsen, Br.andes) ; "A Girl's Ride in Iceland," &c. LONDON : HORACE COX, WINDSOR HOUSE, BREAM'S BUILDINGS, E.( 1895. PRINTED BV HORACE CUX, WINDSOR HuUSE, DREAM**. ULiLDlNGS, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON, E.C. A DOMESTIC DRAMA.

IN ONE ACT. Dedication to " Ja.. L. T.' He (chaffingly) : " What good is a wife ? " She (laughingly): "To be useful, ornamental, or write books." He .- " What good is a husband ? " She (gravely) : "To share responsibility and supply wants." He: "To supply what the wife hasn't got and does not know, eh ? " She .- "Well — in a way — to supply sporting facts when the wife is not quite sure." He (desperately) : " Really, and what credit does the husband get?" She (naively) : " None; but he gets all the blame when the facts are wrong ! Ta, ta ! ! " [Exit She. LIST OF CONTENTS.

Chapter I

"AWA! AWA!" ABOUT 7.55 p.m. on the 10th of August, in a recent year of grace, all was turmoil and confusion at King's Cross Station. Eight o'clock, when the night mail starts for Scotland, is always a pretty busy time ; but, on the evening of that 10th, the platform was a surging, seething mass of humanity. Strangers were hustling one another, friends were tearing hither and thither with hardly time to nod and enquire " Where are you going, old fellow? " Barely waiting for the reply, they tore off to the booking-office to get their tickets, then back to the carriages to see about sleeping berths, or scrim- B mage for a porter to label their luggage, their dogs, or their guns, to some out of the way Highland station, for which the authorities had not even provided a proper printed address !

The train was immensely long, and two engines were required to drag the heavy freight of humanity and luggage hundreds of miles through the darkness to " bonnie Scotland." At the door of one of the compartments was gathered a little group of three persons. Lorna Stracey — a tall, handsome girl of about twenty years of age, whose fine carriage was even more noticeable than her beauty, had such a distinctly aristocratic air that every one who observed her intuitively felt she was indeed a gentlewoman. The almost defiant pose of her head commanded respect from the porters, who, as they passed, said for the hundredth time, with marked deference, " By y'r leave." " Mother, darling ! " the girl exclaimed, " in a few minutes I shall be actually off to Scotland ! " " Yes, my child, where I hope you will thoroughly enjoy your first glimpse of the Highlands."

A young fellow, who completed the party, stood at the door motionless, his gaze rivetted on Lorna ; he appeared to be drinking to the last dregs the cfctp of admiration. His eyes seemed to say — " You are my ideal — my god ! Lorna, pity me ! " But the girl paid no heed, her attention being Awa ! Awa ! 3 arrested by a leash of lovely setters that a porter was dragging along the platform, while another man, running beside the dogs, was trying to stick a label on the reverse side of the address attached to their collars. " Are they not beauties ? " cried the girl. " What lovely red coats they have ! I wonder where the porter is going to put them ? " " Into the dog van," answered the young man, speaking for the first time ; " come and see." In her eagerness to follow the dogs, the girl forgot how angry she had felt when she beheld Alf Curtis at the station, where she wished to be alone with her mother, whom she was leaving for some weeks, and, smiling graciously, walked down the platform after the setters, accompanied by her devoted admirer.

Mrs. Stracey, with a kindly smile, crossed over to the bookstall, while the young couple hurried briskly away. At the rear of the train they found a spacious carriage devoted to the canine species travelling north, who were yelling with all their might, sitting on their haunches in little cages, and appearing as unhappy as if they had been at a dog show. The whole train seemed filled with sportsmen, their guns, their fishing tackle, their golf clubs, and their dogs. " Poor doggies ! they seem to have very comfort able quarters and lots of water ; but still it is a long B journey, and I pity them," the girl remarked at last. As if her words had broken some spell, her hitherto silent companion, unable to contain himself longer, burst forth : " Lorna ! Lorna ! you sympathise with those dogs, cannot you have some pity for me ?

Say something kind that I can remember during the long weeks you are away — not that I need a reminder," he added almost below his breath. " Good God ! if I could only forget ! " " Hush, Alf ! you must not talk like that. Why will you make us both miserable ? Cannot we part without going through all this nonsense again ? " " Dear girl, it may be nonsense to you, it is life and death to me. This parting is terrible. I shall not see you again for weeks," and he really looked as if no greater misfortune could happen. " Well, and what then. I shall soon be back again ; besides, you must learn to do without me, you must act for yourself and learn to stand alone. It is ridiculous your wanting me to decide everything for you. You are a man, and as a man you should have resolution, force of will, and the capacity for immediate action.

Yes, you must learn to stand alone." He bowed his head. " I mean it," she said ; " for my sake, Alf, if you will not do it for your own." And then she added, " Come, do not look so dejected." But he seemed as if he did not hear, and exclaimed, Awa ! Awa ! 5 " Lorna, I love you to madness, love you till I scarcely know what I say or do. Although I felt sure that you would be furious with me for coming to the station, I could not help doing so. I put my hat on, and off again, and on again. I argued with myself ; but — I know I am mad — I rushed down the stairs and jumped into a hansom just for the pleasure of looking at you, though I knew I should only gain your displeasure. I am hardly responsible. Love has made me mad. Pity me, Lorna, for I am wretched ! " The girl was so touched by his manner, and the evident misery felt by this fine tall man, only a few years her senior, that she could not avoid asking herself : " How can I be so cruel ?

Why, oh ! why does he love me so much, when I cannot care for him ?" " Well, Alf," at last she brought herself to say, with an effort, " work hard while I am away, pass your exam., and make me feel proud of you and find you a full blown diplomatist when I return to town. It is your duty, even though you hate the work, to stick to it ; you owe it to your uncle." " But, my dear girl, if I do get into the diplomatic service, will you have anything to say to me ? Lorna, will you ? " " When you do get in you will have a profession — you will be someone, instead of a mere ' idle loafer,' as you call yourself. Father says you have great ability, and your uncle, being an ambassador, can help you." " Help me, how?" he persisted. " Help you to help yourself— to get on— to succeed — to raise yourself to a position of eminence, to be a great man.

Alf, have you no ambition ? " " None," he replied dejectedly, " except to win your love." She looked annoyed, and walked on. " Lorna, you seem more beautiful than ever to night, as if to tantalize me. Can't you love me just one little bit?" " Love cannot be bidden, Alf. It is born, not made. I shall often think of you in Scotland, so to please me, old boy, do keep steady and stick to your work." Was Alf Curtis one of those men who fall in love as easily as they accept an invitation to dinner, and forget again as soon as the season's latest relish has passed their lips, or was his love so woven into his nature, that it had in reality become part of himself and of his life ? Although little more than a youth, he was not usually impetuous ; but rather possessed a calm analytical mind. Love had trans formed him, until his nature was unrecognisable, even to himself.

" Lorna, you are very late," her mother exclaimed, as the young couple returned to the carriage. " The man has been here for the tickets, and in another Awa ! Awa ! 7 moment the train will be off. Good-bye, my child, write to me often, enjoy yourself thoroughly, and come back the dear heart-whole girl you are now." Turning from her mother's embrace, Lorna ex tended her hand to Alf, and, as she said good-bye, added in an undertone, " Don't forget to wear the ring." The young man tried to smile, as he answered, " Never, you have my word." In a few minutes the train was rushing at lull speed through the darkness of the night, and Lorna was enjoying the peaceful sleep of youth. Suddenly she started as though stung, and a little cry of pain escaped her lips, as she awoke from a dream, nothing but a dream, one of those queer tangled fantasies that come when the brain half sleeps or just awakens ; one of those moments when we pass through the most ideal scenes of heavenly happiness, or perchance taste the bitterest depths of the catholic hell.

Turning over she soon slept again, and forgot the poor young fellow, who, pacing sadly up and down Portland-place, was thinking over the recent parting from his ideal, lingeringly dwelling upon every look, every word, as only a lover can. He lighted his pipe again and again, and wove fancy portraits of Lorna in the smoke clouds, as he trudged slowly between the Langham Hotel and the beautiful Park Square Gardens. " Yes," he soliloquised, " if Lorna loved me the whole world would be changed. Oh my darling how I love you, till I scarcely know what I say or do. If you were only my wife, I would pass that exam. and get that appointment. Then I should have ' something to do,' which you seem to consider such a grave necessity. Although I really have enough for us both, far more than enough for myself ; still I would work, work like a black if you wished it."

The young man quickened his pace. How long he walked he knew not, his reverie being at last broken by a friendly policeman who said : " Good evening, sir; fine night." " Good evening ; yes, the weather seems settled," and instead of pursuing the conversation as he would usually have been inclined to do, he passed on and his thoughts reverted to Lorna, and he built castles in the air, and wove fancy pictures of what might be. And all the time the object of his reverie was fast in the arms of Morpheus. The journey to Inverness was lovely. As morning broke the train passed through Perth, where carriages had to be changed. From thence the line was bordered alternately by pine woods and moor lands. Lorna was enchanted with the dark majestic pines, that raised their tall, elegant heads in solemn dignity to the sky — ever pointing heavenwards, while their topmost branches seemed almost to .kiss the Awa !

Awa ! 9 feathery clouds. Their massive stems and dark branches smiled down on the tender plants and moss-grown ground beneath, and on the fairy grasses, swaying in the breeze. The route touched the pretty little towns of Dunkeld, Pitlochry, Blair Athol, Kingussie, and the now important Grantown. As the day advanced the shadows lay darkly ere the train ran along the shores of the Moray Frith, past Forres and Nairn to Inverness. Here Lorna had to change again, and as she stepped from her compartment was not a little horrified at the scene before her. There were very few porters — half-a-dozen at the most. The platform appeared to be a swaying mass of humanity, each passenger trying to find his own luggage, and no one seeming to know when the next train would start ; from which side of the station, where it was going, or to know anything, in fact.

All was hurry and scurry. Everyone was in the worst of humours, after a long night's journey from London, therefore it was difficult to obtain any information ; but at last the girl ascertained that two vans contained Euston luggage, while two others on the next platform had come from King's Cross. Making her way quite alone to the point indicated, she stood watching boxes of every shape and size being disgorged. Out they came in dozens, until the platform was literally strewn with all sorts of bundles ; such incongruous luggage as large family parties require for a lengthened stay at a Highland shooting-box. Dress-baskets, portmanteaus, perambulators, go carts, baths, wine cases, canary cages, nurses, babies, hold-alls, pet kittens and puppies squealing in baskets, were bundled out of the train, to be sorted on the platform.

Everything one could dream of, in fact, seemed to emerge from those two vans that came from King's Cross, but not Lorna's box. The girl was beginning to bethink her of a dreadful legend she had heard concerning the impossibility of ever finding luggage at Inverness, when a trunk some thing like hers, with Lhe bottom nearly out, was pitched from the van ! " What a dreadful catastrophe for the owner," she thought ; " probably a woman." But scarcely had the idea flashed through her mind before she realised that the box was her own, and that the blue silk sleeve protruding from a rent in the side belonged to her smart new tea-gown ! " This is mine," she said in a voice of agony to the stationmaster, who was superintending the unloading. " May be it is," he replied. " But I can't travel with the things tumbling out like that."

"May be you can't; you must just get it mended," he rejoined, not in the least disconcerted. " But my train to Beauly goes in a few minutes," explained the girl in despair. Awa ! Awa ! 11 ' Well, you can't go by that train anyhow, unless you leave your luggage behind you," he answered, with out the slightest evidence of concern or sympathy. Horrified visions of arriving at the shooting-box, travel-stained and tired, without any change of attire, flashed through her mind, and the girl immediately asked if there were not a later train. " Yes ; just one, at three o'clock." " I will go by that then," she declared bravely, but her heart failed her at this experience of a journey alone. The box was instantly thrust aside, to be attended to after more fortunate travellers had departed with their goods and chattels, and, feeling very lonely, Lorna sat down upon it and contemplated the chaotic scene around her.

Was this life in the Highlands, she wondered, was every one always in such a hurry, did people rush and tear hither and thither all day, knocking rudely against each other, and grumbling, as those about her were doing ? Suddenly she remembered the Northern mail had been due to start an hour before her train had even arrived, and that for this reason every one was doing his best to collect his own property as fast as possible so as not to miss the connection from Inverness. At last the platform cleared, and the girl was left alone with the box, the station master, and four porters. " How am I to get this mended ? " she asked. " You had better go to the saddler's," was the reply, uttered in broad Scotch, "and we'll take it to the left luggage office till you come back." " But how long shall I have before my train starts?"

" Three hours, maybe," calmly replied a porter, pushing his cap to the back of his head and wiping his brow, heated with the exertions he had recently undergone. "Then I will try to get some luncheon first, and send a telegram to say I have been detained ; " and, having so decided, Lorna left the platform. Much the better for her luncheon, although she had felt rather unhappy at the idea of entering an hotel dining-room alone, Miss Stracey pulled on her dog-skin gloves and proceeded to the High Street to find a saddler's. There was only one man in the shop, and a good deal of talking had to be gone through before he could be persuaded to find a substitute to take his place behind the counter, while he went to the station to mend the box, which had been so ruthlessly bumped to pieces. Together they walked back to the station, a curious couple ; Lorna, looking more stately than ever amid north-country surroundings, presented a strange contrast to her companion, a red-whiskered, red-faced Scot, with his shirt sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and his corpulent person adorned with a large Awa !

Awa ! 13 white apron. In his hand he carried packing needles and thread. The left luggage office was not even a room, it was about as exposed a place as could be found north of the Tweed. After the burly Scot had examined the box, he shook his red head and said as one having authority — " Ye maun unpack it." Now only imagine any woman being told she must unpack all her best clothes and turn them out in the middle of a stone floor at Inverness Station ! " Cannot you possibly mend it without my doing so ? " asked the perplexed owner in a tone of pitiful dismay. " Nae, it would nae be fast. Ye maun unpack it." Seeing he was determined, Lorna produced her key. A porter undid the straps, and the saddler, evidently sorry for the girl's position, unfastened his white apron, which, like another Raleigh, he gallantly spread on the stones to receive her gowns.

Everything had to be bundled out, the porters meanwhile standing stolidly and silently round. When the trunk was empty the saddler turned it upside down, and showed Lorna with an air of evident satisfaction that the whole of one side and the greater part of the bottom were smashed in. " What a dreadful disaster," the girl exclaimed ; " and it is nearly a new box." "That's naething," said the doughty Scot. "What can ye expect on a Hieland railway in the shooting time?" Resigning oneself to the inevitable is good policy, and accordingly the girl sat herself down on the only available seat, which chanced to be a gentleman's hat box, probably containing his best top hat, which by the blessing of Providence had travelled safely thus far to grace the Sabbath at some Scotch kirk. Lorna did not feel at all charitably disposed towards the railway people, when she saw her silver brushes and laces all mixed up with linen and boots, on the floor of the dreary left-luggage office.

In one hour and ten minutes, however, needles and thread, hammer, nails, and hard work, had mended the un fortunate box sufficiently to encounter the exigencies of another railway tour. The London girl could not help smiling as she realized the absurdity of the scene, which was ren dered all the more ridiculous when she was assisted to repack all her belongings by the grimy fingered, good hearted, but serious countenanced porters, whose hair was made literally to stand on end by the arrival of the station-master in a fearful rage to ask by whose carelessness the mail bags had been left behind? No one knew; but the fact remained, that the Northern train had actually left without the mail bags, which were still gracefully reposing on the Inverness platform. We Southerners are brought up to believe that the chief object of a train Awa !

Aiva .' 15 service is the speedy delivery of the mails ; but we become sadly disillusioned after a stay in the High lands, where such a contretemps as the foregoing is always possible. Everything comes to an end, even a Highland journey, the very slowness of which amused Lorna, not yet accustomed to the train being pulled up beside a field while Sir Somebody Somebody's party descended at the nearest point to the baronet's shooting box. She had not yet learned that goods trains and passenger trains were identical, that a quarter-of-an-hour is sometimes required to un couple a van containing a cow or attach a horse box, and that a little walk into a Highland village is often possible white the guards are chatting, or the luggage trucks being shunted. Lorna realised how the lack of companionship mars one's enjoyment of beautiful scenery ; she felt she wanted someone, anyone, to admire so much beauty with her.

Was it not Tom Moore who indicated this truth in his lines on Avoca ? Yet it was not that Nature had shed o'er the scene Her purest of crystal and brightest of green ; 'Twas not the soft magic of streamlet or hill, — Oh, no, it was something more exquisite still. 'Twas that friends, the beloved of my bosom were near, Who made every scene of enchantment more dear, And who felt how the best charms of Nature improve, When we see them reflected from looks that we love." The silence and want of sympathy became dis tressing. View after view, each more beautiful than the last, passed before her eyes till she felt that she could realise the terrible penalty of taking the vows of a Trappist monk, and the horror of being condemned to eternal silence. Lorna was one of those girls from whom one might expect valiant deeds.

She was the sort of woman to carry through some gigantic plan. A girl full of promise, but still very young and with her character undeveloped. There was something heroic about the very pose of her well-shaped head, and the thoughtful eyes, that denoted a deep capacity for suffering, spite of the laughter and merriment with which they usually sparkled. Lorna was a strong character, but she had hardly realised the fact herself. She little knew her powers of endurance, her energy, and her great capacity for self-restraint. Ah ! at last, there was the station ! Only the carriage met her. The distance was too great to permit her host to welcome his guests as he would have wished when each set foot on the platform. As the carriage turned in at the massive iron gates of " The Hirsel " Lorna was surprised to see a hand some kind of house on the right, with a large nail studded door and no proper windows, only little round things that could not admit much light, but she hardly had time to wonder what the building could be before a cheery voice exclaimed — Awa !

Awa ! 17 " Welcome, Lorna, my lass, glad to see you," and her genial host, Mr. Fraser, in his tweed kilt and Glengarry bonnet leant his arms over the brougham door. " Had a good journey, hope you are ready for any amount of fun, eh, Lorna? But you'll be tired, so I won't keep you ; I am just going to the kennels but shall be back directly," and whistling to a couple of lovely collies that had strayed while their master was speaking to his visitor, the Laird, a magnificent High lander with kindly blue eyes and a long grey beard reaching to his waist, strode off to the kennels with a swinging gait. Mr. Fraser was one of those men everyone loves. Of aristocratic descent, he had inherited the chivalry and daring of his fore fathers, together with all the delightful courtesy and superstitions of past generations.

At the door of the old-fashioned, gaunt, white washed mansion stood Jean, the Laird's only daughter, and hostess of his home, for, her father being a widower, the neat little woman on the steps kept house for him, and " ran the show " right well. "Very tired, dear?" she asked the new comer, but, without waiting for Lorna's answer, continued, ■" You did give us a fright telegraphing like that from Inverness. The carriage had started to meet you but met the telegraph boy instead. Some of our guests have played us that prank before, so the groom opened the wire, and on learning its contents C came back again, the horses, therefore, had not the long drive for nothing." " Was it not awful about my box? " asked Lorna, who was still suffering from the shock of her first Highland railway experience.

" Never mind ; all's well that ends well ; here you are at last, and I'm right glad to see you," answered Miss Fraser, heartily. "We are having tea in the hall, so come and be introduced," she added, putting her arm round the new arrival's waist, and taking her into the house. What a pretty scene met Lorna's gaze as she entered one of those large old-fashioned halls made snug and warm by tapestry hangings and heavy curtains — a huge fire blazed in the large grate, around which were gathered laughing, chattering men and pretty women. " Lorna, you know my cousin Hugh Lempriere ? You've met him in London when he was staying with us." "Of course I know Miss Stracey," replied a splendid looking fellow of some six feet four in height, jumping up from the smallest seat in the room, to hold open the door for the girls.

" Hope you had a pleasant journey." " Mrs. Jackson, may I introduce my friend Lorna Stracey ? " went on the hostess. " Very pleased to make your acquaintance," was the polite answer. "I am sure you must be Awa ! Awa ! 19 dreadfully tired ; it's an awful journey from town, As to-morrow is the Twelfth, I told Miss Fraser I must come a day or two earlier, so as to unpack and rest, before she drags me over those dreadful moors," and the pretty widow sank back in her cushioned chair, where her luxuriant auburn hair contrasted well with the sea-green shade of the silk against which her head reposed. " What a strangely thick throat she has," thought Lorna ; " and a round head like the statues of the Roman emperors ; and she has their square shoulders too. Is she as cruel, crafty, and designing as they were ?

No, of course not ; she is very beautiful." But Lorna had not long to soliloquise. " Mr. Fitzroy Bagshot, come and be introduced," the sprightly little hostess continued as an inner curtain was raised, and a neat little man in some wonderful silk suit, lined with the softest shade of salmon satin, entered. " This is my friend Lorna Stracey from London ; she has never been in Scotland before, so we must initiate her into the mysteries of life in the Highlands." At this juncture the butler appeared with fresh tea, and Lorna attacked mustard and cress sandwiches, and shortbread, with an honest hearty appetite. " It's a funny name, The Hirsel, isn't it ? " Lorna remarked to Mr. Fraser in the middle of the much appreciated tea. " Of course it is Scotch ? " C " Very. It means a sheepfold ; I'm the shepherd and you are all my flock.