How long Dow was in discovering that she had escaped,
and whether he searched for her, no one knows.
After a time he jumped into the dogcart again, and
drove aimlessly through the rain. That wild journey
probably lasted two hours, and came to an abrupt end
only when a tree fell upon the trap. The horse
galloped off, but one of Dow’s legs was beneath
the tree, and there he had to lie helpless, for though
the leg was little injured, he could not extricate
himself. A night and day passed, and he believed
that he must die; but even in this plight he did not
forget the man he loved. He found a piece of
slate, and in the darkness cut these words on it with
his knife:
“Me being about to die, I solemnly swear I didna
see the minister marrying an Egyptian on the hill
this nicht. May I burn in Hell if this is no
true.”
(Signed) “Rob Dow.”
This document he put in his pocket, and so preserved
proof of what he was perjuring himself to deny.
Babbie and Margaret—defence
of the manse continued.
The Egyptian was mournful in Windyghoul, up which
she had once danced and sung; but you must not think
that she still feared Dow. I felt McKenzie’s
clutch on any arm for hours after he left me, but
she was far braver than I; indeed, dangers at which
I should have shut my eyes only made hers gleam, and
I suppose it was sheer love of them that first made
her play the coquette with Gavin. If she cried
now, it was not for herself; it was because she thought
she had destroyed him. Could I have gone to her
then and said that Gavin wanted to blot out the gypsy
wedding, that throbbing little breast would have frozen
at once, and the drooping head would have been proud
again, and she would have gone away forever without
another tear.
What do I say? I am doing a wrong to the love
these two bore each other. Babbie would not have
taken so base a message from my lips. He would
have had to say the words to her himself before she
believed them his. What would he want her to do
now? was the only question she asked herself.
To follow him was useless, for in that rain and darkness
two people might have searched for each other all
night in a single field. That he would go to the
Spittal, thinking her in Rintoul’s dogcart,
she did not doubt; and his distress was painful to
her to think of. But not knowing that the burns
were in flood, she underestimated his danger.
Remembering that the mudhouse was near, she groped
her way to it, meaning to pass the night there; but
at the gate she turned away hastily, hearing from
the door the voice of a man she did not know to be
Nanny’s brother. She wandered recklessly
a short distance, until the rain began to threaten
again, and then, falling on her knees in the broom,
she prayed to God for guidance. When she rose
she set off for the manse.
