Border Ghost Stories Part 3

'No,' I replied; 'I come from the wrong side of the Border,' finally succeeding, as I spoke, in drawing my mare's head out of the water.

''Tis Peden's Cleuch,'[1] he said with animation; ''tis the place where blessed Master Peden was preachin' when the b.l.o.o.d.y "Clavers" was huntin'

him like a fox on the fells; ay, and would hae worrited him wi' his hounds had na the Lord sent down His mist and wrapped him awa frae the hunters.'

He paused a moment, then continued slowly:

'They still hunt for him--"Clavers" and Grierson o' Lag; 'tis the weird they hae to dree till the Day o' Doom for their wickedness i' pursuin'

the Saints o' G.o.d.'

'Have you ever seen them?' I asked lightly.

'Ay, I hae,' came the unexpected response, 'whiles i' the "oncome" or "haar," or by the moonlicht.

'D' ye no ken the bit ballant?

"_Soondless they ride--for aye i' search o' their boon--_ _They ha' died, but G.o.d's feud is for aye unstaunched,_ _And aye they mun ride by the licht o' the moon._"'

'No,' I replied, astonished, 'but how--supposing you have seen them--could you know them to be "Clavers" and Grierson o' Lag?'

'Not only hae I seen them, but I aince heard them talking,' my companion replied quietly as before.

'When was that?' I asked, still more astonished, as I looked more keenly at the speaker.

He was a man of middle stature, dressed in rough shepherd's costume, with a plaid about his shoulders; he had a gentle aspect, with tremulous mouth, and a far-away look in his eyes of speedwell blue.

'I'll tell ye,' he replied simply. 'Blessed Master Peden had been here i' the "killing times," ye ken, preachin' till the puir hill folk, an'

baptizin' their bairns--he baptized a forebear o' my ain--and it would likely be the annivairsary o' the day when he escaped frae the hans o'

the hunters through the "haar," when I chanced to come by here an' saw a bit tent pit up, an' heard folk carousin' within.

'I creepit up, an' I keeked within the openin' o't, an' there I saw twa hunters sittin' at board--eatin', and whiles drinkin' the blood-red wine--ane o' them was the bonniest man e'er I saw i' my life, but he had the sorrowfullest eyes e'er set i' a man's face. There was ne'er a bit colour to his cheeks save where a trickle o' claret had stained the corner o' his lip.

'His comrade was juist the opposite till him; foul he was, an'

discoloured wi' l.u.s.t an' liquor--mair like a haggis nor a human face ava.

'There was a wumman beside him--dootless his whure, that had ridden oot frae Jedburgh to be wi' him--nestlin' in at his side like a ewe till her ram i' the autumn; not that he was takin' muckle thocht o' her, though--an' then he cries oot loud:

'"'Tis a moonlicht nicht, my Lord Claverhouse," he cries; "we'll hunt oor quarry ower muir an' fell, an' aiblins hae mair luck than we had i'

the day; we'll run the auld brock to ground before dawn, I'll hand ye a handfu' o' Jacobuses."

'"I'll hand ye," replied Claverhouse, wi' a smile on his bonny, sad face,

"_Ye'll tak the high road an' I'll tak the low road,_ _An' I'll be in North Tyne afore ye._

"So up an' tak wing, my grey-lag goose," he says, "an' wing your way straight to the North Tyne water."

'"Then here's a last toast," cries Lag, holdin' up his bicker fu' o'

wine.

'Noo, what think ye was his toast?' my companion broke off to inquire of me with eye agleam.

I shook my head, and laid hold of my saddle to remount, for the eerie communication, the loneliness of the spot, and the isolation of the drifting snowflakes had all combined to give me a 'scunner.'

'It was their ain d.a.m.nation,' my companion whispered in my ear; 'he was proposin' the murder o' the Saints o' G.o.d--juist the "sin against the Holy Ghaist"--that was his fearsome health.'

I had climbed into my saddle, and at that moment an unseen plover wailed through the mist.

'Hark!' cried my companion, lifting a finger.

'Hark to his soul i' torment!'

My mare took fright, and made a great spring forward; I let her go, for I was 'gliffed' myself, and right glad was I to reach the road made by human hands that led homeward, for I feared if I stayed on that I too might meet the wraiths of Claverhouse and Lag hunting the moorlands for blessed Master Peden.

[Footnote 1: Peden, the Covenanter, was undoubtedly on the Border in the 'killing times,' and is said to have escaped from the hunters when preaching on Peden Pike by intervention of a mist, but as in old maps this rounded hill west of Otterburn is spelt Paden, the derivation seems doubtful. Peden's Cleuch on the north side of Carter seems undoubtedly to have been his refuge.]

'ILL-STEEKIT' EPHRAIM

'About the middle of the night The c.o.c.ks began to craw: And at the dead hour o' the night The corpse began to thraw.'

_Ballad of Young Benjie._

We--that is, the four members of our Oxford reading party--were bathing in a deep pool in many-terraced Tees, and I was seated on a rock's edge, drying in the September suns.h.i.+ne, and quoting from Clough's 'Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich':

'How to the element offering their bodies, down shooting the fall, They mingled themselves with the flood and the force of imperious water,'

when from the central black cauldron immediately below me appeared the face of Sandie--our best diver--with a most curiously perturbed expression on his countenance. I had been watching a little circlet of foam that eddied round on the outskirts of the current, and seemed to wink at me with a hint of hidden and evasive mystery.

Then it vanished, for Sandie's head had shattered it.

'h.e.l.lo, Sandie!' I cried to him, 'what's up? It's not cramp, is it?'

He climbed out and up to where I sat on the rock above, and shook the water from his hair.

'Ugh!' he said in disgust. 'I've just been to the bottom, and there I swear I came across a drowned body; I felt a corpse and touched long hair. I believe it was a woman's.' He looked at his hands in disgust, and perceptibly s.h.i.+vered.

'Nonsense!' said I. 'It must have been a drowned cow or sheep, or possibly a pony.'

'Go down and look, or rather feel for yourself,' he retorted.

'How deep down was it?' I inquired.

'Twenty feet, perhaps,' he said, 'for it's a deep pool, and I believe the poor thing's tethered--sunk with a stone tied to her feet.'

'Surely not,' I exclaimed, 'for if it was a case of murder it would be known.'

'Go down and see for yourself,' cried Sandie testily. 'I've had enough of it.' Calling our other two companions I told them of Sandie's discovery, and we came to the conclusion that it was our duty to try to verify or disprove Sandie's a.s.sertion.