The Jewel Read online

  While the unhappy couple were visiting Coilsfield House, Eleanora met and was instantly charmed by James Montgomerie. It happened, so it was reported by some of the servants, while her husband was slumbering in Hugh Montgomerie’s library, having imbibed not wisely, but much too well, of his host’s fine claret, and James came upon a weeping Eleanora in the garden. Foolishly, perhaps, James had managed to arrange a series of assignations with Eleanora. The affair had a not-unexpected conclusion when Eleanora fell pregnant with James’s child and when Charles, who had not gone near his wife for some months, realised that he had been cuckolded. Fearing for his mistress’s safety, for Charles was beyond enraged, James had arranged for her to take shelter with sympathetic friends in Paisley. It was here that she had given birth to a son, named James for his father, in November of 1784, while the Burns family were experiencing their first harsh winter in Mossgiel.

  The denouement of the drama had been a nine days’ wonder and the subject of intense speculation, not to say entertainment, in Mauchline and Tarbolton, with the Coilsfield servants reporting that Charlie Maxwell had ridden to Coilsfield and hammered on the big front door, shouting for James Montgomerie to come out and face him like a man. James, nothing if not brave, might even have obliged, and then there would have been ‘wigs on the green’ as they said, but he was not at home and the offended husband suspected, with good reason, that he was with Eleanora in Paisley. The servants had threatened to set the dogs on him but Sojer Hugh, a man of great presence and authority, had come out, sent his men away and spoken to Maxwell firmly but quietly, putting an arm round his shoulders, and eventually leading him inside, where he was persuaded to sit beside the fire, drink more claret and weep about the perfidy of women.

  The fact of the matter was that Hugh – while despising Charlie Maxwell somewhat – was not particularly happy with James, who had got into this kind of scrape before and would probably do the same thing all over again. Hugh had succeeded in pouring oil on troubled waters and had persuaded Charles Maxwell to go back to Skerrington to await developments. Eleanora, meanwhile, had steadfastly refused to return to her husband, but had taken refuge with friends in Riccarton near Kilmarnock, along with her baby, a big, healthy boy.

  While all this was taking place at Coilsfield and beyond, Robert Burns and John Blane had made much more conventional arrangements to meet up with Jean Armour and her friend Christina Morton before the singing school. For a few weeks they spent a pleasant hour, talking together in the snug at the Whitefoord Arms. Christina was more fond of Rab than she was of John, but by now it was clear to her that Rab had eyes only for her friend and there was nothing to be done about that. Since she was a smart and practical girl, not given to repining about what she could not change, she decided to give Jean every chance to get to know Rab better, although not without a pang of worry on her friend’s behalf.

  Jean still had an inkling that Rab might be a chancy young man who might slip away from a girl at time of need, for all that he had so readily acknowledged his first child. But there was all the difference in the world between giving a home to a sweet wee daughter when you had your mother and sisters to shoulder the burden of responsibility, and making hearth and home for wife and wean. But although Rab intrigued her, although she was undeniably attracted to him, she resolved that she would not be as easily persuaded as some.

  The two by two meetings soon began to pall, however, mostly because Christina began to resent wasting the summer months in John Blane’s company, even to please Jean and Rab. She had her eyes on a better match than a farm servant at Mossgiel. She had fancied Robert Paterson ever since they sat in the schoolroom together and he put burrs in her hair, to her pretended outrage. Paterson kept the draper and general merchant’s shop in the town alongside his widowed mother, and the belles were frequent customers, although even more frequent browsers, who seldom had the wherewithal to buy all that they wanted.

  The shop kept linens, everyday woollen fabrics and sometimes silks, although that was a luxury seldom seen in the town and must generally be sent for if wanted. There were pretty printed cottons or muslins, much favoured by the girls for summer gowns. There were common woollen shawls, although such items were mostly homemade; gorgeous stockings with clocks worked onto them at the ankle; and stays, which very intimate items of clothing were kept well hidden away by Mistress Paterson and only brought out when requested. Fine lace was expensive these days and so scarce as to be impossible to find, even if you could afford it, but you could sometimes get Cluny or Torchon in the shop if you were lucky. Good gloves were taxed out of existence or in the case of French gloves, utterly unattainable. But Paterson had haberdashery of all kinds, and you might find silk satin ribbons in a multitude of colours to trim a bonnet, or good, affordable worsted tape, or perhaps a yard or two of trim recovered from an old gown. Mistress Paterson herself was not above scavenging when times were hard, washing what she could and selling second or third hand trims in the shop. There were, besides, glass, brass and bone buttons, threads of all kinds and colours, needles and pins, thread winders and needle cases and a hundred other small necessities of everyday life.

  ‘Things you could not bear to live without,’ Christina called them. Among these things she numbered Robert Paterson.

  She tried to persuade her reluctant beau to come to the Whitefoord Arms, but he said he was too busy in the shop, and besides, he could settle his heart on no woman. If he liked a lass, he would call her a ‘grand cracker’, but there were a number of grand crackers who seemed to be tenants of his heart and he was never quite able to make up his mind to attach himself to any single one of them.

  ‘He’s far too fond of the siller. If her tocher is good enough, he might fall in love with her on account of it.’

  This was what Rab remarked privately to Jean, when they had arrived fortuitously early in the snug at the Whitefoord Arms. Christina was always late these days and John Blane had been finishing a job out at the farm, so Rab had left without him, hoping perhaps to get Jean to himself for a while.

  ‘He seems fond enough of Chrissie. And I know she likes him fine. Besides, she’ll have a tocher and a good one. Her parents are not short of money.’

  ‘Well, maybe he is fond of her and maybe not, but tell your friend he’s not a lad to be trusted.’

  Jean laughed. ‘And you are?’

  ‘I’m as trustworthy as the next man, Jeany. And I suppose that’s all that can be said about any of us.’

  ‘I suppose it is.’

  The way he said it made her feel suddenly sad. He must have seen her face fall, the way he seemed to notice everything about her.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jeany. And who knows? If the right lass comes along…’

  Chapter Six

  The Black Fit

  O whistle and I’ll come to you, my lad.

  O whistle and I’ll come to you, my lad.

  Though father and mother and a’ should gae mad;

  O whistle and I’ll come to you my lad.

  The truth was that Christina was disappointed in Paterson and his inability to make up his mind, but she thought that she knew him better than most and perhaps she was right. Certainly she had known him longest and thought that one day he might come round to realising what a treasure lay on his own doorstep, as it were, waiting to be discovered.

  ‘And if,’ Jean remarked to her friend one day as they were sighing over some splendid trim, newly come from Ayr and from Glasgow before that, ‘If you were to marry Robert Paterson, all this would be yours and you could have whatever you liked from the shop!’

  ‘I’m not sure his mother would be so accommodating. She watches us like a cat watching a dunnock. Have you noticed?’

  ‘But even so, you would get to see everything first. It would be a fine thing to be married to a draper.’ Jean sighed. Finer than being married to a weaver, she thought.

  Christina’s liking
for Paterson was genuine and had very little to do with his trade. And so, after a few weeks of sedate conversation in the Whitefoord Arms, she left off even being late and instead took herself away to stay with relatives outside the town for the summer months, where Paterson might realise that he was missing her, and might visit her if he chose. He didn’t choose to do so very often, just at first, but as the summer progressed, he seemed to be asking where she was and when she might be coming back and began sending her notes on the back of drapery receipts. This meant that the balance of any lawfully chaperoned courting for Jean Armour and Robert Burns was well and truly upset.

  The fact of the matter was that there was nothing lawful about it.

  Jean had been more or less deceiving her father and mother for the few weeks that she and Rab had been meeting. James Armour knew that she was going to the singing school, and his wife told him that there was no harm in it. Jean had a fine voice and the master was pleased with her, judging her the star of his school. What could he do but give his permission? Besides, he frequented the Whitefoord Arms himself in the evenings, and thought that the proprietor and his wife would keep an eye out for any untoward behaviour. But nobody had mentioned the meetings with Rab, not even Johnnie Dow, who made it a steadfast rule to keep all confidences and turn a blind eye wherever possible. Once Christina had given over coming, it was an easy matter for Rab to have a quiet word with John Blane, and suggest that perhaps work at Mossgiel might delay him. Which was how Jean and Rab spent a few more weeks deep in conversation, mostly by themselves in the snug, with Mistress Dow looking in occasionally to check that all was as it should be.

  It was all feeling, all sensation and there was no denying it. Or, as it turned out, him. It was in the way he looked at her, the way he took her hand in his, the way he seized it across the table, raised it to his lips and kissed the palm, gazing into her eyes all the while, and she knew that she was lost. One way or another, sooner or later, she would be his, even though she snatched her fingers away, glancing around to see whether anyone had noticed, put her hands on her lap, blushed furiously, told him not to do it. Oh but she wanted him. She could do nothing to prevent her body from responding to him.

  From time to time, he would recite his poetry for her, telling her what he was working on, telling her the ideas that were fermenting away in his head. One of his poems, about the kirk elder, Willie Fisher, shocked her to her core with the irreverence of it, even though he only whispered bits of it across the table, saying that some of it might not be fit for her ears. And yet it was true. Everyone knew that Fisher was a hypocrite, up to all kinds of fornication even while castigating others for it. But should such things be committed to paper? Wouldn’t that bring trouble to your door? And what would it be like for a young woman to be publicly associated with a man who could write such things and circulate them around the town?

  He said he was writing feverishly, every evening, by candlelight or by the uncertain glow of a single rushlight when his day’s work was done, writing at the desk up in his garret chamber at Mossgiel while his brother slept. She remembered the room where she and the other lassies had slept on the night of the rocking. Remembered the bed she had slept in.

  ‘I’m so glad of the early dawns. They give me light to work by, when the house is quiet and before the day’s work has begun.’

  ‘You need to sleep though, Rab!’

  ‘Ach, time enough for sleep in the winter. I can do without sleep. But if I couldn’t meet you, talk to you like this, steal a kiss now and then, I don’t know what I’d do. You inspire me, Jeany!’

  She knew he had said as much to other lassies, and was well aware that he could charm the birds out of the trees. Perhaps he only wove a web of words to seduce daft lassies like Betty Paton and herself, to entice them into making fools of themselves with him and worse, ruining the rest of their lives. Except that he hadn’t done that with Betty, had he? No. She hadn’t been ruined at all, really. Everyone said Betty had been a willing partner. He had taken the child and given it a home at Mossgiel, and even though he hadn’t wanted to marry her, Betty herself said that he had made no promises, had been true to his word, or lack of it. But he hadn’t left her in the lurch either. Not like some of the lads that needed to be practically dragged kicking and screaming into the kirk and forced to admit their sins.

  ‘Listen,’ he said, a week later. ‘Do you know Catherine Govan?’

  Jean nodded. She did indeed know Katy Govan, the aunt of Rab’s nine year old herd boy, Willie Patrick. Willie worked out at Mossgiel as a general servant, feeding the cattle, mucking the byre and running back and forth to Mauchline on various errands. He would often be entrusted with Rab’s correspondence, being a trustworthy little lad. Sometimes, when John Blane was otherwise occupied, he was even allowed to work as gaudsman helping Rab with the four horses at the plough. His mother had died giving birth to him, but his father lived and worked as a shoemaker on the Cowgate, alongside Willie’s elder brother, George. Whenever Willie was in the town, being a wee thing homesick, he would seize the opportunity to call in and see his relatives. His aunt Catherine was a widow herself, living at the Cross, quite close to the Whitefoord Arms. The woman was sober and grave but kindly enough when you knew her well. She kept herself to herself and did fine sewing as a way of earning a living for herself and her surviving children, helped out by the charity of the parish and Mr Auld, the minister.

  ‘What about her?’ Jean said.

  ‘I’ve been thinking that she might be persuaded to be our…’ He hesitated, looked at her again, smiling ruefully. ‘Och Jeany, I do not think your father approves of me yet, does he?’

  The truth was that far from approving of him, James Armour still hated him like poison. Rab knew it. Jean knew it. There was no hiding the fact, although in public, Armour did his best to keep his feelings to himself, well aware that Rab Mossgiel had the ear of many of the gentry, and these same gentry might be the source of much needed work for him in the future.

  ‘No.’ She could do little but agree with him. ‘He dislikes you, Rab. After your wee Bess was born…’

  ‘What would he have had me do? Deny the wean? How could I do that?’

  ‘No. And I admire you for it. But he would have had you not get Betty Paton with child at all.’

  ‘We all make mistakes.’

  ‘Was it a mistake?’

  He grinned. ‘It was a great pleasure, I’ll allow.’

  She shook her head, laughing in spite of herself. ‘There you go! You see what I mean? What am I to say to that, Rab? Have you heard yourself?’

  ‘Say you’ll keep seeing me, Jeany. I’m not seeing Betty now, you ken that fine.’

  ‘Are you not?’

  ‘Only when she comes to visit Bess. We’re not walking out together, if that’s what you mean, although we are friends. I’ll hate nobody if I can help it. So what do you say? Will you meet with me so that we can take a walk together? If I can arrange it?’

  ‘Maybe aye, maybe no.’

  ‘The trouble is, it’s summer. The roses are blooming and the birds are singing and I’d rather be walking out with you, my Jeany, than sitting in here with the smell of spilled ale and smoke in the air. What do you think?’

  It would be a perilous undertaking, to be sure. Walking out meant being alone with him, unsupervised, unchaperoned. There would be nobody to protect her, although she sensed that he was not a man to force himself on any woman. Not like some. But there would be nobody to dissuade her. And she certainly didn’t trust herself to be alone with him.

  ‘Word will get back to my father. Word that we’re seeing each other, without any chaperone. And my mother’s not much better, you know. She’s no friend of yours, Rab. They take every chance they can to remind me how much they dislike you. How unsuitable they think you are.’

  ‘That’s where Katy Govan comes in.’

  ‘What about her
?’

  ‘I thought she might act as black fit to us.’

  ‘Black fit?’

  ‘A go-between for us two.’

  ‘Aye. I know fine what you mean.’

  A black fit or black foot was somebody, often an older woman or man, whose help might be enlisted to carry messages back and forth between lovers. This was a more serious undertaking altogether, an admission that they were a couple, that a lad and lass might be something more than friends. Sometimes the black fit was needed where parental disapproval was a bar to meeting. Sometimes it simply meant that a respectable person would act as match-maker within a small and curious community like this one, easing the means of two young people getting to know each other, with marriage more often than not being the outcome. But either way, there was a gravity about the arrangement that could not be ignored.

  ‘Have you spoken to her?’ asked Jean with a mixture of anxiety and excitement. Suddenly, what had seemed like a mild flirtation was becoming very serious. She had not expected it, not of Rab Burns.

  ‘Aye I have. I walked with Willie when he was going home to visit his father. We passed her house and I made sure he went in to see his Aunt Katy first, for it suited me that he should. I went in with him, took her a basket of eggs and some cheese from my mother.’

  ‘That was kind of you.’

  ‘Aye it was. She felt beholden to me and grateful. I thought it was a good time to speak to her, once I had sent Willie away to see his father, of course.’

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I said I was half mad with love for you, Jeany, and I might die of a broken heart if I could not get courting you properly, but your parents would not hear of it.’

  ‘You didnae say that!’

  ‘Why wouldn’t I? It’s the truth.’

  ‘Well, even if it is, it’s the first I’ve heard you say it.’