Harold Bindloss - The League of the Leopard

A splash was followed by a hoarse exclamation as the man slipped into the water up to the knee; then Dane heard the thud of a flung out fish, and sat very still, for it would clearly be injudicious to present himself just then. He noticed a minute twinkle of brightness among the boulders across the pool which puzzled him. It was too small for the light of a lantern, and he remembered nothing that shone in just the same fashion. While he wondered what it could be, another dark object rose beside the alder, gripping what looked like a heavy stick.

"I'm thinking I have ye noo!" a gruff voice exclaimed. "Ye sorrowful wastrel, stealing a puir man's fish!"

Thomas Chatterton stood upright, knee-deep in the river, with an exclamation; and Dane, knowing there was much deeper water close behind him, sprang to his feet. That the irascible iron-master would show fight if necessary, he felt certain, and equally so that a portly elderly gentleman would make a poor match for a brawny laborer. Hardly had he got to his feet, however, than the keeper, sliding down the bank, dropped silently into the river, and disappeared as if by magic, while, as Dane wondered what had startled him, another voice rang out.

"Run straight in on the alder while I head him off from the firs!" it directed; and a whistle was followed by the sound of trampling feet.

Somebody came smashing through the undergrowth, and Dane was never quite certain as to the cause for what happened next, though he surmised that Chatterton's dread of becoming a laughing-stock to his enemy proved momentarily stronger than his reason. In any case, he must have endeavored to follow the keeper's lead, and lost his footing, for a side swing of the stream swept him out from shore, while Dane, realizing that an elderly gentleman in heavy boots and leggings was hardly likely to make much head against a flooded river, plunged from the bank in the flattest dive he could compass, though horribly afraid that he might strike his head against a submerged stone. It was a good plunge, for he rose almost in mid-stream, and heard a great splashing and panting close before him. A few moments later, he had Chatterton by the shoulder, and braced himself for a struggle.

Chatterton, though driving sideways down the stream, could apparently swim a little, and did not appear unduly alarmed. Indeed, Dane had cause for believing he feared nothing except ridicule; but he was very heavy, and panted stentoriously, while muddy froth beat into the younger man's eyes and nostrils, and the rebound, which surged in a whirling eddy from a central rock, swept them down together toward the white race between the boulders at the tail of the pool. Dane had no intention of being hammered against them if it could be avoided, and did his utmost, thrusting with one hand on Chatterton's shoulder and swimming on his side. Still, the boulders swept up-stream past them, the larches flitted by, and though they drew clear of the fastest rush, it seemed impossible that they could make a landing in time to escape the rapid. Chatterton was apparently swallowing water, and choking badly now.

"For heaven's sake, make a last effort, sir!" spluttered Dane; and the iron-master splashed furiously.

A strip of shingle grew nearer, but they would hardly have reached it had not a man floundered in almost shoulder-deep and clutched them as they passed. All three went down together, Chatterton undermost; but when Dane's head broke the surface, a hand was twined in his hair, and a half-choked voice said:

"You are in wading distance, man. Get up and walk!"

Dane felt sliding shingle beneath him, and tightening his grip on Chatterton he struggled for a foothold; and finally they reeled, breathless, dazed, and dripping, out among the boulders. Then somebody turned back the slide of a darkened lantern, and the half-drowned Chatterton gasped, for it was evident that his rescuer was Carsluith Maxwell, the son of his enemy. Maxwell stared at Chatterton, and the iron-master gaped at him; but while blank astonishment was stamped on both their faces, it was Maxwell who recovered his senses first.

"Robertson, hail Jim to run over to The Larches, and say that Mr. Chatterton, who fell into the river trying to capture a poacher, is coming home with me to change his clothes," he ordered, and then turned toward the dripping pair. "It was very plucky of you, sir, and you were only a few seconds too late. I thought you would secure the depredator. It is two miles round by the footbridge, and you hardly look fit for the walk, so you are coming to Culmeny with me. There is really no use protesting."

Thomas Chatterton did not look capable of much exertion, but he hesitated.

"It is very kind of you, but your father and I, unfortunately – "

Maxwell laughed.

"I believe you had some trifling difference; but this is a Christian country, and the reason given quite insufficient for letting you freeze to death. Mr. Dane, I presume? You will help me to persuade your host."

Chatterton, although exhausted, yielded dubiously, and it was not long before the pair shed their dripping garments beside a blazing fire in Culmeny, and struggled into the dry ones provided, both sets being of average size. Dane, however, was tall and long of limb; Chatterton was short and broad, and when his toilet was finished, he stood up half-choked, with every button straining about him.

"This is worse than a strait waistcoat, Hilton," he fumed; "and I'd rather forfeit five pounds than go down and meet them as I am. By the way, I believe I never thanked you; but I will not forget our swim. But tell me how you came to turn up so opportunely."

Chatterton betrayed some anxiety in the last words, but Dane managed to frame an answer which reassured him as he surveyed himself in a glass and hoped the Misses Maxwell would not put in an appearance. The wet hair plastered down his forehead showed a washed-out straw color against the darkened skin. His brown wrists and ankles projected ridiculously from the borrowed garments, and somebody's slippers would not cover more than a portion of his feet.

"We are neither of us particularly prepossessing at first sight, but I suppose we must make the best of it; Maxwell asked us to come down when we were ready," he said.

They went down, Chatterton fuming, Dane struggling with a desire to laugh; and two men rose to meet them when they entered a long, low-ceilinged room. That meeting was fraught with far-reaching consequences, and Dane could afterward recall it vividly. The old place of Culmeny was an ancient and somewhat decrepit edifice, owned for many generations by the Maxwells, and the wainscot of the room was dark with age. Quaintly embroidered curtains were drawn across one end of it; there were few pictures, and these old; while the whole place wore a somber air, almost intensified by the light of the wax candles on the great uncovered table, which supported a steaming bowl. This, Dane noticed, was of oak hooped with tarnished silver. It was, however, the two men who fixed his attention. The elder, a spare gray-haired man with a white moustache, came forward holding out his hand.

"I must congratulate you upon your escape, Mr. Chatterton," he said. "I am glad that Carsluith had sense enough to bring you home with him; and I can recommend a ladleful of this mixture as a preventative against a chill, while regretting that, because the fires were low, we could not send you a dose earlier. The customs of Culmeny are not altogether what they used to be."

The pair formed a striking contrast when Chatterton turned toward his host, glass in hand. The one was softly spoken, spare to gauntness, and characterized by a subtle air of distinction; the other, short, florid, abrupt in speech, and more often aggressive than dignified in manner. Then, because Chatterton was also a man of impulse, who cared for neither place nor tradition when anything stirred him, as his host's welcome evidently did, he bowed to Brandram Maxwell with more grace than Dane deemed him capable of.