Alec Forbes of Howglen | Page 9

King Robert, the
crowning triumph of whose intellect, in the eyes of his descendant, was
the strewing of the caltrops on the field of Bannockburn.
But James Dow was ill-pleased when he heard of the
arrangement--which was completed in due time. "For," said he, "I
canna bide that Bruce. He's a naisty mean cratur. He wadna fling a bane
till a dog, afore he had ta'en a pyke at it himsel'." He agreed, however,
with his mistress, that it would be better to keep Annie in ignorance of
her destiny as long as possible; a consideration which sprung from the
fact that her aunt, now that she was on the eve of parting with her, felt a

little delicate growth of tenderness sprouting over the old stone wall of
her affection for the child, owing its birth, in part, to the doubt whether
she would be comfortable in her new home.
CHAPTER VII.
A day that is fifty years off comes as certainly as if it had been in the
next week; and Annie's feeling of infinite duration did not stop the
sand-glass of Old Time. The day arrived when everything was to be
sold by public roup. A great company of friends, neighbours, and
acquaintances gathered; and much drinking of whisky-punch went on
in the kitchen as well as in the room where, a few months before, the
solemn funeral-assembly had met.
Little Annie speedily understood what all the bustle meant: that the day
of desolation so long foretold by the Cassandra-croak of her aunt, had
at length actually arrived, and that all the things she knew so well were
vanishing from her sight for ever.
She was in the barn when the sound of the auctioneer's voice in the
corn-yard made her look over the half-door and listen. Gradually the
truth dawned upon her; and she burst into tears over an old rake which
she had been accustomed to call hers, because she had always dragged
it at hay-making. Then wiping her eyes hastily--for, partly from her
aunt's hardness, she never could bear to be seen crying, even when a
child--she fled to Brownie's stall, and burying herself in the manger,
began weeping afresh. After a while, the fountain of tears was for the
time exhausted, and she sat disconsolately gazing at the old cow
feeding away, as if food were everything and a roup nothing at all,
when footsteps approached the byre, and, to her dismay, two men,
whom she did not know, came in, untied Brownie, and actually led her
away from before her eyes. She still stared at the empty space where
Brownie had stood,--stared like a creature stranded by night on the low
coast of Death, before whose eyes in the morning the sea of Life is
visibly ebbing away. At last she started up. How could she sit there
without Brownie! Sobbing so that she could not breathe, she rushed
across the yard, into the crowded and desecrated house, and up the stair

to her own little room, where she threw herself on the bed, buried her
eyes in the pillow, and, overcome with grief, fell fast asleep.
When she woke in the morning, she remembered nothing of Betty's
undressing and putting her to bed. The dreadful day that was gone
seemed only a dreadful dream, that had left a pain behind it. But when
she went out, she found that yesterday would not stay amongst her
dreams. Brownie's stall was empty. The horses were all gone, and many
of the cattle. Those that remained looked like creatures forgotten. The
pigs were gone, and most of the poultry. Two or three favourite hens
were left, which auntie was going to take with her. But of all the living
creatures she had loved, not one had been kept for Annie. Her life grew
bitter with the bitterness of death.
In the afternoon, her aunt came up to her room, where she sat in tearful
silence, and telling her that she was going to take her into the town,
proceeded, without further explanation, to put all her little personal
effects into an old hair-trunk, which Annie called her own. Along with
some trifles that lay about the room, she threw into the bottom of the
box about a dozen of old books, which had been on the chest of
drawers since long before Annie could remember. She, poor child, let
her do as she pleased, and asked no questions; for the shadow in which
she stood was darkening, and she did not care what came next. For an
hour the box stood on the floor like a coffin, and then Betty came, with
red eyes and a red nose, and carried it downstairs. Then auntie came up
again, dressed in her Sunday clothes. She put on Annie's