第43章

`Gae farer up the burn to Habbie's Howe, Where a' the sweets o' spring an' simmer grow:

Between twa birks, out o'er a little lin, The water fa's an' mak's a singan din;

A pool breast-deep, beneath as clear as glass, Kisses, wi' easy whirls, the bord'ring grass.'

The Gentle Shepherd.

That is what Peggy says to Jenny in Allan Ramsay's poem, and if you substitute `Crummylowe' for `Habbie's Howe' in the first line, you will have a lovely picture of the farm-steadin'.

You come to it by turning the corner from the inn, first passing the cottage where the lady wishes to rent two rooms for fifteen shillings a week, but will not give much attendance, as she is slightly asthmatic, and the house is always as clean as it is this minute, and the view from the window looking out on Pettybaw Bay canna be surpassed at ony money. Then comes the little house where Will'am Beattie's sister Mary died in May, and there wasna a bonnier woman in Fife. Next is the cottage with the pansy-garden, where the lady in the widow's cap takes five-o'clock tea in the bay-window, and a snug little supper at eight. She has for the first, scones and marmalade, and her tea is in a small black teapot under a red cosy with a white muslin cover drawn over it. At eight she has more tea, and generally a kippered herring, or a bit of cold mutton left from the noon dinner. We note the changes in her bill of fare as we pass hastily by, and feel admitted quite into the family secrets.

Beyond this bay-window, which is so redolent of simple peace and comfort that we long to go in and sit down, is the cottage with the double white tulips, the cottage with the collie on the front steps, the doctor's house with the yellow laburnum tree, and then the house where the Disagreeable Woman lives. She has a lovely baby, which, to begin with, is somewhat remarkable, as disagreeable women rarely have babies; or else, having had them, rapidly lose their disagreeableness--so rapidly that one has not time to notice it.

The Disagreeable Woman's house is at the end of the row, and across the road is a wicket-gate leading-- Where did it lead?--that was the very point. Along the left, as you lean wistfully over the gate, there runs a stone wall topped by a green hedge; and on the right, first furrows of pale fawn, then below, furrows of deeper brown, and mulberry, and red ploughed earth stretching down to waving fields of green, and thence to the sea, grey, misty, opalescent, melting into the pearly white clouds, so that one cannot tell where sea ends and sky begins.

There is a path between the green hedge and the ploughed field, and it leads seductively to the farm-steadin'; or we felt that it might thus lead, if we dared unlatch the wicket gate. Seeing no sign `Private Way,' `Trespassers Not Allowed,' or other printed defiance to the stranger, we were considering the opening of the gate, when we observed two female figures coming toward us along the path, and paused until they should come through. It was the Disagreeable Woman (although we knew it not) and an elderly friend. We accosted the friend, feeling instinctively that she was framed of softer stuff, and asked her if the path were a private one. It was a question that had never met her ear before, and she was too dull or too discreet to deal with it on the instant. To our amazement, she did not even manage to falter, `I couldna say.'

"Is the path private?" I repeated.

"It is certainly the idea to keep it a little private," said the Disagreeable Woman, coming into the conversation without being addressed. "Where do you wish to go?"

"Nowhere in particular. The walk looks so inviting we should like to see the end."

"It goes only to the Farm, and you can reach that by the highroad; it is only a half-mile further. Do you wish to call at the Farm?"

"No, oh no; the path is so very pretty that--"

"Yes, I see; well, I should call it rather private." And with this she departed, leaving us to stand on the outskirts of paradise, while she went into her house and stared at us from the window as she played with the lovely undeserved baby. But that was not the end of the matter.