Annie o' the Banks o' Dee

“You —you! You old stiff-kneed curmudgeon! You a rival of a young fellow like me! Bah! Go home and go to bed!”

Fletcher was bold.

“Here!” he cried, dashing his rod on the grass; “I don’t stand language like that from anyone!”

Off went his coat, and he struck Craig a well-aimed blow under the chin that quite staggered him.

Ah! but even skill at fifty is badly matched by the strength and agility of a man in his twenties. In five minutes’ time Fletcher was on the grass, his face cut and his nose dripping with blood.

Craig stood over him triumphantly, but the devil still lurked in his eyes.

“I’m done with you for the time,” said Fletcher, “but mark me, I’ll do for you yet!”

“Is that threatening my life, you old reprobate? You did so before, too. Come,” he continued fiercely, “I will help you to wash some of that blood off your ugly face.”

He seized him as he spoke, and threw him far into the river.

The stream was not deep, so the Laird got out, and went slowly away to a neighbouring cottage to dry his clothes and send for his carriage.

“Hang it!” said Craig aloud; “I can’t fish to-day.”

He put up his rod, and was just leaving, when Shufflin’ Sandie came upon the scene. He had heard and seen all.

“Didn’t I tell ye, sir? He’ll kill ye yet if ye don’t take care. Be warned!”

“Well,” said Craig, laughing, “he is a scientific boxer, and he hurt me a bit, but I think I’ve given him a drubbing he won’t soon forget.”

“No,” said Sandie significantly; “he – won’t – forget. Take my word for that.”

“Well, Sandie, come up to the old inn, and we’ll have a glass together.”

For a whole fortnight Laird Fletcher was confined to his rooms before he felt fit to be seen.

“A touch of neuralgia,” he made his housekeeper tell all callers.

But he couldn’t and dared not refuse to see Shufflin’ Sandie when he sent up his card – an old envelope that had passed through the post-office.

“Well,” said the Laird, “to what am I indebted for the honour of this visit?”

“Come off that high horse, sir,” said Sandie, “and speak plain English. I’ll tell you,” he added, “I’ll tell you in a dozen words. I’m going to build a small house and kennels, and I’m going to marry Fanny – the bonniest lassie in all the world, sir. Ah! won’t I be happy, just!”

He smiled, and took a pinch, then offered the box to the Laird.

The Laird dashed it aside.

“What in thunder?” he roared, “has your house or marriage to do with me?”

“Ye’ll soon see that, my Laird. I want forty pounds, or by all the hares on Bilberry Hill I’ll go hot-foot to the Fiscal, for I heard your threat to Craig Nicol by the riverside.”

Half-an-hour afterwards Shufflin’ Sandie left the Laird to mourn, but Sandie had got forty pounds nearer to the object of his ambition, and was happy accordingly.

As he rode away, the horse’s hoofs making music that delighted his ear, Sandie laughed aloud to himself.

“Now,” he thought, “if I could only just get about fifty pounds more, I’d begin building. Maybe the old Laird’ll help me a wee bit; but I must have it, and I must have Fanny. My goodness! how I do love the lassie! Her every look or glance sends a pang to my heart. I cannot bear it; I shall marry Fanny, or into the deepest, darkest kelpie’s pool in the Dee I’ll fling myself.

“‘O love, love! Love is like a dizziness,
That winna let a poor body go about his bus-i-ness.’”

Shufflin’ Sandie was going to prove no laggard in love. But his was a thoroughly Dutch peasant’s courtship.

He paid frequent visits by train to the Granite City, to make purchases for the good old Laird McLeod. And he never returned without a little present for Fanny. It might be a bonnie ribbon for her hair, a bottle of perfume, or even a bag of choice sweets. But he watched the chance when Fanny was alone in the kitchen to slip them into her hand half-shyly.

Once he said after giving her a pretty bangle:

“I’m not so very, very ugly, am I, Fanny?”

“’Deed no, Sandie!”

“And I’m not so crooked and small as they would try to make me believe. Eh, dear?”

“’Deed no, Sandie, and I ay take your part against them all. And that you know, Sandie.”

How sweet were those words to Sandie’s soul only those who love, but are in doubt, may tell.

“Tis sweet to love, but sweeter far
To be beloved again;
But, ah! how bitter is the pain
To love, yet love in vain!”

“Ye haven’t a terrible lot of sweethearts, have you, Fanny?”

“Well, Sandie, I always like to tell the truth; there’s plenty would make love to me, but I can’t bear them. There’s ploughman Sock, and Geordie McKay. Ach! and plenty more.”

She rubbed away viciously at the plate she was cleaning.

“And I suppose,” said Sandie, “the devil a one of them has one sixpence to rub against another?”

“Mebbe not,” said Fanny. “But, Fanny – ”

“Well, Sandie?”

“I – I really don’t know what I was going to say, but I’ll sing it.”

Sandie had a splendid voice and a well-modulated one.

“My love is like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June;
My love is like a melody,
That’s sweetly played in tune.