McNab

“ The words died on my lips as I looked: looked at the tall, spare form, the straight shoulders, the close-cropped iron-grey hair: looked most of all at the white, haggard face. It was the face of my employer as I had learned to know it during my four weeks in her house. But—it was not Mrs. McNab!
The moments dragged by as we stood, giving back stare for stare: I, bewildered, terrified, unable to move, the other grim and watchful. I caught my breath in a gasp at last, and a threat came to me like the lash of a whip.
“You will be wise if you make no noise!” ”

“ Almost every man in the Wirree was in McNab's debt. He knew more about their lives and antecedents than was to their soul's comfort. They suspected that more than one of the men who had been taken back to the Island had been put away by McNab, and that those lean, crooked hands of his had fingered Government money—rewards for the capture of escaped convicts. But so long as they were in with Thad McNab, Wirreeford men with pasts that would not bear looking into thought they were all right. ”

“ Straight north, day after day! To McNab, a man who had cruised ten years on Alaskan waters, the air began to feel like home. It was crisp, surging cool in the lungs, fragrant with balsam from the wooded islands. Already Ned had begun to readjust some of his ideas in regard to the North. It was no longer easy to believe that his father had exaggerated its beauty and its appeal, its desolation and its vastness. It was a strange thing for a man used to cities to go day upon day without seeing scarcely a village beside the sea, a single human being other than those of his own party. ”

“ He was going to her when the side-door of the Black Bull—the door of McNab's parlour, as he knew—opened. Donald Cameron stood in it for a moment. Davey saw McNab behind him, his crooked figure and twisted face with the withered fringe of hair about it.
Cameron staggered across the stretch of gravel to the buggy in which his wife sat waiting. He climbed into it.
"Will you not let me drive, Donald?"
The clear sweetness of his mother's voice came to the boy's ears.
"No," Donald Cameron said unsteadily. "There's no woman living will drive me while I can lay hands on the reins." ”

“ I am not going to lose her again, if I can help it!”
“I should be very sorry to think our friendship would end with the holidays,” said Mrs. McNab. “Indeed, after all the young people have gone away I should like to keep you here awhile, my dear, for a thorough rest—with nothing to do but lie about and read, or drive the car, or bathe. It would be dull, but I think it would be good for you.”
“You’re awfully kind, Mrs. McNab,” I said. “But there’s school—and Madame Carr. Think of the waiting twelve-year-olds to whom I teach deportment!”
“Hang the twelve-year-olds!” said Dr. Firth explosively. ”

“ Beryl and Harry would never forgive me. It would ruin their lives; Harry could never go back to the University.”
I saw that, and my sense of helplessness increased. To drag young Harry McNab into this tangle, just at the commencement of his manhood, was not to be thought of. I suggested Dr. Firth, but Mrs. McNab recoiled from the idea in horror.
“But he is the very man who has been robbed! He is kind, I know, but he is only human—how could I expect help from him! He would be the first to hand Ronald over to the police.” ”

“ All the first settlers signed their original location tickets. Now, McNab held them under him by two instruments—the bond executed at Leney House in Callander, and the location ticket which bound themselves and their lands to the Chief and his heirs and successors forever. The reader will direct his attention to the Order in Council for the settlement of the Township of McNab, passed in 1823, and contrast it with the terms the Laird of McNab imposed upon his settlers. They were ignorant. They had implicit [Pg 26] confidence in their Chief. ”

“ Endowed with a wisdom, which in one placed in less desperate position would have been madness, John Rex shouted to his pursuers. "The rope! the rope!" The words, projected against the sides of the enormous funnel, were pitched high above the blast, and, reduplicated by a thousand echoes, reached the ears of those above.
"He's alive!" cried McNab, peering into the abyss. "I see him. Look!" ”

“ McNab answered curtly:
"No wonder! He has been living wi' decent folk lately, and decency tells. Them Californians are the civilest o' mortals. You'll mind my ain lad, that was here about four years syne?"
"I'll never forget him, Mistress McNab. A perfect gentleman."
"Weel, he was, in a way, a Californian—born, of course, in Scotland, but knocked about among the Californians, until he learned how to behave himsel' to rich and poor and auld and young, and special to women and bairns."
While this conversation was going on Robert sat in the old dining-room. ”

“ The sound of it stunned her nevertheless.
"P'raps the Schoolmaster'll get off this affair of the cattle, but that's only three years," McNab said. "The other'd be till the expiration of his sentence, probably for the end of his life, my dear; 'n Steve—a month or two'd be the end of him! You're the price of their freedom. You pays y'r money and takes y'r choice, Deirdre." ”

“ When he appeared at Kennell, McNab read the communication and asked poor Sandy to confess. Mr. McNab stoutly denied it. He was completely astonished and indignant at being thus charged and asked to acknowledge a crime he had never contemplated, and which, if his name had been affixed to it, would have been a privileged communication and beyond the bounds of prosecution. ”

“ He meant you to be a great man in the district. Then McNab began talking to him. Your father thinks McNab's doing him a good turn in some way, but I feel it's nothing but evil will come to us from him. The sight of the man makes me shiver and I wonder what harm it is he is planning for us."
Her voice went to Davey's heart. ”

“ McNab sniggered.
"Oh well—you're a lad, Davey," he said. "As good a man with cattle as your father, and you know better than he does how to make yourself popular. We used to say you was as mean as him once—a chip of the old block."
Davey started to his feet. He stood by the table, swaying a little as he hung to it.
"You ... you be careful, McNab, or I'll smash your damned head," he said.
It was only when they were very fuddled that men spoke to him like this. McNab giggled.
Farrel heard the boy's voice. It came to him, thick and uncertain, through the thin walls. ”

“ McNab did not appear at all: genius was working, and she had given orders that she was not to be disturbed. We dined in the schoolroom in unwonted quiet; the children confessed to being tired, and went off to bed early, leaving me free to answer long letters that had awaited me from Colin and Madge—long, cheery letters, written with the evident intention of making me believe that life in the Prahran flat was one long dream of joy. ”

“ It was Thad McNab who spoke.
He grudged Mrs. Hegarty her gathering of young people and the patronage of Pat Glynn, but then she was able to run the place better than he, and although it was supposed to be her property, none knew better than the two of them that it was his as much as the Black Bull.
McNab came and stood in Mrs. Mary Ann's doorway sometimes when there was dancing, and the joy of several of the dancers was quenched at the mere sight of his shrivelled yellow face and pale eyes.
The Schoolmaster looked down at him. No man could afford to quarrel with McNab. ”

“ The little I had seen of Beryl McNab did not make me feel inclined to turn to her for instructions. But Mrs. McNab’s next words were comforting.
“Just at present I am doing only light work,” she said. “A few hours each day: more, perhaps, during the night. With so many in the house I can scarcely seclude myself altogether. But I do not want to be continually troubled with household matters. I shall, of course, interview the cook each morning, to arrange the daily menu. Otherwise, Miss Earle, I shall be glad if you will endeavour to act as my buffer.” ”

“ He, on the impulse of the moment, selected one of the settlers as the author—one Alexander McNab, who had been a teacher in Scotland, and who had specially emigrated to Canada to follow his profession. As such he received [Pg 43] the location ticket for 200 acres instead of one, as had been awarded to other settlers. He was now the only educated man among the settlers. He had shown symptoms of insubordination some time previously. His handwriting was very like that of the libellous communication. He resided within two miles of Kennell Lodge, near the present Flat Rapid Road. ”

“ Mrs. McNab and I paid another visit to the Island on the fourth night, taking a fresh supply of food. We found our refugee in a distinctly bad temper, loneliness and lack of tobacco being his principal grievances. He became rather more cheerful when we supplied the latter need, but muttered angrily when he learned that no letter had yet been received from his friend in Adelaide. “A man can’t stay on this beastly rock for ever!” I heard him say. “I’ll be in a pretty fix if Transom slips me up, after all.”
“You do not think he will, Ronald?” Mrs. McNab’s voice was sharp with anxiety. ”

“ McNab, and Judy and Jack enjoyed it, too. Please don’t worry about me. I am really much stronger than when I first came here.”
“I am very glad to hear you say so,” Mrs. McNab said. “Indeed, Dr. Firth, I should be sadly lost without Miss Earle. For one so young she has surprising tact in dealing with cooks and children!” At which I turned a brilliant red, and Dr. Firth laughed and said good-bye. I walked with him to the gate, where his car stood. Just as he started the engine, Judy and Jack came tearing up.
“When are we to come over to see you? You said we were to come one day in the holidays!” ”

“ Davey did not look at McNab, and McNab took no notice of him, enjoying his position of importance by the fireside, and chuckling over the gay chatter Deirdre threw to him.
"We eat our heads off, up here, Mr. McNab," she said. "And sleep! Davey and Conal there, to see them yawning over their supper to-night you'd think they'd never seen a bed for weeks. They've been saying they're going to turn in early because they've to go off mustering first thing in the morning, and father and Steve would have sat here dozing by the fire for a while, and then gone off to bed too. ”

“ Family Compact, with their little bantam, Sir Francis, began to crow; the people of McNab were fast verging to a state of revolt themselves, when the news reached this side of the Atlantic that the Earl of Durham and a special set of Commissioners were coming out to investigate all complaints and redress all grievances. This was news, indeed! It gave hope to the desponding, and inspired the settlers with new vigor. All hope was nearly crushed out by the supercilious mockery of their petition by Sir Francis and his Executive Council, and the delusive falsehoods which his reply contained ”

“ At this point McNab rushed into the room crying: "For goodness sake, my lady, stop! You'll be having the police in, and the de'il to pay all round, disturbing the Sunday saints and the like o' it. Excuse me, ma'am, but you don't know what you're up to."
"I am singing a psalm, McNab. Is there anything wrong in that?"
"You've put your finger on the wrong, ma'am. Singing a psalm isna a thing fit to be done in your ain parlor on the Sunday. It is a' right in the Kirk, but it is a' wrang in the parlor." ”

“ No one smelt mischief brewing quicker than he. He had seen McNab's face. He knew Young Davey's temper and the sort of man he was growing. He knew Conal, too, and that no love was lost between them. It was an urgent matter would send Davey looking through the town for Conal that way, he guessed, and knowing something of the business they had in hand, as an old roadster always does, imagined the cause of the urgency. ”

“ McNab was there, and the trooper from Port Southern with him. Under his coat, I could make out his uniform. A bottle of rum made the talk go easy between them, and I heard the plan they were making. It was that M'Laughlin should not keep too close a watch for 'travellers' from the Island—be too keen on their scent—and McNab should play friendly to them and tell M'Laughlin of their whereabouts when they thought they were getting off finely. He was to arrest them, and the pair of them would share the reward. Steve and I were expected. We were to be first victims. ”

“ We had all better go about in our best clothes, because if they meet us in a body they will attack us with their cameras, and it would be painful if ‘Mrs. McNab’s house-party at The Towers’ appeared as we’re looking now!”
“I will not have that!” Mrs. McNab exclaimed heatedly. “Harry, I insist that no one shall take photographs here—if you meet any newspaper people you are to discourage them, no matter what they say. To photograph a private house for a newspaper is an unwarrantable impertinence! ”

“ Maddened with a terror he could not define, the hunted man turned to meet the material peril that was so close at hand.
With a ferocious gasp, the dog flung himself upon him. John Rex was borne backwards, but, in his desperation, he clutched the beast by the throat and belly, and, exerting all his strength, flung him off. The brute uttered one howl, and seemed to lie where he had fallen; while above his carcase again hovered that white and vaporous column. It was strange that McNab and the soldier did not follow up the advantage they had gained. Courage—perhaps he should defeat them yet! ”