Reginald Scot

“ It's word's going up, and word's going down,
Going to the king's bower,
That his dear daughter was with child,
That was his daily flower.
'If she be with child,
As I suppose she be,
I'll put her into prison strong,
And hunger her till she die.'
The king he wrote a letter broad,
And sealed it with his hands,
And sent it down to Johnnie Scott,
In Scotland where he stands. ”

“ THE RETURN OF MARY REGAN
Suddenly all conjectures concerning Bradley were swept utterly from his mind. Down the gilded red-carpeted stairway that led from what the Grand Alcazar termed its “ballroom de luxe,” there came—though this was not the figure Clifford first noted—a short, full-bodied, ornately dressed man, with a bald crown and a smile of engaging amiability. Beside him, and a half-head taller,—and this is what Clifford first saw,—walked a slender young woman, in an evening coat of rose velvet, her rounded throat gleaming a dusky marble from the soft shadows of the furred collar. ”

“ It is, however, not the less an hypothesis.
The first tangible notice of Clement occurs in a 'Catalogue of the Abbots of Fulda' (Perte, Monumenta Germanice Historica, Scriptt. xiii. 272) , where we read that Ratgar, who was abbot from 802 to 817, sent a certain Modestus and other monks to Clement the Scot for the purpose of learning grammar. Clement was, then or later, plainly resident at the Frankish court ”

“ Clifford considered rapidly how he might achieve a private meeting with her. Half an hour later he was sitting with Uncle George in Monsieur Le Bain’s Grand Alcazar, and was telling this wise old man of Broadway all that had happened.
“Certainly some little situation for Mary Regan!” Uncle George looked at Clifford with his shrewd old lashless eyes. “But, son, I hope your motor’s not missing fire over her—and her a married woman?”
“I’m concerned because I’m certain Loveman is planning to use her. I can protect her better, and I stand a better chance to land Loveman, if I know where she is.” ”

“ Somehow—though Mary Regan could mean nothing in his life—this statement brought great relief to Clifford.
She went on in the same quiet voice. “The rest of what I have to tell you is of more importance. My name is not Miss Gilmore nor Mrs. Gardner, and never was. My name is Mary Regan. My father was ‘Gentleman Jim’ Regan, a confidence-man; I’ve helped my Uncle Joe Russell, another confidence-man. I’ve been something of a confidence-woman, a crook, in the past. Now I’m what you’d probably call an adventuress.”
“What!” exclaimed Mr. Morton. ”

“ Changed habits of thought, reaching and affecting every class of society, make it useless now to seek in Scotland for any new developments of the legend of Michael Scot. This is not so certainly true, however, of the South of Europe; of Italy, Sicily, and Spain, where he was once a familiar figure. There the slow progress of education has left the common people still in possession of much legendary lore, and even of the living faculty by which in past ages such tales have been formed. ”

“ Clifford nodded. “It’s great stuff; hang on with all your teeth. But you can’t be on the job all the time. Suppose we have dinner together this evening and then see a show?”
“Sorry, Bob, but I’m dated up with dad to-night. If you’ll make it to-morrow evening, though, you’re on.”
“All right. Say we meet at seven in the Gold Room at the Grantham.”
It was so agreed. Clifford left Jack with one dominant impression: at least this phase of Mary’s scheme was visibly succeeding—Jack, whom no one had ever been able to get to go to work before, seemed tightly anchored to his job. ”

“ Clifford had wandered through the score of big public rooms that comprised the first two floors of the Grantham—the lounges, the parlors, the half-dozen restaurants—with the feverish hope that he might glimpse Mary Regan (so little effect had Uncle George’s wisdom had upon him!) , but with no idea of what he should do or say should he see her. He had had an impulse to call again at her suite, but had restrained himself from that folly. He now glanced through the slowly filling Gold [76] Room, but he did not sight her. ”

“ Leaving Thorne fairly gasping at this swift transition, Clifford strode out of the office and out of Police Headquarters. Two minutes later he was in a telephone booth in a saloon across the way and was asking the Grantham Hotel, in which he had left Mary Regan an hour before, for “Mrs. Gardner.” Soon Mary’s cool, even voice sounded over the wire.
“This is Robert Clifford,” he said. “May I see you again—for just a few minutes?”
There was a long silence; then the cool voice queried: “Alone?” ”

“ He backed away, covering Clifford with his pistol. "You're not going to get me, and no other man--while I'm alive, anyhow."
Mary Regan stepped between the two.
"You're all wrong, Jim!" she cried rapidly. "Mr. Clifford has tried to be your friend. didn't he advise you, before anything happened, to cut loose from those three men? And that night in Original Joe's café, when I wanted to speak to you, it was to tell you something Mr. Clifford had told me--that those three had some crooked game working against you and Jennie, and that you should look out. ”

“ I hadn’t heard that.”
[231] “His father showed me Jack’s telegram. Jack might at least have sent me word before this,” said Clifford.
“Just like Jack: a good fellow, but you can’t count on him.” Loveman’s voice lowered. “I wonder if our common friend, Mary Regan, has heard anything from him.”
“Not unless he thinks a lot more of her than he does of me,” Clifford grumbled.
“Queer situation there, isn’t it?” mused Loveman. “Wouldn’t be surprised if he had treated her the same as he has you.” The lawyer’s tone became humorously lugubrious. “Well, we all have our troubles. ”

“ Clifford shook his head.
Regan's manner relaxed. "Then have another drink?"
"Thanks. No."
"Well, I've got to meet the bunch." He raised his glass and drained the last of his buttermilk, then rose. "So-long." ”

“ They hurried into the long, low, gray car—the car which was to have borne Mary upon that cunningly devised saturnalia. “Jimmie, if you don’t mind, sit in front with Slim Harrison,” said Clifford, and himself took the rear seat with Mr. Morton, Mary between them. He leaned forward and spoke with harsh dominance into Slim’s ear. “Slim, I know this is a great machine, and I know that when you want to be you’re a great driver—and understand this, your only chance of getting out of this affair halfway easy is for you to get us to Greenport not later than the car ahead. Now, turn her loose.” ”

“ So I've studied him, his life, his friends--and so have the men who used to be under me--almost with a microscope. That's how I know. Thus far he has managed to avoid detection. And for a time he'll continue to escape, for he's the cleverest pickpocket working in. New York. But in the end he'll take too long chances, or overlook some detail, and will be caught. They always are."
"Most of that I already knew," said Mary Regan.
"That is only the best," said Clifford. "The worst thing about him is the three pals he is now working with. God knows what made him tie himself up with such a bunch ”

“ However, in those days character and honesty were still appreciated by men who did not imitate them. Mr. Scott rose to eminence in his profession, and enjoyed at one time an extensive practice. Somewhat formal in manner and a rigid Calvinist in religion, he had many little peculiarities of the rural rather than the city Scot. Thus, though very abstemious in his habits, he was fond of sociability and grew very merry over his sober glass of wine. Moderate in politics, he had a natural leaning to constitutional principles, and was jealous of modern encroachments on the royal prerogative. ”

“ Ye’se bear the tongue that can never lie.
‘Gin ere ye want to see me again,
Gang to the bonny banks o Farnalie.’ ‘Thomas the Rhymer,’ “Scotch Ballads, Materials for Border Minstrelsy,” No 97, Abbotsford; communicated to Sir Walter Scott by Mrs Christiana Greenwood, London, May 27, 1806 (Letters, I, 189) , from the recitation of her mother and of her aunt, both then above sixty, who learned it in their childhood from Kirstan Scot, a very old woman, at Longnewton, near Jedburgh. ”

“ Mary Regan whirled about.
"I shall not tell!"
"Yes, you will. It's the only decent thing there's left that you can do for the boy. You and he are about to part, and he must not be allowed to go on thinking that you love him; he's got to be cured of that." It gave Clifford a hurting pleasure to be thus giving pain for pain. "And besides, while I'm making you no promises, there are some things I can do to make this a bit easier for you--and if you want these from me for yourself or your uncle, you've got to tell Jerrold." ”

“ Despite her control Mary Regan had paled. "You don't mean--my brother--"
"No. Your brother is the exception to the law. In him there is a streak of his own kind of honor. But you have got to understand the code, the point of view, and perverted psychology, of these pickpockets. With them it is the accepted order of things for one to have a girl working for him. That is convention. What would be strange to him would be not to have a girl. Slant-Face did not have a girl. That at first puzzled his three pals. ”

“ Still, at the works of how many novelists except Scott should we grumble, if we had the admirable descriptions of Glendearg, the scenes in the Abbey, the night-ride of poor Father Philip, the escape from the Castle of Avenel, the passage of the interview of Halbert with Murray and Morton? Even the episode of Sir Piercie Shafton, though it is most indisputably true that Scott has not by any means truly represented Euphuism, is good and amusing in itself; while there are those who boldly like the White Lady personally. ”

“ There were a few indubitable members of the smartest social set for whom the wildest was becoming tame and cloying; and there were men and women hardly less well dressed, who lived by every means except honest effort—who were looking for pleasure and looking for prey; and in between these showy extremes were a few work-a-day persons who had come hither in a spirit of daring exploration.
Presently Clifford saw Mary Regan, obsequiously led by Monsieur Le Bain himself, and followed by the urbane little Peter Loveman, make way through the hilarious room and take possession of the reserved table. ”

“ THE WORLD SITS DOWN TOGETHER
It was opening night of the new bill at the Grand Alcazar; and Clifford, as he waited alone at a little table for his host, almost unconsciously searched through the great restaurant of black-and-gold for Mary Regan—just as, almost unconsciously, he had been seeking her wherever he had been during the six months of agreed-upon silence since they had parted. ”

“ Russell's tone was cordial. "One minute, and I'll be out."
Mary Regan, making no sign, permitted Clifford to go down the hall. An open door gave him a glimpse into a bedroom--her bedroom, he instantly surmised--and at the foot of the bed was a woven straw traveling bag and across a chair was a woman's traveling coat of pongee silk.
He had a moment alone in the sitting-room, for Mary Regan did not deign to follow him in to give him company. He gave a swift glance around, then stooped over wires that ran along the base-board, and snip! snip! he went with a pair of thin-jawed, powerful clippers. ”

“ Heavy, sick, Clifford went down the little dark hallway and unfastened the chain-bolt. "Grab him!" Bradley ordered his men, not recognizing Clifford, but knowing him not to be the fugitive he sought, and brushed by him and entered the sitting-room. Clifford, his arms seized, was pushed in after his former chief. Mary Regan and Slant-Face were seated behind a table. They did not rise. The square, dark face of Bradley, with its brilliant little eyes, fixed upon Slant-Face in grim gloating. ”

“ According to this commentator, Michael Scot always kept the best company, living in all respects as a gentleman and cavalier. In his tricks of the table he did not spare even his own master, but, while choosing his boiled meat from Paris, and his roasts from London, would always procure his entrées from the King of Sicily’s provision. The anonymous Florentine adds another tale to the same purpose, saying that his guests once asked Scot to show them a new marvel. ”

“ I wish it had been at the bottom of the Thames when it first gave the use of its roof to smooth-faced, oily-tongued, double-minded Scots thieves!”
“It's an ill bird that fouls its own nest,” replied his adversary, not perhaps the less bold that he saw matters were taking the turn of a pacific debate; “and a pity it is that a kindly Scot should ever have married in foreign parts, and given life to a purse-proud, pudding-headed, fat-gutted, lean-brained Southron, e'en such as you, Maister Christie. But fare ye weel—fare ye weel, for ever and a day ”

“ I defy the Old Enemy to unmask me when I choose to keep my vizard on. What the devil brought the Knight on us before we had the game out? You would have heard me hollo my own new ballad with a voice should have reached to Berwick. But I pray you, Master Roland, be less free of cold steel on slight occasions; since, but for the stuffing of my reverend doublet, I had only left the kirk to take my place in the kirkyard.”
“Nay, spare me that feud,” said Roland Graeme, “we shall have no time to fight it out; for, by our lord's command, I am bound for Edinburgh.” ”

“ Station, power, wealth, beauty, and genius, strove with each other in every demonstration of respect and worship, and—a few political fanatics and envious poetasters apart—wherever he appeared in town or country, whoever had Scotch blood in him, "gentle or simple," felt it move more rapidly through his veins when he was in the presence of Scott.' But in the midst of this blaze of glory, and while he was dreaming dreams of fortune and family pride, what was it that struck the most keen-eyed of critics when he first saw his hero? ”