MRS. M'NAB.
Mrs. McNab was a native of Dumfries, Scotland, and had made her advent
in the Miramichi country about five years previous to the occurrences
just mentioned.
Having buried her husband, mother, and two children,--hoping that
change of scene might lighten the weight upon her spirits, she had
concluded to emigrate with some intimate acquaintances to the Province
of New Brunswick.
On first reaching the settlement, she had spent several weeks at the
Dubois House, where she set immediately at work to prove her
accomplishments, by assisting in making up dresses for Mrs. Dubois and
Adèle.
She entertained them with accounts of her former life in
Scotland,--talking largely about her acquaintance with the family of
Lord Lindsay, in which she had served in the capacity of nurse. She
described the castle in which they resided, the furniture, the
servants, and the grand company; and, more than all, she knew or
pretended to know the traditions, legends, and ghost stories
connected, for many generations past, with the Lindsay race.
She talked untiringly of these matters to the neighbors, exciting
their interest and wonder by the new phases of life presented, and
furnishing food for the superstitious tendencies always rife in new
and ignorant settlements. In short, by these means, she won her way
gradually in the community, until she came to be the general factotum.
It was noticed, indeed, that in the annual round of her visits from
house to house, Mrs. McNab had a peculiar faculty of securing to
herself the various material comforts available, having an excellent
appetite and a genius for appropriating the warmest seat at the
fireplace and any other little luxury a-going. These things were,
however, overlooked, especially by the women of the region, on account
of her social qualities, she being an invaluable companion during the
long days and evenings when their husbands and sons were away, engaged
in lumbering or fishing. When the family with which she happened to be
sojourning were engaged in domestic occupations, Mrs. McNab,
established in some cosey corner, told her old wife stories and whiled
away the long and dismal wintry hours.
Of all the people among whom she moved, Adèle Dubois least exercised
the grace of patience toward her.
On the return of Mr. Dubois and his daughter to the house, after
having seen the horses safely stowed away, he refreshed himself at the
tea-table and left the room to attend to necessary business. Mrs.
Dubois and Mrs. McNab went to fit up an apartment for the stranger.
In the mean time Mr. Norton and Adèle were left with the invalid.
Mr. Brown's face had lost its pallid hue and was now overspread with
the fiery glow of fever. He grew more and more restless in his sleep,
until at length he opened his eyes wide and began to talk deliriously.
At the first sound of his voice, Adèle started from her seat,
expecting to hear some request from his lips.
Gazing at her wildly for a moment, he exclaimed, "What, _you_ here,
Agnes! you, travelling in this horrible wilderness! Where's your
husband? Where's John, the brave boy? Don't bring them here to taunt
me. Go away! Don't look at me!"
With an expression of terror on his countenance, he sank back upon the
pillow and closed his eyes. Mr. Norton knelt down by the couch and
made slow, soothing motions with his hand upon the hot and fevered
head, until the sick man sank again into slumber. Seeing this, Adèle,
who had been standing in mute bewilderment, came softly near and
whispered, "He has been doing something wrong, has he not, sir?"
"I hope not", said the good man, "He is not himself now, and is not
aware what he is saying. His fever causes his mind to wander".
"Yes, sir. But I think he is unhappy beside being sick. That sigh was
_so_ sorrowful!"
"It was sad enough", said Mr. Norton. After a pause, he continued, "I
will stay by his bed and take care of him to-night".
"Ah! will you, sir?" said Adèle. "That is kind, but Aunt Patty, I
know, will insist on taking charge of him. She thinks it her right to
take care of all the sick people. But I don't wish her to stay with
this gentleman to-night. If he talks again as he did just now, she
will tell it all over the neighborhood".
At that moment, the door opened, and Mrs. McNab came waddling in,
followed by Mr. and Mrs. Dubois.
"Now, Mr. Doobyce", said she, "if you and this pusson will just carry
the patient up stairs, and place him on the bed, that's a' ye need do.
I'll tak' care o' him".
"Permit me the privilege of watching by the gentleman's bed to-night",
said Mr. Norton, turning to Mr. Dubois.
"By no means, sir", said his host; "you have had a long ride through
the forest to-day and must be tired. Aunt Patty here prefers to take
charge of him".
"Sir", said Mr. Norton, "I observed awhile ago, that his mind was
quite wandering. He is greatly excited by fever, but I succeeded in
quieting him once and perhaps may be able to do so again".
Here Mrs. McNab interposed in tones somewhat loud and irate.
"That's the way pussons fra' your country always talk. They think they
can do everything better'n anybody else. What can a mon do at nussin',
I wad ken?"
"Mr. Norton will nurse him well, I know. Let him take care of the
gentleman, father", said Adèle.
"Hush, my dear", said Mr. Dubois, decidedly, "it is proper that Mrs.
McNab take charge of Mr. Brown to-night".
Adèle made no reply, and only showed her vexation by casting a defiant
look on the redoubtable aunt Patty, whose face was overspread with a
grin of satisfaction at having carried her point.
Mr. Norton, of course, did not press his proposal farther, but
consoled himself with the thought, that some future opportunity might
occur, enabling him to fulfil his benevolent intentions.
A quieting powder was administered and Mrs. McNab established herself
beside the fire that had been kindled in Mr. Brown's apartment.
After having indicated to Mr. Norton the bedroom he was to occupy for
the night, the family retired, leaving him the only inmate of the
room.
As he sat and watched the dying embers, he fell into a reverie
concerning the events of the evening. His musings were of a somewhat
perplexed nature. He was at a loss to account for the appearance of a
gentleman, bearing unmistakable marks of refinement and wealth, as did
Mr. Brown, under such circumstances, and in such a region as
Miramichi. The words he had uttered in his delirium, added to the
mystery. He was also puzzled about the family of Dubois. How came
people of such culture and superiority in this dark portion of the
earth? How strange, that they had lived here so many years, without
assimilating to the common herd around them.
Thus his mind, excited by what had recently occurred, wandered on,
until at length his thoughts fell into their accustomed
channel,--dwelling on his own mission to this benighted land, and
framing various schemes by which he might accomplish the object so
dear to his heart.
In the mean time, having turned his face partially aside from the
fire, he was watching unconsciously the fitful gleaming of a light
cast on the opposite wall by the occasional flaring up of a tongue of
flame from the dying embers.
Suddenly he heard a deep, whirring sound as if the springs of some
complicated machinery had just then been set in motion.
Looking around to find whence the noise proceeded, he was rather
startled on observing in the wall, in one corner, just under the
ceiling, a tiny door fly open, and emerging thence a grotesque,
miniature man, holding, uplifted in his hand, a hammer of size
proportionate to his own figure. Mr. Norton sat motionless, while this
small specimen proceeded, with a jerky gait and many bobbing grimaces,
across a wire stretched to the opposite corner of the room, where
stood a tall, ebony clock. When within a short distance of the clock
another tiny door in its side flew open; the little man entered and
struck deliberately with the hammer the hour of midnight. Near the top
of the dial-plate was seen from without the regular uplifting of the
little arm, applying its stroke to the bell within. Having performed
his duty, this personage jerked out of the clock, the tiny door
closing behind him, bobbed and jerked along the wire as before, and
disappeared at the door in the wall, which also immediately closed
after his exit.
Having witnessed the whole manoeuvre with comic wonder and curiosity,
Mr. Norton burst into a loud and hearty peal of laughter, that was
still resounding in the room when he became suddenly aware of the
presence of Mrs. McNab. There she stood in the centre of the
apartment, her firm, square figure apparently rooted to the floor, her
head enveloped in innumerable folds of white cotton, a tower of
strength and defiance.
Her unexpected appearance changed in a moment the mood of the good
man, and he inquired anxiously, "Is the gentleman more ill? Can I
assist you?"
"He's just this minnut closed his eyes to sleep, and naw I expect he's
wide awake again, with the dreadfu' racket you were just a makin' O!
my! wadna you hae made a good nuss?"
Mr. Norton truly grieved at his inadvertency in disturbing the
household at this late hour of the night, begged pardon, and told Mrs.
McNab he would not be guilty of a like offence.
"How has the gentleman been during the evening?" he asked.
"O! he's been ravin' crazy a'maist, and obstacled everything I've done
for him. He's a very sick pusson naw. I cam' down to get a bottle of
muddeson", and Mrs. McNab went to a closet and took from it the
identical bottle of brandy from which Mrs. Dubois had poured when
preparing the stimulating dose for the invalid. Mr. Norton observed
this performance with a twinkle of the eye, but making no comment, the
worthy woman retired from the room.
That night Mr. Norton slept indifferently, being disturbed by exciting
and bewildering dreams. In his slumbers he saw an immense cathedral,
lighted only by what seemed some great conflagration without, which,
glaring in, with horrid, crimson hue upon the pictured walls, gave the
place the strange, lurid aspect of Pandemonium. The effect was
heightened by the appearance of thousands of small, grotesque beings,
all bearing more or less resemblance to the little man of the clock,
who were flying and bobbing, jerking and grinning through the air,
beneath the great vault, as if madly revelling in the scene. Yet the
good man all the while had a vague sense of some awful, impending
calamity, which increased as he wandered around in great perplexity,
exploring the countenances of the various groups scattered over the
place.
Once he stumbled over a dead body and found it the corpse of the
invalid in the room above. He seemed to himself to be lifting it
carefully, when a lady, fair and stately, in rich, sweeping garments,
took the burden from his arms, and, sinking with it on the floor,
kissed it tenderly and then bent over it with a look of intense
sorrow.
Farther on he saw Mr. and Mrs. Dubois, with Adèle, kneeling
imploringly, with terror-stricken faces, before a representation of
the Virgin Mary and her divine boy. Then the glare of light in the
building increased. Rushing to the entrance to look for the cause of
it, he there met Mrs. McNab coming towards him with a wild, disordered
countenance,--her white cotton headgear floating out like a banner to
the breeze,--shaking a brandy bottle in the faces of all she met. He
gained the door and found himself enwrapped in a sheet of flame.
Suddenly the whole scene passed. He woke. A glorious September sun was
irradiating the walls of his bedroom. He heard the movements of the
family below, and rose hastily.
A few moments of thought and prayer sufficed to clear his healthy
brain of the fantastic forms and scenes which had invaded it, and he
was himself again, ready and panting for service.