The visit to the Bridge of Allan was anything but a successful
expedition on the whole. Little Margaret took cold, and had a trifling
illness, which filled her three slaves with trembling terror; and Isabel
was so much disposed, with unconscious superstition, to regard this as
‘a judgment’ on her own distracted thoughts and wavering mind, that she
was not a pleasant companion to Miss Catherine, who, on the other hand,
blamed herself for her over-confidence in her own opinion, for exposing
the child to bodily risk and the mother to temptation. Marion made no
small amount of critical observations to herself behind their backs,
thinking the child’s illness also ‘a judgment.’ ‘Them that flees from
the Lord, the Lord’s hand will find them out,’ said Marion to herself.
And the little party was not a happy one. They remained until after the
anniversary of Mr. Lothian’s murder, of which Miss Catherine was rather
disposed to make a solemnity. Poor Isabel, with her heart still
trembling for her child, and still suffering from the sharp assault of
the new life which had taken her at unawares, found it difficult enough
to force back her thoughts into the channel of the past, and feel all
the grief, the heavy weight of recollection that was expected of her.
After the anniversary was over they went home. It was on a brilliant
June day--a warm, languid, breathless afternoon, when the steamer once
more carried them up Loch Diarmid. Miss Catherine herself looked round
her with an anxious air when she first stepped on board, involuntarily
feeling that _he_ might be there again way-laying them. Isabel did not
look for him, but an excitement which she could not conquer took
possession of her. It seemed to herself that she was coming home to wait
for him, and that, sooner or later, he must come to the place he knew so
well to disturb her life. The Lady of the Manor recognised group after
group, and speculated with Marion, as there was no satisfaction to be
got from Isabel, upon their different errands. ‘There’s John Campbell
has been settling his son in Glasgow,’ she said. ‘I hope it will not
turn the lad’s head. They’re a very pushing family. But I can’t tell
what the smith’s wife should have to do so often in Maryburgh, wasting
her time and spending her siller. Marion, is that Archibald Smeaton I
see there at the other end of the boat? Go and ask him if the queys are
all sold, and what price they brought; and here!--listen--ye can ask
him,’ said Miss Catherine, aside into Marion’s ear, ‘if yon Englishman
is still about the Loch.’
While Marion went upon this commission there was a momentary pause in
Miss Catherine’s talk--partly because Isabel was unresponsive, and
partly because she was anxious as to the answer which might be returned
to the last question. But her eyes were not the less busy scanning the
shores of the Loch with that strange interest which a local notability
takes in every symptom of change that may have become visible in his or
her absence. She gave a sudden exclamation at one point as they went on,
and seized upon Isabel’s arm, forcibly calling her attention.
‘Look at Ardnamore!’ cried Miss Catherine, with a gasp of surprise.
Isabel started and lifted her eyes. The house was all open to the rays
of the setting sun, the very door was standing wide open, and every
appearance of inhabitation was about the place. But what was most
wonderful of all was the apparition of a white figure fully revealed in
the intense light, standing on the green clearing of the lawn. The trees
were all so thick around, and the yellow, slanting sunset shone so full
upon the green slope and the one figure on it, that it was difficult to
pass it without notice. All the windows were lit up with a glow as of
illumination; the green trees were almost reddened by the rays; the
white walls of the house blazed with intensity of tone; and the one
woman stood in the midst of it all, looking out with a certain wistful,
lingering patience in her attitude. Perhaps imagination only conferred
upon this white figure, which was too distant to be seen, the qualities
of expectation and patience. But the whole scene struck the travellers
with a shock of surprise.
‘And no one ever told me a word about it,’ Miss Catherine said, with
indignation. ‘Can he have had the sense to let the house--or can they
have come back? but then who was that?’
‘It was Ailie,’ said Isabel.
‘It was no such thing,’ said Miss Catherine. ‘Ailie, indeed! My dear,
you are thinking of something else, and you have not looked at her. That
is the figure of a gentlewoman. They must have woke up to their
interests at last, and let the house. An English family, I would not
wonder. But even an Englishwoman can have no need to put on a moonstruck
look like that.’
‘You are speaking of my wife,’ said someone at Miss Catherine’s ear.
Like most people who live among their inferiors, she had a way of
expressing her sentiments without any constraint of her voice or
concealment of her opinion. She was a person of importance, and she was
very well aware of the fact; consequently she started, and turned round,
not well pleased, to ask the intruder what he meant by thrusting himself
into private conversation; but was struck dumb, and all the strength
taken out of her for the moment, to find Mr. John himself standing by
her side. Isabel was roused and startled too. It was, indeed, her little
cry of recognition which persuaded Miss Catherine that the apparition
was real and undeniable.
‘John Diarmid!’ she cried, with a voice half choked with wonder and
curiosity; and then made a dead pause, looking at him with a surprise
too great for speech.
‘You must beware how you speak of my wife,’ he said. ‘Yes, we have come
home. I have brought her home--and she is no longer Ailie, but my wife.
If you would be a friend to either of us, you might show an example to
others, and not lead the way to trouble.’
‘Trouble--what trouble?’ said Miss Catherine; ‘and why should I be a
friend to you, John Diarmid, or set anybody an example to do you
pleasure?’
‘Why should you be a foe?’ he said.
And then they both paused, and looked at each other. Mr. John’s
appearance had changed. It was nearly three years since he had left Loch
Diarmid with his wife; and the wild look of passion and excitement which
had marked the prophet had died out of his face. But his appearance was
more strange to homekeeping eyes than it had been even when his face was
lighted up with that glance which was half-insanity. He had acquired the
foreign air which in those days was given by a beard; and his dress,
too, was foreign; and there was about him that indescribable look which
is not English, which has come to be conventionally identified with the
conspirator and revolutionary. He had a great cloak on his arm--a
Spanish cloak capable of being thrown around him after a fashion not
impossible in those days, though now identified with, at the least, a
Byronic hero. His dark face, so much as could be seen of it in the
forest of dark hair and darker beard, was more like that of an Italian
than a Scotchman; his aspect was that of a man full of weighty cares and
responsibilities. The wild inspiration of his supposed mission had gone
from him; but it was not only that he had lost that: something also
there was, which the keen-sighted spectators perceived without
understanding, which he had acquired. He looked at Miss Catherine
without flinching, but with no excitement, meeting her eye calmly, and
repeating what he had already said.
‘Why should you be a foe? I am none to you. You might be a protection to
my wife. Am I to understand that my sins have been such that you will
not forget what is past, and give your countenance to her? It might be a
comfort to her,’ he said with a suppressed sigh.
‘I cannot see what other protection your wife wants, John Diarmid, when
you are here.’
‘But I am not likely to be here,’ he said, quietly. ‘I have many things
on my hands. I am here to-day, and gone to-morrow. Poor thing! she is
alone; her own friends are unlike her now. You saw her standing
there----’
‘You have made a lady of her,’ said Miss Catherine, with a
half-congratulation, half-reproach.
‘I have made her----’ he said, and paused. ‘No, I have made her
nothing; nought of it is my doing. It is another than I that must bear
the blame.’
‘Then there is blame to be borne?’ said Miss Catherine. ‘John Diarmid, I
know nothing about your history since you’ve been away; but if you’ve
been unkind to that poor lass, after making her marry you----’
‘My kinswoman,’ he said, with a faint touch of scorn not distinct enough
to be called a sneer, ‘what I have done to her is of little consequence.
It is God Who has been unkind to her. Don’t start as if I spoke
blasphemy. _She_ can see but one way of working----’
‘Then I suppose,’ said Miss Catherine, vehemently, ‘you’ve given up the
trade of prophet for yourself? I thought as much--and left her, poor
weak thing! to bear the burden. And what is your way of working now?’
‘You have no right to speak to me so,’ said Mr. John. ‘I have given up
no trade; but I see it is by nations and peoples, and not by single men,
that the reformation of the world is to be accomplished. Why should I
explain my views to you? You would not understand me. What I wish is
that you would protect her as a woman and my kinswoman might, when I am
not here to do it.’
‘And why should you not be here to do your duty yourself, John Diarmid?’
said Miss Catherine. ‘You have done her all the honour a man can do a
woman, and it’s your place to stand by her now.’
‘Honour!’ he said, and uttered an impatient, weary sigh. ‘It might have
been better for her had she never come to such honour.’ Isabel, who had
been listening eagerly, though she had not spoken, heard the exclamation
which was muttered between his teeth, and in her hasty heart rebelling
against Miss Catherine’s coldness, felt it was time for her to
interfere.
‘Mr. John,’ she said, ‘I am not just Isabel, as when you knew me--but
Mrs. Lothian. I will go to Ailie, and--take care of her, as much as I
can, while you are away.’
Miss Catherine turned and looked upon her with almost as much
consternation as if it had been Baby Margaret who spoke. And as for Mr.
John, the strangest change came over his face. His large fiery eyes, in
which excitement still lurked, though it was unlike the excitement of
old, softened over with a glimmer as of tears. He went up to her, close
to her, as if it would have given him pleasure to lay his hand on her
head, or her shoulder--‘Is the child yours?’ he said. ‘Tell me its
name.’
‘Margaret,’ said Isabel, under her breath.
‘I thought it was Margaret; God bless her!’ he said, with something
between a sigh and a moan; and then waved his hand and left them
hurriedly, going to the other side of the boat, and turning his face to
the opposite shore. Thus he left them as abruptly as he had come to
them, leaving Isabel’s offer of service totally unanswered. To him as
well as to Miss Catherine it was as if a child had spoken; and Isabel’s
voice was like her sister’s, and the deeper expression which had come
into her face made the fundamental resemblance of the two faces more
striking. It was to John Diarmid as if his dead love herself had risen
up to offer her protection to the woman who was his wife.
‘So, Isabel, you’ve taken Ailie under _your_ protection? You are a
married woman, no doubt,’ said Miss Catherine, with emphatic scorn; ‘but
you’ll not find it an easy task to introduce Mrs. Diarmid of Ardnamore
in the county, you may take my word.’
‘Was I thinking of the county?’ cried Isabel. ‘Oh, Miss Catherine, how
can you be so kind and so cruel? I was thinking of her heart breaking,
and her comfort lost----’
‘Her comfort lost?’ cried Miss Catherine. ‘The comforts of Janet
Macfarlane’s cottage were you thinking of? I am not so high-flown. It is
plenty, I hope, for Ailie to have gained her purpose, and got herself
made lawful mistress of Ardnamore, without exacting protection, which
means introductions, from either you or me.’
‘Oh! you cannot think that was her purpose,’ cried Isabel, fully roused;
but by this time the pier was reached, and Jean Campbell’s anxious face
was visible, looking out for the travellers, and all the familiar
landscape opened before them.
She was very subdued and pensive when she re-entered her own home--the
home which now was her only shelter upon earth--her first, and, as she
thought, her last dwelling-place. Not positively sorrowful, but softly
and full of musings and melancholy thoughts. When the child was put to
bed she went and sat by the window, and watched the lingering night out,
through the long, long twilight, and sweet wavering darkness lit with
stars.
‘You’re sitting in the dark,’ said Jean Campbell, coming in. ‘Eh,
Isabel, my dear, I canna bide to see ye sitting that idle, with nae
light. You’re thinking, and that makes sorrow. I thought you were tired
with your journey and in your bed, which would be a better place.’
‘No, it is not sorrow,’ said Isabel, softly; ‘it is the long day and the
bonnie night. It is not dark yet, and I was doing nothing. Do you think
she is looking well, now you’ve seen her? and you’ve noticed how she has
grown?’
‘I saw the difference before you were out of the boat,’ said Jean. Bless
her--the bonnie lamb! She’s like a rose, and so she has ay been since
the day she came into this world. If ever there was a bairn that brought
a blessing----’
‘You did not tell me when you wrote,’ said Isabel, hastily, ‘that Mr.
John and Ailie had come to Ardnamore.’
Jean had given a perceptible start at the beginning of the sentence, as
if she feared to be questioned; but recovered herself as soon as she
heard these names. ‘I scarcely kent myself,’ she said; ‘I wouldna
believe it till I saw Ailie at the kirk. Eh, she’s changed. Me that
minds what she was----’
‘Does she look--as if she were happy?’ said Isabel, feeling her own
voice flutter like a sigh through the dark.
‘She looks--like a spirit; no like a woman,’ said Jean; ‘ye should have
seen the folk how struck they all were. Some thought she would be giving
herself airs noo she’s come home to her ain, and some thought she would
be currying favour to make folk forget, and some----’
‘Oh, never mind what they thought,’ said Isabel, ‘tell me about
herself.’
‘Eh, Isabel, you would have been struck! She was as white as a woman cut
out of stane, and a’ dressed in white, which was awfu’ strange to see.
She went no to the Ardnamore pew, but to her auld seat, and knelt down
at the very prayers when a’body else was standing. But the strangest of
all was the look in her e’en. You would have thought she had never seen
one that was there in all her life before.’
‘But oh,’ cried Isabel, the tears coming to her eyes, ‘it was not
pride.’
‘No, it wasna pride,’ said Jean; ‘there was some that said it was, but
no one that looked at her close like me. I dinna like to say what I
thought myself. There’s been mad folk in the Ardnamore family for many a
generation; but then Ailie’s no one of the Ardnamore family except by
her marriage, and that wouldna affect her; but----’
‘I am going to see her to-morrow,’ said Isabel.
‘I wouldna if I were you,’ said Jean. ‘Oh, Isabel, my bonnie woman! I
canna bide to see you have any troke with such folk. And there’s
strangers about the parish I’m no fond of. I heard yesterday of a man
that spoke to young Mrs. Diarmid of Ardgartan, and gave her an awfu’
fright, and--unless Miss Catherine would take you in her carriage. And
you in your deep crape! You canna go and pay visits so early. It wouldna
be like you to show so little respect----’
‘You have some reason more than this,’ said Isabel, growing pale in the
darkness, and faltering as she spoke, for her heart began to beat and
took away her voice.
‘Me! what reason could I have?--but just your good, my lamb!’ said Jean,
with nervous volubility; ‘but I’m no for you mixing yourself up with
such folk; and I’m no for you walking about the country-side your lane.
There’s a heap of Irish about, ay coming with thae weary steamers.
You’re no to blame me, Isabel, if I am awfu’ anxious, more anxious in
your condition than if you were a bairn of my own----’
‘But I see you have another reason,’ said Isabel; ‘am I such a bairn or
such a fool that you will not tell me? But I am going to see Ailie
to-morrow, whatever happens; if you like you can come with me yourself.’
‘Na, it’s no my place, as if I were Mrs. Lothian’s equal,’ said Jean,
standing irresolute by the table, tracing a pattern on the carpet with
her foot. Little Margaret woke at the moment, which was a godsend to
her. She had to be patted, and rocked, and sung to, ere she would go to
sleep again. Jean escaped under cover of this interposition; but her
face was full of care when she brought in the candles, flashing the
light in Baby Margaret’s eyes, who immediately opened those dark orbs
wide, and made herself very broad awake, and had to be played with for
ever so long before she would consent to sleep again. And Isabel was
tired, and not to be disturbed with agitating news, and ‘put off her
night’s rest.’ Besides, what good would it do to tell her? But Jean’s
heart was heavy with thoughts of what might be coming, when she bade her
stepdaughter good night.