CHAPTER I

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The

Prodigal Father

BY

J. STORER CLOUSTON

AUTHOR "THE LUNATIC AT LARGE,"

"A COUNTY FAMILY," ETC.

New York

The Century Co.

1909

Copyright, 1909, by

J. STORER CLOUSTON

_Published, September, 1909_

J. F. TAPLEY CO.

NEW YORK

WITH GRATEFUL ACKNOWLEDGMENT TO AN UNKNOWN CORRESPONDENT WHO ONCE

MADE A CERTAIN SUGGESTION. IF HE READS THIS STORY HE PERHAPS WILL

REMEMBER

J. S. C.

THE PRODIGAL FATHER

INTRODUCTORY

In one of the cable tramway cars which, at a reverential pace,

perambulate the city of Edinburgh, two citizens conversed. The winds

without blew gustily and filled the air with sounds like a stream in

flood, the traffic clattered noisily over the causeway, the car itself

thrummed and rattled; but the voices of the two were hushed. Said the

one--

"It's the most extraordinary thing ever I heard of."

"It's all that," said the other; "in fact, it's pairfectly

incomprehensible."

"Mr. Walkingshaw of all people!"

"Of Walkingshaw and Gilliflower--that's the thing that fair takes my

breath away!" added the other; as though the firm was an even surer

guarantee of respectability than the honored name of the senior partner.

They shook their heads ominously. It was clear this was no ordinary

portent they were discussing.

"Do you think has he taken to--?"

The first citizen finished his question by a crooking of his upturned

little finger, one of those many delicate symbols by which the north

Briton indicates a failing not uncommon in his climate.

"It's a curious thing," replied his friend, "that I haven't heard that

given as an explanation. Of course he's not a teetotaler--"

"Oh, none ever insinuated that," put in the other, with the air of one

who desired to do justice even to the most erring.

"On the other hand, he's ay had the name of being one of the most

respectable men in the town, just an example, they've always told me."

"I knew him fine myself, in a business way, and that's just the

expression I'd have used--an Example."

"Respected by all."

"An elder, and what not."

"A fine business, he has."

"His daughter married a Ramornie of Pettigrew."

They shook their heads again, if possible more gravely than before.

"He must be going off his head."

"He must be gone, I'd say."

"Yon speech he made was an outrage to common sense and decency!"

"And about his son's marriage!"

"That's Andrew Walkingshaw--his partner?"

"Aye."

"Oh, you've heard the story, then? I wonder is it true?"

"I had it on the best authority."

They pursed their lips solemnly.

"The man's mad!"

"But think of letting him loose to make a public exhibition of himself!

It's an awfu' end to a respected career--in fact, it's positively

discouraging."

"You're right: you're right. If as respectable a liver as him ends that

way--well, well!"

In this strain and with such comments (exceedingly natural under the

circumstances) did his fellow-citizens discuss the remarkable thing that

befell Mr. Walkingshaw. And yet they could see only the outward symptoms

or manifestations of this thing. Now that the full circumstances are

made public, it will be generally conceded that few well-authenticated

occurrences have ever at first sight seemed less probable. This has

actually been advanced as an argument for their suppression; but since

enough has already leaked out to whet the public curiosity, and indeed

to lead to damaging misconceptions in a city so unused to phenomena

other than meteorological, it is considered wisest that the unvarnished

facts should be placed in the hands of a scrupulous editor and allowed

to speak for themselves.

PART I

THE PRODIGAL FATHER

CHAPTER I

At a certain windy corner in the famous city of Edinburgh, a number of

brass plates were affixed to the framework of a door. On the largest and

brightest of them appeared the legend "Walkingshaw & Gilliflower, W.S.";

and on no other sheet of brass in Scotland were more respectable names

inscribed. For the benefit of the Sassenach and other foreigners, it may

be explained that "W.S." is a condensation of "Writers to the Signet"--a

species of beatified solicitor holding a position so esteemed, so

enviable, and so intensely reputable that the only scandal previously

whispered in connection with a member of this class proved innocently

explicable upon the discovery that he was affianced to the lady's aunt.

The building in which the firm had their office formed one end of an

austere range of dark stone houses overlooking a street paved with cubes

of granite and confronted by a precisely similar line of houses on the

farther side. The whole sloped somewhat steeply down a hill, up which

and down which a stimulating breeze careered and eddied during three

hundred days of the year. Had you thrust your head out of the office

windows and looked down the street, you could have seen, generally

beneath a gray sky and through a haze of smoke, an inspiring glimpse of

distant sea with yet more distant hills beyond. But Mr. Walkingshaw had

no time for looking gratis out of his window to see unprofitable views.

The gray street had been the background to nearly fifty years of

dignified labor on behalf of the most respectable clients.

His full name was James Heriot Walkingshaw, but it had been early

recognized that "James" was too brief a designation and "Jimmie" too

trivial for one of his parts and presence, and so he was universally

known as Heriot Walkingshaw. His antecedents were as respectable as his

clients. One of his eight great-great-grandfathers owned a landed estate

in the county of Peebles, one of his maternal uncles was a theological

professor in the University of Aberdeen, and his father before him had

been a W.S. Young Heriot himself was brought up on porridge, the tawse,

the Shorter Catechism, and an allowance of five shillings a week. His

parents were both prudent and pious. Throughout such portions of the

Sabbath as they did not spend with their offspring in their pew, they

kept them indoors behind drawn blinds. His mother kissed young Heriot

seldom and severely (with a cold smack like a hailstone), and never

permitted him to remain ten minutes in the same room with a housemaid

unchaperoned. His father never allowed him to sleep under more than two

blankets, and locked the front door at nine o'clock in summer and six in

winter.

The supreme merit of this system in insuring the survival of the fittest

was seen in its results. Heriot's elder brother passed away at the age

of two in the course of a severe winter. Clearly he would never have

been a credit to oatmeal. His younger brother broke loose at nineteen,

pained his relatives exceedingly, and retired to a distant colony where

the standard was lower. His name was never mentioned till at his decease

it was found that he had left L30,000 to be divided among the survivors

of the ordeal. And finally, here was Heriot, a credit to his parents,

his porridge, and his Catechism--in a word, an Example.

One damp February morning, Mr. Walkingshaw, accompanied as usual by his

eldest son, set forth from his decorous residence. It was one of a

circle of stately houses, broken in two or three places to permit the

sedatest kind of street to enter. The grave dignity of these mansions

was accentuated by the straight, deep-hewn furrows at the junctions of

the vast rectangular stones, and by the pediment and fluted pillars

which every here and there gave one of them the appearance of a Greek

temple dedicated to some chaste goddess. In the midst, a round,

railed-in garden was full of lofty trees, very upright and dark, like

monuments to the distinguished inhabitants.

Just as Mr. Walkingshaw and his son had got down the steps and reached

the pavement, the door opened again behind them and a figure appeared

which seemed to light the dull February morning with a ray of something

like sunshine. Her dress was a warm golden brown; her face clear-skinned

and fresh-colored, with bright eyes, a straight little nose, and, at

that moment, eager, parted lips; her hair a coil of curling gold; her

age nineteen.

"Father!" she cried, "you've forgotten your muffler!"

"Tut, tuts," muttered Mr. Walkingshaw.

He stopped and let her wind the muffler round his neck, while his son

regarded the performance with a curiously captious eye.

"Thanks, Jean," said Mr. Walkingshaw.

He threw the girl a brief nod, and the two resumed their walk. Jean

stood for a minute on the steps with a smile half formed upon her lips,

as though she were prepared to wave them a farewell; but neither man

looked back, and the smile died away, the door closed behind her, and

the morning became as raw as ever.

For a few minutes father and son walked together in silence. In Andrew's

eye lurked the same suggestion of criticism, and in his parent's some

consciousness of this and not a little consequent irritation. They were

the same height--just under six feet--and there was a decided

resemblance between Mr. Walkingshaw's portly gait and Andrew's dignified

carriage, but otherwise they were not much alike. The father had a large

and open countenance, very ruddy and fringed with the most respectable

white whiskers; and something ample in his voice and eye and manner

accorded with it admirably. Andrew's face also was full, but rather in

places than comprehensively. The chief places were his cheeks and upper

lip. This lip was perhaps his most striking characteristic. It was both

full and long, meeting his cheeks at either end in a little dimple, and

protruding above the lower lip. Beneath it his chin sloped sharply back

and then abruptly shot forward again in the shape of a round aggressive

little ball. His eye was cold and gray, his hair dark, his age

six-and-thirty, and for the last few years he had been his father's

partner. He was the first to break the silence.

"Why you don't see a respectable doctor, I can't imagine," said he.

"I went to Mackenzie. I went to Grant," replied Mr. Walkingshaw shortly.

"A lot of good either of them did my gout!"

"Gout!" said Andrew. "And have you exchanged that for anything better?

You ought to have stayed in bed to-day. I wonder you ventured out in the

state that man's got you into."

The words might conceivably be taken to represent a very natural filial

anxiety, but the voice was reminiscent of the consolation of Job. Mr.

Walkingshaw had always been able to inspire his children with a respect

so profound that it was a little difficult at times to distinguish it

from awe. Even Andrew when he became his partner had not lost the

attitude. But to-day his father accepted the rebuke without a murmur. In

a moment the hard Scotch voice smote again--

"The idea of a man in your position going to an infernal quack like

Professor Cyrus! Professor? Humph! The man's killing you."

Mr. Walkingshaw's ruddy face grew redder. The standard of common sense

is high in Scotland; the humiliation in being taken in profound; the

respect for the professional orthodoxies intense. And he had been the

protagonist of everything sensible, orthodox, and prudent! He felt like

a constable caught in the pantry.

"Cyrus is a man of remarkable--ah--ideas. He assures me I shall see the

beneficial effects soon. Patience--patience; that is what he says.

I--ah--have probably only caught a little chill. I believe in Cyrus,

Andrew, I believe in him."

Andrew received the explanation with outward respect. His father's eye

had become formidable; but in silence his own expressed his opinion of

this paltry defense. Presently he inquired--

"Would you like people to know who you're going to?"

Mr. Walkingshaw started.

"I'll trouble other folks to mind their own business," he said sharply;

yet he cast an uncomfortable glance at his son.

"Oh, I'm not anxious they should know my family's escapades," said

Andrew reassuringly.

But his gray eye had now a triumphant gleam, and his father realized he

had no case left to go before the court. If people were to know--well,

he would certainly be a less shining example. Mr. Walkingshaw of

Walkingshaw and Gilliflower in the hands of a quack doctor! It would

sound awful bad--awful bad. Little did he dream what people would be

saying of that reputable Writer to the Signet three months later.

* * * * *

Business happened to be slack that afternoon, and at the early hour of

four o'clock Mr. Walkingshaw resumed his overcoat and muffler. As Mr.

Thomieson, his confidential clerk, decorously tucked the scarf beneath

the velvet collar, he offered a word or two of respectful sympathy.

"Far the wisest thing to go home, sir. But will you not take a cab? It's

an awful like day to be out with a chill on ye."

Mr. Walkingshaw perceived his junior partner gazing on him in severe

silence, and defiantly decided to walk. Yet as he paced homewards he

could not but admit, in the unquiet recesses of his own mind, that it

certainly was an odd sort of chill. He felt--well, he found it hard to

tell exactly how he felt--rather as though he had swallowed some ounces

of quicksilver which kept flashing and running about inside him with

every step he took. Suppose Cyrus's wonderful new system were actually

to prove dangerous to the constitution, possibly even to the life, of

his august, confiding patron? You could not always know your luck,

however deserving you might be. The tower of Siloam fell both upon the

righteous and the unrighteous. What would people say if Professor Cyrus

metaphorically fell on him? Heriot Walkingshaw had more at stake than

mere existence. He had a character to lose.

The sight of his house, so dignified and so permanent, soothed him a

little. As he hung his coat upon the substantial rack in the dark and

spacious hall, he was soothed still further. Ascending to his

drawing-room, the thick carpet underfoot completed his tranquillity.

Surely nothing disconcerting could happen to a man who owned such a

house as this. But alas! regrettable episodes have a habit, like migrant

birds, of arriving in companies.

CHAPTER II

Mrs. Walkingshaw had been dead for many years, and in her stead Heriot's

maiden sister, a thin, elderly lady of exemplary views and conduct,

ruled her household. As her brother ruled her, he found the arrangement

worked admirably.

"Are you not coming out with me in the carriage?" said she to her niece

that afternoon.

Jean excused herself. She had letters she positively must write; and so

the two tall horses pranced off, bearing in the very large and very

shiny carriage only the exemplary lady. As she heard them clatter off

over the resounding granite, Jean gave a little skip. Her eyes danced

too and her lips smiled mysteriously. She ran upstairs like a whirlwind

and had the drawing-room door shut behind her before she paused. Only

then did she seem to feel safely alone and not in the carriage shopping.

The room was very long, and very wide, and immensely high, with three

tall windows down one side and substantial furniture purchased in the

heyday of the Victorian epoch. The slim, fair-haired figure was quite

lost in the space considered suitable by an early nineteenth-century

architect for the accommodation of a Scottish lady; and the fire made

much more of a display, glowing in the gloom of that raw February

afternoon.

Jean sat by a little writing-table and took up a pen. Then she waited,

evidently for ideas to come. Ten minutes later they arrived. The door

was softly opened, a voice respectably subdued announced the name of

"Mr. Vernon," and the duties of the pen were over.

The gentleman who entered made a remarkable contrast to the sedate

upholstery. He had a mop of brown hair upon a large and well-shaped

head, a broad face with rugged, striking features, very bright blue

eyes, a dashing cavalier mustache, and a most engaging smile. His

clothes were light of hue and very loose, his figure was of medium

height and strongly built, his collar wide open at the neck, and his tie

a large silk butterfly of an artistic shade of brown. Altogether he was

a most improbable person to find calling upon a daughter of Mr. Heriot

Walkingshaw.

He gave Jean's hand the grasp of a friend, but his eyes looked on her

with a more than friendly light in them. When he spoke, his voice was

as pleasant as his smile, and his accents were those of that portion of

Britain not yet entirely occupied by the victors of Bannockburn.

"It's very good of you to stay in," he said.

"Oh, I wasn't going out in any case," said Jean demurely.

She seated herself in one corner of the sofa, and the young man, after

hesitating for an instant between a seat by her side and a chair close

by, and failing to catch her eye to guide him, chose the chair, and for

the moment looked unhappy.

"I've come to say good-by," he began.

She looked up quickly.

"Are you going away?"

He nodded his brown mop.

"Yes, I'm off to London again."

"For good?"

"I hope so; anyhow, it can't be for much worse than I've done here."

"Haven't your pictures been--been appreciated here?" she asked.

"They haven't been sold," he said, with a short laugh.

"What a shame! Oh, Mr. Vernon, I do think people might have had better

taste."

"So do I," he smiled, "but they haven't had. I've made nothing here but

friends."

He had a musical voice, rather deep, and very readily expressive of what

he strongly felt. His last sentence rang in Jean's ears like a

declaration of love. Her eyes fell and her color rose.

"We have all been very glad to see you."

He shook his head; his eyes fastened on her all the time.

"No, you haven't."

She looked up, but meeting that devouring gaze, looked down again.

"Not all of you," he added. "Your father disapproves of me, your eldest

brother detests me, and your aunt distrusts me. It's only you and Frank

who have been my friends."

Frank was her soldier brother, and Jean adored him. She thought she

could never care for any one but a soldier, till she encountered art and

Lucas Vernon.

"Yes, Frank certainly does like you very much indeed," she said warmly.

"Don't you?"

"Yes," she answered firmly.

He smiled and bent towards her.

"Your hand on it!"

She held out her hand, and he took it and kept it.

(At that moment Mr. Walkingshaw was opening his front door.)

For a minute they sat in silence, and then she tried gently to draw the

hand away.

"Let me keep it for a little!" he pleaded. "I'm going away. I shan't

hold it again for Heaven knows how long."

His voice was so caressing that she ceased to grudge him five small

fingers.

(Mr. Walkingshaw had removed his muffler and was hanging up his coat.)

"Are you at all sorry I'm going?"

"Yes," murmured Jean, "Frank and I--we'll both miss you."

The artist murmured too, but very indistinctly. The idea he expressed

thus inadequately was, "Hang Frank!" But she heard the next word too

plainly for her self-possession.

"Jean!"

(Mr. Walkingshaw was now ascending his well-carpeted staircase.)

She gave him one glance which she meant for reproof; but when he saw her

eyes, so loving and a little moist, he covered the short space between

them with one movement, and was on his knees before her.

"Do you love me?" he whispered.

Her head bent over his, and she answered very faintly something like

"Yes."

Mr. Walkingshaw entered his drawing-room.

For a moment there was a painful pause. Jean's face had turned a

becoming shade of crimson, and the artist was on his feet. Naturally the

woman spoke first.

"I--I didn't expect you back so soon, father."

"So I perceive," said Mr. Walkingshaw.

The young man turned to him with creditable composure.

"One can hardly judge of the effect in this light," said he.

Mr. Walkingshaw had heard of people becoming insane under the stress of

a sudden shock, and he wondered uneasily whether this misfortune had

befallen Lucas Vernon or himself. The artist perceived his success, and

hope began to rise afresh. He cocked his head professionally on one side

and examined the confounded girl.

"We must try the pose in my studio."

Jean also saw the dawn of hope.

"May I inquire what you are talking about?" demanded her father.

"Miss Walkingshaw has promised to sit to me for her portrait,"

explained the artist. "We were trying one or two positions."

Mr. Walkingshaw breathed somewhat heavily, but said nothing. Jean's

color began to subside.

"Mr. Vernon was arranging my hands," she contributed towards his

enlightenment.

Mr. Vernon was now gazing on her in the attitude which he had learnt

from plays and poems conveyed to the laity the best conception of

artistic fervor.

"The head a little more to the right!" he exclaimed. "The hands crossed!

A smile, please! Now, sir, how do you like that?"

Mr. Walkingshaw ignored the question altogether and addressed his

daughter.

"If Mr. Vernon can give any reasons why he should paint your portrait, I

think he had better give them to me before the matter goes further."

His formidable eye supplied the addendum, "And you leave the room!"

She obeyed, and the painter was left with this singularly favorable

opportunity of obtaining a commission at last.

CHAPTER III

"Well, sir?" said Mr. Walkingshaw.

Lucas was unused to the subtleties of diplomacy, but it seemed to him an

evident case for tact.

"What do you think about it yourself?" he began cautiously.

"I think," replied the W.S., "that you'd be better back in England."

His eye again spoke for him, and this time it said, "There is no further

use in attempting to deceive me."

The artist took the hint. His strong, pleasant face became a mirror

reflecting the very truth; his blue eyes were filled with a light

brighter even than the inspiration of art; his mellow voice burst out

abruptly--

"I love Jean!"

The effect was rather like discharging a cannon and bringing down a

scrap of plaster.

"Oh, indeed," said Mr. Walkingshaw. "You mean my daughter?"

"I should think I do!"

"I merely asked for information, Mr. Vernon."

"Then I can guarantee your information!" Lucas smiled frankly, but he

might as well have smiled at the hat-rack in the hall. "I'm quite aware

you don't think me good enough for her--and I agree with you. But if it

comes to that, who is? You may say my name's neither Turner nor Rubens;

you may think it's like my dashed impudence asking you to let me make a

short cut to heaven across your hearth--"

It was at this point that Mr. Walkingshaw discharged his ordnance.

"What is your income?" he inquired coldly.

His aim was more accurate. The artist descended to earth with a thud.

"My _income_?" he gasped.

"Your income," repeated the bombardier.

The artist ran his fingers convulsively through his hair.

"Now, what the deuce should I put it at?"

"An approximately correct figure," suggested Mr. Walkingshaw.

"To tell you the truth, I haven't the least idea."

"A thousand?"

"Oh, good God, no!"

"A hundred?"

"Oh, more than that."

"Can't you suggest a figure yourself?"

"Well, let's say that in a good year I make anything up to three or four

hundred pounds, and in a bad year anything down to fifty or sixty."

"We'll say that if you like. Do you expect any legacies to fall in to

you--anything of that kind?"

"Unfortunately I don't."

Mr. Walkingshaw regarded him with contemptuous severity.

"Then you propose to marry my daughter on maybe fifty or sixty pounds a

year?"

"I told you that was in a bad year," protested the artist.

"Thank you, but I don't want any of your fluctuating incomes for my

girl. I don't care if you earned ten thousand pounds this year. So

long as you can't guarantee that to last, you're no better than a

speculator--a hand-to-mouth, don't-know-where-you-are-to-morrow sort of

person. Now, that sort of thing _won't do_, Mr. Vernon. Before you next

think of marrying a girl in my daughter's position, let me give you this

bit of advice: learn to paint your pictures on some kind of proper

business principles. If you do them, say, once a month and sell them at

a standard price--just as other folks have to manufacture and sell their

goods--you'll not find yourself in the same ridiculous position you're

in at this moment."

Mr. Walkingshaw rose to indicate that the interview was at an end; but

the artist's endurance ended first.

"Mr. Walkingshaw! Did you ever _make_ anything in your life?"

The W.S. stared at him.

"I have made most of what I possess, sir."

"Pooh! You're talking of money. Does your mind never run on anything

but money? I mean, have you ever made a hat or a shoe, or a book or a

picture, or even a cheese? Have you ever actually turned out anything

that was the least use or pleasure to anybody?"

Vernon's blue eyes were bent upon him in such an extraordinarily intense

and flashing manner that Mr. Walkingshaw found himself compelled to

answer.

"That kind of thing is--ah--not in my line."

"Then," burst forth the artist, "you can no more judge of my work than

a toasting-fork can judge of a steam engine. The woman who cooks your

dinner understands more than you do. She knows better than to think it

costs no more time and trouble to cook an omelette than boil an egg.

A picture a month, and the same price for each! Confound it, Mr.

Walkingshaw, you make me ashamed of you!"

"Do you imagine, sir, that that affects me?"

"If I were you, I'd prefer my son-in-law to respect me."

Mr. Walkingshaw positively jumped.

"You mean to--er--"

"Marry her, whether you like it or not! I'm in love--and she loves me!

There's not the least use trying to explain to you what love means. It

would be like trying to explain a cigar to a chicken. You're too

respectable. You can't understand."

The tirade ceased abruptly, and the young man smiled again upon the

petrified Writer to the Signet.

"I am going back to London to-night. Just give me a year or two, Mr.

Walkingshaw. I'll make an income for her."

Mr. Walkingshaw regained his senses.

"You will never be admitted inside this house in your life again, sir.

You will never marry _my_ daughter; and mind you, you needn't flatter

yourself she will correspond with you or anything of that kind. My

children have been decently brought up. What I say is done; and what I

say shan't be done, is not done!"

He had recovered his formidableness now, and the artist's face fell. For

a moment he looked gloomily at his father-in-law elect, and then he

turned for the door.

"We shall see," he said.

"You shall not see _her_ again," retorted Mr. Walkingshaw.

The door slammed behind art and love and impracticability, and he stood

in his vast drawing-room alone.

CHAPTER IV

It is a pleasant and an edifying thing to contrast the difference

between the fates of the reputable and the Bohemian even in the lists of

love. Clearly these matters are managed by some scrupulously equitable

power. One hesitates to dub it Providence for fear of seeming

sentimental, but one may safely describe it as something almost as wise

and decidedly more respectable. Here was Lucas Vernon, without a settled

income or any very coherent notion of how to make one, dismissed the

house of the girl he was foolish enough to love. There, on the other

hand, was Andrew Walkingshaw, who had first devoted himself to amassing

and investing a handsome competence, and then, without any further

difficulty to speak of, had selected and secured one of the most

charming girls imaginable. In every respect but one he had chosen

obviously well. She was fair to see, and hence very gratifying to be

seen with; she was quite young, and therefore amenable and not too

sophisticated; and she came of so excellent and ancient a family that

it was a pleasure merely to mention the name of his prospective

father-in-law to his envious acquaintances. Archibald Berstoun, Esq., of

that ilk, was the style in which that gentleman preferred to have

correspondence addressed to him, accepting Berstoun of Berstoun as a

less satisfactory alternative, and answering very briefly letters to

plain Archibald Berstoun, Esq.

The only drawback to Ellen Berstoun was her father's unfortunate

financial position. Andrew had to take her without a penny; but then, on

the other hand, he might not have got her at all had her parents the

wherewithal to display her charms in London ballrooms. Also, Archibald

of that ilk might have looked for a showier mate for her under more

prosperous circumstances. As it was, her parents spent a strenuous

fortnight in persuading her to accept so excellent an opportunity of

reducing their supply of marriageable daughters to the more reasonable

number of five, and the approval of their creditors was practically

unanimous.

They had been engaged for a month, when, upon that same afternoon, she

arrived on a short visit to the Walkingshaw's house. Andrew would have

met her at the station had her train arrived only twenty minutes later,

but it was one of the most admirable features in his character that he

made a point of never on any pretext leaving the office before the hour

had struck. Frank, however, showed remarkable alacrity in offering

himself as substitute. So zealous and obliging a brother was he that he

started for the station with half an hour to spare, and whiled away a

portion of that time in purchasing a bouquet of flowers and a very

ornamental box of chocolates.

Holding the chocolate-box and his umbrella under one arm and the bouquet

in his other hand, this best of brothers paced that eligible promenade,

the platform of the Haymarket station. People, especially women, glanced

at him with approval as the erect, military young figure passed and

repassed on his vigil, marching as though on parade. He was twenty-five,

bronzed of skin, well-featured, trimly mustached, modest and yet gallant

of mien, attired in an overcoat drawn in at the waist and a hat

becomingly cocked a little towards his left ear--in a word, a credit to

that distinguished corps, the Cromarty Highlanders. At present they were

in India, and he was home on furlough.

Sometimes his clear young eyes looked disconsolately into space,

as though the saddest thoughts afflicted him; and then they would

brighten with a sudden excitement. As these brightenings almost

invariably coincided with the first rumbling of a train far down the

line that glimmered beneath red lamps and green, leading from the north

out of the gathered dusk, it seemed as though the cheering prospect came

from thence. This probability would appear to be increased by the

disappearance of the excitement when the train proved to come from

some locality of no interest whatsoever. An observant female in glasses

and a golf cape, who entertained herself by furtively studying this

agreeable-looking stranger, smiled knowingly at each of these

manifestations: _she_ knew whom he was waiting for, even without the

palpable evidence of the bouquet and chocolate-box, and the only thing

that puzzled her was why he should have these very mournful lapses. A

secret grief seemed inappropriate both to the gentleman and the obvious

situation. But how could she guess that she was merely witnessing an

accentuated variety of the pleasure with which any good brother looks

forward to meeting his future sister-in-law at the end of a cold

journey?

"Yon's her noo," said a porter to whom the young officer addressed a

question for the fourteenth time.

The north line runs for a long way very straight just there, and Frank

could see the two round glows far off in the darkness grow larger and

larger, brighter and brighter, with the furnace-lit smoke streaming ever

more brilliantly above, till the shape of a great engine started out,

thundering close upon him. And then the observant female was gratified

by a glimpse of a slender girl, rather tall, smiling very kindly as the

interesting unknown handed her down from her carriage and placed the

flowers in her small gray glove. Her hair was dark; she wore handsome

furs; she left the entire charge of her luggage to her escort, like a

lady accustomed to be waited on; she moved down the platform with a

graceful air of distinction, and as she passed close by, the observant

female's heart was won by the sweet and innocent expression on her face.

She thought them one of the nicest-looking couples she had ever seen.

Meanwhile, the man whose virtues had earned this charming girl, and

whose high position could command the services of a Highland subaltern

to do his station work for him, was dictating a letter to his

typewriter.

But when Andrew sat down to dinner beside the lady of his choice, and

felt that at last he could conscientiously lay aside the serious

business of life for a little dalliance with the fruits of his industry,

it was pleasant to see with what happy mingling of pride and calm he

accepted his good fortune. He conveyed that suggestion of having put the

lady in his pocket from the moment she whispered "Yes," and kept her

there among his keys as a valued, yet not foolishly over-valued,

possession, which is so virile a characteristic of the thoroughly

successful man. Now he was taking her out to have a look at her, and

incidentally--as it were, unconsciously--exhibit his trophy to the

company. As for Ellen Berstoun, she looked so kind, so delicately

radiant, so gently bred, and so anxious to give pleasure, that she made

just the contrast to her dominating betrothed that sensible people

believe in. Here, they would tell you, was a match made in a more

practicable place than heaven.

The rest of the company at dinner consisted of Mr. Walkingshaw,

evidently proud of his future daughter-in-law, yet singularly silent and

abstracted; Miss Walkingshaw, very erect at the end of the table; Jean,

very downcast, poor girl (yet did she not deserve to be?); Frank,

looking for some reason considerably less happy than when he handed

Miss Berstoun out of her carriage; and Mrs. Dunbar. Madge Dunbar was a

second cousin, and the widow of Captain Dunbar of Hammersmith's Horse,

who was killed at Paardeberg. She was left with no children, a very

small income, and a number of relatives occupying excellent stations in

life. With one or other of these she generally stayed, but latterly had

shown a decided preference for the hospitality of Mr. Walkingshaw. In

fact, she had already been with them for three months, and as Mr.

Walkingshaw was always very emphatic in his refusals to let her think of

leaving, and remarkably gracious on every occasion on which they were

seen in company, while his sister declared her to be one of the best

women she knew, acquaintances had begun to exchange whispers. She was

forty-five, full-figured, though not yet precisely stout, dark-eyed, and

irreproachably dressed. She was also irreproachably diplomatic.

Champagne was drunk in honor of Miss Berstoun, and as being the beverage

most suitable to her pedigree (though, as a matter of fact, she had only

tasted it twice before, since Archibald of that ilk confined himself to

whisky, and his wife to dandelion porter). As the butler passed behind

Mr. Walkingshaw's chair, his master arrested him by pointing to his

glass. The vigilant Andrew bent forward in his seat.

"Are you giving the system up?" he inquired, with his cross-examining

smile.

"I feel that a glass of wine would do me good to-night," his father

replied with dignity.

"Oh, I'm so glad to see you enjoying yourself again, Heriot!" smiled

Mrs. Dunbar.

"Thank you. Thank you, Madge," said he, and made a little courteously

old-fashioned indication that he drank to her health.

The lady in a sprightly fashion returned his toast, and the junior

partner frowned. He disapproved of Mrs. Dunbar, he strongly suspected

her of ulterior designs, and he regarded the adoption of Christian names

by second cousins as superfluous, and in the circumstances a little

indecorous. His long upper lip grew longer as he addressed his relative.

"I was under the impression it was you who encouraged him to go in for

this so-called system."

"Oh, but it's possible to overdo everything, you know," said the lady,

with a smile whose sweetness he inwardly decided to be compounded of

some base imitation of sugar. "Don't you agree with me, Heriot?"

"Absolutely," pronounced her host, with emphasis.

So passionate a lover naturally regretted parting even for a moment from

his betrothed, yet under the circumstances Andrew felt decidedly

relieved when the ladies left the room, and the three Walkingshaw men

drew together at the end of the table. His father passed the port to his

sons and then helped himself. Andrew frowned again: he believed in never

neglecting an opportunity for salutary criticism.

"Oh, you're going to take port too?"

"I am," said Mr. Walkingshaw, and drinking his glass straight off,

filled it afresh.

Andrew drew down the corners of his lips, raised his eyebrows, and

glanced across at his brother; but Frank was staring abstractedly at the

tablecloth.

The second glass seemed to revive their father. He smacked his lips over

it with something of his old gusto, threw out his chest, frowned

formidably, yet with a certain complacency, and said--

"I've had to perform an unpleasant duty this afternoon, Andrew."

Andrew pricked up his ears and looked sternly expectant. Yet on neither

of them did the idea of an unpleasant duty seem to have a saddening

effect.

"That fellow Vernon has been making love to Jean. I ordered him out of

the house. He's off to London again, I'm thankful to say."

"Upon my word!" said Andrew.

He looked as though he had been told of the attempted assassination of

the President of the Court of Session. But on Frank the news produced

quite a different effect. He started out of his reverie and exclaimed--

"You ordered him out? Poor Jean!"

The two older and wiser men turned upon him together.

"Yes, sir," said his father, "I did order him out. It would have been

'poor Jean' if I hadn't."

"I'd have kicked him downstairs!" said Andrew.

"You'd have had a devilish thin time if you'd tried," retorted his

brother. "Vernon could take you across his knee. He's a good fellow--a

deuced good fellow; he'd have made Jean a deuced good husband. Kick him

downstairs? By Gad, you'd have squealed when the kicking began!"

He addressed himself entirely to his brother, though he had done no more

than approve of the exiling of Lucas, and he spoke with a curious

bitterness. Mr. Walkingshaw struck the table with his fist, not

passionately, in any disorder of mind, but sternly and effectively.

"Hold your tongue," he said, and kept his eyes on him to see that he

held it.

Frank rose.

"I beg your pardon," he said to his father, and, not looking again at

his brother, walked out of the room.

The two wiser heads, being then left undisturbed by the follies of

youth, discussed at length and in complete accord the outrageous episode

of the afternoon.

CHAPTER V

Frank strode hurriedly across the hall, flung into the library, and

there relieved his feelings by a few crisp expletives. Gloom succeeded

anger, but after a few minutes youth began to prevail even over these

high emotions. He turned up the light, adjusted his tie and smoothed his

hair before the mirror over the mantelpiece, and ran upstairs to the

drawing-room. Outside the door he paused, looking now like the expectant

watcher on the platform. Faintly he heard Ellen Berstoun's voice, and

the same look came into his eyes as when he caught the distant roaring

of the train. He straightened his neck, banished all expression from his

face as a soldier should, and entered the room.

It is generally conceded by such as have enjoyed the privilege of

sitting in a drawing-room waiting for the gentlemen to lay down their

cigars that no period of the day is more immune from the bustle and

turmoil of modern life. But the peace of an ordinary drawing-room was a

bank holiday compared with the Walkingshaws'. Not too much gas was

burned, or too much coal, since money is not made and well-born wives

secured by waste of fuel. That leads to mere cheerfulness. The monastic

atmosphere was completed by the Victorian upholstery and the hushed

voices of the four ladies, so that even the young soldier instinctively

trod more like a burglar than a Cromarty Highlander as he advanced

towards one of the groups of two.

Near the fireplace sat Miss Walkingshaw and Mrs. Dunbar engaged on

fancy-work, and occasionally murmuring references to "my last

cook"--"that tall girl Jane." But it was not they that Frank approached.

On two chairs very close together and far removed from the others, Jean

and Ellen talked. Their voices, too, were hushed, but the subject of

their conversation was evidently more agitating than cooks. In fact,

there was something very like a sob more than once in Jean's voice, and

Ellen held her hand and gently pressed it. But when poor Jean saw her

favorite brother coming towards her with a warm sympathy in his eyes

that told her he knew her trouble, she could control herself no longer.

Up she jumped, and throwing him one wry, tearful smile as she passed,

ran out of the room.

The two elder ladies looked up and then down again at their work. They

had not yet heard of the painful episode. Frank came forward and took

his sister's chair, which had been drawn so very close to Ellen's. He

was thus able, by exercising caution, to take up the confidential

conversation.

"I suppose she has told you?" he muttered, with a wary glance towards

his aunt.

"Yes," murmured Ellen. "I'm so sorry!"

She looked nearly as distressed as Jean, and her gentle voice made her

words sound like a sweet lament for all unhappy loves.

"I call it the deuce of a shame!" said the soldier.

"Can't we do anything to persuade your father?"

He was conscious of a little glow at being adopted so instinctively as

an ally.

"I've told him what I think about it."

"Have you?"--there was a sparkle in her eyes.--"How good of you! What

did he say?"

"Told me to hold my tongue."

Her face fell.

"I must talk to Andrew about it."

Frank smiled sardonically.

"I'm afraid you won't find him very sympathetic either."

She looked down at her little pointed shoe and said nothing.

"Who isn't very sympathetic, Frank?" asked Miss Walkingshaw, suddenly

looking up.

He started guiltily.

"Oh--er--a lot of fellows one can think of," he explained.

Mrs. Dunbar looked at the two young people curiously. She knew whom she

herself did not consider sympathetic, and jumped to a conclusion. There

was nothing the junior partner would dislike more than being critically

discussed by that dear girl who was so much too nice for him, and that

engaging boy who was so infinitely better-looking. It seemed a pity they

could not enjoy their conversation without interruption.

"Would you like me to play you something, dear?" she asked.

"Oh yes, dear," said Miss Walkingshaw. "Do, please!"

They were the most affectionate of friends. Indeed, it was touching to

see how devoted Madge was to Heriot's wintry sister. Nobody else had

ever seen so much in her to love.

The music began, and, once started, showed no sign of stopping. Over the

top of her music Mrs. Dunbar's black eyes smiled a discreet approval of

the confidential pair. She only wished that Andrew, gagged and bound

beneath his brother's chair, was here to listen to them. She was sure

they must be discussing something it would do him good to hear.

"Is Mr. Vernon a very nice man?" asked Ellen.

"One of the best. These artist fellows are apt to be a bit

swollen-headed for my taste, but Lucas Vernon's a sportsman."

She appreciated the distinction succinctly indicated.

"He does sound nice," she said. "Oh, I wish everybody had enough money!"

Frank drew another distinction.

"Everybody who deserved it, anyhow."

"Well," said Ellen softly, "if I had the arrangement of things, I would

risk it and give _everybody_ enough. It makes me so unhappy to see

people longing for things they can never possibly get--whether they

deserve them or not."

The young soldier looked at her oddly from the corner of his eye. Could

it be possible that two people could sit so close together and speak in

such hushed confidence, and yet that one of them could be so strangely

oblivious as not to know when she had laid her slender little finger on

the other's open wound? He had the strictest notions of duty and of

honor: it was absolutely essential she never should realize: but, alas!

the sympathetic widow was playing the most divinely romantic waltz. To

complete the horrible temptation, Ellen looked suddenly at him with her

tender eyes shining and her delicate skin gently flushed and murmured--

"It makes me wretched--I pity them so!"

The waltz grew more romantic with every note, the temptation to feel

this pity soothe his own wound more irresistible.

"I'm one of 'em," he said.

He endeavored to compromise with duty by throwing the most unfeeling

ferocity into his confession; but even the best drilled soldier cannot

simultaneously advance and stand where he was.

Ellen's eyes were riveted on him now.

"I'm sorry. Have I said anything I shouldn't?"

She looked distressed, and he realized he had overdone the ferocity.

"No, no, I assure you. I only meant I--I--well, one can't have

everything."

He wished that delirious waltz would stop. It made it so hard to collect

one's thoughts, and especially to recover the blank countenance he had

managed to assume before he took this chair and heard that music and

looked into those eyes. She smiled with playful kindness.

"Are you so frightfully hard up?"

"It isn't money! Oh, can't you--"

He didn't finish his sentence; nor did he need to. A sudden light dawned

in Ellen's eyes; her lips instinctively parted; and then she turned her

face away. And thus they sat for what seemed an hour, while the

sympathetic widow poured out voluptuous harmonies without cessation.

In reality it was only two minutes later that Mr. Walkingshaw and Andrew

entered: the senior partner looking, for a habitual diner-out, curiously

flushed after his mild indulgence in port; the junior partner's full

cheeks bulging with the backwash of a lover's smile. Frank sprang up,

and his brother, smiling even more affectionately, took his chair. At

the same moment the widow stopped playing, and the scales seemed

suddenly to fall from the young soldier's eyes. He saw himself as the

most despicable villain in Europe, and Ellen as lost for ever, whether

as sister or friend. So distraught was he that he had nearly tried to

open a mid-Victorian cabinet before he discovered it was not the door.

Downstairs he hurried wildly, threw on an ulster and cap, and the front

door banged behind him.

The unhappy young man looked up at the circle of solemn mansions which

towered above him, black against the dark gray heavens, and it seemed to

him that each one as he passed it silently rebuked him; while the trees

across the street, even though they were decidedly less solid, gave vent

to their displeasure audibly. He had been brought up in the severest

Scotch traditions, and though life in the army had vastly changed his

outlook, it had in certain particulars but substituted "form" for

"duty." To-night both standards rose spectrally and shook their awful

fingers at him. He had let his heart get the better of his head! No

member of his family (save luckless Jean) whom he ever knew or heard of

had done such a thing before. Or if they had, the indiscretion had been

judiciously hushed up, and the family escutcheon kept stainless. As for

the divinity he had scandalized, she would never forgive him; she would

always think of him as a traitor to his respectable brother!

At this point a little star peeped out of the hurrying clouds and

vanished again instantly. It was as though some power above had winked.

On he strode through the steep, empty streets, lines of black freestone

houses, built by regular church-goers and unbreathed upon by scandal

ever since, frowning upon him perpetually; and the wind, which had risen

greatly, wailing and booming all sorts of morals. And now a fresh

trouble agitated him. He was growing less contrite! He kept seeing his

brother's bulging cheeks, and Ellen's innocent, kind smile, and all

sorts of backslidings suggested themselves. He had been criminal enough

to fall in love, and now was added another crime--he could not fall out

again. Never had he dreamt of such depths of depravity in him, Frank

Walkingshaw.

Again a little star twinkled for an instant.

It was a full two hours later that he returned home, footsore (for he

had been walking in his pumps) and with a mind as far from calm as ever.

He assumed that everybody would be in bed, but no sooner had he shut the

door than Jean appeared, flying downstairs to meet him.

"Oh," she cried, with a note of disappointment, "I hoped it was the

doctor!"

"The doctor!" he exclaimed.

"Hush!" she whispered, and came close up to him. "Father has suddenly

been taken very ill."

At that moment Andrew also appeared, to see who had entered. He looked

portentously grave.

"Well," he said, "what have I been saying? It's happened just exactly as

anybody but a fool might have known it would--just precisely. He's no

one to blame but himself for it--and his precious Mrs. Dunbar."

He rubbed his hands almost pleasantly.

"That quack's done for him--and his wine to-night finished the job.

Well, I warned him against both. People that will not take advice must

bide the consequences. Are you going to stay up for Dr. Mackenzie,

Jean?"

"Of course," she said.

"Well then, I might as well get off to my bed. If there's any immediate

danger,"--his face grew very solemn,--"if the end's expected in the

night, or anything like that, just knock on my door."

The junior partner bade them a grave good-night and retired; and such

imaginative persons as are not satisfied with this bald record of facts,

may picture him either as offering up a brief prayer for his father's

happy recovery, or meditating upon the image of his betrothed--or both.

CHAPTER VI

Fortunately, it proved unnecessary to disturb the junior partner during

the night, but next morning, when he had heard the doctor's report and

personally visited the sick-bed, he took the most serious view of the

situation. He summoned his two married sisters, urging them to lose no

time; he spent only half an hour at the office; and then he sat down

with his _Scotsman_ in the library (his Bible accessible in case of

emergencies) to await the developments that he grieved to think were now

practically inevitable. The doctor had paid a second visit and given the

gloomiest report. Put in a nutshell, it came to this: that he could make

neither head nor tail of his patient's symptoms, but that, as they were

clearly the result of a course of treatment at the hands of an

unqualified practitioner, it was improbable that Mr. Walkingshaw would

recover from the consequences of his error.

In the afternoon he was told that his father would like to see him. He

had finished the _Scotsman_ and begun a conversation with his betrothed

in a gently facetious vein, but it took him not a moment to adjust his

features to the rigidity of an urn, and save for the faint squeaking of

his boots, he ascended the stairs with noiseless solemnity. He found Mr.

Walkingshaw propped up on pillows and breathing heavily. The demeanor of

both was exactly becoming to the situation.

"Are you suffering much pain?" inquired the son in a hushed voice.

"It comes and goes," sighed the father. "It was just diabolical a few

minutes ago; now it's a wee thing better, thanks."

"A kind of temporary relief," suggested the son.

"Possibly, possibly. I'd like to think it was going to last, though."

"I wish I could hold out hopes," said Andrew sympathetically.

Mr. Walkingshaw stirred suddenly.

"The doctor's not given me up yet, surely?" he exclaimed in a louder

voice.

"Hush, hush! It'll only hurry things if you let yourself get excited."

"But, Andrew, my dear boy, tell me what he said to you."

The junior partner shook his head, kindly but resolutely.

"No, no; not yet awhile. So long as your mind remains clear, just keep

composed; and then, when you feel any decided change, I'll hold nothing

back from you, and we can get the rest of the family round the bedside.

You'll agree that's the best thing."

The orthodoxy of this programme ought, one would think, to have soothed

the W.S. But it is strange what fancies sick men take.

"I don't agree at all," said Mr. Walkingshaw warmly. "In fact, I may

tell you Cyrus warned me there might be kind of temporary

complications."

He looked at his son for a moment and then added, with sudden decision--

"Andrew, I'd like to see Cyrus."

A grim smile dilated Andrew's cheeks.

"You'll have to catch him first. He's off."

"Off?"

"Bolted this morning as soon as he heard he'd done for you. I hear he

owes a couple of hundred pounds in the town, one way and another. That's

your Professor for you!"

Mr. Walkingshaw groaned. His son thought it well to improve the

occasion, since he did not expect to have many more.

"Him and his radio-electricity! What was it he was going to do--renew

the cells of the body?"

"Well, why shouldn't cells be renewed?" protested the invalid weakly.

"There will be," said his son facetiously. "He'll find himself in one

again or I'm mistaken."

Mr. Walkingshaw lay silent for a few minutes. Then suddenly he groaned.

"Another of them coming on!" he muttered, and twisted his face away.

It was a few minutes more before he spoke again.

"I trust they'll catch the rascal! Andrew, my boy, can you not do

anything to assist the police?"

It was impressive to see how adequately the junior partner handled each

fresh development of the situation. At these last words he looked

exceedingly grave.

"Had your thoughts not better be turning to other things?" he suggested.

The invalid's head started forward from the pillow.

"Will you have the kindness to mind your own--" he began; and then, in

judgment, another spasm assailed him.

Andrew closed his eyes, drew down the corners of his mouth, and his lips

moved silently but evidently piously. It was impossible to remain

callous to such an elevating influence.

"You are right, Andrew; you are right," said his father. "And now, just

supposing I was taken, you'll see that affair of Guthrie and Co. through

the way we decided on?"

Andrew opened his eyes immediately and exhibited a fresh instance of his

adaptability to each changing circumstance.

"I've just been thinking of a better method still," he answered

promptly. "Why should the creditors get any more than they're legally

entitled to? You mind yon five thousand pounds invested in the Grand

Trunk Railway?"

"Perfectly, perfectly."

"Well, when one goes into the thing, they've really no more than a moral

right to that; and if one once begins on moral rights, there's no end to

them."

"That sounds a bit worldly-wise, Andrew; but as you like--as you like."

His junior partner regarded him severely.

"I may remind you that I'm only following your own precepts."

"One says things in health that one repents of on a bed of sickness.

Manage Guthrie and Co. as you like, but don't quote me if you mean to

neglect moral obligations. I had the decency never to quote my own

father, and it's the least you can do for yours, Andrew."

Andrew still looked displeased. It seemed to his fastidious ears that

there was an unpleasant smack of something remotely resembling cynicism

in this speech. It sounded almost as though he were expected to

acquiesce in the outrageous proposition that members of his family

occasionally allowed moral to be overridden by practical considerations.

He could not conceive of himself admitting the possibility of such a

thing even in the secret recesses of his soul. It was most uncomfortable

to listen to his own father going on like this. He must be very ill

indeed--evidently at death's door.

He walked to the window and looked out gloomily upon the gray clouds

driving over the black chimney-cans. The wind had risen to a moderate

gale, and the air was filled with sounds. It struck him as a very

uproarious day for a Writer to the Signet to be going to his long home.

He had given his father credit for soberer tastes. In fact, he was

reminded unpleasantly of the riotous people he had heard of who passed

away in company with a pint of champagne and a cigar. This sort of thing

would really not do.

"About my will, Andrew," said his father's voice.

He turned with remarkable alacrity and a forgiving eye. At once he was

the deferential offspring.

"You'll find you're left very well off," continued Mr. Walkingshaw.

His son's cheeks bulged in a melancholy smile; precisely the right smile

under the circumstances.

"Not at the expense of the others, I hope," he answered modestly.

"Oh, I was meaning you'd be well off as a family."

The smile subsided.

"Oh, I beg your pardon," said Andrew.

"But of course you'll get the bulk."

The smile mournfully returned.

"You have the position to keep up, and I thought it only fair to you,"

said Mr. Walkingshaw.

Andrew bent his head in solemn acknowledgment of the truth of this

observation and the justice of the arrangement.

"There's just one little addendum I want to make. This unpleasant affair

of Jean's has set me thinking, and supposing I'm taken, Andrew--just

supposing--"

"Assuming it's as we fear--I understand, I understand."

"Well, then, you see, I'll not be here myself to keep Frank and Jean

from doing foolish-like things if they happen to have a mind to; and

they're not like you and their sisters. You've all chosen sensibly, but

they're in a kind of way different. I ought to have had them educated at

home."

"What I've always said," his son agreed.

"Anyhow, it's too late now, and what I'll just have to do is

this--introduce a clause making them forfeit their shares if they marry

without your consent in the next five years."

"Would ten not be safer?" suggested Andrew.

"We'll say seven, then. And of course you'll not withhold your consent

unreasonably? I'll trust you for that."

Andrew's attitude expressed to such perfection the confidence that might

be reposed in him that his father shed him a satisfied smile.

"And now," said he, "I wonder had you not better get me my will?--or we

might wait till to-morrow, and see how I'm feeling then."

If the junior partner had looked grave before, he looked funereal now.

"Your mind's clear now," he said. "I wouldn't put it off."

"Well, well," said Mr. Walkingshaw, "there are my keys on the

dressing-table: you know where to find the will."

Andrew went downstairs as solemnly as he had come up, and with the same

faint squeak.

CHAPTER VII

It never occurred to Frank and Jean to blame their father in any way for

electing so boisterous a day for his probable decease. Clearly they had

not so fine an instinct for respectability as their brother. Their

orthodoxy, compared with his, was built upon a sandy foundation: warm

hearts can never hope to sustain, in its impressive equipoise, the head

of an Andrew Walkingshaw. One might as well expect to find sap running

up the legs of his office stool.

That afternoon they instinctively drifted away from the others and sat

unhappily together. The gusty booming of the wind and the clash of

branches in the garden across the gale-scourged street tormented them

with fancies. It seemed as though a thousand riotous misfortunes were

buffeting their hearts.

"Rain!" cried Jean, with a little start and then a shiver.

"Isn't it beastly?" muttered Frank, his eyes on the carpet.

It came on with the sudden violence of a thunder-clap. In a moment the

tossing trees became gesticulating ghosts seen dimly through a veil of

glistening rods of water sharply diagonal--nearly horizontal; and even

through the musketry rattle on the window-panes they could hear the

pavement hiss beneath their deluge.

"Oh, Frank dear!" murmured Jean.

Giving way to illogical tenderness, the young soldier took her hand and

held it.

Of course, the least turn for hard argument would have reassured them.

The storm would blow over; they could find new lovers; their father,

even suppose he died, would receive suitable interment. Besides, they

would be the richer by his decease. But they remained foolishly moved.

"If anything does happen to father," said Jean sorrowfully, "I shall

never forgive myself."

Frank looked surprised.

"Forgive yourself--for what?"

"For not loving him more. I almost hated him yesterday."

Her voice sank very low and she looked apprehensively at her brother.

But he did not rebuke her as he ought.

"It's jolly difficult to love him sometimes," he admitted sadly.

She seemed to gain courage.

"Frank," she said, "have you _ever_ actually felt as affectionate about

him as one ought?"

He shook his head.

"He never struck me as wanting that kind of thing. I've respected him,

of course."

"Oh, so have I--enormously."

"Well," said Frank, "that's all he wanted out of us, I fancy."

"Still," she murmured, "we might have given him something more."

"'Pon my word, I don't know what he'd have done with it."

She could not but admit that that, in fact, was just the difficulty. The

cultivation of sentiment had not been included in Mr. Walkingshaw's

youthful curriculum. His father before him had enjoyed but two forms of

relaxation from his daily burden of obligations to clients and Calvin--a

glass of good claret, and a primitive form of golf played with a missile

of feathers in the interstices of a tract of whins. His mother had not

even these amusements. Small wonder Heriot Walkingshaw found it a

little difficult to sympathize with soft creatures who demanded

hot-water bottles at night and affection by day. Jean had a weakness for

both, and had only managed to obtain the hot bottle--and even that was a

secret.

The deluge continued and the wind bellowed. Lower and lower sank their

spirits.

"I sometimes wish I were more like Andrew," sighed Jean.

The young soldier started.

"Oh, Heaven forbid!" he exclaimed, and then in a moment added in a low

voice, "I wish I had his luck, though."

Jean softly pressed his hand. She understood.

"I wish you had, Frank," she whispered.

As if in rebuking answer to these impious desires, the portly form of

Andrew filled the doorway. He looked like the reincarnation of all the

mourners who had ever followed a hearse.

"He is worse," he said in a sepulchral voice. "The end's not far off.

You had better come up and see him."

In the sick chamber they found already assembled Miss Walkingshaw, Mrs.

Dunbar, Ellen (who kept in the background and never caught Frank's eye

once), and their two elder sisters. Of this pair, Maggie, the eldest of

them all, had long been coupled with Andrew as the two greatest credits

to the family. She was the wife (and incidentally, it was said, the

making) of Ramornie of Pettigrew, a laird of good estate in the kingdom

of Fife. Her business capacity was almost equal to her brother's. She

had extracted Pettigrew from the hands of the friends who had been

"doing him no good," paid off the bonds on his property, presented him

with three creditable children, including the necessary heir male, and

would undoubtedly have put him into Parliament could she have ensured

her own presence always at his side. But as he would have to deliver his

speeches himself, even if she composed them, she was content with making

him a deputy-lieutenant. In person this lady suggested the junior

partner as well as in mind. She, however, was blonde, and though her

cheeks took after his, her upper lip was not quite so substantial.

Gertrude, the second sister, was now Mrs. Donaldson, wife of Hector

Donaldson, advocate. At the time, it was considered a middling sort of

marriage; since his cross-examination of the co-respondent in Macpherson

_v._ Macpherson and Tattenham-Welby, it had been considered a creditable

marriage; and if his practice continued its present rate of increase,

it would soon become a good marriage. In any case, she had justified the

Walkingshaw reputation for investing money or person soundly and

shrewdly. She resembled her father, and he had always been considered a

fine-looking man. Both Andrew and Maggie thought she got too many of her

clothes in London. They made her a little conspicuous, and they hoped

she could afford it. Still, one heard very encouraging things said of

Hector nowadays.

Mr. Walkingshaw was evidently weakening. He lay back with his eyes

closed till they were all assembled, and then Andrew, who seemed to have

the entire management of the melancholy ceremony, stepped up to the

bedside and, with lowered eyelids, murmured--

"They are all here now."

Mr. Walkingshaw opened his eyes.

"I'm likely to be taken," he said in a weak voice. "Andrew'll have told

you."

He paused: and one little stifled sob was heard, too gentle to catch his

ear. It came from Jean.

"I'd just like to say a word to you all before I go. I've tried my best

to do my duty by my children and my sister and my kinsfolk."

At this specific inclusion of herself the sympathetic widow could keep

silence no longer.

"Indeed you have, Heriot!" she murmured.

"Hush!" said Andrew sternly.

"Let them say what they feel, Andrew," said his father, with a glance of

melancholy kindness at the widow. "It's natural enough."

Mrs. Ramornie at once took that hint, and her brief words of eulogy were

corroborated by a general murmur.

"Thank you, thank you," said Mr. Walkingshaw. "I may possibly have made

mistakes now and then--I am but human. At the same time, I think there's

none will gainsay I've shown a kind of respectable example. It's a great

thing to be thankful for if one can die without making an exhibition of

oneself--a great thing to be thankful for."

The master of ceremonies by a grave glance indicated to the company that

another approving murmur would be appropriate, and his own voice led the

hum.

"I've another thing to be thankful for," resumed the invalid, "and

that's my eldest son. Andrew'll take good care of you all--of you and

the business both. Oh, Frank, my lad, he's a fine example to you; just

as your sister Maggie is to you, Jean. Mind you both follow them. You'll

never give folks reason to talk about you then. Don't get yourselves

talked about! That's the main thing. Of course, you'll take every

opportunity of bettering yourselves, both of you; but do it in a kind of

sober, decent way. Do it like Andrew: I can say no more than that."

All eyes were sadly fixed on the two distressed young people, but they

made no answer, and the affecting scene now terminated with these last

few words--

"If by any kind of chance it happens I'm given a year or two more after

all, I'll take no more part in worldly matters. I'll leave things to

you, Andrew, just the same as if I was gone. If I linger on, a chastened

man, taking for a wee while an interest in your welfare, that's all that

will be left to me--that's the whole I look forward to."

Andrew's sorrowful eyes replied, "And that's more than we do," as he

silently shook his father's hand. Then the company tiptoed sadly out of

the sick-room.

CHAPTER VIII

Of all the anticipatory mourners, the most demonstrative was the

sympathetic widow. She could barely control her emotion till she reached

the drawing-room. There she broke down quite.

"Oh, Mary, Mary!" she sobbed.

They were alone together--Mary, commonly styled Miss Walkingshaw, and

she. The exemplary spinster was likewise distressed, but in a calmer

manner, as became a lady who had shared Heriot's Spartan upbringing.

"Whisht, whisht," said she. "He'll maybe get over it yet."

"No--no, he won't! That horrible beast will see that he doesn't!"

Miss Walkingshaw started nervously.

"You're not meaning the nurse?"

"I mean that--ugh!--that Andrew!"

A bright pink spot appeared in each of Miss Walkingshaw's cheeks. But

the widow was too agitated to observe either them or the horrified stare

with which she greeted this outburst.

"I believe he would _kill_ him to spite me!"

"Madge!" said the exemplary spinster in a voice which for the first time

reminded her of Heriot's.

Mrs. Dunbar collected herself. Doubtless she realized the injustice she

was doing that excellent man.

"I am sorry, Mary," she said gently. "I don't know what I'm saying. I

admire Andrew as much as any one. I didn't mean it. It was only that I

felt I _had_ to blame some one for this terrible sorrow."

Her friend continued to look at her with decidedly diminished warmth.

"Our religion forbids us--" she began austerely; but the sympathetic

widow hurriedly anticipated her.

"I know, I know, dear--so it does. How true, Mary; oh, how true! How

sweet of you to remind me."

She turned her large black eyes, glistening pathetically, full upon her

friend; but for some reason Mary continued to regard her with a new and

curious expression. A trace of suspicion seemed to be among its

ingredients.

Meanwhile her slandered nephew was in the library with his two elder

sisters. The gas was now lit and the storm curtained out. Mrs. Ramornie

and Andrew talked in decorously lowered voices; Mrs. Donaldson more

loudly, and almost more airily, as became her dashing appearance and

smart reputation. Yet she too had a nice sense of the solemnity of the

occasion, and they forgave her elevated voice, since they knew several

people of rank who talked like that.

"An irretrievable loss," Andrew was saying; "an irretrievable loss."

They agreed with him as heartily as people could who were feeling so

depressed.

"A public loss," he added; and again they concurred.

"That will have to be taken into consideration in making the

arrangements," he went on.

They looked graver than ever.

"Something like Sir James Maitland's?" suggested Mrs. Donaldson.

"Something of the sort," said he.

"I only hope it will not be a wet day," said Mrs. Ramornie. "George

caught lumbago at his last funeral--Lord Pitcullo's, you know."

George was the laird of Pettigrew. Nowadays his wife saw that he mixed

with none but the most desirable company, whether it were alive or

dead.

"Oh, my dear, he must come over for it!" said her sister.

"He will," replied Mrs. Ramornie; and they knew that point was settled.

"To tell the honest truth, I'm devoutly thankful for one thing,"

observed Andrew, with the first smile he had permitted himself, and even

it was appropriately grim: "this will put Madge Dunbar's nose out of

joint."

"Thank Heaven for that!" replied Mrs. Ramornie devoutly.

"She meant to get him," said Mrs. Donaldson. "I never saw a woman try

harder."

"If you'd been living in the house, you'd have seen still more of her

trying," replied her brother.

Another fierce shower beat upon the window, with it the gale rose higher

and the branches clashed more noisily. Even behind curtains one felt in

the presence of something elemental. Silence fell on the three, and when

they spoke again it was more solemnly than ever.

"It will make a considerable difference to us all, of course," said Mrs.

Donaldson.

Her brother seemed to take this as a question, for he nodded gravely and

answered--

"Oh, decidedly it will make that."

She mused for a moment and then turned to her sister.

"What was the name of the shoot the Hendersons had last season?"

"Glenfiddle."

"They paid two hundred, didn't they?"

"Two hundred and twenty," said Andrew.

He was a mine of information on the affairs of his acquaintances,

especially on what they paid for things.

"Can you not get enough invitations in the meantime?" asked Mrs.

Ramornie.

"Oh, dozens. But we want a little shoot of our own--when we can afford

it."

"I only mean to build that new conservatory we've always been talking

about," said Mrs. Ramornie; and Andrew pursed his lips and nodded his

approval. The pursing was meant as a hint of criticism on their too

dashing sister.

It was at that moment that there came the first gentle tap upon the

door.

"Come in," said Andrew, and the invalid's nurse entered.

"Mr. Walkingshaw would like a pint bottle of champagne," said she.

The junior partner stared first at her and then at his sisters. They in

turn opened their eyes.

"Is it the--er--usual thing?" he inquired.

"The doctor said nothing about it. Who would ever imagine he was going

to want champagne again?"

"Is it ever given?" asked Andrew cautiously.

"Oh, I know it's given," interposed Mrs. Ramornie decisively. "George's

uncle drank it up to five minutes before he died."

George's uncle had been a very bad example. At the same time he had been

a baronet, and Andrew swithered between the dissoluteness of the request

and a certain stylishness it undoubtedly possessed.

"Mr. Walkingshaw is very determined for it," said the nurse.

"Very well," he answered. "I'll get it for you."

He went out with her and then returned to his sisters.

"Does it mean the end is near?" asked Mrs. Donaldson in a very hushed

voice.

"It means it's nearer," he answered grimly.

Undoubtedly this was a wild end for one of the most respectable lives

ever lived in Edinburgh. Outside, the gale was now positively

shrieking; and inside, he presumed the cork was already popping.

"What a pity!" said Gertrude.

"Oh, I don't know about that," replied her sister. "It keeps them happy.

George's uncle tried to sing after they thought all was over."

Her brother frowned. The possibility that the head of Walkingshaw &

Gilliflower might exit singing exceeded his gloomiest forebodings. He

wished women did not have that habit of talking about unpleasant things.

Could they not keep the like of that to themselves?

Even as he frowned the second tap disturbed them.

"What is it now?" he snapped.

"Could you tell me," asked the nurse, "where Mr. Walkingshaw keeps his

cigars?"

"Cigars!" he cried.

"He is very set upon one."

Andrew silently opened a cupboard and handed her a box of cigars. Then,

still in silence, he seated himself before the fire and frowned at the

dancing flames. Behind his back his sisters talked in low voices, but he

seemed to have no taste for further conversation.

A few minutes later came the third tap, and this time there was so

curious a look in the nurse's face that the junior partner was on his

feet in an instant.

"Is it--shall we come up?" he exclaimed.

"Mr. Walkingshaw would like to know what there's to be for dinner," said

the nurse.

He looked at his sisters and they at him, and then he rang the bell.

Nobody spoke till the butler came up.

"Will you ask the cook what's for dinner? Mr. Walkingshaw wants to

know."

Andrew threw into this speech all the concentrated bitterness of his

soul. Here was the quintessence of unorthodoxy in the very home of

Walkingshaw & Gilliflower! The head of the firm proposed to die not

merely drinking and smoking, but, if possible, feasting. They might be

in some wretched Bohemian den.

In a few minutes the butler returned with a menu. Andrew read it with a

sardonic smile.

"Tell him," he said, "that he can have cocky-leeky soup, boiled cod and

oyster sauce, loin of mutton, apple charlotte, and cheese straws--any or

all of them he likes."

"Thank you," said the nurse.

Andrew planted himself before the fire.

"A fine story this is to get about!" he exclaimed darkly.

"But surely father must be light-headed," said Mrs. Ramornie.

"Umph," he replied.

He clearly did not consider this a very creditable excuse.

"Or perhaps he is really feeling better," suggested Gertrude.

"Better! A man at death's door one minute--given up by the doctors--and

wanting to eat his dinner the next!"

He started.

"I wonder's that nurse fooling us! I didn't like the look of the woman

from the moment she came into the house. I don't believe in your

good-looking nurses."

On this point his sisters cordially agreed with him. Still they didn't

believe it was the nurse.

"Then what is it?" he demanded. "If he's light-headed, why does she pay

any attention to him?"

The door opened, this time without a tap, and in petrified silence they

beheld the portly form of Heriot Walkingshaw, arrayed in a yellow

dressing-gown, holding between his fingers a cigar, and smiling upon

them with a curious blend of satisfaction and meekness.

"I have recovered," said he.

As he made this simple announcement he blew luxuriously through his nose

two thin streams of smoke, while the meekness of his aspect seemed to

make some conscious effort to keep on terms with the satisfaction.

A duet of questions and exclamations arose from the two ladies, and

again some conscious restraint appeared to underlie the paternal calm

with which he answered them.

"Yes," said he, "it is probably one of the most extraordinary recoveries

on record. It began all of a sudden. The spasms passed completely away,

my temperature fell to normal, and I felt a curious sensation almost of

exhilaration. It grew stronger and stronger till at last I could keep in

bed no longer. I felt livelier than I have for years."

He passed the cigar under his nose, drew in his breath, and smiled at it

with a kind of partially chastened affection.

"Do you think could we not have dinner put on a little earlier, eh?"

A cry from the open door startled them. The sympathetic widow, her

black eyes dilated, was gazing at the patient.

"Heriot!" she exclaimed, and there was a note in her voice that came

very near to damping the junior partner's enthusiasm at finding the head

of his firm restored to him.

"Yes, Madge," said Mr. Walkingshaw, his beatific smile still blander, "I

have indeed been spared."

He drew another deep whiff from his cigar, and added gently--

"For maybe a few more years of quiet usefulness."

PART II

CHAPTER I

Down the steep street where stands the office of Walkingshaw &

Gilliflower, careers a hat. It is a silk hat and of a large size, the

hat of a professional man of the most dignified standing and evident

brain capacity. Nothing could show better the innate depravity of March

winds than their choice of such a hat to play with. They had thousands

to choose from--bowlers, caps, wideawakes, all kinds of commonplace

head-gear--and here they have selected for their sport this cylinder of

silk, symbolical of all most worthy of the city's respect. It leaps and

bumps and slides, propelled by the breeze and the law of gravitation,

down the decorously paved hill, in company with a little cloud of dust

and some scraps of dirty paper. And behind it, now at a canter, now at a

panting trot, ambles the portly form of Mr. Heriot Walkingshaw. The very

devil must be in the wind to-day.

At the corner of Queen Street the hat met the full force of the

easterly blast, and bidding good-by to gravitation, turned at right

angles and skimmed for forty yards through space as though the brothers

Wright had mounted it. Then it resumed the action of a Rugby football,

pitching now on its end and now on its middle, and behaving accordingly

each time. Mr. Walkingshaw, perceiving that it was now bouncing in the

direction he desired to go, fell for a moment to a walk and looked

around for some assistant. But the only spectators within hail happened

to be two errand boys who had not seen a circus for some time and

evinced no desire to interrupt the entertainment. So off he started

again, his white spats twinkling beneath his flapping overcoat, and

covered the first fifty yards in such promising fashion that he was able

to strike the revolving rim a series of smart raps with his umbrella

before the wind had recovered its breath. Then suddenly up leapt the

hat, cannoned from a lamp-post on to the railings of the Queen Street

Gardens, from them across the pavement into the gutter, and there,

getting nicely on edge, careered like a hoop, with the thud of Heriot's

footsteps growing fainter behind.

Down the next cross street came two acquaintances of the Writer to the

Signet, and they stopped at the corner in amazement.

"Good God, that's Heriot Walkingshaw!" cried one.

"A man of his age!" replied the other; "he's running like a wing

three-quarter--look at his stride!"

A benevolent lady half stopped the hat with her umbrella. The W.S. was

up to it. He stooped to reach it--a quick grab and he had it by the rim.

"Well picked up, sir!" cried one of the acquaintances.

Mr. Walkingshaw did not hear. He was on the other side of the street and

engrossed in brushing his quarry with his coat sleeve.

"It's a wonderful performance," remarked the other acquaintance; "but it

ought just about to finish him."

"Will it? Look at him--he hasn't turned a hair!"

"It's amazing--positively amazing!" they murmured together as they

watched their elderly friend not only replace his trophy on his head,

but cock it at an angle that breathed reckless defiance to the March

winds.

"Did you ever see Heriot Walkingshaw with his hat at that angle before?"

"As often as I've seen him do even time chasing it!"

Off he strode, breathing faster than usual, and his hat still a little

ruffled, but otherwise as jaunty a figure as ever left an office; while

his two acquaintances went away to narrate to the wondering city what

their astonished eyes had seen.

* * * * *

Meanwhile the junior partner was unburdening his soul to the

confidential clerk.

"That's the end of Guthrie and Co.!" he exclaimed wrathfully. "The whole

thing settled in a fortnight--we might be a marriage registry! It's just

been 'we agree to this,' 'we agree to that,' 'we agree to anything you

suggest.' We haven't fought a single point. I'd have made those

creditors whistle a bit before they saw yon five thousand pounds! But

what's my father say? You heard him yourself--'moral obligation'--'might

be fought!'--'get it settled.' He's botched the whole business."

Mr. Thomieson shook his grizzled head.

"It's certainly not been our usual way of doing business."

Andrew glowered at his desk.

"He said he was going to leave the business to me, and in forty-eight

hours he was taking more responsibilities on his shoulders than he had

for years! He barely has the decency to ask me for my opinion now; and

when I give it, he tells me it's timid. Timid!" The junior partner's

voice rose to a shout. "He just goes at things like a bull, and before

I've time to get in two words edgeways, the thing is settled and he's

out of the office whistling!"

"That whistling's a queer thing he's taken to," observed the clerk.

"He was doing it coming home from church last Sunday."

"Verra strange, verra strange," commented Mr. Thomieson.

He seemed more struck with the peculiarity of the senior partner's

conduct; Andrew with its offensiveness.

"He shows a fine grasp of things all the same," added the clerk. "In

that way it fairly does me good sir, to see him so speerited. It minds

me of old times."

"A proper like business we'd have had to-day if he'd gone on like this

in old times!" grumbled Andrew. "He gets through things quick enough, I

admit; but I tell you he does not take the same interest in them. He

talks of 'dry details'!"

"Is that so?" said Mr. Thomieson, his eyes opening.

"It's a fact. And he's started cracking jokes with the clerks."

"Aye, I heard him yesterday myself. It sounded awful bad in this

office."

"I tell you what it'll end in," said Andrew. "It'll end in our losing

our business--that'll be the end of it. And this is what he calls 'a few

years of quiet usefulness'!"

The junior partner's upper lip seemed to hang like a curtain half

covering his face. Behind it he swore so distinctly that the

confidential clerk discreetly withdrew.

CHAPTER II

"It's quite remarkable how well I'm keeping--quite astonishing," said

Mr. Walkingshaw to himself, as he continued his walk with his recovered

hat perched at the angle that had so surprised his acquaintances.

A month had passed since the stormy afternoon when he had said farewell

to his family, and he now looked back upon that adieu as the rashest and

most premature act of his life. Andrew must have frightened him; that

was the only conceivable excuse for his conduct, seen in the white light

of his present rude health; and he secretly decided that the junior

partner had been getting a little too much rope. If you once let these

lads kick up their heels, the deuce was in it. He would do nothing

unjust, but he would see that he didn't encourage Andrew to alarm him

again. Thus does the virtue even of the most exemplary occasionally

over-exert itself.

Meanwhile, it was uncommonly pleasant to be able to chase one's hat for

a quarter of a mile and feel not a twinge of gout or rheumatism after

the merry pursuit. Mr. Walkingshaw felt half inclined to give his hat a

start again. What a joke it would be to kick it over the railings next

time! At this very undignified thought, he recollected himself and for a

few minutes looked as decorously pompous as the head of the firm should.

But somehow or other that run seemed to have stirred his blood. The fun

of kicking his hat over the railings returned so forcibly that there

spread over his ruddy face a smile which greatly surprised the wife of

one of his most respected clients passing at that moment in her

carriage. She too returned home to talk of Mr. Walkingshaw's curious

demeanor in the public streets of his native city.

The kicking fancy, by a natural chain of thought, reminded him that the

England and Scotland International was being played next Saturday. He

must be there, of course; and wouldn't he shout himself hoarse for

Scotland! He had a moment's dismay when he remembered that old Berstoun

had made an appointment to come in on Saturday and see him about his

confounded money affairs. Then he cheered up again. Let the old chap be

hanged! He would wire and put him off. In fact, he must be put off. For

had not Madge Dunbar promised to come to the match with him? By this

time he had reached the door of his house, and it occurred to him

forcibly that afternoon tea was always a much pleasanter function if

Madge were present. He hoped she wouldn't be out calling.

The dignified twilight of his hall sobered him considerably. He had been

following a strangely frivolous line of thought, he told himself.

Certainly he must never allow his hat to escape again. That run had

quite upset his equanimity: he found himself going upstairs two steps at

a time, and had to pause and shorten his stride.

In the drawing-room he found his sister and the widow.

"Hullo!" said the W.S. before he could recollect himself.

"Hullo!" smiled the widow archly.

He had felt ashamed of the exclamation the moment it escaped him, but

finding it received so prettily, he secretly resolved to say it again

some day--after a week or two had elapsed, perhaps; confining himself to

more dignified remarks in the interval.

"You look as though you had heard good news," said Mrs. Dunbar.

"I've been chasing my hat," he chuckled.

He had meant to make no allusion to the undignified episode, and here he

was blurting it out first thing! He began to feel puzzled by this odd

persistence of high spirits.

"Not in the street, surely?" said Miss Walkingshaw, with her longest

face.

"Oh, I hope it was in the street!" cried the widow. "I'd have loved to

see you!"

Her dear friend regarded this speech with the strongest disapproval; in

fact, she had never quite approved of Madge since those unlucky words of

hers. But Mrs. Dunbar had ceased for some reason to show the same marked

regard for her opinion. It was Heriot who had again refused to hear of

her leaving, and she seemed content to win his approval.

"It was in the street," smiled Mr. Walkingshaw. "I chased it for quite

half a mile, and ran it down single-handed. I wish you had been there,

Madge. You'd have seen there was life in the old dog still!"

He had doubled the distance and forgotten the lady with the umbrella;

but then, as Andrew had remarked, a distaste for dry detail had suddenly

become characteristic of his recovered health.

"Too much life sometimes, I think!" she exclaimed coquettishly; and Mr.

Walkingshaw winked in reply.

He was inwardly as surprised at the wink as he had been at the "hullo."

These aberrations seemed to come quite spontaneously. He wished he could

understand what caused them.

"Have you had a tiring day at the office?" asked the dry Scotch voice of

his sister.

Her familiar accents instinctively banished the aberrations.

"Tolerably, tolerably," he said, with his old air. "We had the affairs

of Guthrie and Co. to settle up. I settled them, though."

"Andrew would be a great help," she replied, with an apprehensive glance

at him. She was much in her nephew's confidence at present.

"Andrew, pooh!" said his father. "He'd talk the hind leg off an

elephant. When things need settling, I just settle them myself and leave

him to grumble away to Thomieson."

Miss Walkingshaw gasped, and the widow gave the sweetest little laugh.

"Poor Andrew!" said she.

"Poor Andrew indeed," retorted her friend, with more indignation than

she had almost ever permitted herself in the presence of her formidable

brother.

He looked at her in genuine surprise. So subtly had his point of view

altered that he quite failed to grasp her cause of complaint.

"What's the matter, Mary?" he asked.

"Oh, if you don't see, what's the good in my trying to explain?"

He merely stared at her, and the widow tactfully interposed.

"Of course you are going to the match on Saturday?" said she.

"Of course, Madge."

"Have you forgotten Mr. Berstoun is coming to see you?" asked Miss

Walkingshaw.

He waved aside this objection with a dignified sweep of his hand. A

piece of cake happened to be in it, and the icing flew across the floor.

On the instant he was on his hands and knees collecting it.

"Berstoun's a mere nuisance," he answered from the carpet. "He'll never

get out of debt if he lives to a thousand. What's the good in his coming

to see me? Let him tell his creditors to go to the devil; that's the

only sensible thing to do."

He rose chuckling--

"He'll go himself some day; so they'll meet again."

His sister's face was too much for the widow's gravity. She began to

laugh hysterically, her black eyes dancing all the time in the merriest

fashion at her host. It was so infectious that in a moment he had joined

her.

"Won't they?" he kept asking through his chuckles. "Won't they, Madge?"

She kept nodding, choked with laughter, and another strange sensation

began to puzzle Mr. Walkingshaw. It was not so much something new as

something forgotten which was beginning to return, and it concerned this

very sympathetic widow. She was an uncommonly nice woman--really

uncommonly: and what an odd pleasure he began to feel in her society! He

felt even more satisfaction than when he had run down his hat.

CHAPTER III

It was upon a fine April morning that Mr. Walkingshaw made his momentous

discovery. His sister had left her room on her way to breakfast when she

heard his voice calling her. It had so curious a note of excitement that

she got a little flustered. Whatever could be the matter? She hurried to

his dressing-room door and tapped with a trembling hand. She was not

easily agitated as a rule, but her brother had been very disconcerting

for the past few weeks, and now his voice was odd. She remembered

reading of gentlemen lying on their dressing-room floors with razors in

their hands--

"Come in!" he cried impatiently.

She found him dressed all but his coat, and he was standing by the

window looking out over the street and the circular garden.

"Come here, Mary," he said, and pointed at the houses seen through the

leafless trees. "Have they been doing anything to the Hendersons'

house?"

"What doing to it?" she exclaimed.

"Painting it, or brightening it, or--or anything of that kind?"

"Who ever heard of painting a house!"

From which it may be gathered that the good lady was not in the habit of

visiting other cities.

"Well then, washing it?"

"Mr. Henderson washing his house! Whatever would he do that for?"

"Tuts, tuts," said her brother, "I'm only asking you. It looks so

uncommonly distinct. Can you not count the chimney-cans?"

"Me? You must get younger eyes than mine, Heriot."

"I can count them," he answered.

"_You_ can! But I thought you'd been complaining you couldn't always

recognize people across the street nowadays."

"I can count those chimneys," he repeated. "I've counted them five

times, and they come to fourteen each time. I'd like to get some one

younger to count them too. Where's Madge Dunbar?"

He started impetuously for the door.

"She's dressing!" cried the horrified lady. "You can't get her in

here--you with your coat off, too!"

Mr. Walkingshaw turned back.

"Well, anyhow," said he, "I'll lay you half a crown there are fourteen

chimneys on Henderson's house. Will you take it up?"

"When did you hear I'd taken to betting?" she gasped.

He waved aside the reproach airily, much as he waved aside everything

she said nowadays, the poor lady reflected. His next words merely

deepened her distress.

"Look at my face carefully," he commanded. "Study it--touch it if you

like--examine it with a lens--give it your undivided attention while I

count twenty."

He counted slowly, while she stared conscientiously, afraid even to

wink. "Now, what have you observed?"

"You're looking very well, Heriot," she answered timidly.

"Did you ever see a man of my age look better?"

"N--no," she stammered.

"Well, don't be afraid to say so, for it's perfectly true. Do you mind a

kind of deep wrinkle under my eyes? Where's that gone now?"

"I can't imagine, Heriot."

"Well, don't look distressed; it's bonnier away."

"Yes," she said in a flustered voice, "you do have a kind of smoother

look."

"Smoother and harder," he replied, prodding his ribs with his fingers.

She gave a little cry of distress.

"You're growing thin! Your waistcoat's hanging quite loose. Oh, Heriot,

it's terrible to see you that way!"

Her heart might be a little withered by all those northern winters, with

never another heart to keep it warm, but it could still beat faster at a

breath of suspicion cast upon her hospitality. She had not been feeding

her only brother properly!

"Tell me yourself what you'd like for your dinner!" she entreated him.

He laughed at her genially.

"Pooh! Tuts! Did you ever in your life see me eat a better dinner than

I've been taking lately? You might give one a suet pudding oftener, but

that's all I have to complain of."

Heriot had always been addicted to suet pudding, but for a number of

years past his doctor's opinion had been adverse to this form of diet

for a gentleman of gouty habit.

"But what about your gout, Heriot?" she asked.

"Gout? Fiddle-de-dee! Who's got gout? Not I, for one."

He had been glancing complacently at his improved reflection in the

mirror. Abruptly he stepped up close to the glass and examined his

visage with unconcealed excitement.

"Good God!" he murmured.

Then, with much the expression Crusoe must have worn when he spied the

footprint, he turned to his sister, and, grasping a lock of hair upon

his brow, bent his head towards her, and demanded--

"What color's that?"

"Dear me," she said, "it looks quite brown. I didn't know you had any

brown hair left."

He raised his head and looked at her in solemn silence till she began to

feel dreadfully confused. Then he bent again.

"Do you notice anything else?"

"N--no; unless your hair's got thicker. But that's not likely at your

time of life."

"It is _not_ likely," said he. "It is most improbable--in fact, it is

practically impossible; but it is thicker."

He rubbed his chin and gazed at her with the queerest look. Mary had

known him since he trundled a hoop, but she never remembered him go on

like this before. As for Heriot, he seemed to be debating whether he

should spring something still more surprising on her or not. But she

looked so uncomfortable already, so totally without the least clue to

his mysterious words, so unconscious of anything stranger about him than

his shirt-sleeves and loss of weight, that he only uttered something

between a gasp and a sigh, and, turning away from her, took up his

brushes to smooth his augmented hairs.

"I'll be down to breakfast in a jiffy," he said.

Miss Walkingshaw thought that an odd kind of phrase for Heriot to be

using.

CHAPTER IV

Andrew no longer walked to the office with his father in the mornings.

Not that _he_ had anything to do with the altered custom: in fact, he

was always most careful to assure his friends that he had more than once

waited as long as five minutes to give his father the opportunity of

having his company--if he was wishing it. But Mr. Walkingshaw was never

less than ten minutes late nowadays.

On this particular morning he set forth a full half-hour after his son.

He had been very absent-minded after his talk with his sister,--not even

Mrs. Dunbar could keep his attention for more than a moment,--and he had

sat for the best part of twenty minutes thoughtfully putting on his

boots. One or two acquaintances who saw him on the way from his house to

his office often recalled his demeanor that morning. Now he would loiter

along with bent shoulders, his hands behind his back, trailing his

umbrella and brooding as though he contemplated bankruptcy. Then

suddenly his pace would quicken, the umbrella whirled round and round

like a Catherine wheel, and with his head held jauntily and the merriest

smile he would swagger along like a young blood of twenty-six who had

just been accepted by an heiress. And then abruptly he would lapse into

his mournful gait.

"I want to see Mr. Andrew," said he, as soon as he was seated in his

private room.

The junior partner entered with a melancholy visage and a reproachful

eye.

"Oh, you've come at last," he remarked, too quietly to be rude, too

pointedly to be pleasant.

But his father seemed not to have heard.

"Sit down, sit down," he said; and then in an earnest manner and with

the gravest face began, "I've something to tell you, Andrew, that I

think you ought to know."

Andrew's visage relaxed. This gravity promised better than anything his

father's behavior had led him to expect of late.

"Something most extraordinary has happened. You've noticed a little kind

of difference in me of late, possibly?"

"I have," said Andrew, with an intonation that made his acquiescence

particularly thorough.

"A sort of cheerfulness and healthiness, and so on?"

"And so on," assented Andrew.

"Well, I've accounted for it at last!"

"Oh?" said Andrew.

This did not strike him as quite so interesting. He thought of the

papers he had left, and glanced at his watch.

"You mind my telling you about Cyrus's theory of the cells of the

body--that all they needed was the proper kind of stimulation, and

they'd be as good as new? Well, he went one better than that sometimes.

I never told you what his idea was--it sounded kind of daft-like when

you didn't hear him laying it down himself--but I'll tell you now."

His voice sank impressively, and his junior partner grew vaguely uneasy.

This was a most unsuitable place and hour to be discussing quack medical

theories. He didn't approve of it at all.

"His idea was that every cell of the body--mine and yours,

Andrew,"--(Andrew grew exceedingly uncomfortable: this verged on the

indecent),--"every single cell of them is just a kind of wee vessel in

which chemical and electrical changes are going on. While they keep

brisk we keep young, and when they get off the boil, so to speak, we

grow old. Well now, what's to hinder one stirring them up to boil faster

and faster, instead of slower and slower? And if they once did that, of

course you'd begin to grow young instead of going on getting old.

Andrew, it's happened to me."

Andrew started.

"What has?"

"I'm growing young again!"

His junior partner looked at him for half a minute in dead silence. Then

he decided that this statement had better be answered humorously.

"Is this story a sample?" he inquired.

"You don't believe me?"

Andrew's cheeks bulged in a faint smile.

"Am I expected to?"

"Look at my waistcoat--when did you ever see it as loose as that, and me

healthier than I've been for years, and eating more? Look at my

face--where are the wrinkles gone? Look at my head--how long is it since

you've seen a patch of brown hair there?"

To complete this overwhelming series of proofs, he leapt up, and with

an agile jump on one foot whirled the other leg clean over the back of

his chair.

"It's twenty years and more since I last did that!"

Andrew was fairly startled out of his skepticism now. He had the eyes of

a goldfish, and his upper lip and swelling cheeks twitched nervously.

"What an awful thing to happen!" he murmured.

"It has happened, though," said his father.

"But surely--oh, it must just be temporary. You don't think it will

last, do you?"

"I think nothing," replied Mr. Walkingshaw, with conviction. "I have no

settled opinions left. I am a mass of cells in active eruption."

He began to chuckle.

"I'm like a dashed volcano, Andrew!"

His son looked at him piteously. To suffer this sea change was bad

enough, but to laugh about it was diabolical. Mr. Walkingshaw could not

but sober down under such an eye. He gathered his countenance into an

aspect as portentously solemn as his dwindled wrinkles could achieve.

His son grieved afresh to see how their passing diminished the once

overpowering respectability of his parent.

"It's an awful predicament," said Mr. Walkingshaw, shaking his bronzing

head.

"Awful--just awful! What will people say?"

"That's just what I've been wondering. How am I going to break it to

them?"

"You're not going to tell people!"

"But they'll notice for themselves."

Andrew gazed at him gloomily.

"It may pass off,"--his face cleared a little,--"in fact, it's certain

to."

"It doesn't feel much like it at present: I'm fairly bursting with

spirits," smiled Mr. Walkingshaw, and then recollected himself and grew

grave again. "What's to be done supposing people do notice?" he asked.

"We'll just have to stretch a point," said Andrew somberly, "and give

some other explanation."

"We might give some decent, respectable doctor the credit for it," his

father suggested.

"They'd all be afraid to take it, if it went on any further. Imagine a

respectable doctor admitting he'd made a man grow younger! I dare say

they might be proud of such a performance in London, but they've more

decency here!"

It seemed characteristic of Mr. Walkingshaw's calamity that he should

bounce up like a tennis ball after each well-meant effort to depress

him.

"In that case," said he cheerfully, "we'll just have to say I am trying

to make myself more of a companion for you."

Andrew started violently.

"We'll say no such thing! Do you suppose _I'm_ going to have my name

mixed up with it?"

His father remained serene.

"Well then, what do you suggest?"

Andrew's cheeks drooped, carrying the corners of his mouth down with

them.

"There's no good in suggesting. You can trust your friends to do that

for you. Pretty stories they'll be circulating!"

Mr. Walkingshaw regarded him with dignity, mingled with a trace of

good-natured contempt for such a lack of spirit.

"My dear Andrew," said he, "you need not be under the slightest

apprehension. Whatever my external appearance may become--and I trust it

will remain not altogether unpleasing--I shall see to it that my conduct

rebuts any breath of scandal. I shall be, if possible, more circumspect,

more scrupulously observant of the rules which should regulate the

behavior of a man in my position, more discreet both in speech and

conduct. The tongues of the libelous will be effectually silenced

_then_."

Mr. Walkingshaw accompanied these excellent sentiments by gently

swinging himself to and fro in his revolving chair and rolling a scrap

of blotting-paper into a pellet, which, at the conclusion of his speech,

he absent-mindedly discharged at the office clock. His son seemed as

impressed by these movements as by his words.

"You'll find it easier," he began bitterly, "to set people talking than

to--"

"When you come to think of it, the situation is not without decided

advantages," his father interrupted, springing up and pacing the room

with an animated air. "Just think of the renewed opportunities for doing

all kinds of useful and beneficial things! I might take a more prominent

part in public life: I might even go in for politics. I certainly shall

take a bit of salmon-fishing. The study of some of our classical authors

suggests itself as a relaxation for my leisure moments. The subjects of

aeroplanes and national defense are worthy of consideration, too. I

should like to visit several of the continental countries--our own

colonies are even more attractive; there wouldn't be the same

difficulties about the language. Or, by Jingo, Andrew, I might learn

French and Italian! Yes, the position is not without its compensations."

He stopped beside his son and laid his hand upon his shoulder.

"I propose to widen greatly the scope of my energies, without in the

least forfeiting the respect of my fellow-citizens. That is my ideal,

Andrew. Ah, my boy, you and I will have some great times together! By

that I mean, of course, some beneficial and profitable times."

He took a sudden step forward and kicked the wastepaper-basket into the

fireplace.

"I might even take up football some day, if this goes on," he smiled,

and then abruptly recovered his solemnity.

"Beneficial and profitable," he repeated gravely. "Those are to be our

watchwords. Will you have a weed?"

The junior partner started out of the reverie into which he had fallen.

"Are you going to start smoking _here_?" he cried.

"Why the deuce shouldn't I? It's my own office. These old-fashioned

ideas of yours about not smoking on business premises are getting out

of date. Besides, it keeps the flies away. And now I must get on to my

correspondence."

With a cigar in the corner of his mouth and humming something resembling

an air, the senior partner dashed into his day's work with the ardor of

an egg-collector.

CHAPTER V

In the meantime, the two least satisfactory members of the family were

sadly enduring the consequences of their foolishness. To Frank and Jean

the world seemed a very gray place at present; and even the daily

increasing juvenility of their parent failed to enliven them. They were

too engrossed in their own unhappiness to take much notice of it; and

what they saw merely distressed them, for so far his beneficent projects

had not included them. Frank moped about the house, consorted

occasionally with an acquaintance, now and then went away for a day's

golf, and at frequent intervals confided to Jean his disgust with the

arrangements of the universe. Ellen Berstoun was to have paid them

another visit, but for some reason she put it off; and at this decision

he was plunged for forty-eight consecutive hours into a frenzy,

alternately of relief and despair, which left him at last more

lackadaisical than ever. A few days after his father's momentous

interview with Andrew, he was roused to fresh anguish by the junior

partner's departure to spend a week-end at Berstoun Castle, and his

state of mind now became so unbearable that he abruptly announced to

his sister--

"I can't stick this any longer! I'm going up to town."

"What for?" she asked.

"For a bust," he answered desperately. "I'm going to try to--to--to

forget."

And the poor youth strode hurriedly out of the room to examine the state

of his silk hat and his finances.

Jean devoutly wished she too could fly to London! Like a dutiful girl,

she had returned, at her father's peremptory bidding, two unopened

letters received from that city. Frank knew his address and forwarded

them for her. Once or twice after that he himself received a letter in a

hand suspiciously resembling the writing on the unbroken envelopes, and

it certainly was a fact that on each of these occasions the erring pair

were closeted for long together, and that Jean's spirits rose a little

for a few hours afterwards. But they soon sank again.

After Frank had announced his desperate resolution she sat alone

for some time in the drawing-room. Everybody else was out, and the

house seemed prodigiously silent and vast. At last she heard a little

noise, which presently took the form of footsteps bounding upstairs,

accompanied by a cheerful tuneless whistling. The door was flung

open, and her father entered.

It was only at that moment that Jean realized he was a curiously altered

man. He was dressed in brown tweeds and a light waistcoat; his face was

flushed, and a smile danced in his eyes.

"I've been for a bicycle ride," he announced.

She could hardly believe her ears.

"You--on a bicycle?" she gasped; for Mr. Walkingshaw had been born long

before bicycles.

"Yes; I've had a couple of lessons--only two, and I went for a six-mile

ride all alone to-day!"

"Then weren't you at the office?"

"In the morning; but one gets no exercise in that beastly office. I need

a lot nowadays."

He threw himself into a chair and a smile broke over his face, in which,

to her further bewilderment, she recognized an unmistakable flavor of

roguishness.

"Thinking of him?" he inquired.

Poor Jean nearly jumped out of her chair.

"Of--of whom?" she gasped.

"The artist fellow, what's his name--Vernon."

"Father!" she said in a low, pained voice.

"Eh? What's the matter?"

She looked at him between grief and amazement.

"You said that his name was never to be mentioned. Do you mean to--why

do you--what do you mean, father?"

Mr. Walkingshaw was finding it harder every day to retain his old

attitudes in all their dignity. He was altering at an astonishing pace.

How many years younger he had become already he could not compute. He

had tried once or twice to calculate about where he stood but the

surprising thing was that he found he cared less and less what was

happening, and how fast it happened. He enjoyed himself amazingly so

long as he did not worry; and the obvious moral was--don't worry. At the

same time, he had no intention whatsoever of forfeiting the respect of

his fellow-citizens, still less of his family. It was true this proviso

occurred to him more often after than before he had surprised them by

some trifling deviation; still, when it did occur, it occurred forcibly.

On this present occasion he suddenly became preternaturally solemn,

coughed with a little dry, respectable sound, and replied severely--

"I meant that it must never be mentioned by you, but--ahem--it

is--ah--different with your father. I still leave myself at liberty

to mention him with reprobation."

Jean jumped up with a sparkling eye.

"In that case I'll leave you. I've obeyed you so far, but I certainly

shan't obey you if you tell me to sit and listen to _anything_ against

him!"

And she started for the door.

"My dear girl!" cried Mr. Walkingshaw.

He jumped up too, caught her by the hand, and led her to the sofa.

"Now, now," he said kindly; "sit down and tell me all about it."

She looked at him in fresh amazement.

"All about what?"

He found it a little difficult to explain precisely what he meant. He

only knew that he felt an unwonted expansion of his heart towards this

really charming little daughter.

"All about the weather and crops," he suggested playfully.

Jean began to tremble a little.

"I--I don't understand you at all," said she.

He smiled pleasantly.

"Am I such a very mysterious old fellow?"

At this odd and novel mixture of kindness and queerness she felt her

words choking her, as much with fear as anything.

"We--we never have understood each other," she found herself saying.

He looked startled.

"What? You don't mean to say you--But I'm your father."

"I suppose that's the reason."

"I have always tried to do my duty."

"The trouble is, you succeeded."

"What!" he exclaimed. "Do you actually mean to say you--ah--didn't

appreciate my duty?"

She was sitting by his side on the sofa, her eyes downcast and her lips

obstinately set. Never before in her life had she stood up to him like

this, but now that she had begun she was discovering to her surprise

that she had more of her father's temper than she had dreamt of.

"No," she said. "I didn't sometimes."

Instead of getting angry, Mr. Walkingshaw seemed merely astonished and

interested.

"Perhaps it was the way I did it," he suggested.

She looked up quickly.

"Yes," she answered.

"Well, my dear, I have lately discovered that I shall never be too old

to learn. Just tell me how you'd like to be treated, and I'll try to

manage it. I am very fond of you, Jean."

Her mouth lost its obstinacy; her eyes and voice grew kind.

"Father dear, if only you'd show it! If only--"

He interrupted her by a resounding kiss.

"More that kind of way?" he smiled.

For answer she threw her arms round him and gave him what he immediately

decided to be the pleasantest hugging he had ever enjoyed. This was a

method of doing his duty that must certainly be repeated; he had no

doubts about that. It led to such surprising results, too. In a few

minutes he found himself embarked upon the most charmingly confidential

conversation.

"It was a little rough on you," he confessed.

"You mean--?" she hesitated.

"Well, well, perhaps we'd better not allude to it again," he answered

kindly.

But apparently she had no intention at all of avoiding the subject.

"Oh, yes," she said eagerly. "I'd like to talk about it with you now."

It did not seem to occur to the W.S. that he might end by committing

himself to some expression of sympathy he would repent of later.

"Capital," he answered genially. "You still like the fellow, then?"

"Like him!" she exclaimed. "Oh, father, I--I still love him."

"I wish he'd brush his hair a little better and wear a respectable tie;

still, he undoubtedly has some original ideas."

Mr. Walkingshaw found himself musing on the artist's outrageous opinions

with a new catholicity. They had staggered him at the moment: they began

to interest him now.

"It's a pity he can't make a little more money," he added.

"But I don't need a large income to be happy, father."

"Eh?" said Mr. Walkingshaw.

This was going rather too fast; yet when he looked into her shining

eyes, he found it really very difficult to keep severe.

"Money is a very important thing, my dear," he replied.

"It's not nearly so important as love! Surely, father, it's far, far

better that two people should be very, very fond of each other than

have plenty of money! You do agree with that, don't you?"

It was at this moment that there came to the little advocate-for-love's

assistance a recollection of the sympathetic widow. In his mind's eye

Mr. Walkingshaw suddenly saw a vision of her black eyes vivaciously

beaming, and for some reason this enabled him to regard Jean's point of

view in a wholly new and original light.

"Well," said he, "I'm not sure that there isn't something in what you

say. I do believe you're right, my dear--in fact, I'm positive you're

right. The love for a fine woman--well, it's a first-rate

sensation--most refreshing."

"For a woman?" asked Jean, a little surprised. "But we were talking

about a man."

There was no mirror available, but Mr. Walkingshaw had a strong

suspicion that he must be blushing.

"For a man--of course," he said hastily. "I meant for a man. But in a

general way I think I may say that love's the thing for everybody! It's

the thing for you and me anyhow, eh, Jean?"

Jean felt as though she had scrubbed a lump of crystal and found it to

be a diamond. How was it she had never before discovered these depths of

affection and geniality below his awe-inspiring exterior? She had not

scrubbed hard enough!

"Yes, indeed!" said she. "Oh, I do understand you now. Father, I'm so

happy! And you won't think too hardly of Mr. Vernon, will you?"

"H'm," smiled her father. "That's a matter we might well take to

avizandum, I think."

For a daughter of a Writer to the Signet, Jean was woefully ignorant.

She did not know what avizandum meant in the least. But she felt sure it

was the name of one of the roads to happiness; and she hugged him again.

It was in the midst of this embrace that Mrs. Donaldson entered. She

had always esteemed the author of her own existence and her family's

prosperity, but she had never hugged him; nor had he shown any evidence

of desiring such an operation.

"Good gracious, Jean!" she exclaimed.

"We are arranging a bike ride," beamed her father.

To complete the confusion of his more creditable daughter, this

improbable announcement was accompanied by an unabashed wink, directed

at his less creditable child apparently for the superfluous purpose of

assuring her he jested.

That evening Mr. Walkingshaw began to be discussed by his

fellow-citizens in earnest.

CHAPTER VI

"You're not drinking, Andrew," said Mr. Walkingshaw. "Go on, fill up

your glass. Man, do you call that filling a glass? Here's the way."

Leaning across the table, he poured in the port till it stood above the

rim, with the steady hand of a man of forty. He was hardly as young as

that yet, but he was amazingly rejuvenated. It could not possibly last,

Andrew said to himself; still, he felt dreadfully uncomfortable.

"You seem very anxious I should drink," he said gloomily, looking

askance at his brimming glass.

"You're so dull, my boy," his father answered genially. "There's no life

in you at all. You for a lover! You ought to have come back looking

happy. One would think she'd broken it off."

It was the evening of the same day. Andrew had returned from his visit

to the Berstouns shortly after Mrs. Donaldson departed, and as Frank was

dining out, he and his father sat alone together over their wine.

"I've no reason to feel particularly happy," he said.

"Eh?" cried his father. "Nothing gone wrong, is there?"

"I don't understand these women."

"No," said Mr. Walkingshaw, with jovial candor, "you'd be a bit of a

stick with the sex, I can well imagine. You haven't the cut of a ladies'

man: but it's all a matter of practice, my boy; just a matter of

learning experience as you go along. What did she say to you?"

Andrew was divided in mind. This tone exasperated him beyond measure. He

felt inclined to leave the room. Yet, on the other hand, he judged

himself ill-used by his betrothed, and when he had any ground of

grievance, he had the pleasant habit of venting his complaints as long

as his audience would listen to him. To-night the habit proved even

stronger than his distaste for his high-spirited parent.

"She was queer," said he.

"They're all that," replied Mr. Walkingshaw knowingly. "The great thing

is not to mind what they say. It's what they do that counts: and she'd

be affectionate, I suppose, eh?"

"I've never gone in for much of your spooning and kissing and that sort

of thing," began Andrew.

"The more fool you!" interrupted his parent. "What do you think a girl

gets engaged for if it isn't to be cuddled?"

He surprised himself by his own acumen. The late Mrs. W. had not been in

the least that sort of lady, and he had never been engaged to anybody

else; yet here he was laying down the law with the serenest confidence.

Some divine instinct must be inspiring him. His son seemed less

favorably impressed with his sagacity.

"Ellen's not that sort of girl," said he.

"My dear fellow, they're all that sort. At least, that's my view of the

matter. Well, what's gone wrong?"

"I don't know," said Andrew sourly. "I can't make her out. She's

different somehow. It was almost as though she wasn't so fond of me."

"Are you sure you've done nothing to annoy her? They're very touchy, you

know."

"I haven't done a thing to annoy her. I can swear to _that_."

"Then," said Mr. Walkingshaw, with inspired conviction, "there's some

other fellow cutting you out."

Andrew started.

"Who?"

"Oh, I don't know all her neighbors. It's nobody she's met here, I

suppose."

"She never saw a man when she was here but Frank and me."

"Then it's some one in Perthshire," pronounced Mr. Walkingshaw,

emphatically but cheerfully.

Andrew frowned at his still brimming glass. He trusted that he did not

overvalue himself; at the same time, the idea of another being preferred

by a girl who had once enjoyed the privilege of being engaged to Andrew

Walkingshaw struck him as far-fetched.

"I don't think it's another man," he said.

"It's my opinion it is, Andrew; and I'm not wanting to lose so nice a

daughter-in-law, so you've got to see that she doesn't turn round

altogether. You've got to go in and win; make sure of her, my boy!"

Mr. Walkingshaw grew more and more animated and his son more and more

distressed. He was behaving so unlike the senior partner in Walkingshaw

& Gilliflower.

"What are you wanting me to do?"

"Behave less like a damned umbrella," pronounced Mr. Walkingshaw, with

a startling lapse into epigram.

Andrew stared.

"Oh?" said he.

"Be lively, and--er--amorous, and--ah--sparkling; that's the sort of

thing. Go in for a few new ties and waistcoats. Socks, too, are things

that the young men display considerable enterprise in. I was tempted

myself this afternoon by a shop window full of really remarkably chaste

hosiery--pale green with stripes! you'd look first class in them. I came

to the conclusion at last that perhaps I was hardly young enough for

them yet; but I invested in half a dozen ties of quite a tasty design."

"_You_ bought half a dozen ties!" exclaimed Andrew.

"I did; and you're welcome to any of them you like. Or will you come

with me and we'll choose something?"

"Thank you," replied his son sardonically; "but on the whole I'd sooner

trust to nature."

"In that case, Heaven help you, my poor boy! You have your good points,

but beauty's not among them. Imagine you as a statue, Andrew! Eh?"

The worthy gentleman laughed genially, but the unhappy lover did not

join in his mirth.

"I am glad I amuse you," he said, and rose to leave the table.

"Sit down, sit down, man," his father commanded; "I haven't half

finished with you yet. Have you read any poetry to her?"

"I have not."

"Well, read some; try a bit of--er--I'm not so well up in the poets as I

hope to be soon, but I fancy Byron has written some very stimulating

verses; or why go over the border for them--why not try her with Burns?

What's finer than--

"'Had we never loved sae kindly,

Had we--um--um--sae blindly,

Never--something--um--um--parted,

We should--something about being broken-hearted?'"

"It's very sentimental, I've no doubt," answered the junior partner, in

a tone which implied that he was uttering the last word in caustic

criticism.

But his father merely grew the more enthusiastic.

"And what else have you got to be but sentimental? My dear boy, my eyes

have been opened this very afternoon. I've never been sentimental

enough with my children; and what's the consequence? Here's you letting

a pretty girl slip through your fingers because you don't let yourself

loose on her! Now what you ought to say to her is something like this:

'My own darling--or sweetheart--or even duckie,'--use some popular

symbol, as it were, of affection,--'I am so passionately'--or fervently,

if you like--let us say, 'so fervently in love with you that I can't

hold out'--or perhaps you might find a better word than that; you want

to inflame the lassie without startling her. 'I can't endure'--that's a

better word--'I can't endure for another month. Marry me four weeks from

to-day!' And there you have the whole thing done."

Andrew had remained standing beside the table.

"Is that all now?" he inquired.

His father regarded him with a fine jovial scorn, much as Sir John

Falstaff might have regarded the inventor of lemonade.

"I doubt you're a hopeless case," said he. "There's ginger enough in an

ordinary policeman to make three of you. But I'm not going to let you

lose Ellen Berstoun if I can help it. Run away now and complain to your

auntie."

In pointed silence Andrew availed himself of this permission, while his

father remained to light a cigar and meditate upon the disadvantages of

unalloyed respectability. A fine example in many ways Andrew undoubtedly

was, just as he trusted he had been himself; but he showed up poorly

when it came to love-making. He was too old for his age; that was the

trouble with Andrew. Now that he came to think of it, there was

something uncompanionable in elderly people. It was surprising he had

not noticed it before, but lately it had occurred to him forcibly. A

brisk young fellow like Frank, a pretty girl like Jean--one felt more in

touch with them. Perhaps they were a trifle on the juvenile side: the

choicest, the most sympathetic period of life was undoubtedly that

attained by--Mr. Walkingshaw jumped up, laid down his cigar, and started

for the drawing-room. What a fine woman Madge was!

He spent a delightful hour in the ladies' society. The obliging widow

was easily prevailed upon to gratify a passion he had lately developed

for tuneful and romantic melody, and she thrummed through five waltzes

and the whole of two comic operas, while he sat on the sofa holding

Jean's hand and exchanging confidential smiles. Jean was in the seventh

heaven of happiness; the widow enthusiastically approved of the

symptoms; and the only critic present appeared to be his exemplary

sister. She listened to the concert with a bleak face, and regarded the

dalliance on the sofa out of a troubled and uncomprehending eye.

Aglow with sentiments, which from being mere amorphous ecstasies were

rapidly developing into shapely visions of black eyes and well-nourished

contours, Mr. Walkingshaw bade good-night to the ladies and settled

himself comfortably in his easy-chair before a friendly fire and in

company with a fragrant pipe. How delicious his tobacco tasted!

Evidently this last tin must be of a superior quality. He resolved that

he should insist on being supplied with the same high-class variety in

future.

At this point his pleasant reverie was interrupted by the entrance of

Frank, just returned from dining with a friend. His father greeted him

genially.

"Well, my boy, help yourself to a drink and light your pipe."

Frank glanced at him suspiciously. He had never before been encouraged

either to drink or to smoke; indeed, he had more than once complained

that his father seemed to forget he was now a grown-up man. What his

sudden cordiality meant he could not divine; but on general principles

he feared it. This did not prevent him from accepting both overtures

and sitting down on the other side of the fire. Mr. Walkingshaw asked

him a few questions about how he had spent the evening, always with the

same friendly air, till the young soldier began to suspect he had

negotiated some peculiarly fortunate business transaction. He became

emboldened to approach what he feared might prove a delicate subject.

"I'm thinking of running up to London for a week or two," he began.

"An excellent idea," said his parent. "It must be rather slow for you

here."

Frank got more and more encouraged.

"The only trouble is, I find myself rather short of funds."

"How much do you want?"

The going was too smooth to last, thought Frank. He became cautious.

"Oh, a tenner or so, I suppose," he suggested.

"A tenner!" exclaimed his father.

"Say a fiver, then," said Frank hurriedly.

"A fiver for a week or two in London? My dear boy, you don't know how to

do the thing at all. Your return ticket will cost you over three pounds;

supposing one averages your dinners at ten shillings a night for a

fortnight--that's seven pounds more; suppers, even if you supped alone"

(here he winked upon his startled offspring), "will run you at least as

much. Put railway and grub at thirty pounds--just to be safe. Then

you'll be going to theaters and music-halls, and taking cabs, and having

a week-end at Brighton--and the Lord knows what else. My hat, it will be

a spree!"

With sparkling eyes and a beaming smile he leant forward in his chair

and tapped his son upon the knee.

"I'll come with you, Frank."

"You!" gasped the poor youth.

"Yes," said Mr. Walkingshaw, apparently more to himself than to Frank,

"that's the way to set about it!"

He beamed upon his son confidentially.

"I've got a splendid idea, and you're just the very chap to help me. I

won't spoil sport, my boy, but I'll travel up with you--and, by Jove, we

might stop at the same hotel, if that wouldn't embarrass you. Would it?"

"N--no," said Frank, "n--not at all."

"Just what we were needing--a little blow-out in London, eh?"

Frank gave a little nervous laugh.

"Do you really mean it?"

Mr. Walkingshaw was now standing in front of the fire, alternately

rising on tiptoe and thumping down on his heels.

"Don't I just! When shall we start--to-morrow morning?"

"To-morrow! But I haven't done any packing."

"Well, no more have I. We'll just chuck in a few things and buy anything

else we want in London. I need practically a new outfit myself. Can you

introduce me to a good tailor?"

"Ye--es," stammered Frank.

"That's all settled, then."

Mr. Walkingshaw began to laugh mysteriously.

"I'd like to see Andrew's face when he learns I've gone!"

"But aren't you going to tell him?"

Mr. Walkingshaw's voice sank.

"Not a word to any of them, Frank! You put my things into your cab

without any one noticing; I'll say I'm going to the office; and we'll

meet at the station. I don't want to get talked about, you see."

It was reassuring to find that Mr. Walkingshaw still valued his

reputation, even though the measures he took to preserve it were not

excessively convincing.

"All right, then," said Frank; "I'd better go and pack now. Good-night."

"Good-night, my boy," his father answered fervently. "God bless you!"

The Cromarty Highlander had been through some nerve-testing experiences,

but, as he went to his room, he realized that the severest ordeals often

occur in civil life.

Meanwhile, his parent at a leisurely pace was following him upstairs

when he perceived a light still burning in the drawing-room. He gently

pushed the door open, and a smile of peculiar pleasure irradiated his

rosy face. There, busy at the writing-table and quite alone, sat the

sympathetic widow. He remembered how prettily she had answered a simple

interjection once before.

"Hullo!" he warbled.

CHAPTER VII

The widow started and turned in her chair. This time she did not archly

cap his greeting. Instead, her exclamation had a tincture of alarm. He

was so very unlike his usual self.

"Writing a billet-doux?" he inquired, still smiling.

He softly closed the door behind him, and approached her with a kind of

jaunty, springy gait that increased her perplexity. She loved to see him

lively, but this smirking manner was really almost peculiar.

"May I sit at your feet, Madge?" he asked, and without waiting for an

answer, drew up a footstool and planted himself so close to her knees

that the sense of propriety felt by all fine women with any experience

of life impelled her to withdraw them some three inches farther from his

shoulder. At the same time she bent her head a very little forward and

gently drew in her breath. The late Captain Dunbar had possessed in

addition to the virtues of a dashing temperament, certain of its

failings, and her cousin's demeanor decidedly reminded her of his

conduct after particularly convivial evenings at the mess. But the test

was reassuring. Her nose was keen, and she noticed nothing--absolutely

nothing.

"What a beastly big barn of a room this is," he began.

She was at a loss quite what to answer. Could he mean this: he who

prided himself on the becoming stateliness of his house?

"Oh, I think it is a very fine and--and--impressive room, Heriot," she

answered guardedly.

"It's too big and gloomy for a widower. It makes one feel kind of

lonely."

The widow smiled sweetly. She quite understood what he meant now. The

reminiscence of the late Captain Dunbar faded away, and once more she

was sympathy itself.

"Are you often lonely?" she inquired softly.

He looked up into her face with a curious hint of boyishness in his

face.

"Not while you are here, Madge."

Again a species of divine instinct possessed Mr. Walkingshaw. Without

permission asked or given, he took his fair cousin's hand and gently

held it. At the same time a longing to be confidential invaded him. He

had a really prime secret to share with her.

"I am going up to London to-morrow morning!" he announced.

It did not surprise her that business should take him up to town; it did

that his eyes should twinkle at the prospect. She began to feel a trifle

less sympathetic.

"Oh," she said, "why are you going?"

For a moment he hesitated. Could he venture to confide in her? The young

and amorous Heriot said, "Of course! Such a divinity will be all

sympathy." But the senior partner in Walkingshaw & Gilliflower

emphatically retorted. "Never tell a woman what you don't want the whole

town to know!" He was still old enough to obey the more prudent

counselor.

"I'm going to see my old friend Colonel Munro."

Decidedly Mr. Walkingshaw was fast acquiring that quick adaptation to

circumstances which is the hall-mark of youth. He had not thought of his

old friend Charlie Munro for the last year or more, and here he was

coming in most usefully just when he was wanted. Heriot recognized with

a touch of awe his own unwonted fertility.

"Don't tell any one!" he added, and then immediately realized that at

the same time he must be losing a little of that valuable discretion

which had characterized the head of Walkingshaw & Gilliflower.

"My dear Heriot, this sounds suspicious."

He realized now the penalties for indiscretion.

"I am going to see him on particularly private business. We do not wish

it to get talked about."

He thought he had recovered his old manner to a nicety, but what was his

surprise when his cousin shook a well-manicured finger in his face, and

cried--

"What a naughty boy you are getting! I wonder whether I ought to tell on

you or not?"

This time he tried another of his ingenuous smiles.

"_You_ wouldn't tell on me, Madge!"

"Oh, indeed! Why should I care about your reputation?"

Mr. Walkingshaw deliberately faced the situation. He had not meant to

commit himself that evening--not, in fact, till he had enjoyed an

untrammeled week in town; but he had placed his reputation in this

charming lady's hands, and he realized he must obtain a receipt for it.

"Don't you care about me?" he inquired tenderly.

"What--what do you mean, Heriot?" she faltered.

"You are everything to me," he answered, and looking into her black

eyes, inwardly decided that this expressed very little more than the

precise truth.

* * * * *

It was a very few minutes after this that he found himself seated very

close to the sympathetic widow's side, with one arm encircling a

considerable segment of what had been a remarkably trim waist, and the

other hand toying with a collection of ruby and amethyst rings.

"I do hope I shan't disappoint you, Heriot," she murmured.

"No fear of that, my dear," said he, pinching one of her plump fingers.

"It will be rather a Darby and Joan marriage, of course," she smiled.

"Will it?" replied Heriot, with a glint out of the corner of his eye

that reminded her forcibly of the late Captain Dunbar.

"Oh, Heriot!" she expostulated. "Remember you're the father of a

grown-up family."

"Well," he replied, with amorous facetiousness, "what man has done, man

can do."

The lady endeavored gently to withdraw her hand, but he held it firmly.

"Will it be a long engagement?" she asked, with a colder smile.

"By Jove, not very!" he whispered riotously.

She felt like one of those intelligent persons who pull the triggers of

supposititiously unloaded guns. By a supreme effort she mastered her

emotion and remarked--

"I wonder what your family will say."

He kissed her demonstratively and cried--

"My family be hanged! I'm not going to tell them yet."

"When will you?" she asked, disengaging herself with a difficulty that

impressed her still further.

"Time enough when I get back from London."

The widow was not altogether unsophisticated. This blend of abandonment

and secrecy impressed her unfavorably. She had known of more than one

ballroom proposal where the gentleman was just sufficiently master of

his emotions to stipulate for silence till he had departed on a

twelvemonth's furlough.

"How soon are you coming back?" she inquired.

"Week or two," he answered airily.

"A week or two to see Colonel Munro!"

"Intricate business," he answered her, with a fresh salute.

"Poor old Charles Munro is a kind of relation of mine," she observed.

He eyed her with more surprise than passion.

"Oh! I didn't know that."

"I haven't written to him for years. I think I must send him a letter

this week."

Mr. Walkingshaw realized that he was marrying brains as well as beauty.

He also realized that Colonel Munro was now part of his London

programme. However, on second thoughts, Charlie Munro was a dear old

fellow, and very likely he'd have been looking him up in any case. His

spirits bounded up again. In fact, why should they ever sink with such a

fair creature by his side?

"Do, darling," he whispered.

She surrendered herself to his affection and sighed happily. Why should

she feel disturbed with one of the most respectable of Writers to the

Signet pledged to devote his declining years to her consolation?

"I trust you, Heriot," she murmured.

"My little duck!" he answered tenderly.

* * * * *

At twelve o'clock next morning the London express thundered on to the

bridge across the Solway. Mr. Walkingshaw looked up at his son.

"We're out of Scotland now," he said, with a sigh of reminiscent ardor.

"Home and beauty are far behind us, Frank."

Then in a different key he added--

"It is curious that my spirits should keep rising."

From which it appeared that he had grown young enough to realize that

though lunch may be over, there is always dinner to look forward to.

PART III

CHAPTER I

Colonel Munro drew the ends of his white tie through the loop in the

middle with infinite care. In a very wide circle of acquaintances he was

universally known as "Charlie" Munro; and you had only to look at him to

see how appropriate was this gallant diminutive. His head was bald at

the top, but cleanly and beautifully bald, like a head of the finest

marble; on either side and behind, his hair was both white and curly;

his eye was bright, his features remarkably handsome, his mustache a

slender ornament of silver, and his figure tall and slender. At

sixty-three he was probably handsomer than he had ever been before in

his life; and that was saying a great deal. He lived in very pleasant

bachelor chambers in St. James' under the charge of a competent valet.

"Let me see that card again," he said, as he gave his tie those little

finishing touches that converted it from an elegant accessory into a

work of art.

The valet went to his sitting-room and returned with a calling card on

a tray. Colonel Munro studied it a trifle lugubriously.

"James Heriot Walkingshaw," he read, with this addendum in pencil,

"Shall call for you 7:30. Count on your company at dinner."

The Colonel buttoned his white waistcoat.

"Didn't you tell Mr. Walkingshaw that I would probably be engaged?" he

asked.

"Well, sir," said the valet smoothly, "the gentleman seemed such an old

friend of yours, I thought perhaps you wouldn't like to miss him."

"One's oldest friends are sometimes d----d nuisances, Forman."

The Colonel saw the pleasant evening he had contemplated spending in the

society of two or three of the gayest old bloods in London darkening

into a _tete-a-tete_ with Mr. Walkingshaw at his portentously

respectable club, and regretted he had allowed Forman to lay out a clean

white waistcoat; for he was, by force of circumstances, economical as

well as gallant.

"I tell you what," said he, "I don't mean to wait a minute after 7:30.

If he turns up late, you can make my apologies, and say I'll be happy to

lunch with him to-morrow."

He put on his coat, added an overcoat and white scarf, cocked his opera

hat on his shapely old head, and sat confronting his sitting-room clock.

At 7:29 he rose briskly, and then with a sigh sank back into his chair.

He heard a footstep on the stair.

"Mr. Walkingshaw," announced the valet.

The Colonel advanced with that courteous smile for which he was

renowned.

"My dear Charlie!" cried his visitor.

"Well, Heriot," smiled the Colonel, looking a little surprised at the

remarkable joviality of this greeting.

He surveyed his old friend up and down, and seemed still more surprised.

"What a buck you are!" he exclaimed.

In truth, Mr. Walkingshaw, arrayed in a new opera hat, a new and shining

pair of dress boots, and a fashionable new overcoat, cut a very

different figure from the sedate W.S. of the Colonel's previous

acquaintance.

Heriot looked a trifle self-conscious.

"I hope I haven't overdone the thing," said he.

"Not a bit," smiled the Colonel, as a bright inspiration struck him.

"The only criticism I'd make is that you are really thrown away on the

members of your very sedate club, Heriot."

"Oh, but I didn't mean to dine you at my club."

Colonel Munro opened his eyes and smiled again.

"Where do you propose?"

"Well, I thought perhaps you might advise me."

"Let me see," mused Charlie, with a pleasant air.

"What about the Carlton?"

"First-rate, if you care to run to that."

"I've booked a table there on spec," said Heriot.

The Colonel beamed.

"I say, you're coming out, Heriot. Blowing the expense this time, what?"

"I don't care what I spend!" replied his old friend, in a burst of

confidence.

"Then let's start," said the Colonel. "Like to take a cab?"

"I've got one waiting."

"After you," said Charlie, holding the door open.

He was struck by the agility with which his old friend descended the

stairs, and smiled afresh at the increasing possibilities of the

situation.

"I say, this is very pleasant," beamed Mr. Walkingshaw as they jingled

off in a hansom.

Rather bashfully he took from his overcoat pocket a pair of dazzling

white kid gloves.

"These are the proper things in the evening, aren't they?" he inquired.

"I notice you've got on a pair."

His guest chuckled.

"They'll do to dance in afterwards if we go on to Covent Garden," he

laughed, and then added waggishly, "How would you like to go to a fancy

dress ball, Heriot?"

"Is there one on to-night?" asked Heriot.

"Yes."

"Are you going?"

"Oh, I've given up that sort of thing years ago; but of course, if

you're keen to go, I might stretch a point."

Mr. Walkingshaw looked at him doubtfully out of the corner of his eye

and answered nothing.

A little later the two old friends had grown more merrily confidential

than they had been since the days of their youth. Charlie Munro was a

little puzzled by the subtle alteration in his host, but he was not in

the least disposed to criticize it. He felt more and more inclined to

tempt him into a further display of frivolity.

"Well, now, what about the Covent Garden ball?" he suggested.

Heriot's eyes grew bright, but his mouth pursed cautiously.

"Aren't they rather--er--fast?" he inquired.

"As fast as you choose to make 'em."

"But aren't the ladies rather--er--rather--well--"

"Not a bit," said the Colonel. "There's a mixture, that's all."

"But I say, Charlie, what about being seen by any one we know?"

"We'll get a disguise for you," smiled Charlie.

"Really, can you?"

"Oh, I'll see to that."

He began to picture a very amusing evening with his old friend Heriot.

Mr. Walkingshaw drank off his glass of champagne.

"Well, if you're game--" said he.

"I'm game for anything, my dear fellow, so long as I've you by my side,"

laughed Charlie. "When you're tired, I'll promise to take you away.

Shall we call it arranged?"

"I'll risk it," said Heriot stoutly.