TWO CONVERSATIONS.
The next day Wallis came to see Malcolm and take him to the tailor’s.
They talked about the guests of the previous evening.
“There’s a great change on Lord Meikleham,” said Malcolm.
“There is that,” said Wallis. “I consider him much improved. But
you see he’s succeeded; he’s the earl now, and Lord Liftore--and a
menseful, broad-shouldered man to the boot of the bargain. He used to
be such a windle-straw!”
In order to speak good English, Wallis now and then, like some Scotch
people of better education, anglicized a word ludicrously.
“Is there no news of his marriage?” asked Malcolm, adding, “they say he
has great property.”
“My love she’s but a lassie yet,” said Wallis, “--though she too has
changed quite as much as my lord.”
“Who are you speaking of?” asked Malcolm, anxious to hear the talk of
the household on the matter.
“Why, Lady Lossie, of course. Anybody with half an eye can see as much
as that.”
“Is it settled then?”
“That would be hard to say. Her ladyship is too like her father: no one
can tell what may be her mind the next minute. But, as I say, she’s
young, and ought to have her fling first--so far, that is, as we can
permit it to a woman of her rank. Still, as I say, anybody with half
an eye can see the end of it all: he’s for ever hovering about her. My
lady, too, has set her mind on it, and for my part I can’t see what
better she can do. I must say I approve of the match. I can see no
possible objection to it.”
“We used to think he drank too much,” suggested Malcolm.
“Claret,” said Wallis, in a tone that seemed to imply no one could
drink too much of that.
“No, not claret only. I’ve seen the whisky follow the claret.”
“Well, he don’t now--not whisky at least. He don’t drink too much--not
much too much--not more than a gentleman should. He don’t look like
it--does he now? A good wife, such as my Lady Lossie will make him,
will soon set him all right. I think of taking a similar protection
myself, one of these days.”
“He is not worthy of her,” said Malcolm.
“Well, I confess his family won’t compare with hers. There’s a
grandfather in it somewhere that was a banker or a brewer or a soap
boiler, or something of the sort, and she and her people have been
earls and marquises ever since they walked arm in arm out of the ark.
But, bless you! all that’s been changed since I came to town. So long
as there’s plenty of money and the mind to spend it, we have learned
not to be exclusive. It’s selfish that. It’s not Christian. Everything
lies in the mind to spend it though. Mrs Tredger-- that’s our
lady’s-maid--only this is a secret--says it’s all settled--she knows it
for certain fact--only there’s nothing to be said about it yet--she’s
so young, you know.”
“Who was the man that sat nearly opposite my lady, on the other side of
the table?” asked Malcolm.
“I know who you mean. Didn’t look as if he’d got any business there
--not like the rest of them, did he? No, they never do. Odd and end
sort of people like he is, never do look the right thing-- let them try
ever so hard. How can they when they ain’t it? That’s a fellow that’s
painting Lady Lossie’s portrait! Why he should be asked to dinner for
that, I’m sure I can’t tell. He ain’t paid for it in victuals, is he?
I never saw such land leapers let into Lossie House, _I_ know! But
London’s an awful place. There’s no such a thing as respect of persons
here. Here you meet the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker, any
night in my lady’s drawing-room. I declare to _you_, Mawlcolm MacPhail,
it makes me quite uncomfortable at times to think who I may have been
waiting upon without knowing it. For that painter-fellow, Lenorme they
call him, I could knock him on the teeth with the dish every time I
hold it to him. And to see him stare at Lady Lossie as he does!”
“A painter must want to get a right good hold of the face he’s got to
paint,” said Malcolm. “Is he here often?”
“He’s been here five or six times already,” answered Wallis, “and how
many times more I may have to fill his glass, I don’t know. _I_ always
give him second-best sherry, _I_ know. I’m sure the time that pictur’s
been on hand! He ought to be ashamed of himself. If she’s been once
to his studio, she’s been twenty times--to give him sittings, as they
call it. He’s making a pretty penny of it, I’ll be bound! I wonder he
has the cheek to show himself when my lady treats him so haughtily. But
those sort of people have no proper feelin’s, you see: it’s not to be
expected of such.”
Wallis liked the sound of his own sentences, and a great deal more talk
of similar character followed before they got back from the tailor’s.
Malcolm was tired enough of him, and never felt the difference between
man and man more strongly than when, after leaving him, he set out
for a walk with Blue Peter, whom he found waiting him at his lodging.
On this same Blue Peter, however, Wallis would have looked down
from the height of his share of the marquisate as one of the lower
orders--ignorant, vulgar, even dirty.
They had already gazed together upon not a few of the marvels of
London, but nothing had hitherto moved or drawn them so much as the
ordinary flow of the currents of life through the huge city. Upon
Malcolm, however, this had now begun to pall, while Peter already
found it worse than irksome, and longed for Scaurnose. At the same
time loyalty to Malcolm kept him from uttering a whisper of his
home-sickness. It was yet but the fourth day they had been in London.
“Eh, my lord!” said Blue Peter, when by chance they found themselves
in the lull of a little quiet court, somewhere about Gray’s Inn, with
the roar of Holborn in their ears, “it’s like a month sin’ I was at the
kirk. I’m feart the din’s gotten into my heid, an’ I’ll never get it
oot again. I cud maist wuss I was a mackerel, for they tell me the fish
hears naething. I ken weel noo what ye meant, my lord, whan ye said ye
dreidit the din micht gar ye forget yer Macker.”
“I hae been wussin’ sair mysel’, this last twa days,” responded
Malcolm, “’at I cud get ae sicht o’ the jaws clashin’ upo’ the
Scaurnose, or rowin’ up upo’ the edge o’ the links. The din o’ natur’
never troubles the guid thouchts in ye. I reckon it’s ’cause it’s a
kin’ o’ a harmony in ’tsel’, an’ a harmony’s jist, as the maister used
to say, a higher kin’ o’ a peace. Yon organ ’at we hearkent till ae day
ootside the kirk, ye min’--man, it was a quaietness in ’tsel’, and cam
throu’ the din like a bonny silence--like a lull i’ the win’ o’ this
warl’! It wasna a din at a’, but a gran’ repose like. But this noise
tumultuous o’ human strife, this din’ o’ iron shune an’ iron wheels,
this whurr and whuzz o’ buyin’ an’ sellin’ an’ gettin’ gain--it disna
help a body to their prayers.”
“Eh, na, my lord! Jist think o’ the preevilege--I never saw nor thoucht
o’ ’t afore--o’ haein’ ’t i’ yer pooer, ony nicht ’at ye’re no efter
the fish, to stap oot at yer ain door, an’ be in the mids o’ the
temple! Be ’t licht or dark, be ’t foul or fair, the sea sleepin’ or
ragin’, ye ha’e aye room, an’ naething atween ye an’ the throne o’ the
Almichty, to the whilk yer prayers ken the gait, as weel ’s the herrin’
to the shores o’ Scotlan’: ye ha’e but to lat them flee, an’ they gang
straucht there. But here ye ha’e aye to luik sae gleg efter yer boady,
’at, as ye say, my lord, yer sowl’s like to come aff the waur, gien it
binna clean forgotten.”
“I doobt there’s something no richt aboot it, Peter,” returned Malcolm.
“There maun be a heap no richt aboot it,” answered Peter.
“Ay, but I’m no meanin’ ’t jist as ye du. I had the haill thing throu’
my heid last nicht, an’ I canna but think there’s something wrang
wi’ a man gien he canna hear the word o’ God as weel i’ the mids o’
a multitude no man can number, a’ made ilk ane i’ the image o’ the
Father--as weel, I say, as i’ the hert o’ win’ an’ watter an’ the lift
an’ the starns an’ a’. Ye canna say ’at thae things are a’ made i’ the
image o’ God, in the same w’y, at least, ’at ye can say ’t o’ the body
an’ face o’ a man, for throu’ them the God o’ the whole earth revealed
Himsel’ in Christ.”
“Ow, weel, I wad alloo what ye say, gien they war a’ to be considered
Christi-ans.”
“Ow, I grant we canna weel du that i’ the full sense, but I doobt, gien
they bena a’ Christi-ans ’at ca’s themsels that, there’s a heap mair
Christi-anity nor gets the credit o’ its ain name. I min’ weel hoo
Maister Graham said to me ance ’at hoo there was something o’ Him ’at
made him, luikin’ oot o’ the een o’ ilka man ’at he had made; an’ what
wad ye ca’ that but a scart or a straik o’ Christi-anity.”
“Weel, I kenna; but ony gait I canna think it can be again’ the trowth
o’ the gospel to wuss yersel’ mair alane wi’ yer God nor ye ever can be
in sic an awfu’ Babylon o’ a place as this.”
“Na, na, Peter; I’m no sayin’ that. I ken weel we’re to gang intill the
closet and shut to the door. I’m only afeart ’at there be something
wrang in mysel’ ’at taks ’t ill to be amon’ sae mony neibors. I’m
thinkin’ ’at, gien a’ was richt ’ithin me, gien I lo’ed my neibor
as the Lord wad hae them ’at lo’ed Him lo’e ilk ane his brither, I
micht be better able to pray amang them--ay, i’ the verra face o’ the
bargainin’ an’ leein’ a’ aboot me.”
“An’ min’ ye,” said Peter, pursuing the train of his own thoughts, and
heedless of Malcolm’s, “’at oor Lord himsel’ bude whiles to win awa’,
even frae his dissiples, to be him-lane wi’ the Father o’ ’im.”
“Ay, ye’re richt there, Peter,” answered Malcolm, “but there’s ae
p’int in ’t ye maunna forget--and that is ’at it was never i’ the
day-time--sae far ’s I min’--’at he did sae. The lee-lang day he was
among ’s fowk--workin’ his michty wark. Whan the nicht cam, in which no
man could wark, he gaed hame till ’s Father, as ’t war. Eh me! but it’s
weel to ha’e a man like the schuilmaister to put trowth intill ye. I
kenna what comes o’ them ’at ha’e drucken maisters, or sic as cares for
naething but coontin’ an Laitin, an’ the likes o’ that!”