_CONSULTATION_.
The Laird returned into the room with Roderick, and it was well that
he did so. But for his sturdy arm the young man would have fallen;
and, as it was, he dropped breathless and trembling into the nearest
chair. Weakened by his illness, the agitation had nearly overcome him,
and, but for the salutary presence of the Laird, might have found some
hysterical mode of relief. As it was, the pain in his side had
returned with renewed violence, he gasped for breath, and, with the
Laird's assistance, had to throw himself on his bed.
He, who believed he had been striving after so lofty an ideal, who had
been leading, and as he fondly hoped with some success, the majority
of his flock towards the same high standard, to be thus cast down!
What must his walk and conversation really have been, notwithstanding
his approving conscience, that he should so lightly have been
suspected of such abominable hypocrisy and vulgar debauchery? He
groaned as he thought of it; his temples burned, and, despite the
presence of a stranger, the tears at last oozed abundantly through the
fingers which he had pressed against his eyes.
The Laird flourished his large silk handkerchief, bepatterned over in
yellow and crimson like a small carpet. He coughed, he blew his nose
like a trumpet, and then he crumpled up the handkerchief and mopped
his eyelids in a very suspicious way. 'Hoots! Mr. Roderick!' he said,
while he laid his enormous paw as tenderly on the young man's forehead
as Mary might have done. 'Never mind, man! A set of born idiots! But
you answered them well, lad, and nobody with any sense that knows you
will care a snap o' the thumb for all their havers. Keep up your
heart, man! There's nobody whose good opinion is worth the having will
think a bit the worse of you. Just leave them alone, and if their
whole case does na fall to pieces like a girdless tub, my name's no
James Sangster! A set o' senseless pridefu' bodies! that dinna ken
which end o' them's uppermost for pure conceit!'
Mary came in presently, and behind her was Captain Kenneth. He had
ridden over to enquire for his old friend Roderick (that was how he
worded it), and arrived just after the 'deputation' had been admitted
to the study. Mary received him, and led him for the present 'ben the
house,' where Eppie, and the baby, and herself were holding a little
conclave of their own. The conference in the adjoining room naturally
furnished a subject of conversation. Mary was indignant and bitter,
but not very precise; and Kenneth imagined that Roderick had become
unhinged in his theology, and was being set up as a mark to sling at
by all the orthodox in the parish, and expressed himself more freely
than reverently on polemical hair-splitting, even girding somewhat at
the Headship, the pet doctrine of the Free Church, but here Eppie's
patience broke down.
'It's naething o' the kind, sir!' she cried; 'Mister Brown's as sound
as a bell on a' p'ints o' doctrine, an' nane has ever ventured to say
the contrar. It's a daftlike story o' ill livin' 'at they're wantin'
to pruive on him, an' they canna do 't, an' sae they hae come here til
himsel', to gar him confess an' save mair fash. I hae heard my granny
tellin' the gate they gaed to wark wi' the wutches lang syne, hoo they
garred them confess whether they wad or no, an' I'm thinkin' gin they
daured, they'd be for tryin' sic like on him. Drobbin' him wi' prins,
an' what no. But it's a terrible daftlike haver, an I'm thinkin', sir,
ye'll hae heard tell o't afore noo.'
Captain Drysdale had not heard of it, but Eppie very speedily made him
acquainted with the whole story, while Mary and the baby were out
looking at his horse tethered to a post hard by.
Kenneth's entrance brought composure alike to Roderick and the Laird,
both from necessitating more self-control, and also from the
satisfaction of seeing that not quite all the world had turned their
backs on him. Roderick could not speak above a whisper, but the Laird
gave a very full account of the late visitation.
'There is one point, Captain Drysdale,' he added after a lengthy
narrative, 'on which you may be able to throw light. One of the points
they made against him was that this story of his exploits had
originally come from Inchbracken.'
'I cannot imagine how that could be. Ah!' he added after a pause, 'it
must be one of my uncle's heavy jokes! I do remember, now I think of
it, his telling us how he had met Roderick carrying home a baby, and
the clumsy joke he made over it. You know my uncle is a very good
fellow, but he can scarcely be called a wit, though he would vastly
like to be thought one, and when by any chance he has struck out some
little smartness he _will_ repeat it till every one for ten miles
round has heard it. I remember it perfectly now, and Tibbie Tirpie's
name got into the conversation about that same time somehow, and so
the servants combined the two. Oh, Rod! He will be so awfully sorry.
But this poor little baby who has been the innocent cause of all the
annoyance. Such a pretty little thing it is too! How did you come by
it?'
Roderick was lying on the bed, calmer now, and soothed by the friendly
sympathy of his two friends, but his voice was weak and the pain in
his side made speaking irksome. He looked to Mary, and she repeated to
Kenneth the story of the shipwreck and the finding of the baby.
'And what was the name of the ship?' asked Kenneth; 'was that ever
discovered? To know it would be the first step towards finding out who
the child belongs to, and after all the annoyance it has brought, you
would no doubt be glad to restore it to its lawful guardians.'
'Indeed, then, we shall be very sorry to part with it. It is the
dearest little thing in the world. I should cry my eyes out if it were
taken from us, I do believe. The sweet little pet! And it is so
wonderfully pretty. No doubt of its gentle birth, poor little waif! To
think it has not a relation in the world!'
'And the name of the ship was?'
'We saw the ship's name in the _Witness_ the following week. 'The Maid
of Cashmere,' was it not, Roddie?'
Roderick nodded.
'That,' said Kenneth, 'was the name of the ship in which my poor
friend Jack Steele lost his wife. He is Major in the Dourgapore Light
Cavalry, and they are not two years married yet. They were both to
have come home in her, but a week before sailing his leave was
cancelled, owing to a threatened rising in the Mahratta country. His
wife was ordered home by the doctors, who said her only chance of life
was the sea voyage, so she sailed alone with a child only a week or
two old, I believe, and the nurse. Poor things! both were lost. After
making the voyage round the Cape in safety, to be lost upon the Scotch
coast, within a few hours of home! Was it not sad? The Mahratta alarm
died out as fast as it arose; and six weeks after Mrs. Steele had
sailed, Jack was able to set out himself. He knew nothing of the
disaster till he reached his father's house in Edinburgh, and you may
suppose what a shock it was to him. He arrived at home just three
weeks after his wife's funeral. His, you see, had been a quick
passage, while the ship his wife sailed in was considerably overdue
before the wreck occurred. Poor fellow! when he asked for his wife and
child, and why they had not come to meet him, you may suppose how
terrible it was; they had nothing to show him but his wife's grave,
and the shock nearly killed him. He was in bed for three weeks after
it, and is only able to creep about now. The old judge took to his bed
after his daughter-in-law's funeral, so you may suppose the dismal
house it was. Jack is an only child, and the old man had set his heart
on having a grandchild, and he was cut up in a way you would not think
possible, if you had ever seen the hard grim way he has of dealing out
justice to offenders. It appears that the child was not born till a
fortnight before Mrs. Steele sailed, and that the letter announcing
that Jack and his wife were going home was posted before its birth;
and so the old people did not know they had a grandchild till Jack's
letters, written after his wife had sailed, reached them. They did not
know of its existence, in fact, till after they were assured of its
death, but the poor old lady cries and laments, I am told, over
this--I must call it an imaginary bereavement (for she had never seen
or even heard of the little thing till after its death) as bitterly as
if it were a child of her own she had lost. The body of this child,
too, has never been found; and they say it has been a great
aggravation of poor Jack's grief, to think what may have become of it.
How old would you suppose your baby to be, Mary? Would it not be
strange if it turned out to be Jack's little daughter?'
'We saw in the _Witness_ that Lord Briarhill and Mrs. Steele had gone
to Inverlyon and claimed their daughter-in-law and took the body back
with them to Edinburgh; and we advertised in the Witness that we had
picked up an infant apparently washed ashore from the wreck, but no
one took any notice, and we have not had a single enquiry.'
'It might still be quite possible, nevertheless, that your little
foundling is the Steeles' lost baby. The old judge was bearing the
loss of his daughter-in-law, I understand, with very proper
resignation. He had never seen her, so that there was no room for
personal grief or deep feeling, beyond what the melancholy manner of
her death must necessarily call forth, and sympathy for his son. But
the next mail brought letters which mentioned the birth of the child,
and its having accompanied its mother on the homeward voyage, and
then they say the poor old man was completely overcome--took to his
bed--and the old lady sat beside him and cried by the hour. As for
Jack, he was like one out of his mind when they told him, and he has
been very ill since. His oldest friends dare scarcely intrude on him
yet; he is so badly cut up. By and bye he will want a change, and I
have asked him to come to Inchbracken for a few weeks.'
'And do you think then that he ought to be told about our little waif!
I quite dread to tell any one about it now lest he should claim it,
and I cannot bear to think of losing our pretty plaything.'
'Surely he ought to be told, if there is the smallest possibility of
its being his own child; and if you like, Roderick, I will relieve you
of that duty. In your present health you will probably not be sorry to
avoid unnecessary letter-writing.'
Roderick nodded.
'I fear, Captain Drysdale,' interrupted the Laird, 'that is to say if
a stranger can judge correctly in the matter, you will find it rather
a difficult piece of news to break to this Major Steele. Do you think
the probability of the child being his is sufficiently strong to
justify you in subjecting him to the dreadful disappointment that
would follow, if it proves not to be his after all? It appears to me
scarcely warrantable to raise hopes which, if unfounded, will cause a
disappointment more cruel than was the original loss. If I might
suggest, I would urge very great caution.'
'I see what you mean, Mr. Sangster, but how are we to avoid it? Nobody
in this country has ever seen the child or could identify it but
himself, and surely it is due both to him and the child that he should
be informed of its history, if there be even the slightest possibility
of his being its father.'
'Undoubtedly, but did you not say just now that you expected him to
visit you at Inchbracken very shortly? Might it not be well to wait
till then before saying anything to him whatever? It could then be
mentioned to him carefully and gradually. Any clothing of the child
that he might perhaps recognize, or even the child itself might be
shown him, and then its story could be told. That would spare him the
misery of suspense, and the possibility of disappointment; whereas if
you write, the man will order post horses at once, and set out to
investigate your story. Think of his impatience and suspense as he
sits in the post chaise, thinking and thinking about it till he grows
giddy. It will be twenty-four or perhaps thirty-six hours from the
time he gets your letter till he can reach Glen Effick. He may fret
himself into a fever in that time. You say he has been ill already,
and he will be sure of a relapse if the child turns out not to be
his.'
'I believe you are right, Mr. Sangster. I will merely write and urge
him to come as early as possible. The season for shooting and visitors
is about over, and he may be as quiet as he likes.'
'And are you really going to leave us, Mr. Roderick? asked the Laird.
'I remarked your saying so to Mr. Geddie, and was really tickled at
his unwillingness to let you go away, even while he would not let you
stay in the Church. That man would have made a fine grand inquisitor
if he had been born in a Catholic country.'
Roderick smiled, and answered in a low voice--'He is a good man, and
very zealous. But it is quite true. If he had lived two centuries ago
he would have wanted to burn every one who saw things differently from
himself, and he would have thought he did God service in burning them.
He thinks if he is right every body who differs from him must be
wrong. He does not comprehend toleration, and he has no common sense.
As my father would have said--"he wants a wife!" if only to teach him
that there is a world of daily providence and common things, as well
as the world of doctrines and theologies he lives in. But he is a
worthy creature!' 'Yes!' he continued, still almost in a whisper. 'We
shall go south--Ventnor or Torquay--for the winter. I shall write to
enquire at once; but I am not fleeing from discipline, Mr. Sangster! I
shall appoint an agent to protect my interests before the Presbytery.'
'Then,' said Mary, 'might we not stop over in Edinburgh, and show
Major Steele the baby?'
'I did not propose to take it with us. Supposing Major Steele is
unable to recognise it, it would have to come back here and raise more
talk; and I fear we should not know what to do with it during our
travels if we carried it south, so I think we shall have to leave it
here with Eppie for the winter.'
The tears stood in Mary's eyes. 'Oh, Roderick,' she said, 'I shall be
so sorry to part with it.'
'Could you not remain too, Mary?' whispered Kenneth.
Mary coloured and shook her head, but a smile peeped from her eyes in
a passing glance, which effectually dissipated the threatening shower.
'I shall look out poor baby's chain, and the things she was picked up
in, and give them to you to show Major Steele. So mind you come for
them before we go.'