THE REIGN OF MISRULE.
Apart from Peggy’s despair at the separation from her husband,
following so close on the death of her mother, the young wife felt
as pleased as she could feel that she was to have her cousin Jenny
for her helper and counsellor. Peggy had always looked up to Jenny,
putting her under a different classification from that bestowed on
ordinary servants. Peggy knew how clever and diligent her older,
better-instructed kinswoman had proved herself. It had been entirely
by her own laudable exertions that she had attained a higher standing,
from which she had always been reasonably condescending and indulgent
to her little cousin.
The tables were turned now, but it never entered Peggy’s head to be
anything save highly gratified that she could be of use to Jenny, while
Peggy was grateful in proportion for the services which she was sure
Jenny would render her. Jenny, who had lived as an upper servant among
ladies, would show Peggy how to behave like a lady, so that she might
no longer annoy the laird and affront his mother. And Jenny would speak
to the poor, yearning, mourning girl’s hungry heart of the mother whose
name had come to be a forbidden word at Drumsheugh, long before Peggy
had left off wearing her first crape. Luckie Hedderwick’s memory must
be cherished in a measure by Jenny also, since she had known the widow
well, and had even been indebted to her in her better days.
Jenny was quite of Peggy’s opinion that she ought to profit by her
cousin’s good fortune. But there the thoughts of the kinswomen diverged
widely, and ran in two distinct and opposing channels. Jenny Hedderwick
was a calculating, unscrupulous young woman, bent on making her
own--and that as quickly as might be--out of Peggy’s advantages, and of
what Johnnie Fuggie had confidently reckoned, in more senses than one,
her relations’ share in them. Johnnie was a forward fool, as obtuse
as he was intrusive, but Jenny was worse. She had viewed what was to
her Peggy’s utterly unwarrantable exaltation with indignant amazement
and disgust, while she had at the same time endeavoured to swallow her
jealous vexation, and reap all the benefit she could gain from her
cousin’s prosperity without paying any heed to what Peggy might lose in
the process.
Jenny did not go the length of hating Peggy, or even of bearing her
decided ill-will. She was not worth it in Jenny’s estimation. She was
a silly ‘coof,’ who, if one lost sight of her fair face, had not a
single claim to rise above her old allies, and was as totally unfitted
to do so as a girl could be. All the use she was for, in Jenny’s sharp,
mocking estimate, was to serve as available prey for those who had
spirit and wit to spoil the new-made lady.
In accomplishing her object Jenny would not dream of being harsh
or cruel to young Mrs. Ramsay. She would be as good to Peggy in a
half-jeering, contemptuous manner as the girl would permit. Jenny
was too astute a schemer as well as too reasonable a mortal for the
opposite course of conduct. Indeed, hers was not a harsh or cruel
nature, though she was wholly worldly and in many respects unfeeling.
At the same time, Jenny would not take the trouble or undergo the
personal mortification of keeping up much of a disguise before
Peggy--her own cousin, who had been wont to convoy Jenny and carry
her bundle for her in the elder woman’s earlier visits to the Cotton,
when Peggy had felt amply rewarded for her trudge and toil by an old
riband of Jenny’s or a handful of the ‘sweeties’ which had been her
last ‘market fare’--a silly lass, who could not hold up her head in her
own house, fill the place she had won, give orders and exact obedience
and deference from a laird himself, as Jenny would have done with a
high hand in Peggy’s place. But Peggy must ‘pinge’ like a senseless
bairn for the poor old mother well out of the way. Who was to stand on
ceremony and put herself about to maintain a great show of appearances
before such an unmitigated goose?
Accordingly, the very day after the setting out of Drumsheugh and his
mother, Jenny--a strapping-enough figure, with a foxy head and steely
eyes--proceeded to ‘rake’ through the house, up and down, backwards
and forwards, opening cupboards and turning out the contents of
drawers; taking an inventory, as it were, of what might be useful to
her, with an eye to future raids.
Peggy came upon her cousin standing on a chair, narrowly inspecting the
articles of dress put away on the shelves of Mrs. Ramsay’s wardrobe, to
which the prowler had found access by means of a key on the bunch which
she carried with her ready for action.
‘Eh, Jenny, ye mauna meddle there, nor touch a preen in this room,’
cried Peggy, in the utmost dismay. ‘There’s naething o’ mine there,
it’s a’ Mrs. Ramsay’s; this is her room.’
‘Hoot, Peggy,’ said Jenny lightly, in no manner discomposed. ‘Div ye no
ken yet a’ the rooms here are yours, and it is only by your will and
pleasure that the auld flytin’ wife gets house-room now at Drumsheugh?’
Peggy was in greater distress than before. ‘But, Jenny, you’re sair
mista’en; Mrs. Ramsay is Drumsheugh’s leddy-mither. She has the best
title to be here, and she is nae randy. She has behaved as I could
never have looked for her to behave, as no common woman would have
acted. She neither flat nor grat, but took me in as her dochter without
a word against it, though we had deceived her--Drumsheugh and me; and
she has been gude to me, and patient wi’ me. Oh, Jenny, surely I never
said a word to the contrary.’
‘I daresay no,’ said Jenny carelessly; ‘she’s your gude-mither--you’re
bund to keep her up ahint her back, whatever you may do to her face.
But that need not hinder you from taking a look at her gear when you
have the chance. It will be a’ yours in the end, for she has no other
bairn save Jamie Ramsay, unless the body play you an ill trick, and put
it past you in her wull, which is the mair reason that ye should mak’
yoursel’ acquent wi’ what there is for her to leave ahint her.’
‘No, no, Jenny,’ protested Peggy, wringing her hands; ‘come down off
that chair. I dinna want to ken what that press hauds so long as it is
no mine but hers--Mrs. Ramsay’s, to do what she likes wi’.’
Jenny paid no heed to the prohibition. ‘Look, Peggy,’ she said, pulling
out and throwing down a long, lace scarf, so that it fell over Peggy’s
head and shoulders, ‘see how you’ll set that. I’m thinking you’ll wear
that, or something like it, when you come out o’ your shell and gang
wi’ your laird to grand parties.’
But Peggy was not to be betrayed through her vanity. She snatched off
the scarf and began to fold it up quickly with trembling fingers. She
knit her smooth brows into the semblance of a frown, and set down her
foot with a desperate stamp, as an outraged worm will turn on a wanton
aggressor. ‘Do you hear me speaking to you, Jenny? Put back Mrs.
Ramsay’s things this minute? Let them alane, or I’ll ring for her maid
Cunnings.’
Jenny leapt down instantly and cleverly took the first and worst word
of accusation: ‘What do you mean, Peggy Ramsay? Am I a thief, think
ye, that ye should ca’ in Cunnings or ony other woman to catch me
for taking a look about me when I was brocht here to look after you,
madam, and see to your belongings, and put you on the richt road to
behaving like ane o’ the gentles? I can tell you it will be a long time
before you do that, Peggy, my woman, when you begin by wyting your ain
mither’s kith and kin for a cantrip, because you have said the word
and you are my leddy now, and are not to be contered. Had I ever the
name of being licht-fingered, Peggy Ramsay, when I had whole charge of
a hantle grander braws than I’m like to see at Drumsheugh? What ill
was I doing to the leddy’s claes by just giving them a bit turn and
air and proper fauld up, which is beyond Cunnings’s power now that she
is ower stiff to mount upon a chair? Has it crossed your mind what
folk would think and say gin you ca’ed in ony o’ your servants--_your
servants_--Peggy Ramsay, to stop your cuzin from looking over Mrs.
Ramsay’s wardrobe? Do you want to brand me as a thief, mem?’
‘Oh! Jenny, Jenny, how can you say sic words!’ cried Peggy, in an
agony, willing to fling herself at her cousin’s feet, and beg her
pardon a dozen times. ‘You ken that I ken you’re as honest as mysel’. I
never dreamt of evening you to sic sin and shame. It would be insulting
mysel’ and my mither and a’, as well as you! I niver, niver meant sic a
wrang!’
‘Weel, then, Peggy, you’ll better take care what you say, and think
twice afore you speak again,’ said Jenny, not so much wrathfully as
in delivering the calm warning of a deeply-injured woman. ‘I like you,
Peggy, for auld lang syne, and I’ll do my best for you in spite o’ what
has happened. But, I’m just flesh and blude after a’, and though you
ha’e marriet a laird you maunna try to ride roch shod ower my head, and
bleck my gude name!’
‘Jenny, do you still believe I would?’ implored the weeping Peggy, but
with an accent of indignant reproach in the pleading, which told Jenny
she had gone far enough.
‘Na, I hardly think it,’ Jenny said with a return to reassuring,
patronising kindness. ‘But you’re a young lassie and you’re uplifted a
bit, nae doubt. Your best friend’s advice to you would be to take tent,
and ca’ canny, and dinna lippen to your ain first thochts, till you’re
aulder and wiser and less likely to be mista’en.’
Jenny came off the undoubted conqueror in the preliminary sparring,
though she showed some wariness in pursuing her victory. She did not
again enter old Mrs. Ramsay’s private domain and rummage among her
personal possessions before Peggy. Jenny confined herself to what was
the common ground of the laird and Peggy.
Cunnings was the next person who interfered with Jenny in her little
arrangements. ‘Ye maunna shift the ornaments in the rooms,’ the old
servant said with stolid impassiveness, which might have meant anything
or nothing to Jenny, whom she caught abstracting an agate patch-box
and a pair of silver lazy tongs from the drawing-room--and a gold
and tortoise-shell snuff-box, and a shagreen case which might have
suited a pair of Moses Primrose’s gross of green spectacles, from the
dining-room. ‘Mair by token that flowered pelerine which I heard you
borrow from young Mrs. Ramsay that you micht wear it at a friend’s
house in Craigie, was sent down by smack frae Lon’on as a gift from
the laird to his leddy. It is not my place to interfere wi’ ony favour
young Mrs. Ramsay may chuse to grant, but I will tak’ it upon me as
an auld servant, weel acquent wi’ the ways of the family, to say that
the laird may no tak’ it weel from her to bestow his gift, even in the
licht o’ a len’ on anither woman. I’ll also say as a frien’ to baith,
that whatever may have been fitting eneuch aince on a time, in the
niffer o’ bunches o’ ribands and strings o’ beads and sic worthless
troke o’ lasses when you were equals, the fine pelerine, noo shuitable
for Drumsheugh’s leddy, is hardly the wear for a young woman even in
upper service like you or me, Jenny Hedderwick.’
Jenny snuffed the air with her upturned nose, and her eyes shot out
an ominous flash, but she thanked Cunnings with the greatest apparent
friendliness and respect. She had taken the accurate measure of the
older woman in her strength and weakness, for such natures as Jenny’s
seldom fail to gauge the flaws of their neighbours. Accordingly in
the week following this incident, Jenny betrayed symptoms of falling
into an ailing state of health, languished, and stood clearly in need
of the ale-saps and bread-berry, the white wine, whey possets, and
warm drinks for which Peggy, in her anxiety and affection, furnished
abundant materials; while Cunnings prepared the food and drink for the
threatened invalid, disinterestedly to begin with.
There are various curious old legends and traditions of all countries
and ages--travesties, like the swallowing of the pomegranate seeds
by Proserpine--of the sacred record of the eating of the apple in
Paradise--which illustrate the danger of tasting forbidden fruit. If
a man or woman who hesitates is apt to be lost, the weak individual
who prees and prees as Rab and Allan preed the famous peck o’ maut
which Willie brewed, till nothing of the peck remains, is still more
likely to become the victim of a fatal appetite. Within a month poor
old Cunnings had fallen lower before her mortal enemy, and disgraced
herself more irretrievably than she had done in the whole course of
her long service. She had been so helpless in her degradation that
she could not ‘bite a finger’ in the customary phrase, though why the
wretched sinner should seek to accomplish such a useless performance
in the circumstances has not been explained. She had been seen in this
state, and had been put to bed, the guilty woman, like an innocent
baby, by one of the more compassionate of the mocking under-servants,
to whom Cunnings ought to have served as an example while she ruled
over them. She knew it all--the extent of her transgression, the shame
of it, the degree to which she had exposed herself. She was down in
the mire, and did not believe she could ever rise again and free
herself from its defilement, while her infatuated base propensity was
tempting her to lie and wallow in the dirt, so that she could gratify
the horrible craving. She shrank from poor Peggy, who, in place of
challenging and denouncing her housekeeper, was fit to break her heart
over Cunnings’s lamentable breakdown.
Cunnings was terrified to meet her old mistress. She became the
bond-slave of Jenny Hedderwick, who had led the older woman into
temptation and was now prepared to feed her vice, so that it might
serve Jenny’s evil ends.
There never was so thorough a moral ruin effected in so short a time.
The truth is that a man liable to Cunnings’s sin might have indulged
in it, succumbed so far, and still have continued true to the trust
reposed in him and to one half of his better antecedents. He might
have escaped a complete collapse, and saved his integrity and honour.
But it is a well-known melancholy instance of psychological difference
between men and women that, whereas there remains a reservation and
some power of resistance, even of retaining a few of the finer traits
of character in the drunken man, in the case of the woman, in whom
reason is weaker and passion stronger, an indulgence in an excess of
intoxicating drink is prone to open the flood-gates to all corruption,
and to produce a complete demoralisation of the individual.
There was no further hope or help for Peggy from Cunnings.
Jenny, triumphing in an unhallowed victory over all obstacles, sought
to get Peggy too in her power, as she had got Cunnings. And Peggy had
no defence from Jenny’s wily stratagems and bold, fierce assaults,
except God’s grace and her own good intentions. She was not wise,
but she had grown up pious and dutiful, faithful and tender of
conscience as of heart. It remained to be seen whether God and goodness
alone would suffice to protect Peggy from Jenny, the flesh, and the
devil--all the evil influences to which her husband’s thoughtlessness
and Mrs. Ramsay’s mistake had given her over.
Balcairnie could not interfere or come to Peggy’s rescue, though he
was in a position to be soon aware of the mischief which was going
on. Balcairnie was, to a great extent, gagged, if not tongue-tied. He
was not one of those impulsive, inconsiderate male-friends who figure
in so many stories, and by way of helping the women, for whom the men
are supposed to have some regard, rush rashly into the breach, indulge
in a great deal of foolish Platonic philandering, and precipitate the
wrong they have been solicitous to avert. The Scotch yeoman was a man
of another sort. He possessed straightforward honesty and common sense
approaching to sagacity in his slowness and solidity of intellect. He
was further endowed with some of the delicacy of feeling and action in
which those fine gentlemen of fiction are often curiously deficient.
He knew perfectly well that it was not in his honorary office of
farm-manager to go much about the young Lady of Drumsheugh and attempt
to control her in her domestic concerns. To do so would be to draw down
upon both the strongly-flavoured gossip of the country side. It would
be to take a liberty which not even his intimacy with his laird could
freely warrant, and which Drumsheugh, easy-going as he was, might very
possibly resent. In that case Balcairnie would have played beautifully
into Jenny Hedderwick’s hands.
No, he was aware from the beginning that he must stand at a distance,
and only come forward if matters went utterly amiss so as to forebode a
grand catastrophe.