Wearily, mocking sick hearts with their floods of brightness, the summer
days stole on. The house of Schole gaunt and melancholy, stood shrined
in the full glory of that sunshine. The dark figures within wandered
about in restless pain, like ghosts uncongenial to the light, or gazed
forth with vacant eyes upon the rejoicing country, and dazzling sea. In
the sick chamber lay that restless, suffering man, wending unconsciously
nearer and nearer the valley of the shadow of death.
The doctor from the little town had visited him repeatedly.--Nearly a
fortnight after the wreck, he had a final conversation with Christian.
Anne was watching eagerly in Patrick Lillie's study. Christian
accompanied the doctor to the door, and answered his subdued and
sorrowful farewell; then she entered the study. Anne looked up anxiously
in her face.
"The time has come," said Christian, solemnly, "there is no hope of his
life. He has but a little way to go, and yet he knows not the only
entrance. God succor us--what can we do alone? Come with me--now there
is no longer any obstacle or hindrance--come with me."
Anne followed her silently. The room in which Patrick lay was high, and
had also windows looking on the water--that broad placid, noble Firth,
the sole companion of the watcher.
Wan and wasted, with only the hectic spot burning on his cheek to
distinguish it from the pillow on which it uneasily rested, lay the
dying man. Cold, wasting, death-like perspiration lay heavily upon his
brow; his long, white hand and emaciated arm were stretched upon the
coverlet with a power of nervous motion in them, which contrasted
strangely with their color and form of death.
On a small table beside him lay a paper closely written. Near at hand
were writing materials. His eyes were fixed upon the manuscript--he did
not seem to notice the entrance of Christian and Anne. He was speaking
in broken sentences, with incoherent intervals between.
"Sevenfold--sevenfold. Thou God of mighty justice! Thou Lord of holy
revenge! What can a sinful man do more? Not an old man, O, Lord! not a
little child; seven lives in their prime--seven full of health, and
strength, and hopefulness--seven saved for one lost. Lord of mercy, wilt
Thou accept them! what can I more?"
"Patrick," said Christian Lillie, "if the whole world had lain perishing
at your feet, what more than urgent need was it to save them all; the
seven will not atone for the one. If ye have no other atonement to
offer, then the blood is still crying upon God for vengeance."
"Christian," exclaimed the dying man, "what can I do?--what shall I do?
They tell me I am near the hour of judgment; will you thrust away my
last plea?--will ye deny me my last hope? Did He not accept the publican
who restored fourfold? Behold my offering, O, Lord, and be merciful--be
merciful! I have toiled through all this terrible life--labored, and
groaned, and fainted for the uplifting of Thy countenance--and shall I
go away in darkness, and wilt Thou show me no more light at all for
ever? Lord! Lord!"
The thin, worn arms were lifted in passionate appeal--the long white
fingers clasped--the wasted face convulsed with despairing earnestness.
Christian Lillie knelt by her brother's bedside.
"Mercy and light, Patrick--mercy and light! our Father in heaven does
not give them for a hire. Take them out of a gracious hand that has paid
a bitter price for the gifts--take them, Patrick. Take them from Him who
has made the sole sacrifice that can stand in the sight of God. Blood
for blood."
"Blood for blood!" said Patrick Lillie, with a wild shudder. "Blood for
blood! has it come to this end? Christian, I have been laboring to make
amends--I have labored in vain: let me pay the price now at last--there
may be peace then. Let me away--let me away--I will pay the price--a
life for a life!"
He was struggling to rise--his emaciated features shining wildly with
his desperate purpose. Christian's arms were stretched over him,
subduing the frenzy.
"Patrick," she said, solemnly, "in a little while the Lord will recall
the life He has sent so fearful a shadow on. A day or two--maybe only an
hour or two--and in this ghastly noon of ours, which is more terrible
than the darkest midnight, the sun of your life must go down. The Lord
is taking the price with his own hand. Patrick, let me but know that you
are grounded on the one rock--that ye can see the one sacrifice."
The unhappy sufferer sank back exhausted.
"'Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed.'
Christian, it is a just sentence--take me away--I see it--I see it--it
is what no mercy can wipe out--no grace forgive--it must be atoned for.
Ye hear me, Christian! the price must be paid. If ye would have hope in
my death, take me away."
"It is a just sentence," said Christian Lillie, firmly. "Just in the
sight of God and man--I say not that there needs no public atonement;
but ye cannot pay it now--and I say that for your life, your higher
life, Patrick, an atonement has been made. Do you forget Him that died
at Jerusalem? they ranked him with murderers--was He one? He was
accursed for the shedders of blood. Throw but your sin upon Him--rest
but your soul upon Him, and I will have hope in your death--ay! such
hope as will cover all the by-gone darkness with a mist of radiance;
only let me know that you are safe in His shadow--strong in His faith,
and I am content."
"I have slain a man to my bruising, and a young man to my hurt,"
murmured the dying man, "and I should--God forgive me that I have
shrunk and trembled from this fearful penalty--I should pay back blood
for blood in the sight of man. Christian, hear me: I acknowledge Him, my
Saviour--my Lord--my King. I acknowledge His work--only not for
this--for this I must render justice in the sight of men. Let me go--I
have trembled for it all these dreadful years--I have hid me from the
very sunshine for its fear--I have doomed them--God bless them! God, out
of his gracious heaven, send down the blessings of the covenant upon
them! whom I shall never look upon in this world again--to exile and
shame for me. Christian, let me go--I see it all now--my eyes are
opened. Let me pay the price--then there may be peace; whoso sheddeth
man's blood--Christian, let me go!"
"Patrick," said Christian Lillie, "you have told me when your mind was
clear that this deed was not wilful, nor springing from a heart of evil
against him that is gone. Tell me again. Patrick!--do you mind how he
fled into the sacred city in the ancient Israel, who had shed blood
unawares, and there was safe? Can you see? is there no shadow before
your eyes? Can you tell me? Patrick, you shed this blood unawares."
A wild gleam shot over the sick man's death-like face. His lips
moved--he shut them convulsively as though to keep down some thrill of
agony.
"I cannot tell--I cannot tell. God help me--there is nothing clear; that
I did it--that I took away the divine mysterious life which all the
universe could not give back again--Christian, Christian, it will make
me mad--the remembrance of it has gone near to make me mad a thousand
times. Oh, that my life had been taken instead! oh, that he had slain
me, and not I him!"
Christian knelt by his bedside holding his hand--he became calmer.
"Lord, show it to me--show me the past--show me what is to come. I was
angry with my brother in my heart--I cannot see--I cannot tell, if the
fiend was within me then. Christian, have _they_ not suffered a death
for me?--have I not slain them in cold blood with my fear and cowardice!
I will do them justice--I will bear my own sin. Let me go."
He sat up in his bed, his excitement giving nervous strength to his
wasted frame; as he rose he saw Anne for the first time--she stood awed
and wondering by the door.
The unhappy man threw himself back upon his pillow, covering his face.
"Send her away. Do you want to kill me--do you want to betray me,
Christian? Send her away."
Christian Lillie made a motion with her hand, and Anne withdrew. Most
strange, and sad, and terrible was this scene; this unhappy sufferer
enduring in those agonies so intense a retribution--eager to do justice
on his death-bed, and yet shrinking from the sight of her who might
bring that justice speedily upon him--her, the sister of the injured
Norman, who would not have inflicted another pang upon the man for whom
her generous brother had sacrificed his all.
She did not see Christian again that day: during all its long, weary,
sunny hours, Christian remained constantly by that sick-bed--through the
shorter watches of the balmy and tranquil night her vigil continued;
those melancholy wistful eyes never closed in slumber; that gaunt,
attenuated frame sought neither rest nor nourishment; the agony of
eighteen years had come to a climax; the heroic work of all her desolate
lifetime was drawing to an end.
Anne did not leave the house till late that evening; she could hear the
sound of voices in the sick chamber, and Christian's slow step sometimes
traversing it, when she went away. In the morning she returned early.
Christian was in her own room, as Anne could hear, while she sat in the
apartment below--sometimes kneeling--sometimes pacing it slow and
heavily as was her wont, and sometimes with the agitated quick step,
which she had heard before during the short time in which she witnessed
Christian Lillie's supplications. Her patient was for the time asleep.
She was there, not resting nor seeking rest, absorbed in the unutterable
earnestness of her pleadings, wrestling with God for a blessing.
The day glided on, so slow--so wearily, with but the drowsy ripples of
the sea, the steady, cold, immovable beating of that strange pulse of
Time, whose sound fatigues the anxious ear so miserably, and the
irregular, agitated throbs of her own heart, to fill its languid
lingering hours, that Anne sickened when she looked abroad upon its
cloudless radiance. Then those books of Patrick Lillie's fascinated
while they irked and pained her--the pensive, contemplative tone--the
microscopic, inward-looking eye--the atmosphere of monastic quietude and
meditative death! She was in no mood for studying character, yet she
felt how strangely constituted the spirit must have been which found its
daily ailment in these.
Had he done that deed and yet was he not guilty? Did he stand in the
position of the manslayer, for whom God's stern law of olden vengeance,
in one of those exquisite shadings of mercy, which mark the unchanging
unity of our Gospel Lord and Saviour--ordained through ancient
Palestine, the sacred cities of refuge? Had he shed this blood unawares?
and whence then came the terrible mist which had gathered in his memory
about the deed? Was it possible that he could be uncertain of
himself?--that he could have forgotten those momentous circumstances?
or had his long-diseased brooding over them made imagination and fact
stand in his remembrance side by side?
At last, the weary day declined. Christian Lillie came to her at sunset,
and with few words, bade her follow to the sick room again. Anne obeyed.
It was very near now, that awful peace of Death. The emaciated face was
sharp and fixed--the stamp was upon his forehead. A little time now, and
all earthly agony would be over for him.
But there was a tranquil shadow on his face, and the large caverns of
Christian's eyes were full of dew, which did not fall, but yet had risen
to refresh the burning lids which had kept watch so long. The manuscript
was upon the table still--the thin arm lay quietly on the coverlet. A
slight shudder passed across his frame as Anne entered; an involuntary
thrill of that coward fear which had overwhelmed his nature. Then he
turned his eyes upon her with a steadfast, melancholy, lingering look,
failing sometimes for a moment as the slow blood crept coldly to his
heart in another pang of terror; but renewed again--a sorrowful look of
lingering, clinging tenderness, as though he saw in her face the shadow
of another--the generous glance of one dearly beloved long ago, who had
given up name, and wealth, and honor for his sake.
"Christian," he said, "Christian, it comes. I feel that I am entering
the dark valley. What I have to do, let me do quickly.--Raise me up."
She lifted him in her arms--in her strong devotion she might have borne
a threefold weight--the dying man was like an infant in her hands.
He took the pen she offered him into his unsteady fingers, and began, in
feeble characters, to trace his name at the bottom of the manuscript.
While he did so, he murmured broken words.
"I am guilty--I am guilty! I only. Lord, Thou knowest who hast saved me!
Only his tenderness, like Thine--only his gracious heart, Thy true
follower, has screened me, a miserable sinner, from the doom of the
slayer! It is I only--my Lord, Thou knowest it is I!"
He had signed his name. Christian laid him back tenderly upon the
pillow. With a firm hand she placed her own signature at the side of the
document, and then gave the pen to Anne. The sister of the man who had
done the deed, and the sister of him who had suffered for it--it was
meet their names should stand together. Anne added hers. She could form
some idea, of what this paper was. She signed it as a witness.
The words of the dying man ran on--a feeble, murmuring stream.
"Christian! he is alive--he is safe! No evil has come upon them! Tell me
again--tell me again! They do not curse me--they forgive the miserable
man who has made them exiles? It is over now, Christian. All your
anguish--all your vigils: their disgrace and banishment--it is over now.
God knows, who has visited me with His mercy and His light, why this
desolation has fallen upon you all for my sin. I have been a coward.
Christian, Christian! when they are home in their joyous household--when
they have forgotten all their grief and dishonor, when they are tranquil
and at rest--they will never name my name; my memory will be a thing of
shame and fear: they will shrink from me in my grave."
The thin hands met in silent appeal. There was a wistful, deprecating
glance thrown upon Anne and Christian.
"Patrick," said Christian, "can _we_ ever shrink from you, who have been
willing, for your sake, to endure the hardest calamity that could be
thrown upon man? Can _they_ forget your name, who have lost their own
for your sake, and never murmured? Patrick! look upon his sister. She
has come to us in our sorest trouble; she has clung to us with her
tenderest service, as if we had blessed him, and not blighted. Take your
comfort from her. As for me, my labor is over. I will live to see
Marion. I must, if it be the Lord's will--but for forgetfulness, or
shame, or shrinking, ye never thought of me!"
Anne stood by the bedside. The eyes of the dying man, so intensely blue,
and strangely clear, were shining wistfully upon her. She could not find
words to speak to him.
"Mind them of me," said Patrick Lillie, faintly. "Tell them, that if
they have suffered pain for me, they never can know what agony, bitterer
than death, I have endured within this desolate house. Bid them mind me
as I was, in yon bright, far away time, that I have been dwelling in
again this day. Tell them, the Lord has given me back my hope, that He
gave me first in my youth. Tell them, I am in His hand, who never loses
the feeblest of His flock. Tell them--"
He was exhausted--the breath came in painful grasps.
"Do not fear," said Anne, gently. "We will remember you in all
tenderness, with sorrow and with reverence. I will answer for Norman."
"For Norman!" said the dying man. "All blessings on the name that I have
not dared to say for years! The blessing of my God upon him, who has
been separated from his brethren. Norman! Marion! They have suffered in
exile and in grief for me. Tell them, that with my last breath, I bade
God bless them--God bless them! They have done as my Lord did--they have
suffered for the guilty--and He will acknowledge His own."
There was a pause. His breath came painfully. The hectic on his cheek
flushed deeper. Christian made a gesture with her hand to Anne,
dismissing her. He saw it.
"Stay," he said, "stay--my work is not yet done. Christian, hear me;
when I have said this, I will take my journey in peace. My eyes are
clear now. I dare look back to that terrible time. I did it unawares.
The blood on my hand was not wilfully shed; ye hear me, ye trust me,
Christian! I had that deadly weapon in my hand; my mind was far away as
it often was. I was thinking of the two, and of their bright lot; my eye
caught something dark among the trees. I thought it was a bird.
Christian, it was the head of Arthur Aytoun, the man that I was hating
in my heart! I came home; my soul was blinded within me. I was as
innocent of wish to harm him as was the water at my feet; but yet in my
inmost heart long before, I had been angry with my brother! My soul was
blind; now I see, for the Lord has visited me with His mercy. You know
all now. I have sinned; but I did this unawares, and into His city of
refuge, my Lord has received my soul."
The shadows were gathering--darker, closer--the face becoming deadly
white. His breath came with less painful effort, but the end was at
hand. He made a sign which Christian knew. She lifted a Bible, and began
to read. Anne stood behind in silent awe, as the low voice rose through
that dim room, whose occupant stood upon the eternal brink so near an
unseen world. "There is, therefore, now no condemnation." Wondrous
words! spanning all this chaos of human sin and feebleness with their
heavenward bridge of strong security.
Christian read on calmly, solemnly while the slow life ebbed wave by
wave. She had reached the end.
"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or
distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that
loved us. For--"
She was stayed by the outstretching of that worn and wasted hand. A
strange shrill voice, unnaturally clear, took up the words:
"I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor
principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor
height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate me
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus my Lord."
Christian sprang forward to support him. He needed no support. In the
might of that one certain thing, of which he was at last persuaded, the
spirit of Patrick Lillie had ascended into his Saviour's heaven.
A pale, feeble, worn-out garment, over which no longer the fluctuating
fever of a wavering mind should sweep and burn--a fair, cold face, whose
gentle features could answer no longer to the thousand changes of that
delicate and tremulous soul, Christian laid back upon the pillow--no
longer restless, or ill at ease, or fearful, but sleeping peaceful
sleep--tranquil and calm at last!
And she stood by his bedside who had borne, through all these dreadful
years, the strong tenacious life of deadly agony for him. As pale as
his, was the thin, worn face bending over him; for a moment she listened
with that intensest pain of watching, which seems to make the listener
blind, and concentrates all the senses in that one--listening for the
faint fall of his breath. It was in vain: those pale lips, until the
great day of resurrection, should draw breath again--never more.
"I thank God," said Christian Lillie, in the solemn calm of that
death-chamber; "I thank God, Patrick, my brother, that you are safe, and
at rest. Safe after perils greater than time could wear out. At rest
after the hourly warfare and deadly travail of a lifetime--I thank God.
My Father!--my Father! I thank Thee, who rejectest no petition, that
Thou hast heard my cry!"
Her hands were clasped. Anne feared they were becoming rigid in the
attitude of supplication so common to them. She laid her hand upon
Christian's arm.
"Ay, I will not linger," said Christian, "but look at him--look at him
at peace, and blessed at last. Do you see my tears? I have not shed one
since yon June morning, but now I can weep. I will not linger; but can
you not feel the blessedness of seeing his salvation--his rest in the
fair haven--his solemn peace at last? I thank God, Patrick--I thank
God!"
"You are worn out," said Anne, gently; "come now and take rest--leave
the further cares of this sad time to me."
The tears were falling from her eyes like large soft rain-drops; there
was a quivering, woeful smile about her lip.
"Ay, ay, I will go; I have one work yet for his sake, and theirs. At
peace in the pure heaven of our Lord and Saviour--at rest. In hope and
certainty that nothing can shake again, look how he has begun his
tranquil waiting for the second coming. He is with his Lord, and I--yes,
I will go and rest. Here I take up again the human hope that has been
dead within me for eighteen lingering years; it died by him, and by him
it is alive again. I will go and take rest for my labor. I trust him to
your hands; I have never trusted him before in the care of any mortal.
Now, I must rest for Norman's sake, and you will watch for Patrick's; I
trust him to you."
And so, at last Anne was able to lead her to her own chamber. The
tension of mind and frame had been so long and stern, that now, when it
was relaxed, Anne trembled for the issue; but Christian had borne all
the vicissitudes of mental agony too long to sink now when there still
remained labor to do "for his sake, and theirs." She suffered Anne's
attendance with a strange child-like gentleness, as of one whose own
long task is over; and while she lay down upon her bed, continued to
speak of that blessed rest and peacefulness with a tremulous quivering
smile, and wandering of thought which brought the tears fast from Anne's
eyes.--Deeply pitiful and moving was this pathetic garment of her grief.
At last, sleep was mercifully sent, such sleep as God gives to His
beloved--calm, serene, and child-like--the sad smile trembling upon her
lip--the mild tears stealing from under her closed eyelids, and her soul
the while carried back to times of past tranquillity--the peace and
gentle joyousness of the old cottage home.
From Christian's bedside, Anne proceeded to a sadder work; a work too
painful and repugnant for anything but callous habit, or deep
tenderness. She called up the old serving-woman, and together they
rendered the last offices to the dead.
The solemn, calm, majestic, awful dead, in whose still presence, were he
in life the meanest, the princeliest soul of earth must stoop and bow.
Strange doom which, with its sad mysterious ending, can make the meanest
lifetime a sublime, unequalled thing! Strange death which, in its
ghostly silence, can thrust so lightly the vain speculations of man
aside, and make our mortal flesh shrink and tremble from the thrilling
power of unseen life, that moves behind the curtain of its gloom. What
man shall stand in its presence, and dare to say that this is the end?
What man shall look upon its majesty, and tell us that is the mere death
at which he thrills and shivers? It is not so--mightier, more terrible
and great--it is the supernatural glow of an unseen life beyond that
thus appals us.
The moonbeams glided over the Firth in spiritual stillness.--The
necessary offices were done, and Anne and Marget sat down in a small
adjoining room to watch. The old woman began to nod in her chair; this
was to her but an ordinary death, and death to those who are accustomed
to assist at its dread ceremonials, loses its awe and solemnity. Anne
opened the window as the sun rose, and bathed her pale face in the
delicious air of the morning. Under her sadness and awe a solemn joy was
trembling.--Her work was accomplished--now for the exile's
home-coming--for household rest and companionship--for communion with
the near and dear kindred over whom her heart had yearned so long.
The country was beginning to awake: the early morning labor of those
rural people had commenced. She could see smoke rising from the
indistinct dim towns on the Fife coast.--She awoke her companion, and
then went softly into Christian's room.
But Christian was gone; her Bible lay open upon the table, where she had
sought its comfort when she rose. Her plain black silk cloak and bonnet
had been taken away. Anne began to be alarmed; where could she be?
In the chamber of death she was not. Anne fancied she could perceive
some trace of her having entered the room, but they had watched in the
adjoining apartment, and Anne knew that she had been wakeful. She
hurried down stairs and searched the rooms below: Christian was not to
be found.
Looking through the low window of the study, she saw Jacky standing at
the gate, and hastened to admit her. The girl was shivering with intense
anxiety, and alarm--she had been standing there for more than an hour.
On the previous night, she had haunted the precincts of Schole in fear
and trembling for her mistress, and had been abruptly dismissed by
Marget, with a fretful explanation that "Maister Patrick was in the
deadthraw"--since then she had been watching at the window of Miss
Crankie's parlor. Now, she was awe-stricken, speaking below her breath,
and letting fall now and then silent, solitary, large tears. She had
never been in the shadow of death before, and her imaginative spirit
bowed before its majesty.
"Jacky," said Anne, "he is dead."
Jacky did not answer--she only glanced a timid, wistful, upward look out
of those keen, dark eyes of hers, dilated and softened with her
sympathy.
"You will come in and stay with me, Jacky," said Anne. "I must remain
here for some days--you are not afraid?"
Afraid! no. Jacky was stricken with awe and sad reverence, but not with
fear.
"I do not well know what to do, Jacky," said Anne, thoughtfully. "Miss
Lillie seems to have wandered out: I cannot find her."
"If ye please, Miss Anne, I saw her."
"Where, Jacky?"
"I was standing at the window looking out--it was just at the
sun-rising--and I saw the gate of Schole opened canny, and Miss Lillie
came out. She was just as she aye is, only there was a big veil over her
face, and she took the Aberford road; and she didna walk slow as she
does at common times, but was travelling ower the sands as fast as a
spirit--as if it was a great errand she was on; naebody could have
walkit yon way that hadna something urging them, and I thought then that
Mr. Patrick was dead."
Anne did not observe Jacky's reflections and inferences--she was too
much occupied in speculations as to Christian's errand.
"If ye please, Miss Anne, would ye no go up to your ain room and lie
down? I'll stay and keep a'thing quiet."
"I must see Miss Crankie," said Anne. "The air will revive me, Jacky,
and I could not rest. In the meantime, you must stay at Schole, and see
that no one disturbs the stillness that belongs to this solemn vicinity.
We should have reverenced him living--we must reverence him more sadly
dead."
Jacky was overcome--her eyes were flooded--she needed to make no
promise. Anne's charge to her was given in consequence of some grumbling
threat of Marget's to "get in some o' the neighbors--no to be our lane
wi' the corp." Anne was determined that there should be no unseemly
visits, or vulgar investigation of the remains of one who had shrunk
from all contact with the world so jealously.
"If ye please, Miss Anne--"
Anne had put on her bonnet, and stood at the gate on her way out.
"What is it, Jacky?"
Jacky hung her head in shy awkwardness.
"It was just naething, Miss Anne."
Anne comprehended what the "just naething" was, and, understanding the
singular interest and delicate sympathy of this elfin attendant of hers,
knew also how perfectly she was to be trusted.
"Jacky," she said, "what I tell you, you will never tell again, I know:
this gentleman who died last night was nearly connected with us--if
Marget asks you any questions, you can tell her that; and my work is
accomplished here--accomplished in sorrow and in hope. By-and-by my
brother of whom you have heard, will come home I trust, in peace and
honor, to his own house and lands.--The work we came here for is done."
Jacky was tremulously proud, but she had yet another question.
"And if ye please, Miss Anne--little Miss Lilie?"
A radiant light came into Anne's eye. It was the first time she had
dared to speak of the near relationships with which she now hoped to be
surrounded.
"Lilie is my niece--my brother's child--I believe and hope so, Jacky."
Jacky's first impulse was to turn her back on Schole, and flee without a
moment's delay to Oranside. She recollected herself, however; she only
sat down on the mossy garden-path, and indulged in a fit of joyous
crying--pride, and exultation, and affection, all contributing their
part. "For I kent," said Jacky to herself, tremulously, when Anne was
gone, "I aye kent she was like somebody--a' but the e'en--and it would
be her mother's e'en!"
But Jacky recollected her charge--recollected the solemn tenant who lay
within those walls, and became graver. Marget was sitting in the kitchen
when she entered, refreshing herself with a cup of tea. Their
salutations were laconic enough.
"Is that you, lass?" said Marget.
"Yes, it's me," said Jacky. "Miss Anne said I was to come in and stay;
and she'll be back soon hersel."
"And wha's Miss Anne that's taking sae muckle fash wi' this puir
afflicted family?" said Marget. "Are ye ony friend to us, lassie? or
what gars your mistress and you come into our house, this gate?"
"Miss Anne says Miss Lillie is a friend. I think it's maybe by ither
friends being married, but I dinna ken--only that they're
connected--Miss Anne said that."
"And what do they ca' ye?" continued Marget.
"They ca' me Jacobina Morison--I was christened that after my uncle--but
I aye get Jacky at hame; and they ca' Miss Anne, Miss Ross, of
Merkland."
"She'll be frae the north country," said Marget. "I never heard o' ony
Norland freends Miss Kirstin had. Onyway it maun be for love ony fremd
person taks heed o' us--for it canna be for siller. They're a strange
family. Ye see the breath was scarce out o' Maister Patrick, puir
lamb--he was liker a bairn, than a man of years at ony time--when Miss
Kirstin she gaed away. I saw your leddy seeking her--whaur she's gane,
guid kens."
"Did she ever do that before?" asked Jacky.
"Eh, bless me, no: she was aye ower feared about _him_, puir man, wha
has won out o' a' trouble this night. Maybe ye wad like to see him? He's
a bonnie--"
Jacky interrupted her hurriedly. In that imaginative, solemn awe of
hers, she could not endure the ghastly admiration which one hears so
often expressed by persons of Marget's class for the dead, about whom
they have been employed.
"Ye'll be wearied?" said Jacky, hastily.
"Ay, lass, I'm wearied: it's no like I could be onything else wi' a'
that I have to do--and that sair hoast, and the constant fecht I hae wi'
my breath--it's little the like o' you ken--forbye being my lane in the
house. If ye'll just bide and look to the door, I'll gang an get some o'
the neighbor wives to come in beside me: there's nae saying when Miss
Kirstin may be hame."
"Miss Anne's coming hersel," said Jacky, eagerly. "And if ye would lie
down and get some rest, I'll do the work--and I'm no feared to be my
lane--and if ye had a guid sleep, ye would be the better o't."
"I'll no' say but what I would," said Marget, graciously; "and ye're a
considerate lass to think o't. Tak a cup o' tea--it's no right to gang
out in the morning fasting--and I daresay I'll just tak your counsel.
It doesna do for an auld body like me to be out o' my bed a' night."
So Jacky got Marget disposed of, and remained with much awe, and some
shadow of superstitious fear, alone within the house of
Schole--supported by the sunshine round about her as she lingered at the
door--for Marget, in decent reverence, had drawn a simple curtain across
the window. The other rooms were shuttered and dark--the natural homage
of seemly awe and gravity in the presence of death.
Anne had no difficulty in inducing Miss Crankie to take upon her those
matters of sad external business, which she herself was not qualified to
manage. With more delicacy than she expected, Miss Crankie undertook
them immediately. Mrs. Yammer was "in sore distress with rheumatics in
my back, and my head like to split in twa wi' the ticdoloureux--and it's
a' yon awfu' nicht--and I dinna believes Miss Ross, I'll ever get the
better o't.--Johann and you, that are strong folk, fleeing out into the
storm, and me, a puir weak creature, left, to fend my lane--forbye being
like to gang out o' my judgment wi' fricht, for you and the perishing
creatures in the ship. Eh! wha would have thought of a weak man like yon
saving them--and so he's ta'en to his rest! Weel I'm sure, Miss Ross,
you've been uncommon kind to them--they canna say but they've found a
friend in need."
"They are my relatives," said Anne: "I mean we are nearly connected."
Miss Crankie opened her little dark eyes wide. Mrs. Yammer began, with
an astonished exclamation, to recollect the pedigree of the Lillies, and
acquaint herself with this strange relationship.--Her sister stopped her
abruptly.
"Take your breakfast, Tammie, and dinna haver nonsense. Is Kirstin
content, Miss Ross, to have ye biding in her house?"
"Quite content," said Anne.
Miss Crankie's eyes opened wider. She began with a rapid logic, by no
means formal, but which had a knack of arriving at just conclusions, to
put things together. She had a glimmering of the truth already.
"Miss Lillie is out," said Anne. "I fear, in her deep grief, she
wandered out, finding herself unable to rest; but neither she nor I are
able for these details. You will greatly oblige me, Miss Crankie, and do
your old friend a most kind service, if you will undertake this."
Miss Crankie promised heartily, and Anne returned to Schole. Again there
passed a long, weary, brilliant summer day, but Christian did not
return. The night fell, but the roof that covered the mortal garment of
Patrick Lille, sheltered no kindred blood. Anne had taken Christian's
place--she was the watcher now.