"Red o'er the forest peers the setting sun,
The line of yellow light dies fast away."
Keble.
"Well, I'm afraid, Webster, it's a thankless task. There are plenty of
Scotch names about here, but not the one we want. I'm heartily tired of
going about from churchyard to churchyard, poking around like ghouls or
medical students. We've been to all the graves in the neighborhood, and,
interesting as such a pursuit may be to an antiquary like yourself, I
find it very slow. I'm one of those sensible people who believe in living
in the present, and letting the dead past bury its dead, as the poet
says."
"Are you, indeed?" retorted his companion drily. "Too lazy, I suppose, to
do anything else."
"Well, that may be the case; but this I know, that I'm going to cable
Lady McAllister to-morrow, and tell her that I'm going back. You may stay
here if you like, as you appear to find the country so charming."
"It is very kind, indeed, of you to give me your permission," replied the
other. "But, my gay and festive friend, I doubt very much whether Lady
McAllister will allow you to return. You know, as well as I, how decided
she is. When she has once got an idea into her head, it is hard to get it
out."
"But, my dear sir," said the younger man, "it is such an utterly
ridiculous idea that she has got into her head now."
"Not quite so ridiculous as you think. It is a well-known fact that,
about the year 1754, Ivan McAllister, with a regiment of Scottish
soldiers, did embark for Canada, and landed at Quebec. It is just as well
known that a Scottish regiment was disbanded near Rimouski a few years
later, and we have every reason to believe, from our correspondence with
the Quebec Government, that Ivan McAllister settled in this district."
"I grant you all that, but he is dead long ago."
"Yes, but in all probability he has descendants living. If not, of course
the McAllister male line is extinct, and Lady McAllister's hopes will
receive a terrible blow."
"Poor Lady McAllister! she seems to have taken the thing very much to
heart. I hope she won't be disappointed, but I wish I hadn't come on this
wild-goose chase."
"You have come," said the elder, "so you had better make the best of it."
"Well, a precious lucky fellow this McAllister will be, if he exists.
Why, Dunmorton Castle with its woods must be worth half a million
sterling."
"Umph!" said the old man. "There is a condition."
"Yes, yes, but not a very dreadful one. Still, I'm not sure that I'd like
to marry Lady Janet myself."
"My young friend, your speculation on the subject is idle, for you will
never get the chance."
"Well, it doesn't matter," said his young friend philosophically, and
with a sentimental air, "my heart is another's."
"Ah, indeed! And who may the un--" (he had nearly said unfortunate, but
corrected himself in time) "fortunate damsel be?"
"Miss Sally Perkins. Yes, she is the girl of my choice. Oh! that I had
never crossed the briny ocean, so far away from Clapham and my Sally. The
Sunday I broke the news of my departure to her I shall never forget. It
was at tea; we were eating shrimps and brown bread and butter. She had
just poured out tea, and had eaten only two shrimps, when I told her I
was going across the broad Atlantic. She could eat no more shrimps that
day. She was overcome."
"Poor Miss Perkins!" said his companion. "Sure devotion could no further
go. She must be very fond of you."
"She is; and I must go back to England."
"You have come, and now I advise you to wait till I return. And, let me
tell you that cabling is very expensive just now. You will only waste
your money for nothing, and besides will be snubbed for your pains by
Lady McAllister."
The speaker who gave this sage advice was a little old man, with a
wizened face like parchment. His keen blue eyes had a shrewd twinkle in
them, and altogether he gave one the impression that he could see further
into a stone wall than most people. He was the confidential lawyer and
intimate friend of Lady McAllister, of Dunmorton Castle in Fife, and had
served the family for more than forty years.
His companion was a young Londoner, somewhat of the Cockney stamp, by
name Thomas Brown, a youth chiefly celebrated for his immense estimation
of his own capabilities.
The two men had arrived a week before by one of the mail steamers, and
had, in accordance with Lady McAllister's commands, visited nearly every
churchyard in the district to discover the name of McAllister.
Hitherto this had been a thankless task. Now, dispirited and fatigued,
they were leaning upon the rough wooden fence which divided the burying
ground of Father Point church from the road. This church, dedicated to
the Good St. Anne, had been built by the pious efforts of pilots on the
ships plying the River St. Lawrence and the Gulf. It was intended to be a
thankful recognition to their patron saint for their deliverance from the
perils of the deep.
And the church had become a noted place for pilgrimages. Indeed, it was
said that miraculous cures were effected by the agency of a sacred relic
of St. Anne, and many a sufferer was brought here in the hope that, by
performing his devotions at the shrine of St. Anne, he would be cured of
his maladies.
There was something very pathetic about the lonely little churchyard of
Father Point, with its borders of overgrown raspberry bushes straggling
in untidy clusters round the graves. At one end of the ground were five
graves, marked each by plain wooden crosses, painted a dull black, with
the Christian names in white of those who slept beneath. These rough
crosses marked the resting-places of the good nuns, who had spent their
lives working in this part of the country. All that is left to serve as
remembrance of their struggles, their trials, their brief glimpses of
happiness, are these wooden crosses, from which the rain of a few autumn
days effaced even the names of those who labored so long and faithfully.
This evening everything is very calm and still, and the peace of nature
is only disturbed by the tinkling of the bells on the necks of the cattle
as they are driven home by the French Canadian cow-herds. A silence seems
to have settled over the whole face of nature. Presently, however, from
the open windows of the church comes a song, faint at first, but swelling
louder and stronger, on the evening breeze:
"Maria, Maria, ora pro nobis,
Ora, ora pro nobis, Sancta Maria."
It is the evening hymn of the curé and his acolytes pealing out on the
still evening air. Higher and higher one treble voice goes like the cry
of a soul in agonized entreaty:
"Maria, Maria, Sancta Maria,
Ora, ora pro nobis."
Then it dies away, and all is still except the ever-present swish! swish!
of the rising tide against the great boulders on the beach.
"Oh! I say, Webster," said young Brown, in his mincing, affected tone,
"why not, after they have finished in there," he pointed to the church,
"go in and ask the priest whether he knows anything of these people? He
ought to know them if anyone does. Good idea, eh?"
"Yes," said the old lawyer, turning round suddenly and looking rather
annoyed, for in spite of his hard crust of Scotch dryness, his young
clerk's voice has jarred on him at this moment. He had been deeply moved
by the beauty of the scene, and the sweet tones coming from the church
had stirred within him long-forgotten memories.
"Yes, for once you have hit on a bright idea, and we will act on it. Let
us go in and see the priest. And, my young friend, remember that most of
these priests are gentlemen, so mind your manners."
"I expect that house next the church is his," replied young Brown. "We
can walk slowly on, and, in the meantime, the priest will come from his
devotions."