Mr Cameron left us this morning. To-day I have been exploring with
Flora, who wants to go all over the house and garden and village--speaks
of her pet plants as if they were old friends, and shakes hands with
everyone she meets, and pats every dog and cat in the place. And they
all seem so glad to see her--the dogs included; I do not know about the
cats. As we went down the village street, it was quite amusing to hear
the greetings from every doorway.
"Atweel, Miss Flora, ye've won hame!" said one.
"How's a' wi' ye, my bairn?" said another.
"A blessing on your bonnie e'en, my lassie!" said a third.
And Flora had the same sort of thing for all of them. It was, "Well,
Jeannie, is your Maggie still in her place?" or, "I hope Sandy's better
now?" or, "Have you lost your pains, Isabel?" She seemed to know all
about each one. I was quite diverted to hear it all. They all appeared
rather shy with me, only very kindly; and when Flora introduced me as
"her cousin from England," which she did in every cottage, they had all
something kind to say: that they hoped I was well after my journey, or
they trusted I should like Scotland, or something of that sort. Two
told me I was a bonnie lassie. But at last we came to a shut door--most
were open--and Flora knocked and waited for an answer. She said gravely
to me,--
"A King's daughter lies here, Cary, waiting for her Father's chariot to
take her home."
A fresh-coloured, middle-aged woman came to the door, and I was
surprised to hear Flora say, "How is your grandmother, Elsie?"
"She's mickle as ye laft her, Miss Flora, only weaker; I'm thinkin'
she'll no be lang the now. But come ben, my bonnie lassie; you're as
welcome as flowers in May. And how's a' wi' ye?"
Flora answered as we were following Elsie down the chamber and round a
screen which boxed off the end of it. Behind the screen was a bed, and
on it lay, as I thought, the oldest woman on whom I ever set my eyes.
Her face was all wrinkled up, yet there was a fresh colour in her
cheeks, and her eyes, though much sunk, seemed piercingly bright.
"Ye're come at last," she said, in a low clear voice, as Flora sat down
on the bed, and took the wrinkled brown hand in hers.
"Yes, dear Mirren, come at last," said she. "I'm very glad to get
home."
"Ay, and that's what I'll be the morn."
"So soon, Mirren?"
"Ay, just sae soon. I askit Him to let me bide while ye came hame. I
ay thocht I wad fain see ye ance mair--my Miss Flora's lad's lassie.
He's gi'en me a' that ever I askit Him--but ane thing, an' that was the
vara desire o' my heart."
"You mean," said Flora, gently, "you wanted Ronald to come home?"
"Ay, I wanted him to come hame frae the far country!" said old Mirren
with a sigh. "I'd ha'e likit weel to see him come hame to Abbotscliff--
vara weel. But I longed mickle mair to see him come hame to the
Father's house. It's no for his auld minnie to see that. But if it's
for the Lord to see some ither day, I'm content. And He has gi'en me
sae monie things that I ne'er askit Him wi' ane half the longing that I
did for that, I dinna think He'll say me nay the now."
"Is He with you, Mirren dear?"
I could not imagine how Flora thought Mirren was to know that. But she
answered, with a light in those bright eyes,--
"Ay, my doo. `His left haun is under my heid, and His richt haun doth
embrace me.'"
I sat and listened in wonder. It all sounded so strange. Yet Flora
seemed to understand. And I had such an unpleasant sense of being
outside, and not understanding, as I never felt before, and I did not
like it a bit. I knew quite well that if Father had been there, he
would have said it was all stuff and cant. But I did not feel so sure
of my Aunt Kezia. And suppose it were not cant, but was something
unutterably real,--something that I ought to know, and must know some
day, if I were ever to get to Heaven! I did not like it. I felt that I
was among a new sort of people--people who lived, as it were, in a
different place from me--a sort of whom I had never seen one before
(that did not come from Abbotscliff) except my Aunt Kezia, and there
were differences between her and them. My Uncle Drummond and Flora, and
Mr Keith, and this old Mirren, and I thought Helen Raeburn and Mr
Cameron, all belonged this new sort of people. The one who did not seem
to belong them was Angus. Yet I did not like Angus nearly so well as
the rest. And yet he belonged my sort of people. It was a puzzle
altogether, and not a pleasant puzzle. And how anybody was to get out
of the one set into the other set, I could not tell at all.
Stop! I did know one other person at Brocklebank who belonged this new
sort of people. It was Ephraim Hebblethwaite. He was not, I thought--
well, I don't know how to put it--he did not seem so far on the road as
the others; only he was on that road, and not on this road. And then it
struck me, too, whether old Elspie, and perhaps Sam, were not on the
road as well. I ran over in my mind, as I was walking back to the manse
with Flora, who was very silent, all the people I knew; and I could not
think of one other who might be on Flora's road. Father and my sisters,
Esther Langridge, the Catteralls, the Bracewells, Cecilia--oh dear,
no!--Mr Digby, Mr Bagnall (yet they were parsons), Mr Parmenter--no,
not one. At all the four I named last, my mind gave a sort of jump as
if it were quite astonished to be asked the question. But where did the
roads lead? Flora and her sort, I felt quite sure, were going to
Heaven. Then where were Angus and I and all the rest going?
And I did not like the answer at all.
But I felt that the two roads led in opposite ways, and they could not
both go to one place.
As we walked up the path to the manse, Helen came out to meet us.
"My lassie," she said to Flora, "there's Miss Annas i' the garden, and
Leddy Monksburn wad ha'e ye gang till Monksburn for a dish o' tea, and
Miss Cary wi' ye."
Flora's face lighted up.
"Oh, how delightful!" she said. "Come, Cary--come and see Annas Keith."
I was very curious to see Annas, and I followed willingly. Under the
old beech at the bottom of the garden sat a girl-woman--she was not
either, but both--in a gown of soft camlet, which seemed as if it were
part of her; I do not mean so much in the fit of it, as in the complete
suitableness of it and her. Her head was bent down over a book, and I
could not see her face at first--only her hair, which was neither light
nor dark, but had a kind of golden shimmer. Her hat lay beside her on
the seat. Flora ran down the walk with a glad cry of "Annas!" and then
she stood up, and I saw Annas Keith.
A princess! was my first thought. I saw a tall, slight figure, a
slender white throat, a pure pale face, dark grey eyes with black
lashes, and a soul in them. Some people have no souls in their eyes,
Annas Keith has.
Yet I could not have said then, and I cannot say now, when I try to
recall her picture in my mind's eye, whether Annas Keith is beautiful.
It does not seem the right word to describe her: and yet "ugly" would be
much further off. She is one of those women about whose beauty or want
of beauty you never think unless you are trying to describe them, and
then you cannot tell what to say about it. She takes you captive.
There is a charm about her that I cannot put into words. Only it is as
different from the spell that Cecilia Osborne threw over me (at first)
as light differs from darkness. The charm about Annas feels as if it
lifted me higher, into a purer air. Whenever I had been long with
Cecilia, my mind felt soiled, as if I had been breathing bad air.
When Flora introduced me, Miss Keith turned and kissed me, and I felt as
if I had been presented to a queen.
"We want to know you," she said. "All Flora's friends are our friends.
You will come, both of you?"
"I thank you, Miss Keith," said I. "I should like to come very much."
"Annas, please," she said quietly, with that sweet smile of hers. It is
only when she smiles that she reminds me of her brother.
"And how are the Laird and Lady Monksburn?" said Flora.
I did not know that the Laird (as they always seem to call the squires
here) had been a titled gentleman: and I said so. Annas smiled.
"Our titles will seem odd to you," said she. "We call a Scots gentleman
by the name of his estate, and every laird's wife is `Lady'--only by
custom and courtesy, you understand. My mother really is only Mrs
Keith, but you will hear everybody call her Lady Monksburn."
"Then if my father were here, they would call him--" I hesitated, and
Flora ended the sentence for me.
"The Laird of Brocklebank; and if you had a mother she would be Lady
Brocklebank."