either? But we suppressed the true explanation of these letters, and
that was, that your father thought it right the young leddy should pass
for his daughter for a while, on account o’some family reasons that were
amang them.”
“But wherefore, when you learned our union, was this dreadful artifice
persisted in?”
“It wasna,” she replied, “till Lady Glenallan had communicated this
fause tale, that she suspected ye had actually made a marriage--nor even
then did you avow it sae as to satisfy her whether the ceremony had in
verity passed atween ye or no--But ye remember, O ye canna but remember
weel, what passed in that awfu’ meeting!”
“Woman! you swore upon the gospels to the fact which you now disavow.”
“I did,--and I wad hae taen a yet mair holy pledge on it, if there had
been ane--I wad not hae spared the blood of my body, or the guilt of my
soul, to serve the house of Glenallan.”
“Wretch! do you call that horrid perjury, attended with consequences
yet more dreadful--do you esteem that a service to the house of your
benefactors?”
“I served her, wha was then the head of Glenallan, as she required me
to serve her. The cause was between God and her conscience--the manner
between God and mine--She is gane to her account, and I maun follow. Have
I taulds you a’?”
“No,” answered Lord Glenallan--“you have yet more to tell--you have to
tell me of the death of the angel whom your perjury drove to despair,
stained, as she thought herself, with a crime so horrible. Speak
truth--was that dreadful--was that horrible incident”--he could scarcely
articulate the words--“was it as reported? or was it an act of yet
further, though not more atrocious cruelty, inflicted by others?”
“I understand you,” said Elspeth. “But report spoke truth;--our false
witness was indeed the cause, but the deed was her ain distracted act.
On that fearfu’ disclosure, when ye rushed frae the Countess’s presence
and saddled your horse, and left the castle like a fire-flaught, the
Countess hadna yet discovered your private marriage; she hadna fund out
that the union, which she had framed this awfu’ tale to prevent, had
e’en taen place. Ye fled from the house as if the fire o’ Heaven was
about to fa’ upon it, and Miss Neville, atween reason and the want
o’t, was put under sure ward. But the ward sleep’t, and the prisoner
waked--the window was open--the way was before her--there was the cliff,
and there was the sea!--O, when will I forget that!”
“And thus died,” said the Earl, “even so as was reported?”
“No, my lord. I had gane out to the cove--the tide was in, and it flowed,
as ye’ll remember, to the foot o’ that cliff--it was a great convenience
that for my husband’s trade--Where am I wandering?--I saw a white object
dart frae the tap o’ the cliff like a sea-maw through the mist, and
then a heavy flash and sparkle of the waters showed me it was a human
creature that had fa’en into the waves. I was bold and strong, and
familiar with the tide. I rushed in and grasped her gown, and drew
her out and carried her on my shouthers--I could hae carried twa sic
then--carried her to my hut, and laid her on my bed. Neighbours cam and
brought help; but the words she uttered in her ravings, when she got
back the use of speech, were such, that I was fain to send them awa,
and get up word to Glenallan House. The Countess sent down her Spanish
servant Teresa--if ever there was a fiend on earth in human form, that
woman was ane. She and I were to watch the unhappy leddy, and let no
other person approach.--God knows what Teresa’s part was to hae been--she
tauld it not to me--but Heaven took the conclusion in its ain hand. The
poor leddy! she took the pangs of travail before her time, bore a
male child, and died in the arms of me--of her mortal enemy! Ay, ye may
weep--she was a sightly creature to see to--but think ye, if I didna mourn
her then, that I can mourn her now? Na, na, I left Teresa wi’ the dead
corpse and new-born babe, till I gaed up to take the Countess’s commands
what was to be done. Late as it was, I ca’d her up, and she gar’d me ca’
up your brother”--
“My brother?”
“Yes, Lord Geraldin, e’en your brother, that some said she aye wished
to be her heir. At ony rate, he was the person maist concerned in the
succession and heritance of the house of Glenallan.”
“And is it possible to believe, then, that my brother, out of avarice to
grasp at my inheritance, would lend himself to such a base and dreadful
stratagem?”
“Your mother believed it,” said the old beldam with a fiendish laugh--“it
was nae plot of my making; but what they did or said I will not say,
because I did not hear. Lang and sair they consulted in the black
wainscot dressing-room; and when your brother passed through the room
where I was waiting, it seemed to me (and I have often thought sae since
syne) that the fire of hell was in his cheek and een. But he had left
some of it with his mother, at ony rate. She entered the room like a
woman demented, and the first words she spoke were, Elspeth Cheyne, did
you ever pull a new-budded flower?’ I answered, as ye may believe, that
I often had. Then,’ said she, ye will ken the better how to blight
the spurious and heretical blossom that has sprung forth this night to
disgrace my father’s noble house--See here;’--(and she gave me a golden
bodkin)--nothing but gold must shed the blood of Glenallan. This child is
already as one of the dead, and since thou and Teresa alone ken that
it lives, let it be dealt upon as ye will answer to me!’ and she turned
away in her fury, and left me with the bodkin in my hand.--Here it
is; that and the ring of Miss Neville, are a’ I hae preserved of my
ill-gotten gear--for muckle was the gear I got. And weel hae I keepit the
secret, but no for the gowd or gear either.”
Her long and bony hand held out to Lord Glenallan a gold bodkin, down
which in fancy he saw the blood of his infant trickling.
“Wretch! had you the heart?”
“I kenna if I could hae had it or no. I returned to my cottage without
feeling the ground that I trode on; but Teresa and the child were gane--
a’ that was alive was gane--naething left but the lifeless corpse.”
“And did you never learn my infant’s fate?”
“I could but guess. I have tauld ye your mother’s purpose, and I ken
Teresa was a fiend. She was never mair seen in Scotland, and I have
heard that she returned to her ain land. A dark curtain has fa’en ower
the past, and the few that witnessed ony part of it could only surmise
something of seduction and suicide. You yourself”--
“I know--I know it all,” answered the Earl.
“You indeed know all that I can say--And now, heir of Glenallan, can you
forgive me?”
[Illustration: Lord Glenallen and Elspeth]
“Ask forgiveness of God, and not of man,” said the Earl, turning away.
“And how shall I ask of the pure and unstained what is denied to me by
a sinner like mysell? If I hae sinned, hae I not suffered?--Hae I had a
day’s peace or an hour’s rest since these lang wet locks of hair first
lay upon my pillow at Craigburnfoot?--Has not my house been burned, wi’
my bairn in the cradle?--Have not my boats been wrecked, when a’ others
weather’d the gale?--Have not a’ that were near and dear to me dree’d
penance for my sin?--Has not the fire had its share o’ them--the winds had
their part--the sea had her part?--And oh!” she added, with a lengthened
groan, looking first upwards towards Heaven, and then bending her eyes
on the floor--“O that the earth would take her part, that’s been lang
lang wearying to be joined to it!”
Lord Glenallan had reached the door of the cottage, but the generosity
of his nature did not permit him to leave the unhappy woman in this
state of desperate reprobation. “May God forgive thee, wretched woman,”
he said, “as sincerely as I do!--Turn for mercy to Him who can alone
grant mercy, and may your prayers be heard as if they were mine own!--I
will send a religious man.”
“Na, na--nae priest! nae priest!” she ejaculated; and the door of the
cottage opening as she spoke, prevented her from proceeding.
CHAPTER THIRTEENTH.
Still in his dead hand clenched remain the strings
That thrill his father’s heart--e’en as the limb,
Lopped off and laid in grave, retains, they tell us,
Strange commerce with the mutilated stump,
Whose nerves are twinging still in maimed existence.
Old Play.
The Antiquary, as we informed the reader in the end of the thirty-first
CHAPTER, [tenth] had shaken off the company of worthy Mr. Blattergowl,
although he offered to entertain him with an abstract of the ablest
speech he had ever known in the teind court, delivered by the procurator
for the church in the remarkable case of the parish of Gatherem.
Resisting this temptation, our senior preferred a solitary path, which
again conducted him to the cottage of Mucklebackit. When he came in
front of the fisherman’s hut, he observed a man working intently, as if
to repair a shattered boat which lay upon the beach, and going up to him
was surprised to find it was Mucklebackit himself. “I am glad,” he said
in a tone of sympathy--“I am glad, Saunders, that you feel yourself able
to make this exertion.”
“And what would ye have me to do,” answered the fisher gruffly, “unless
I wanted to see four children starve, because ane is drowned? It’s weel
wi’ you gentles, that can sit in the house wi’ handkerchers at your een
when ye lose a friend; but the like o’ us maun to our wark again, if our
hearts were beating as hard as my hammer.”
Without taking more notice of Oldbuck, he proceeded in his labour; and
the Antiquary, to whom the display of human nature under the influence
of agitating passions was never indifferent, stood beside him, in silent
attention, as if watching the progress of the work. He observed more
than once the man’s hard features, as if by the force of association,
prepare to accompany the sound of the saw and hammer with his usual
symphony of a rude tune, hummed or whistled,--and as often a slight
twitch of convulsive expression showed, that ere the sound was uttered,
a cause for suppressing it rushed upon his mind. At length, when he
had patched a considerable rent, and was beginning to mend another, his
feelings appeared altogether to derange the power of attention necessary
for his work. The piece of wood which he was about to nail on was at
first too long; then he sawed it off too short, then chose another
equally ill adapted for the purpose. At length, throwing it down in
anger, after wiping his dim eye with his quivering hand, he exclaimed,
“There is a curse either on me or on this auld black bitch of a boat,
that I have hauled up high and dry, and patched and clouted sae mony
years, that she might drown my poor Steenie at the end of them, an’ be
d--d to her!” and he flung his hammer against the boat, as if she had
been the intentional cause of his misfortune. Then recollecting himself,
he added, “Yet what needs ane be angry at her, that has neither soul nor
sense?--though I am no that muckle better mysell. She’s but a rickle
o’ auld rotten deals nailed thegither, and warped wi’ the wind and the
sea--and I am a dour carle, battered by foul weather at sea and land till
I am maist as senseless as hersell. She maun be mended though again the
morning tide--that’s a thing o’ necessity.”
Thus speaking, he went to gather together his instruments, and attempt
to resume his labour,--but Oldbuck took him kindly by the arm. “Come,
come,” he said, “Saunders, there is no work for you this day--I’ll send
down Shavings the carpenter to mend the boat, and he may put the day’s
work into my account--and you had better not come out to-morrow, but stay
to comfort your family under this dispensation, and the gardener will
bring you some vegetables and meal from Monkbarns.”
“I thank ye, Monkbarns,” answered the poor fisher; “I am a plain-spoken
man, and hae little to say for mysell; I might hae learned fairer
fashions frae my mither lang syne, but I never saw muckle gude they did
her; however, I thank ye. Ye were aye kind and neighbourly, whatever
folk says o’ your being near and close; and I hae often said, in thae
times when they were ganging to raise up the puir folk against the
gentles--I hae often said, neer a man should steer a hair touching to
Monkbarns while Steenie and I could wag a finger--and so said Steenie
too. And, Monkbarns, when ye laid his head in the grave (and mony thanks
for the respect), ye, saw the mouls laid on an honest lad that likit you
weel, though he made little phrase about it.”
Oldbuck, beaten from the pride of his affected cynicism, would not
willingly have had any one by on that occasion to quote to him his
favourite maxims of the Stoic philosophy. The large drops fell fast
from his own eyes, as he begged the father, who was now melted at
recollecting the bravery and generous sentiments of his son, to forbear
useless sorrow, and led him by the arm towards his own home, where
another scene awaited our Antiquary.
As he entered, the first person whom he beheld was Lord Glenallan.
Mutual surprise was in their countenances as they saluted each
other--with haughty reserve on the part of Mr. Oldbuck, and embarrassment
on that of the Earl.
“My Lord Glenallan, I think?” said Mr. Oldbuck.
“Yes--much changed from what he was when he knew Mr. Oldbuck.”
“I do not mean,” said the Antiquary, “to intrude upon your lordship--I
only came to see this distressed family.”
“And you have found one, sir, who has still greater claims on your
compassion.”
“My compassion? Lord Glenallan cannot need my compassion. If Lord
Glenallan could need it, I think he would hardly ask it.”
“Our former acquaintance,” said the Earl--
“Is of such ancient date, my lord--was of such short duration, and was
connected with circumstances so exquisitely painful, that I think we may
dispense with renewing it.”
So saying, the Antiquary turned away, and left the hut; but Lord
Glenallan followed him into the open air, and, in spite of a hasty “Good
morning, my lord,” requested a few minutes’ conversation, and the favour
of his advice in an important matter.
“Your lordship will find many more capable to advise you, my lord, and
by whom your intercourse will be deemed an honour. For me, I am a man
retired from business and the world, and not very fond of raking up
the past events of my useless life;--and forgive me if I say, I have
particular pain in reverting to that period of it when I acted like a
fool, and your lordship like”--He stopped short.
“Like a villain, you would say,” said Lord Glenallan--“for such I must
have appeared to you.”
“My lord--my lord, I have no desire to hear your shrift,” said the
Antiquary.
“But, sir, if I can show you that I am more sinned against than sinning--
that I have been a man miserable beyond the power of description, and
who looks forward at this moment to an untimely grave as to a haven
of rest, you will not refuse the confidence which, accepting your
appearance at this critical moment as a hint from Heaven, I venture thus
to press on you.”
“Assuredly, my lord, I shall shun no longer the continuation of this
extraordinary interview.”
“I must then recall to you our occasional meetings upwards of twenty
years since at Knockwinnock Castle,--and I need not remind you of a lady
who was then a member of that family.”
“The unfortunate Miss Eveline Neville, my lord; I remember it well.”
“Towards whom you entertained sentiments”--
“Very different from those with which I before and since have regarded
her sex. Her gentleness, her docility, her pleasure in the studies which
I pointed out to her, attached my affections more than became my age
though that was not then much advanced--or the solidity of my character.
But I need not remind your lordship of the various modes in which you
indulged your gaiety at the expense of an awkward and retired student,
embarrassed by the expression of feelings so new to him, and I have no
doubt that the young lady joined you in the well-deserved ridicule--it is
the way of womankind. I have spoken at once to the painful circumstances
of my addresses and their rejection, that your lordship may be satisfied
everything is full in my memory, and may, so far as I am concerned, tell
your story without scruple or needless delicacy.”
“I will,” said Lord Glenallan. “But first let me say, you do injustice
to the memory of the gentlest and kindest, as well as to the most
unhappy of women, to suppose she could make a jest of the honest
affection of a man like you. Frequently did she blame me, Mr. Oldbuck,
for indulging my levity at your expense--may I now presume you will
excuse the gay freedoms which then offended you?--my state of mind
has never since laid me under the necessity of apologizing for the
inadvertencies of a light and happy temper.”
“My lord, you are fully pardoned,” said Mr. Oldbuck. “You should be
aware, that, like all others, I was ignorant at the time that I placed
myself in competition with your lordship, and understood that Miss
Neville was in a state of dependence which might make her prefer a
competent independence and the hand of an honest man--But I am wasting
time--I would I could believe that the views entertained towards her by
others were as fair and honest as mine!”
“Mr. Oldbuck, you judge harshly.”
“Not without cause, my lord. When I only, of all the magistrates of this
county--having neither, like some of them, the honour to be connected
with your powerful family--nor, like others, the meanness to fear it,--
when I made some inquiry into the manner of Miss Neville’s death--I shake
you, my lord, but I must be plain--I do own I had every reason to believe
that she had met most unfair dealing, and had either been imposed upon
by a counterfeit marriage, or that very strong measures had been adopted
to stifle and destroy the evidence of a real union. And I cannot doubt
in my own mind, that this cruelty on your lordship’s part, whether
coming of your own free will, or proceeding from the influence of the
late Countess, hurried the unfortunate young lady to the desperate act
by which her life was terminated.”
“You are deceived, Mr. Oldbuck, into conclusions which are not just,
however naturally they flow from the circumstances. Believe me, I
respected you even when I was most embarrassed by your active attempts
to investigate our family misfortunes. You showed yourself more worthy
of Miss Neville than I, by the spirit with which you persisted in
vindicating her reputation even after her death. But the firm belief
that your well-meant efforts could only serve to bring to light a story
too horrible to be detailed, induced me to join my unhappy mother in
schemes to remove or destroy all evidence of the legal union which had
taken place between Eveline and myself. And now let us sit down on
this bank,--for I feel unable to remain longer standing,--and have the
goodness to listen to the extraordinary discovery which I have this day
made.”
They sate down accordingly; and Lord Glenallan briefly narrated his
unhappy family history--his concealed marriage--the horrible invention by
which his mother had designed to render impossible that union which had
already taken place. He detailed the arts by which the Countess, having
all the documents relative to Miss Neville’s birth in her hands, had
produced those only relating to a period during which, for family
reasons, his father had consented to own that young lady as his natural
daughter, and showed how impossible it was that he could either suspect
or detect the fraud put upon him by his mother, and vouched by the oaths
of her attendants, Teresa and Elspeth. “I left my paternal mansion,” he
concluded, “as if the furies of hell had driven me forth, and travelled
with frantic velocity I knew not whither. Nor have I the slightest
recollection of what I did or whither I went, until I was discovered by
my brother. I will not trouble you with an account of my sick-bed and
recovery, or how, long afterwards, I ventured to inquire after the
sharer of my misfortunes, and heard that her despair had found a
dreadful remedy for all the ills of life. The first thing that roused me
to thought was hearing of your inquiries into this cruel business; and
you will hardly wonder, that, believing what I did believe, I should
join in those expedients to stop your investigation, which my brother
and mother had actively commenced. The information which I gave them
concerning the circumstances and witnesses of our private marriage
enabled them to baffle your zeal. The clergyman, therefore, and
witnesses, as persons who had acted in the matter only to please the
powerful heir of Glenallan, were accessible to his promises and threats,
and were so provided for, that they had no objections to leave this
country for another. For myself, Mr. Oldbuck,” pursued this unhappy man,
“from that moment I considered myself as blotted out of the book of
the living, and as having nothing left to do with this world. My mother
tried to reconcile me to life by every art--even by intimations which I
can now interpret as calculated to produce a doubt of the horrible tale
she herself had fabricated. But I construed all she said as the fictions
of maternal affection. I will forbear all reproach. She is no more--and,
as her wretched associate said, she knew not how the dart was poisoned,
or how deep it must sink, when she threw it from her hand. But, Mr.
Oldbuck, if ever, during these twenty years, there crawled upon earth a
living being deserving of your pity, I have been that man. My food has
not nourished me--my sleep has not refreshed me--my devotions have not
comforted me--all that is cheering and necessary to man has been to me
converted into poison. The rare and limited intercourse which I have
held with others has been most odious to me. I felt as if I were
bringing the contamination of unnatural and inexpressible guilt among
the gay and the innocent. There have been moments when I had thoughts
of another description--to plunge into the adventures of war, or to brave
the dangers of the traveller in foreign and barbarous climates--to
mingle in political intrigue, or to retire to the stern seclusion of
the anchorites of our religion;--all these are thoughts which have
alternately passed through my mind, but each required an energy,
which was mine no longer, after the withering stroke I had received. I
vegetated on as I could in the same spot--fancy, feeling, judgment,
and health, gradually decaying, like a tree whose bark has been
destroyed,--when first the blossoms fade, then the boughs, until its
state resembles the decayed and dying trunk that is now before you. Do
you now pity and forgive me?”
“My lord,” answered the Antiquary, much affected, “my pity--my
forgiveness, you have not to ask, for your dismal story is of itself not
only an ample excuse for whatever appeared mysterious in your conduct,
but a narrative that might move your worst enemies (and I, my lord, was
never of the number) to tears and to sympathy. But permit me to ask what
you now mean to do, and why you have honoured me, whose opinion can be
of little consequence, with your confidence on this occasion?”
“Mr. Oldbuck,” answered the Earl, “as I could never have foreseen the
nature of that confession which I have heard this day, I need not say
that I had no formed plan of consulting you, or any one, upon affairs
the tendency of which I could not even have suspected. But I am without
friends, unused to business, and, by long retirement, unacquainted alike
with the laws of the land and the habits of the living generation; and
when, most unexpectedly, I find myself immersed in the matters of which
I know least, I catch, like a drowning man, at the first support that
offers. You are that support, Mr. Oldbuck. I have always heard you
mentioned as a man of wisdom and intelligence--I have known you myself
as a man of a resolute and independent spirit;--and there is one
circumstance,” said he, “which ought to combine us in some degree--our
having paid tribute to the same excellence of character in poor Eveline.
You offered yourself to me in my need, and you were already acquainted
with the beginning of my misfortunes. To you, therefore, I have recourse
for advice, for sympathy, for support.”