His voice was thick and hoarse; it petrified her, so still was she--so
dumb; and at that moment the knocker sounded, and importunate voices
were demanding the Laird of Otter.
He obeyed the summons, spoke with his servants a little time, and
returned to find Leslie in the same arrested posture, with the same
blanched face. He had resumed his seaman's coat, and carried his cap in
his hand. He was calm now, and smiling, but with a face wan and shadowed
with an inexpressible cloud.
"It may not be, Leslie," he said, soft and low; "Nigel Boswell's boat is
in sight, struggling to make Earlscraig; he was always rash and
unskilled, though seaward born and bred. If he is not forestalled, his
boat will be bottom upmost, or crushed like glass within the hour. I
trust I will save him; but if there be peril and death in my path, then
listen to what I say, and remember it. Whatever has gone before, at this
moment I am yours; you may doubt it, deny it--I swear it, Leslie.
Despise me, reject me if you will; I cannot perish misinterpreted and
misjudged. I loved Alice Boswell. My love is ashes with its object. I
did not love you once; I love you now. I love a living woman truer,
higher, holier than the dead; and for my love's sake, not for my
vows--the first for love, if it be the last."
He had her in his arms; his lingering kisses were on her eyes, her hair,
her hands. He was gone, and still she remained rooted to the ground. Was
it amazement, anger, terror?--or was it a wild throb of exultation for
that, the real moment of their union? or because she had won him, and
was his who had slighted her, sinned against her--but who was still
Hector Garret, manly, wise, and noble--the hero of her girlhood.
She was roused reluctantly by the entrance of Bridget Kennedy, shaking
in every limb.
"Madam, why did you let Master Hector go?--he has had the look of a
doomed man this many a day. It is thus that men are called, as plain as
when the Banshee cries. Madam, say your prayers for Master Hector while
he is still in life."
"I must go to him, Bridget; I must follow him. Don't try to keep me. He
is my husband, too. The poor women were crowding on the beach this
morning. Let me go!"
She understood that he was exposing himself for another--that his life
hung on the turning of a straw. She ran upstairs, but she did not seek
her child, and when she descended, Bridget had still to fetch her mantle
and bonnet. The old woman did not seek to detain her, but ejaculated
through her chattering teeth, as she peered out after her and wrung her
hands, "She will bring the Master back, if anything can; nought will
harm her. I, poor miserable wretch, would but clog her swiftness. Ay, he
will hearken to her voice; he has been waiting for the sound weeks and
months. Who would have said that Master Hector, like Samson, would twice
be given a prey to a woman! He will hear her above the winds and waves;
body or soul, he will obey her, as he did Alice Boswell twenty years ago
in fire and ruin."
Leslie hurried on in the darkness, her little feet tripping, her slight
form borne back by the blast. Not thus had she wandered on those sunny,
summer days when she first knew Otter; but there was that within, in the
midst of her distress, that she would not have resigned for that light
life twice over.
She reached the beach; the roar of the surf and the shriek of the wind
were in her ears, but no human presence was visible. There flashed back
upon her the vision of her hopelessness and helplessness on such another
blustering, raging night--but the recollection brought no comfort. She
paused in dismay, with nothing but the mist and the driving rain before
her. Stay! obscurely, and at intervals, she caught sight of a light, now
borne on the crest of these giant waves, now sunk and lost. Hark! a
pistol-shot! that must be Boswell's appeal for aid; and yonder lay
Earlscraig--yonder also was Hector toiling to rescue his ancient friend
and persistent foe. She should be there too. At Earlscraig their destiny
would be wrought out.
Leslie sped along in the tumult of earth and sky; the road was more than
a mile, and at such a season and in such weather very toilsome and
dangerous--but what deeds have not tender women achieved, strung by
love, or hate!
When Leslie gained the promontory, she found the old house deserted--the
few servants were on the shore, aiding or watching Hector Garret and his
men in their efforts to save the last of his line, cast away within the
shadow of his own rocks and towers.
Leslie shrank from descending among the spectators; she remained spent
and breathless, but resolute still, where she could spy the first
wayfarer, hear the first shout of triumph, and steal away in the
darkness, fleeing home unmarked and undetained.
It was the first occasion on which she had been close to Earlscraig. The
situation, at all times exposed, was now utterly forlorn. The spray was
rising over the land, the waves were sapping its old foundation, the
weird winds were tearing at the coping of the shattered house; and on
the side where Alice Boswell's turret had stood, stones were rumbling,
and wild weeds streaming. The scene was very dismal and eerie, but
Leslie did not shudder or faint; her senses were bent on one aim, she
was impervious to all else. She sank down in a kneeling position,
staring with unwinking eyes, praying with her whole heart in an agony.
The light which had beguiled her, passed beyond her sight after tossing
for some time to and fro. She could not regain it, she could only
continue ready to seize the first signal of bliss, or woe.
It did not come. The storm raged more madly; the desolation grew more
appalling; Leslie's brain began to whirl; the solitude was rife with
shapes and voices.
Above all stood fair Alice Boswell, wreathed in white flames--from the
wavering cloudy mass of forms the gallant exile plunged anew into the
flood, now seething and rushing to meet its prey.
"Oh woman--Alice Boswell--I did not steal your lover! you kept him from
me long after God and man had given him to me. There are no vows and
caresses in the grave. We have had but one meeting and parting; but one!
Oh, stranger, he is spending his life for her brother, as you were ready
to fling down yours for her. Will none of you be appeased? Then take us
both; in mercy leave not the other! In death let us not be divided!"
The pang was over; Leslie passed into insensibility. When she recovered
herself, the spectres of that horrible dream still flitted around her,
for did she not distinguish through the surge and the blast Hector
Garret's foot speeding to receive his doom?
But "Leslie," not "Alice," was his cry. Beneath the very arches of
Earlscraig, where fair Alice Boswell, her rich hair decked for one, her
bright eyes sparkling for another, her sandal buckled for a third, had
stood, and waved to him her hand--"Leslie! Leslie!" was his cry,
uttered with such aching longing, such utter despair. It was the wail of
no mocking ghost, but the human cry of a breaking heart.
Leslie's tongue clove to the roof of her mouth; but there was no need
of speech to indicate to him his weak, fluttering treasure. Found once
more! Found for ever! raised and borne away swiftly and securely. No
word of explanation, no reproach for folly and desperation, no recital
of his labours, no information regarding others, but--strange from
Hector Garret's stern lips, and sweet as strange--murmurs of fondness
and devotion: "Sweet Leslie! mine only--mine always!" Scoutings at
weariness, cheery reckonings of their way, his heart beating against
hers, her cheek to his; and it was only when Bridget Kennedy opened
the door, and he asked her whether she had yet a chamber for this
truant, that Leslie was aware how well Hector Garret had performed his
part, and how many guests the hospitable walls of Otter sheltered that
eventful night.
Bridget was solemnly praising heaven, whose arm had been about them, and
restored them both in the flower of their days, to Otter, and to their
bairn.
"We have come back for more than Otter and the bairn, Leslie. Bridget
and all the men of Ayr could not have held her here, my faithful wife
that needs must be my love, she has proved herself so true!"
He was throwing off her drenched cloak, and chafing her cold hands. One
of them was clenched on its contents. He opened the stiffened finger,
and found a lock of hair.
"It was all belonging to you that I had, Hector," she whispered; "I took
it long ago, with your knowledge but without your consent. I would not
look at it, or touch it; I kept it for little Leslie. But you said that
you were mine, and it was something of yours to hold; you were mine, and
it was part of you."
* * * * *
"Better for Scotland that weans greet than bearded men," averred the
Lord of Glammis; but he did not say, better for the men, or better for
those who plight hand and heart with them, that the keen, clear eye melt
not, either with ruth or tenderness. Nay, the plants of household faith
and love, scathed by some lightning flash, pinched by some poverty of
soil, will lift their heads and thrive apace when once they have been
watered with this heavenly rain--and like the tree of the Psalmist
growing by the river, will flourish pleasantly, and bear much goodly
fruit thenceforth, and fade not at all, but instead, be transplanted
into "the land that is far away."