“I was gay as the other maidens--all the springs and hopes and
youthful things of the world were like me: prithee, lady, think not
I say so out of envy of your fair estate; for in good sooth, youth
is estate enough for a free heart. But before youth goes, troubles
come--yourself must meet them anon--and be not fearful, gentle one;
for it may be they will leave rare wealth with you, and take but a
little sunshine away.”
OLD PLAY.
THE next day Harry entered blithely upon his old duties again. The
morning was sunny, and bright, and Agnes stood at the window with the
baby, to watch him as he emerged from the outer door below, and turned
to look up to her, and take off his hat in playful salutation. He had
a little cluster of fresh spring primroses, pulled last morning in
the Ayr garden, gracing his button-hole, and there was a spring in
his step, and an elastic grace in his manner as he went away, that
made glad the heart of the little wife. They were all very blithe
this morning--the gladness came involuntarily from Agnes’ lips in the
familiar form of song; she sang to the baby--she sang to them all.
She was still a girl, this pretty wife of Harry Muir--a girl belonging
to that very large class, who never discover that they have hearts at
all, until they have sent them forth on some great venture, perilling
all peace for ever. Agnes had been a very gay, perhaps a rather foolish
girl--liking very greatly the small vanities which she could reach, and
managing to keep out of sight the graver matters of life. She knew what
it was to be poor--but then she had known that all her life, and the
difficulties fell upon elder people, not on herself, and Agnes sailed
over them with innocent heedlessness. The heart slumbered quietly in
her bosom--she scarcely knew it was there, except when it beat high
sometimes for some small merry-making; scarcely even when she married
Harry Muir were those gay placid waters stirred. She liked him very
much--she admired him exceedingly--she was very proud of him--yet still
she had not found out her heart.
But when the cloud began to steal over the gay horizon of her
life--when she had to watch for his coming, and tremble for his
weakness, and weep over his faults those sad apologetic tears, and
say, poor Harry! then this unknown existence began to make itself felt
within the sobbing breast of the little, pretty, girlish wife. The sad
and fatal weakness, which made him in a certain degree dependant upon
them--which aroused the feelings of anxious care, the eager expedients
to protect him from himself, gave a new character to Agnes. In sad
peril now was the happiness of this young, tender, sensitive heart; but
the danger that threatened it had quickened it into conscious life.
He went away with smiles, and hopeful freshness to his daily labour.
He came home, honestly wearied, at an earlier hour than usual, having
his conscience free of offence that day. So happily they all gathered
about the little tea-table; so gaily Agnes presided at its tea-making,
and Martha placed on the table the little crystal vessel full of
honey--odorous honey, breathing out stories of all the home flowers of
Ayr--so much the travellers had still to tell, and the dwellers at home
to hear.
“And now, Martha,” said Harry, “put on your bonnet, and come out. I
believe she has never been out, Agnes, all the time we have been away.”
“Yes, indeed, Harry--Martha was always at the Kirk,” said the literal
Violet.
“But we are not going to the Kirk to-night--come Martha, and taste this
April air.”
Martha looked at her work. “It is a temptation, Harry; but I think you
had better take Rose--see, Rose looks white with working so long, and I
have to go to the warehouse to-morrow.”
“To the Candleriggs!” said Harry, laughing. “Where you scarcely can
tell when it is June and when December; and if Rose is white, you are
absolutely green with sitting shut up here so long--come, Martha.”
It was not very complimentary, but the pallid faded cheek of Martha
actually bore, to eyes which had been in the sunshine, a tinge of that
undesirable hue. Save for the beneficent rest of the Sabbath-day, and
the walk through the hushed streets to church, Martha had indeed,
since her brother went to Ayr, never been out of doors. The luxury of
sending Harry to the pure home atmosphere was not a cheap one. She had
been labouring for, while he enjoyed it.
“But what if Mr. Charteris comes?” said Rose, with a little shyness: no
one else seemed to remember that Mr. Charteris was to come.
“We shall not stay long,” said Harry; “you must keep him till we
return.”
Rose seemed half inclined to go too; but she remembered how often
Martha had sent her out to enjoy the walk which she had denied herself;
and there were a great many “holes,” as those very prosaic sempstresses
called the little spaces in the centres of the embroidered flowers,
at which they worked, to be finished before they were returned to
the warehouse to-morrow--so even at the risk of a little additional
conversation with the formidable Mr. Charteris, Rose made up her mind
to stay.
And Martha and Harry went out alone. They were not within reach of any
very pleasant place for walking, but they struck off through some of
those unsettled transitionist fields which hang about the outskirts
of great towns, to the side of the canal. Those soft spring evenings
throw a charm over the common place atmosphere, of even such ordinary
haunts as this--and it is wonderful indeed, when one’s eyes and heart
are in proper trim, how the great sky itself alone, and the vast world
of common air, in which we breathe, and through which human sounds
come to us, can suffice to refresh our minds with the Nature, which is
beautiful in every place.
The distant traffic of the “Port,” to which this canal is the sea;
the flutter of dingy sloop sails, and a far-off prospect of the bare
cordage, and brief masts of little Dutch vessels, delivering their
miscellaneous cargoes there, gave a softened home look, almost like
the quiet harbour of some little seaport, to a scene which, close at
hand, could boast of few advantages. But the air was bright with the
haze of sunset, and in the east the sky had paled down to the exceeding
calmness of the eventide, lying silently around its lengthened strips
of island cloud, like an enchanted sea. Dull and blank was the long
level line of water at their feet, yet it was water still, and flowed,
or seemed to flow; and along the bank came the steady tramp of those
strong horses, led by a noisy cavalier whose accoutrements clanked and
jingled like a steam-engine, piloting the gaily-painted “Swift” boat
from Edinburgh, with its crowds of impatient passengers, to the end
of their tedious journey. These were homely sights--but the charmed
atmosphere gave a harmony to them all.
And there were some trees upon this side of the canal--and grass as
green as though it lived a country life, and stout weeds, rank and
vigorous, by the side of the way--and the hum of the great town came
softly on their ear, with here and there a distinct sound, breaking
the inarticulate hum of that mass of busy life. Better than all these,
there was such perfect confidence between the brother and sister, as
had scarcely been before, since he was the unstained boy, innocent and
ignorant, and she the eager teacher, putting forth a second time in
this young untried vessel, the solemn venture of her hopes. It was not
that Harry had anything to confide to the anxious heart, which noted
all his thoughts and modes of feeling so narrowly; but the little
daily things which sometimes have so weighty a bearing upon the most
important matters of life--the passing fancies, the very turns of
expression, which show the prevailing tone of the speaker’s mind, were
so frankly visible to the eye of the watchful sister, that Martha’s
heart rejoiced within her with solemn joy.
Meanwhile, Rose sat alone in the parlour doing her work, somewhat
nervously, and hoping fervently that Mr. Charteris would not come till
“somebody was in” to receive him.
The baby lay sound asleep in the cradle. Agnes had gone down to Mrs.
McGarvie to negotiate about some washing, and was at this moment
standing in Mrs. McGarvie’s kitchen, near the small table where Mrs.
McGarvie herself, with the kettle in one hand, and a great horn spoon
in the other, was pouring a stream of boiling water into a bowl half
filled with the beautiful yellow peasemeal, which keeps the stomachs of
Glasgow in such superlative order, compounding the same into brose, for
the supper of Rab, who newly come in, had just removed his blue bonnet
from his shaggy red head in honour of his mother’s visitor. Mrs.
McGarvie had undertaken the washing, and Agnes in her overflowing happy
spirits, was telling her about the journey, from which they had just
returned.
Violet, last of all, was in Mrs. Rodger’s “big room,” a very spacious,
fine apartment, which was generally occupied by some lodger. They had
no tenant for it at present, and were this evening entertaining a
party in the large, lofty, shabbily-furnished dining room. Violet had
gone in among these guests with the natural curiosity of a child, and
poor Rose, nervously apprehensive of the coming of this formidable Mr.
Charteris, sat in the parlour alone.
Her busy fingers began to flag as she filled up these “holes;” and now
and then, the work dropped on her knee. The ordinary apprehensions
about Harry, which generally formed the central object of her thoughts,
were pleasantly hushed to-night. Rose was not thinking about anything
particular--she would have said so, at least--but for all that, long
trains of indefinite fancies were flitting through her mind, and her
thick blunt needle was altogether stayed now and then--only recovering
in hysteric bursts its ordinary movements, when Rose trembled to fancy
that she heard a step on the stair. If Agnes would only come in--if
Harry and Martha were but home again!
At last a step was on the stair in reality. “Maybe it is Agnes,”
said Rose to herself as her needle began to fly again through the
muslin--but it was not only Agnes--it was the foot of a man--poor Rose
wondered if by any possibility she could run away.
And there he was, this sad ogre whom Rose feared, quietly opening the
parlour door, as if he had some right to be there. Mr. Charteris was
almost as shy as Rose herself. He sat down with pleased embarrassment,
and looked exceedingly awkward, and spoke by no means so sensibly as he
was used to do. Rose eagerly explained the reason why she was alone,
and went to the window in haste to look for Agnes.
Mr. Charteris’ eye had been caught by something of a very faded neutral
hue, in a black frame, which hung above the mantelpiece. He asked Miss
Rose if it was embroidery.
Miss Rose was moved to laughter, and her laugh dispersed the mist
of shyness very pleasantly. “It is only an old sampler of my
grandmother’s, Mr. Charteris.”
Mr. Charteris rose to look at it.
“There is not much art in it,” said Rose, “it seems that all the
landscapes on samplers are of one style--but my mother gave it to me
when I was a girl--a little girl--and I used to be proud of it, because
it was my own.”
Mr. Charteris took it down to examine its beauties more closely. It
bore the name of the artist at full length “Rose Allenders,” and had a
square house, and some very original trees, like the trees of very old
paintings, elaborately worked upon it.
“I think you said she had been long dead,” said Cuthbert.
“Long ago--very long ago,” said Rose. “When my mother was only a child,
my grandmother died. Her name is on the stone, among the rest of the
Calders, and her father and her little sister are near her, in the
churchyard. Uncle Sandy used to take us there when we were children. I
believe he thought they would feel lonely in their very graves, because
they lay among strangers.”
There was a pause. Cuthbert again hung up the faded sampler, and
Rose worked most industriously at her opening. Each was earnestly
endeavouring to invent something to say--and both of them were
singularly unsuccessful. It was the greatest possible relief to Rose to
hear Harry’s voice in the passage.
The two young men greeted each other heartily--it seemed that there was
some charm in these very faults of poor Harry--for everybody learned to
like and apologise for, even while they blamed him.
“And so you are going to Ayr,” said Harry, “why did you not come a
little earlier, Mr. Charteris, that I might have shown our town to you.
You will not appreciate the beauties it has, unless some one, native to
it, points them out.”
“For which cause I am here to seek an introduction which Miss Muir
promised me to your uncle,” said Cuthbert.
“To my uncle? are you a character hunter, Mr. Charteris?” said Harry
quickly, and with something which Rose thought looked like rudeness.
“No, I don’t think so--but why do you ask me?”
“Because the vulgar call my uncle a character and an original,” said
Harry. “I thought your cousin, who saw him once, might have told you
so,--and he does not like the imputation. We are jealous of my uncle’s
feelings, as we have a good right to be, for he has been father, and
teacher, and companion alike to all of us.”
“I had some business in the neighbourhood of Ayr,” said Cuthbert,
with a little conscious embarrassment--“one of those things in our
profession that border upon the romantic,--there are not many of them,
Miss Rose;--I want to trace out some links of descent--to find some
lost members of an old family. I shall find them only by means of
gravestones I apprehend, but that will answer my purpose. It is not
quite in my department, this kind of business; but it is pleasant to
have some excuse for seeing so fine a country in this time when ‘folk
are longen to gon on pilgrimages.’--I think you must begin to feel
this longing, Miss Muir?”
“It is wonderful how easily one can content oneself,” said Martha, with
a smile which spoke of singular peace. “We have only to shut our eyes,
Rose and I, and straightway we are at home--or to send some one else to
enjoy it, Mr. Charteris. Harry and Agnes, have brought us so much of
the atmosphere that I scarcely desire it now for myself.”