For the next two days it rained incessantly, and Margot sat in the
little parlour of the inn talking to Mrs Macalister, or rather
listening while Mrs Macalister talked, and playing draughts with Mr
Macalister, who had relapsed into hopeless gloom of mind, and was with
difficulty prevented from rushing home by the first train.
"The doctor said we were to keep him from the office for a good month at
least, and there's not three weeks of the time gone by. If he goes back
now, what will be the use of spending all this money on travelling and
keep, and what not? It will be all clean waste," sighed the poor dame
sadly. "He's a bit fratchety and irritable, I'm free to admit, but you
should not judge a man when his nerves are upset. There's not a better
man on earth than Mr Macalister when he has his health. It's dull for
a man-body to be shut up in an inn, without the comforts of home, and
feeling all the time that there's money going out. It is different when
he can be out and about with his fishing and what not.--If you could
just manage to amuse him a bit, like a good lassie!..."
The good lassie nodded reassuringly into the troubled, kindly face.
"I'll do my best. I have an old father of my own, who has nerves too,
and I am used to amusing him. I'll take Mr Macalister in hand till the
weather clears."
It was not a congenial task, for, truth to tell, Mr Macalister was not
a beguiling object, with his lugubrious face, lack-lustre eyes, and
sandy, outstanding whiskers; nor did he in the first instance betray any
gratitude for the attention bestowed upon him. A stolid glance over his
spectacles was his first response to Margot's overtures; his next, a
series of grunts and sniffs, and when at last he condescended to words
it was invariably to deride or throw doubt on her statements.
"Tut, nonsense! Who told you that? I would think so, indeed!" followed
by another and more determined retreat behind the _Glasgow Herald_.
In the corner of the room Mrs Macalister sat meekly knitting, never
venturing a look upwards so long as her spouse was in view, but urging
Margot onward by nods and winks and noiseless mouthings, the moment that
she was safe from observation.
It had its comic side, but it was also somewhat pathetic. These two
good commonplace souls had travelled through life together side by side
for over thirty years, and, despite age, infirmity, and "nearves", were
still lovers at heart. Before the wife's eyes the figure of "Mr
Macalister" loomed so large that it blocked out the entire world; to
him, even in this hour of depression, "the wife" was the one supreme
authority.
Fortunately for herself and her friends, Margot was gifted with
sufficient insight to grasp the poetry behind the prose, and it gave her
patience to persevere. Solution came at last, in the shape of the
wheezy old piano in the corner, opened in a moment of aimless wandering
to and fro. Margot was no great performer, but what she could play she
played by heart, and Nature had provided her with a sweet, thrush-like
voice, with that true musical thrill which no teaching can impart. At
the first few bars of a Chopin nocturne Mr Macalister's newspaper
wavered, and fell to his knee. Margot heard the rustle of it, slid
gradually into a simpler melody, and was conscious of a heavy hand
waving steadily to and fro.
"Ha-ha!" murmured Mr Macalister, at the end of the strain. "Hum-hum!
The piano wants tuning, I'm thinking!" It was foreign to his nature to
express any gratification, but that he had deigned to speak at all was a
distinct advance, and equal to a whole volume of compliments from
another man.
"Maybe," he added, after a pause, "if ye were to sing us a ballad it
would be less obsearved!"
So Margot sang, and, finding a book of Scotch selections, could gratify
the old man by selecting his favourite airs, and providing him with an
excuse to hum a gentle accompaniment. Music, it appeared, was Mr
Macalister's passion in life. As a young man he had been quite a
celebrated performer at Penny Readings and Church Soirees, and had been
told by a lady who had heard Sims Reeves that she preferred his
rendering of "Tom Bowling" to that of the famous tenor. This anecdote
was proudly related by his wife, and though Mr Macalister cried,
"Hoots!" and rustled his paper in protest, it was easy to see that he
was gratified by the remembrance.
Margot essayed one Scotch air after another, and was instructed in the
proper pronunciation of the words; feigning, it is to be feared, an
extra amount of incapacity to pronounce the soft "ch," for the sake of
giving her patient a better opportunity of displaying his superior
adroitness.
Comparatively speaking, Mr Macalister became quite genial and agreeable
in the course of that musical hour, and when Margot finished her
performance by singing "The Oak and the Ash," he waxed, for him,
positively enthusiastic.
"It's a small organ," he pronounced judicially, "a ve-ry small organ.
Ye would make a poor show on a concert platform, but for all that, I'm
not saying that it might not have been worse. Ye can keep in tune, and
that's a mearcy!"
"Indeed, Alexander, I call it a bonnie voice! There's no call for
squallings and squakings in a bit of a room like this. I love to hear a
lassie's voice sound sweet and clear, and happy like herself, and that's
just the truth about Miss Vane's singing. Thank ye, my dear. It's been
a treat to hear you."
The broad, beaming smile, the sly little nod behind Mr Macalister's
back, proclaiming triumph and delighted gratitude--these sent Margot up
to her room heartened and revived in spirits, for there is nothing on
earth so invigorating as to feel that we have helped a fellow-creature.
The sunshine came back to her own heart, even as it was slowly breaking
its way through the clouds overhead. She thrust her head out of the
window, and opening her mouth, drank in great gulps of the fresh damp
air, so sweet and reviving after the mouldy atmosphere of "the parlour."
Over the mountain tops in the direction from which the wind was blowing
the clouds were slowly drifting aside, leaving broader and broader
patches of blue. Blue! After the long grey hours of rain and mist.
The rapture of it was almost beyond belief! A few minutes more, and the
glen would be alight with sunshine. She would put on boots, cap, and
cape, and hurry out to enjoy every moment that remained.
The strong-soled little boots were lifted from their corner behind the
door, and down sat Margot on the floor, school-girl fashion, and began
to thread the laces in and out, and tie them securely into place. Then
the deerstalker cap was pinned on top of the chestnut locks, and the
straps of the grey cape crossed over the white flannel blouse. Now she
was ready, and the sunshine was already calling to her from without,
dancing across the floor, and bringing a delicious warmth into the
atmosphere.
Margot threw open the door and was about to descend the narrow
staircase, when she stopped short, arrested by an unexpected sound.
Some one was singing softly in a room near at hand, repeating the
refrain of the ballad which she had taken last on her list. The deep
bass tones lingered softly on the words--
"And the lad who marries me,
Must carry me hame to my North Coun-tree!"
George Elgood was echoing her song in the seclusion of his own room! He
had been indoors all the time, then, listening to her while she sang!
Margot's cheeks grew hot with embarrassment, yet in the repeated strain
there was a suggestion of appreciation, of lingering enjoyment which did
away with the idea of adverse criticism.
"Oh, the Oak and the Ash,"--the strain seemed to swell in volume,
growing ever nearer and nearer. "And the lad who marries me--"
The door flew open, and they stood facing one another, each framed as in
a picture in the lintel of the doorways, divided only by a few yards of
boarded passage. The strain came to an abrupt conclusion, frozen upon
his lips by the shock of surprise and embarrassment. For the third time
in their short acquaintance Margot looked straight into his eyes; for
the third time recognised in their depths something that in mysterious
fashion seemed to respond to a want in her own nature; for the third
time saw the lids drop, heard an unintelligible murmur of apology, and
watched a hasty retreat.
For a moment Margot stood motionless, an expression of wounded pride
clouding the young rounded face, then very slowly descended the
staircase, traversed the length of the "lobby," and stood outside the
door, looking anxiously to right and left.
There he was, a strong, well-built figure in knickerbockers and Norfolk
coat striding rapidly up the hill path to the right,--trying, no doubt,
to put as much distance as possible between himself and the
objectionable girl who seemed ever to be appearing when she was not
wanted. For a long minute Margot stood gazing miserably ahead, then
turning resolutely to the left, came face to face with the Chieftain
returning from the village with his pockets bulging with papers.
His sudden appearance at this moment of depression had a peculiar
significance to the girl's mind. Doubt crystallised into resolution;
with a rapid beating of the heart she determined to grasp her courage in
both hands, and boldly make the plunge which she had been meditating for
some days past.