[Illustration: Cover art]
THE ROSS-SHIRE BUFFS
BY
JAMES GRANT
AUTHOR OF "THE ROMANCE OF WAR," &c.
LONDON
GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS
THE BROADWAY, LUDGATE
NEW YORK: 416, BROOME STREET
LONDON:
BRADBURY, AGNEW, & CO., PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.
JAMES GRANT'S NOVELS.
_Price 2s. each, Fancy Boards._
THE ROMANCE OF WAR.
THE AIDE-DE-CAMP.
THE SCOTTISH CAVALIER.
BOTHWELL.
JANE SETON; OR, THE QUEEN'S ADVOCATE.
PHILIP ROLLO.
THE BLACK WATCH.
MARY OF LORRAINE.
OLIVER ELLIS; OR, THE FUSILEERS.
LUCY ARDEN; OR, HOLLYWOOD HALL.
FRANK HILTON; OR, THE QUEEN'S OWN.
THE YELLOW FRIGATE.
HARRY OGILVIE; OR, THE BLACK DRAGOONS.
ARTHUR BLANE.
LAURA EVERINGHAM; OR, THE HIGHLANDERS OF GLENORA.
THE CAPTAIN OF THE GUARD.
LETTY HYDE'S LOVERS.
CAVALIERS OF FORTUNE.
SECOND TO NONE.
THE CONSTABLE OF FRANCE.
THE PHANTOM REGIMENT.
THE KING'S OWN BORDERERS.
THE WHITE COCKADE.
FIRST LOVE AND LAST LOVE.
DICK ROONEY.
THE GIRL HE MARRIED.
LADY WEDDERBURN'S WISH.
JACK MANLY.
ONLY AN ENSIGN.
ADVENTURES OF ROB ROY.
UNDER THE RED DRAGON.
THE QUEEN'S CADET.
SHALL I WIN HER?
FAIRER THAN A FAIRY.
ONE OF THE SIX HUNDRED.
MORLEY ASHTON.
DID SHE LOVE HIM?
THE ROSS-SHIRE BUFFS.
CONTENTS.
THE ROSS-SHIRE BUFFS.
CHAP.
I.--ENGAGED
II.--UNCLE GAINSWOOD
III.--THE COLONEL'S ANSWER
IV.--LORD CAMPSIE
V.--THE PRINCE'S HUSSARS
VI.--AT PIERSHILL
VII.--A NOBLE LORD RESOLVES TO SACRIFICE HIMSELF
VIII.--NEWS FROM INDIA
IX.--THE APPLE OF DISCORD
X.--"IT MAY BE FOR YEARS AND IT MAY BE FOR EVER"
XI.--DOVE IN HER SORROW
XII.--"CUIDICH'N RHI!"
XIII.--IN THE GULF OF PERSIA
XIV.--A BIVOUAC, AND AN "ALERTE" ON THE PLAIN OF SHIBAZ
XV.--THE BATTLE OF KHOOSH-AB
XVI.--TIDINGS OF THE LOST ONE
XVII.--A BOMBARDMENT AND AN EXCITING ADVENTURE
XVIII.--GILLIAN MAKES A STARTLING DISCOVERY
XIX.--THE TANGLED WEB UNWOVEN
A FORGOTTEN PRINCE OF WALES
THE STRANGE STORY OF THE DUCHESS OF KINGSTON
STORY OF A HUSSAR OF THE REGENCY
A WEIRD STORY OF BRUGES
AGNES SOREL, "THE LADY OF BEAUTY"
THE VEILED PORTRAIT
A LEGEND OF THE OLD 55th; or, THE REGIMENT OF FLANDERS
THE FATAL VOYAGE OF THE "LAURA;" or THE STORY OF JACK MILMAN
"THE ROSS-SHIRE BUFFS."
CHAPTER I.
ENGAGED.
"And will you love me always--always, as you do now?" asked the girl
in a low and winning voice, and after a pause, while colouring deeply.
"Could I ever cease to love you, Dove, darling?" replied the other,
questioningly and tremulously.
"And so you are to be my own--my very own."
"So long as my heart has pulsation, Dove!"
Thus it is, with a fragment of the "old, old story," first told in
Eden, that our new one begins--and told in a veritable Eden too,
where, under the glow of a glorious summer sunset, with seemingly all
the flowers that the earth can produce, where the trees are of
surpassing loveliness, and the tall feathery palms exceed in size and
beauty the boasted ones of Kew, beside a pool where the snow-white
lilies floated and the golden fish shot to and fro,--yet a place
having the most prosaic of names--the Botanical Gardens of
Edinburgh,--our two young friends were exchanging what Le Sage would
call "marks of their mutual esteem."
The hum of the adjacent city, towering high in air to the south, came
with a subdued cadence to the ear; the birds twittered about, the
sole witnesses apparently of the half fatuous caresses, which, with
tender incoherencies, make up the delight of such a period, when Time
itself seems to stand still.
Most decorously and demurely sat the pair, when other bipeds passed
near, and, to all appearance, they conversed fluently enough upon
botany or anything else that occurred to them; but the moment they
were alone face turned to face and eye to eye, while hand sought hand
again.
The love-talk in novels, though very delightful to lovers in general,
and perhaps to young ladies in particular, we, ourselves, are rather
apt to skip; for, remembering our own slight experience in such
matters, it seldom seems to have much in it that is capable of
coherent record; but, as this is a true narrative and not all
romance, a little of it must be given, as preluding and introductory.
"And so you will always love me?" cooed the girl, as her lover, after
one swift glance around them, kissed her for the second time, as yet;
but her pouting lips invited a third, after which she started and
said, "Now, Gillian, we must be very proper, for here come people who
may know us."
"Let us walk, then."
And, leaving the rustic sofa which was under a stately tree, they
entered a long leafy avenue known as the Lovers' Walk, where
doubtless the "old story" would be told over and over again.
And now to introduce them more fully to the reader.
Dove Gainswood--she was well-named "Dove," so gentle and sweet was
the girl in her nature--was the only daughter of a wealthy lawyer,
living in one of the stateliest squares, at the west-end of the
Scottish metropolis--a personage of whom we shall unhappily have much
more than his name to record. Under the middle height, she had a
face that was charming in its contour and expression, with the pure
bright complexion that usually accompanies such thick rich hair as
hers, gorgeous dark auburn, of two shades, we may say, for it seemed
as if shot with gold when in the sunshine, and her soft dark eyes
were of that violet grey which looks black by lamp-light.
Gillian Lamond, her lover and cousin, we shall briefly say, was a
handsome, stout, and well-developed young fellow, taller than Dove,
by more than a head; with clear, honest, hazel eyes, who looked older
than his years, and milder than his real nature, which was proud,
fiery, and resentful, for he was, as his name imports, a Highlander
by blood.
In the dawn, but not the noon, of love, there is a difference in its
effect upon the sexes. At first, a young man is timid--often the
more timid of the two; thus hesitation, hope and doubt--doubt of
himself and still more of his uncle Gainswood--made Gillian Lamond
almost bashful; while Dove was quite, or nearly quite, collected,
with a shy yet triumphant smile on her sweet little face.
When they had parted last, a mere boy and girl, she was in her
fifteenth year, and since then had spent three years at a finishing
educational establishment. Now, when she had returned to Scotland in
her eighteenth year, and when Cousin Gillian was close on twenty-one,
it was somewhat perilous to be constantly together--for relationship
and propinquity are Cupid's greatest accessories; and Gillian formed
a portion of their domestic circle, as her father was his legal
guardian.
The hoyden of three years ago had returned from France mistress of
many accomplishments; she had a very pure intonation, and spoke very
sweetly, with a soft, low, cooing voice, quite in accordance with her
name; and had, in addition to that great charm in woman, acquired on
the Continent--or perhaps they were natural to her--some pretty
little ways and tricks of manner, that were very attractive.
Gillian was an only son. His father and Mr. Gainswood had married
two sisters; both of them were dead, and had been so for some years,
at the time our story opens. The mother of Gillian, with all her
little brood, of whom he was the sole survivor, had died far away in
India; and he, in early boyhood had been committed to his uncle's
care, while his father, Colonel Lachlan Lamond, whom he had not seen
for fourteen years, remained "up country," as the phrase is, serving
and scorching to amass money for one object, which had ever been the
passion of his life.
To regain by purchase the old estate of Avon-na-gillian, which had
been for ages in his family, till it passed into other hands through
the mischance of his having an extravagant grandfather, had been his
aim and ambition since the days when he had first passed the Sand
Heads of the Hooghly a poor cadet.
As the chief of the Clan Donoquhy had done, when he purchased back
his forfeited patrimony; as the late Glengarry hoped to do, when he
parted with all his vast estates, save the old castled rock and the
burial-place of his family, was the object of Colonel Lamond, and
amid years spent as a collector in Central India, during which time
he gradually passed, without much fighting certainly, to the head of
his regiment, he never forgot the arid rocks and heathy glens of
Avon-na-gillian; but had the mortification to see it thrice in the
market, before he had been able to transmit to his brother-in-law,
Gainswood, a sum sufficient for the purchase-money; for the coveted
estate, though small and poor naturally and originally, was now
rendered more valuable by its sheep and shootings.
Trusting implicitly in Gideon Gainswood, whom he believed to be a man
of the utmost probity, who was always reputed as such, and whom he
deemed safe as the Agra Bank or the India House itself, he confided
all to him; among others things, the most priceless, his only son,
who, with his name, was to inherit the estate when re-won; and whom
he would not permit--though it had been the lad's intense wish--to
become a soldier, lest the chances of war or of a tropical climate
might cut him off, as it had done all his little brothers, who lay
buried far apart in different parts of India.
Without binding him by any indenture, or fully educating him for the
legal profession--as the old Colonel had some contempt for it--the
injunctions to Gideon Gainswood were, that Gillian should learn
habits of order and industry by having a desk in his office, and
acquire sufficient knowledge of the law to make him careful, and able
to hold his own against all comers when he got it, and became Lamond
of Avon-na-gillian, in the Western Isles.
Gillian sighed at this decision, but was compelled to acquiesce in
his father's wishes, though repining bitterly; but ere long, after
manifesting the greatest reluctance and repugnance, he suddenly began
to devote himself with some perseverance to the dry mysteries of the
law, and to plod at his desk with a willingness which his
brother-clerks supposed to arise from the mere fact that he was a
species of volunteer in the work, but which in reality rose from a
desire to please his uncle Gainswood, and win his golden opinions,
for a reason which did not at first strike that usually astute
personage; and this was the return home of Dove, in whose society all
the leisure hours of Gillian were passed, and he was her escort
everywhere, to the great envy and admiration of his office-chums, who
were only permitted to know the young lady by sight, and among whom
Gillian was very popular--quite a lion in fact, from, his general
bonhommie, suavity, and generosity, as he was always "standing"
luncheons and dinners, as they phrased it, "to any extent."
It was quite natural, their companionship, the girl thought--were
they not cousins? He was quite the same as a handsome brother; but,
of course, a thousand times more tender and attentive. Matters
progressed rapidly and delightfully. Gideon Gainswood did not see
the situation, so absorbed was he in the legal work of his dirty
little world as a lawyer, and in the spiritual affairs of the next,
as an Elder of the Kirk; but old Mrs. Elspat McBriar, a poor widowed
relation, who managed his household, perceived it without the aid of
her spectacles.
And so, with reference to all that we have explained, as they slowly
promenaded to and fro, in the leafy tunnel of the Lovers' Walk, with
his hand caressingly clasping Dove's--
"I should have been a soldier," said Gillian; "a soldier like my
father, and all our forefathers, but for his eccentric reluctance and
distinct objection thereto; but now, Dove, that you have come back to
us, and now that--that you--"
"Are loved by me, Gillian?"
"Oh, my darling--yes!"
"Well?"
"Ambition of every kind, save to love you in return, and to please
you--yes, to adore you, is dead within me!"
Et cætera.
Engaged! So they were engaged, these two, and full of rapture to
think that they were so, and at the whole novelty of the sweet, yet
secret situation. But to what end? Gillian's allowance was small,
and he deemed the Colonel--notwithstanding his Indian pay and
allowances--to be poor, as, according to the statements of his uncle
Gainswood, the money destined for the acquisition of Avon-na-gillian
came home slowly and in small sums, yet he had a vague hope of more
monetary assistance from him in the future.
Dove's father was, he knew, rich, far beyond what legal men in
Scotland ever are; but he dared not reckon on that, as he knew him to
be grasping and avaricious. Still less did the poor lad know that
he, personally, was hated by him secretly, with the hate of those who
wrong the innocent, and dread discovery, and the unweaving of the web
of deceit.
But, of this, more anon.
Withal that their love was in its flush, marriage, the natural
sequel, seemed distant--even remote; but both were so young, there
was time enough; and both were so happy, so hopeful in Heaven and so
true in themselves.
Poor hearts! they foresaw not then how all this love, hope, and truth
were to be tested. It was in the sweet season of summer that Gillian
Lamond walked there hand-in-hand with Dove, his heart brimming over
with the new found joy.
Alas! he could little foresee where that day six months was to find
him--with Outram and Havelock, face to face with the fur-capped
Persian Cavaliers of Nusser-ud-Deen, in the land of the great
Cyrus--of Nusser-ud-Deen, the same shah whom we had so lately among
us, at Buckingham Palace and Trentham--a startling transition indeed.