A LAST KISS.
"Yes; open your heart! be glad,
Glad as the linnet on the tree:
Laugh, laugh away--and merrily
Drive away every dream that's sad.
Who sadness takes for joy is mad--
And mournful thought
Will come unsought."
After the climax recorded in our last chapter, events succeeded each
other with great rapidity at the castle of Rohallion.
At that period of our story, Flora Warrender had attained her full
stature--the middle height. In form, she was round, firm, and well
developed--plump, to speak plainly--yet she was both symmetrical and
graceful. Her eyes, we have said, were a kind of violet grey, clear,
dark and exquisitely soft. Long lashes, and the remarkable form of
her white lids, doubtless gave them this expression. Her forehead
was low and broad, rather than high; her smile won all, and there was
a charming air of delicacy and refinement in her manner, over all her
person, and in all she said or did. The form of her hand and foot
alone sufficed to indicate her station, family and nurture.
"There is a mysterious character, heightened, indeed, by fancy and
passion, but not without foundation in reality and observation, which
lovers have ever imputed to the object of their affections," says
Charles Lamb; and viewed through this most favourable medium, to the
mind of Quentin Kennedy, young and ardent as he was, Flora Warrender,
in all the bloom of her beauty and girlhood, seemed indeed something
"exceeding nature."
Thus it was with a heart filled with painful anticipations of coming
trouble, that he heard Lord Rohallion, one morning at breakfast, when
Jack Andrews emptied the contents of the letter-bag before him,
exclaim,--
"A letter from Cosmo! It is for you, Winny--the careless young dog,
he has not written here for six months--not even to thank me for
paying that precious gambling debt of his, lost among those popinjays
of the 10th Hussars. Then there was that devilish scrape with the
French dancer, whom he took down to Brighton with Uxbridge's son,
Paget of the 7th, and that set----"
"Hush--remember Flora!" whispered Lady Rohallion.
"And the duel, too," persisted the old lord; "pah! in my time we
didn't fight about such trumpery ware as French dancers. But what
says Cosmo?"
"He comes home by the next mail," replied Lady Rohallion, a bright
and motherly smile spreading like sunshine over her face; "how I
shall rejoice to see him--the dear boy!"
"A _dear_ boy, indeed!" said his lordship; "his Guards' life has cost
me ten thousand guineas, if it has cost me a sixpence, Winny."
"Cosmo is coming," said Lady Rohallion, pointedly; "do you hear,
Flora?"
"Yes, madam," replied Flora, colouring, and casting a furtive glance
at Quentin, who appeared to be solely occupied with his coffee and
kippered salmon.
"Cosmo writes that he has succeeded, by a death-vacancy, to the
majority of his battalion of the Guards, which, of course, gives him
the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in the army."
"As captain he has enjoyed that for some years."
"He has therefore applied for the command of a line regiment."
"That will be simple enough, as so many second battalions are being
raised just now for this projected expedition to Spain."
"The Duke of York has promised that his wish shall be gratified, and
he has obtained a few months' leave, to come down here and see us--to
have, as he says, a shot at the birds and a day's fly-fishing with
John Girvan, in the Doon, before he returns to active service."
"And we shall see him, then----"
"In three days--three days at furthest, Flora," she added, with a
glance at Miss Warrender.
"Bravo! you shall see something like a soldier, Flora, when Cosmo
returns--something like what I was, about the time of Saratoga; eh,
Jack Andrews?"
"Yes, my lord," responded Andrews, "coming to attention," as well as
a man might with a hissing tea-urn in his hand.
"Send up the housekeeper, Andrews," said Lady Rohallion, "we must
have the Master's rooms put in order, and also one for his valet; for
I suppose he comes here with him."
"If so fine a knight of the shoulder-knot can tolerate Rohallion,"
said his lordship, laughing.
"Come with me, Flora; I know, child, how glad you will be to assist
me," added Lady Winifred taking Miss Warrender's hand, and leading
her away, while Quentin, whose heart beat painfully, appeared to be
busy with a newspaper. It detailed how forty thousand Frenchmen were
being foiled before Zaragoza's walls of mud, yet it seemed all a maze
to poor Quentin, and he saw not how Flora's rich colour deepened as
she withdrew.
The Master was coming to Rohallion!
Quentin remembered that gentleman's cold and haughty manner, and the
half-concealed dislike which he ever manifested towards himself. He
remembered what Flora had more than once told him two years ago of
Lady Rohallion's intentions or hopes regarding her, and his heart
grew sick with apprehension of a rival so formidable. He thought
perhaps Cosmo might have formed an attachment elsewhere; but that
would not prevent him from making love to Flora, were it only to kill
time; and in her lover's eyes, she seemed so beautiful, that the
Master would certainly find it impossible to oppose the desire of his
mother; and Quentin dreaded her yielding; to the united influence of
the family, and the advantages a suitor of such rank, experience and
position could offer.
He saw it all, and considered Flora lost to him!
Pride made him silent on the subject, and Flora, who with female
acuteness divined what was passing in his mind, deemed it unnecessary
or unwise to speak of it. She pitied Quentin, for she soon perceived
how pale and miserable he looked; while he misconstrued her reserve
and became fretful, even petulant with her.
As if to add to his trouble, with that obtuseness of intellect (shall
we call it petty malice?) peculiar to their order, some of those same
persons, who long ago were wont to annoy Flora and make Quentin
blush, by jestingly calling them "man and wife," now taunted him with
his too probable loss on the arrival of the Master, a boy's love
being almost deemed, beyond any other, a legitimate subject for
banter.
These stinging remarks made Quentin's heart swell with pride and
jealousy, doubt and alarm, for now he heard the matter referred to
daily in the course of conversation.
"So, my dear lady," he heard the parish minister say, when paying his
periodical visit, "local rumour says that the Master is coming home
to obtain a final answer from a certain young lady, before rejoining
the army."
Lady Rohallion merely bowed and smiled, as much as to say that local
rumour was right.
"They have an old man's blessing," he added blandly, as he departed
on his barrel-bellied Galloway cob, and thought of an augmented
stipend in futurity.
"The Master's coming home to enter for the heiress, and have a shy at
the grouse and ptarmigan," the gamekeeper said, while cleaning the
arms in the gunroom.
"He'll walk the course--won't he, Mr. Quentin?" added the groom,
while preparing the stables for more horses.
"To carry the fortress, and leave you to march off with the honours
of war," said the quartermaster at one time.
"A braw day will it be for Rohallion!" remarked the dominie at
another. "There shall be dancing and feasting, scattering of nuts as
we find in Pliny, with shooting of cannon, and shouts of _Io Hymen
Hymenæe_!"
"My puir Quentin," said Elsie Irvine, while, pondering on such
rumours, he wandered moodily enough "by the sad sea wave," "so you're
gaun to lose your wee wifie at last?"
Thus every one seemed to discuss the affair openly and laughingly,
and their remarks and mock condolences, were as so many pins,
needles, daggers, what you will, in the poor lad's heart, so that his
doubts and fears became a veritable torture.
So great was the bustle of preparation in the castle, that the
evening of the third day--the day so dreaded by Quentin--drew nigh
without him obtaining a suitable opportunity of conversing with
Flora; for so much did Lady Rohallion occupy that young lady's time,
that he scarcely met her, save at meals, or in the presence of
others. But on this evening he suddenly saw her walking before him
in the avenue, and hastening forward, he joined her in silence.
Flora seemed weary, but rosy and smiling. Quentin was nervously
excited, but pale and unhappy in expression. Neither spoke, as they
walked slowly forward, and he did not take her hand, nor did she take
his arm, according to their usual custom, and the omission stung
Quentin most. Frankness seemed at an end between them, as if three
days had changed alike their nature and the relation that existed
between them.
Flora looked very beautiful and piquante in her gipsy hat wreathed
with roses, with her hair dark and wavy floating over her shoulders,
while a blush mantled from time to time in her soft cheek, and her
dark liquid eyes stole furtive glances from under their long lashes
at her young lover, fond glances of pity mingled with coquetry, but
all unseen by him, for Quentin's gaze was fixed on vacancy.
At length they reached the lower end of the avenue near the Lollard's
Linn, where there still stands a sombre thicket of very ancient thorn
trees, that were coeval, perhaps, with the first tower of Rohallion.
According to local tradition, this place was haunted by a
spectre-hound, which no one could attempt to face or trace with
safety, even if they had the courage to attempt it. Its form, that
of a great, lean, lanky staghound, black as jet, was usually visible
on clear nights, gazing wistfully at the moon; and in storms of wind
and rain, its melancholy baying would be heard to mingle with the
blast that swept through the ancient sycamores. It molested none;
but if assailed, it became terrible, swelling up to nearly double its
usual size, with back and tail erect like those of a pole-cat, its
jaws red as blood, and its eyes shooting fire.
Those who saw the dog-fiend in this state became idiots, and sickened
or died soon after. Tradition went farther, and asserted that the
spectre-hound was nothing else than the spirit of Lady Jean of
Rohallion (whose grim portrait by Vandyke, with a hawk on her wrist
and a gold cross at her girdle, hung in the ancient hall), a
high-flying cavalier dame, by whose order, after the battle of
Kilsythe, several fugitive Covenanters had been shot down in cold
blood, and buried in that thicket, where her unquiet soul was
condemned to guard their remains in this canine form until the day of
doom.
At all events, the old thorn trees where the spectre was wont to
appear, looked particularly gloomy on this evening, and as the lovers
passed near it, Flora drew closer to Quentin, and then she perceived
that his eyes were full of tears.
"Quentin--Quentin dear!" she exclaimed in a tone of earnest question
and expostulation. It was the first time, almost, that she had
addressed him since Cosmo's letter came, and now her voice thrilled
through him. He threw his left arm round her, and clasping her right
hand within his own, pressed it to his heart, which beat
tumultuously, and while the long avenue seemed whirling round them,
he said,--
"So Lady Rohallion has made up her mind that--that--you shall marry
the Master, Flora?"
"So it is the fear of this that distresses you?"
Pride sealed Quentin's lips.
"My poor Quentin," resumed Flora, looking tenderly and innocently
into his eyes, "you love me very much, don't you?"
"Love you--love you, Flora!" he stammered.
"Yes."
"I love you better than my life!" he exclaimed passionately.
"Well," said she, with a beautiful smile and a gaiety of manner that
he did not quite relish; "I will never marry any man but he whom I
choose myself--certainly not he who is chosen by others."
"Darling Flora!"
"There--there--_stop_--and perhaps, Quentin, I mayn't marry _you_.
'Tis said people change when they grow older, and we are very young,
you know; but Quentin, dear, I love you very, very much, be assured
of that."
Her head dropped on his shoulder, and he kissed her passionately--the
LAST time he was ever to do so in the old avenue of Rohallion.
At that moment the clatter of hoofs was heard, and ere they could
part or regain their composure, two horsemen, one in advance of the
other, both riding fast, with brown leather saddle bags and long
holsters--the first in a fashionable riding-coat with a cape, the
latter in livery, and both in top-boots and spotless white breeches,
passed up the avenue at a hand-gallop.
Both had seen our lovers near the thorn thicket, and the first
horseman, whom Quentin's heart rightly foreboded to be the dreaded
Master of Rohallion, turned in his saddle, and said something to his
groom, indicating the pair with his whip. They both looked back and
laughed immoderately, as they dashed through the ivy-clad arch of the
haunted gate.
Separating in haste and confusion, Quentin and Flora hurried away to
calm their excitement and seek the drawing-room.