Mr Ruthven was walking up and down his garden that afternoon in a
disturbed state of mind, when his wife came to him and asked him what he
thought Lady Carse could be in want of. She was searching among his
books and boxes as if she wanted something. He hastened in.
"Yes," Lady Carse replied, in answer to his question; "I want that
pistol that used to be kept on the top of your bed. You need not look
so frightened. I am not going to shoot you, nor anybody you ought to
care for."
"I should like to understand, however," observed the pastor. "It is
unusual for ladies to employ fire-arms, I believe, except in
apprehension of the midnight thief: and I am not aware of any danger
from burglars in these islands."
"Why no," replied the lady. "We have no great temptation to offer to
burglars; and nothing to lose worth the waste of powder and bullet."
"Then, if I may ask--"
"O yes; you may ask what I want the pistol for. It strikes me that the
boat from yonder vessel may possibly be sent back for me yet. They may
think me a prize worth having, if the stupid people carried my story
right. I would go with them--I would go joyfully--for the chance of
shooting that young gentleman through the head."
"Young gentleman!" repeated Mr Ruthven, aghast.
"Yes, the young Pretender. My father lost his life for shooting a Lord
President. His daughter is the one to go beyond him, by getting rid of
a Prince Charlie. It would be a tale for history, that he was disposed
of among these islands by the bravery of a woman. Why, you look so
aghast," she continued, turning from the husband to the wife, "that--
Yes, yes. Oh, ho! I have found you out!--you are Jacobites! I see it
in your faces. I see it. There now, don't deny it Jacobites you are--
and henceforth my enemies."
With stammering eagerness, both husband and wife denied the charge. The
fact was, they were not Jacobites; neither had they any sustaining
loyalty on the other side. They understood very little of the matter,
either way; and dreaded, above everything, being pressed to take any
part. They thought it very hard to have their lot cast in precisely
that corner of the empire where it was first necessary to take some part
before knowing what the nation, or the majority, meant to do. First,
they prevented the lady's finding the pistol, as the safest proceeding
on the whole; next, they wished themselves a thousand miles off, so
earnestly and so often, that it occurred to them to consider whether
they could not accomplish a part of this desire, and get a hundred miles
away, or fifty, or twenty--somewhere, at least, out of sight of the
Pretender's privateer.
In a few hours the privateer was out of sight--"Gone about north," the
steward declared, "for supplies:" as nobody was willing to give them any
help while under the shadow of Macdonald and Macleod. In the evening,
little Kate rushed into Annie's cottage, silently threw her arms about
the widow's neck, and almost strangled her with a tight hug. Adam
followed, and struggled to do the same. When he wanted to speak, he
began to cry; and grievously he cried, sobbing out, "What will you do
without me? You can't see the boats at sea well now; and soon, perhaps,
you will hardly be able to see them at all. And I was to have helped
you: and now what will you do?"
"And papa would not let us come sooner," said the weeping Kate, "because
we had to pack all our things in such a hurry. He said we need not come
to you till he came to bid you good-bye. But I made haste, and then I
came."
"But, my dears, when are you going? where are you going?"
"Oh, we are going directly: the steward is in such a hurry! And papa
says we are not to cry; and we are not to come back any more. And we
shall never get any of those beautiful shells on the long sands, that
you promised me; and--"
Here Mr Ruthven entered. He had no time to sit down. He told the
children that they must not cry; but that they might kiss their friend,
and thank her for her kindness to them, and tell her that they should
never see her any more. There was so much difficulty with the sobbing
children on this last point, that he gave it up for want of time,
threatening to see about making them more obedient when he was settled
on the mainland. While they clung to Annie, and hid their faces in her
gown, he explained to her that his residence in this island had not
answered to his expectation; that he did not find it a congenial sphere;
that he was a man of peace, to whom neither domestic discord, nor the
prospect of war and difficulty without, were agreeable; and that he was,
therefore, taking advantage of the steward's vessel to remove himself to
some quiet retreat, where the pastoral authority might be exercised
without disturbance, and a man like himself might be placed in a more
congenial sphere. He was then careful to explain that, in speaking of
domestic discord, he was far from referring to Mrs Ruthven, who, he
thought he might say, however liable to the failings of humanity, was
not particularly open to blame on the ground of conjugal obedience. She
was, in fact, an excellent wife; and he should be grieved to cause the
most transient impression to the contrary. It was, in truth, another
person--a casual inmate of his family--whom he had in his eye; a lady
who--
"I understand, sir. If you will allow me to go home with you--"
"Permit me to conclude what I was saying, Mrs Fleming. That unhappy
lady, in favour of whose temper it is impossible to say anything, has
caused us equal uneasiness by another tendency of late--a tendency to
indulge--"
But Annie did not, at such a moment, stand upon ceremony. She was by
this time leading the children home, one in each hand.
"So you are really going away, and immediately?" said she to Mrs
Ruthven.
"Immediately," replied the heated, anxious Mrs Ruthven.
"Where is Lady Carse?"
The question again brought tears into Mrs Ruthven's swollen eyes.
"I do not know. Mr Ruthven wishes to be gone before she returns from
her walk."
"We leave her the entire house to herself," declared the pastor, now
entering. "Will you bear our farewell message to her, and wish her joy
from us of being possessor of the whole house; and of--"
"Here she comes," said Annie, quietly. "Lady Carse," she said, "this is
a remarkable day. Here is another way opening for your deliverance--a
way which appears to me so clear that you have only to be patient for a
few weeks or months before your best wishes are fulfilled. Mrs Ruthven
will now be able to do for you what she has so often longed to do. She
is going to the main--perhaps to Edinburgh; she will see Mr Hope, and
others of your friends; and tell your story. She will--"
"She will not have anything of the sort to do," interrupted Lady Carse.
"I shall go and do it myself. I told her, some time since, that
whenever she quitted this island I would not be left behind. I shall do
my own business myself, if you please."
"That is well," interposed the pastor; "because I promised the steward,
passed my solemn word to him, as a condition of my departure, that it
should never become known through me or mine that Lady Carse had ever
been seen by any of us. I entirely approve of Lady Carse managing her
own affairs."
Annie found means to declare solemnly to Mrs Ruthven her conviction
that no such promise could be binding on her, and that it was her
bounden duty to spare no effort for the poor lady's release.
She was persuaded that Mrs Ruthven thought and felt with her; and that
something effectual would at last be done.
The children now most needed her consolations.
"Do not be afraid," she said cheerfully to them. "I shall never forget
you. I shall think of you every day. Whenever you see a sea-bird
winging over this way, send me your love: and when I see our birds go
south, I will send my love to you."
"And whenever," said Helsa, "you see a light over the sea, you will
think of Widow Fleming's lamp, won't you?"
"And whenever," said Lady Carse, with a solemnity which froze up the
children's tears, and made them look in her face, "whenever, in this
world or the next, you see a quiet angel keeping watch over a sinful,
unhappy mortal, you may think of Widow Fleming and me. Will you?"
The awe-struck children promised, with a sincerity and warmth which
touched Lady Carse with a keen sense of humiliation; not the less keen
because she had brought it upon herself by a good impulse.
The pastor and his family were presently gone; and without Lady Carse.
The steward guarded against that by bringing Macdonald to fasten her
into her house, and guard it, till the boat should be out of reach.
Annie did not intrude upon her unhappy neighbour for the first few
hours. She thought it better to wait till she was wished for.
"Our pastor gone!" thought she, as she sat alone. "No more children's
voices in this dwelling! No more worship in the church on sabbaths!
Thus is our Father always giving and taking away, that we may fix our
expectations on Him alone. But He always leaves us enough. He leaves
us our duty and our sabbaths, whether the church be open or in ruins.
And He has left me also an afflicted neighbour to comfort and
strengthen. Now that she thinks she depends on me alone, I may be the
better able to lead her to depend on Him."
And she was presently absorbed in meditating how best to do this most
needful work.