"WELL, PETER?"
Next day was Sunday. Compared with other days at Clam Beach, it was
the same with a difference--leisure combined with fresh air, but
partaken of in a different form. Church was the recognised occupation;
but the churches were at Blue Fish Creek, four miles away, down the
coast in the other direction from Lippenstock. Omnibuses were in use
to convey the inmates, and everybody went, even the old people, the
dull ones, the invalid, and the young children. It was the only outing
which the dull people allowed themselves; there was nothing to pay for
the carriage exercise, and they never missed it.
Mrs Naylor and Mrs Wilkie remained at home. They had had enough of
driving the day before, and found it agreeable now to sit still in the
deserted gallery, and absorb sunshine and fresh air in peace. At least
such was the state of Mrs Naylor's feelings. Not being a British
mother, she had considerable confidence in her daughter's ability to
take care of herself, so long, at least, as that pernicious young man
Walter Blount was away, and she had no ground to suspect his presence
on Fessenden's Island. Besides, she was aware now that the girl's
uncle had also been left behind, therefore she was safe, not to
mention Peter Wilkie, whose mother had been making herself ridiculous
on the subject all the previous evening. There was nothing very
compromising in the situation, so far as she could see; in fact, with
her desire to suppress the girl's kindness for Blount, she could
almost have wished there had been. It would have brought the other
young man up to the point of committing himself, and, with a little
maternal pressure, compelled her to accept him; and as she had quite
made up her mind that Margaret was to marry in Toronto, that pressure
would assuredly be forthcoming.
Mrs Wilkie's motherly feelings were in a state of ebullition which
would not let her sit still. She would get up from her chair and pace
the gallery with irregular steps, puffing and sighing distractedly,
get tired and plump down again, pressing her hands together, and
sighing worse than before. Her boy was done for--bagged by a designing
girl. Speculatively and in the abstract, she was wont to express a
strong desire to see him married, whatever she may have felt; but the
ideal spouse had never yet appeared--or rather, whenever there seemed
a possibility of any fair one finding favour in his eyes, she began to
see objections, even if she had herself recommended the girl and
fancied that she would like him to marry her. Speculatively, she had
held Margaret Naylor in the highest esteem; actually, she found
herself detesting her with all her might. She had struck up quite a
friendship with her mother, and the fellow-boarders had differed only
as to which of the mothers was most desirous of being allied to the
other. Now, alas! her son's fate seemed to be decided. She must resign
the first place in his care, and had her supplanter been a seraph with
wings come straight down from heaven, she could not have accepted her
without a spasm of jealousy.
"Cast upon a desert island," she muttered to herself, as she paced the
gallery. "A second Robinson Crusoe, with his man Friday. But it's not
a man Friday! It's worse; it's a girl Friday!--or rather, it's worse
than any Friday at all--it's the parrot! A gabbin', chatterin',
useless thing--all tongue and feathers, and not wan grain of sense in
its head. An empty, feckless, dressed-up doll, with nothing but the
face and the clothes to recommend her. How can men of intelleck be
such fools? And after all, it isn't much of a face even. I've
seen----" but here the soliloquy grew inaudible; only, judging by the
toss of her head, which set the little grey curls on her temples
a-dancing, it must have been what she had seen in her own mirror long
ago which was so much more admirable.
She dropped into a chair near her companion, panting, and fanned
herself vehemently, complaining of the heat. It seemed to make her
hotter still to sit beside Mrs Naylor, in her present frame of mind.
"Try to sit still, dear Mrs Wilkie. You will find it the best way to
get cool," Mrs Naylor said, very sweetly. "He will be sure to be home
very soon. My brother-in-law is with them, you know; and between two
gentlemen, they will be sure to contrive some means of getting away."
Mrs Wilkie snorted, and fanned herself more vehemently than before,
relapsing into her late mutterings about Robinson Crusoe and the
desert island; but, disturbed as she was, she had presence of mind
enough to suppress the parrot, and complained of the heat and her
palpitations instead.
Mrs Naylor grew positively nervous, and even began to feel an
anticipatory pity for her daughter, in the prospect of so tumultuous a
mother-in-law--when, quite unexpectedly, the truants drove up to the
door.
"Peter, you rascal!" his mother exclaimed, jumping up and running
down-stairs to meet him. "You've nearly been the death of me;" and, to
demonstrate how much she had suffered, so soon as she came within
range of his supporting arms, she pressed both hands upon her
"palpitation," crying, "Oh!" and made as if she would fall.
Peter caught her as intended, and supported her up to her room, not
soothing her, by any means, but scolding her roundly, in good set
terms; but then he had known her for many years, and understood her
idiosyncrasies. Doubtless his system was the right one. Soothing would
only have encouraged her to rave and do the scolding herself, till her
palpitations came on in earnest. He was an excellent son, whatever his
shortcomings in other respects might be; and there are constitutions
which require what their medical advisers might call "bracing
treatment," just as others agree with bland and soothing remedies.
"Well, Peter?" she asked, with impatient eagerness, so soon as they
were closeted together, in complete forgetfulness of the scene which
she had been enacting the minute before--forgetting her incipient
faintness, and likewise the rough restoratives which had been applied.
"Have ye done it?"
"Done what, mother?"
"You know very well what I mean. Have ye promised to marry that girl
down-stairs?"
"I have not."
She heaved a great sigh of relief; but she went on with her catechism.
"How's that? I never saw ye more taken up with anybody. Ye stuck to
her like a burr the livelong day; and many were the envious glances I
saw some others casting after you two, as ye went dandering over the
hills like a pair of lovers. I was sure ye were nabbet--just grippet
and done for like a wired rabbit; and, says I to myself, there's wan
of the simple wans that love simplicity, and she's just inveigled him
into makin' her an offer."
"She doesn't want to inveigle me. She is provided already. She did not
give me the chance to make a fool of myself, like your young friend in
the Proverbs, whom you are so fond of talking about. She availed
herself of my escort to bring her to a man she liked better than me;
that was all."
"The besom! She took her use out of ye, and let ye slide? Do ye mean
to tell me that, Peter Wilkie? And are ye going to stand it? Have ye
nothing more to say than just stand like a gowk and own til it? Have
ye no spurrit left?"
"Whisht, mother! and don't haver."
"Whisht yourself! Do ye think I'm going to sit still and see a monkey
like that scancing at my son? She'd have the assurance, would she, to
take her use out of my boy, and throw him away when she was done, like
a socket gooseberry! My certie, but she'll rue it yet!"
"She did nothing, mother. The girl is engaged, though we did not know
it. You would not have me cut in and break up an engagement?"
"Ye might, if ye liked. Your poseetion would justifee you, and the
girl would be the gainer."
"But I wouldn't, mother, if she was fond of some one else."
"And who's the young man?"
"You don't know him. He is a Mr Blount, who was staying here last
week, but he went away."
"I never saw him, and ye know I have been a great deal with the girl's
mother. I'm thinking the attachment has not gone far, or I would have
seen him hanging about Mrs Naylor."
"I do not think Mrs Naylor likes him, and that was why he came to the
island to meet her quietly."
"Illeecitly? It'll be an illeecit amoor!"
"Whisht, mother! and don't speak French. You are taking away the
girl's character without knowing it."
"She deserves it, and more. To trifle with a Deputy Minister, and have
a sweetheart without telling her mother! I never heard the like. Ye're
well quit o' her, Peter."
"I never had her. She would not look at me."
"Set her up! But it will be my duty to say a quiet word to Mrs Naylor,
and enlighten her about her daughter's ongoings. It'll be good for the
hizzy, and a warning to her not to make use of gentlemen of poseetion
to serve her underhand ends."
"You won't, mother. It is no concern of yours. We know nothing about
the Naylors' affairs. Let them settle their own hash."
"I cannot but let a mother know about her daughter's ongoings. And oh,
but she's fond of her! It will stab her to the heart. But it may be
blessed to herself, for she's inclined to be rather high sometimes.
It's time she was learning a little humeelity."
"If you do, you'll disgrace me. People will say it was because she
would not look at me that I went and betrayed the girl's meeting her
lover, out of pure spite. Her uncle was there, besides, so it is no
concern of ours. And again, I do not want her."
"Of course not. But to think she would go walking away with you before
everybody, and laughing at you in her sleeve, to keep tryst with
another man! My blood just biles to think of it. I'd like to nip her
ears for her. But see if I don't give her a bit of my mind ere all's
done."
"If you do, mother----"
"Now, don't be clenchin' your fists at me, you unnatural boy. Just
your father over again. And a dour, cantankerous, wrongheaded gowk he
always was. He'd go out in the world and let them just trample on him,
and then he'd come home to his poor sufferin' wife, and play the
roaring lion. But he'd play another tune now, I warrant, if he could
get me back again. He'd be glad enough to have me, now he has to do
without me. And so with you, Peter, when you see me laid out stiff in
my coffin, ye'll be wishin' ye had used me better. Ah, my bonny man,
ye'll be wishin', when it's too late, ye had behaved different to your
fond old mother!" which was pathetic, and caused the speaker to wipe
her eyes. The effect on her son was different.
"I wish you would let the old man alone," he said. "It would sound
better. Nobody knows anything about him here, and need not, if you
will but hold your tongue. Some day you will forget yourself; there
will be a washing of our family linen held in public, and nobody will
think the more of either you or me. As for the young lady, unless you
will promise to say nothing either to her or her mother, we pack up
everything tonight, and back we go to Canada to-morrow morning."