This was also the opinion of Janet when she heard of the encounter
on the road. Her demeanour was very grave when she served her guest
with his dinner, of which one of the aforesaid trout constituted an
important part. She did not smile upon him as in the morning, nor
expatiate upon the diverse dishes, as was her wont, but was curt and
cold, putting his food upon the table with a thud of her tray which was
something like a blow. Lewis, who had not been used to the mechanical
attention of English servants, but to attendants who took a great
deal of interest in him and what he ate, and how he liked it, felt
the change at once. He was very simple in some matters, as has been
said, and the sense of disapprobation quite wounded him. He began to
conciliate, as was his nature.
"This is one of Adam's trout," he said.
"Just that; if it wasna Adam's trout, where would I get it?" said the
ungracious Janet.
"That is true; and a great deal better than if it came from a shop, or
had been carried for miles."
"Shop!" cried Janet, with lively scorn. "It's little you ken about our
countryside, that's clear. Where would I get a shop if I wantit it? And
wha would gang to sic a place that could have trout caller out of the
water."
"Don't be so angry," said Lewis, with a smile. "After all, you know,
if I am so ignorant, it is my misfortune, not my fault. If I had been
asked where I wanted to be born, no doubt I should have said the banks
of Tay."
"That's true," said Janet, mollified. "But you would do nothing o' the
sort," she added. "You're just making your jest of me, as you did of
the misses."
"I--jest at the--misses," said Lewis, with every demonstration of
indignant innocence. "Now, Mrs. Janet, look at me. Do you think I am
capable of laughing at--anyone--especially ladies for whom I would have
a still higher respect--if I knew them. I--jest! Do you think it is in
me?" he said.
Janet looked at him, and shook her head.
"Sir," she said, but with a softened tone, "you're just a whillie whaw."
"Now, what is a whillie whaw? I don't mind being called names," said
Lewis, "but you must not call me a ruffian, you know. If one has no
politeness, one had better die."
"Losh me! it's no just so bad as that. I said sae to Adam. A young
gentleman may have his joke, and no just be a scoundrel."
"Did Adam think I was a scoundrel? I am sorry I made such a bad
impression upon him. I thought we had become friends on the river-side."
"Oh, sir, you're takin' me ower close to my word. I wasna meaning
so bad as that; but, according to Adam, when you set eyes upon
the misses, ye just burst out into a muckle guffaw: and that's no
mainners--besides, it's not kind, not like what a gentleman's expected
to do--in this country," Janet added, deprecating a little. "For
onything I ken," she added, presently, "it may be mainners abroad."
"It is not manners anywhere," said Lewis, angrily. "But Adam is a
great deal too hard upon me, Mrs. Janet. I did not break into a
loud--anything when I saw the ladies--why should I? I did not know
who they were. But afterwards when I discovered their names---- You
must sympathize with me. I had been looking for young ladies, pretty
young ladies," he said, with a laugh at the recollection. "There is
something more even that I could tell you. There had been some idea
of an arrangement--of making a marriage, you understand--between a
Miss Murray and a--gentleman I know;--if the friends found everything
suitable."
"Making up a marriage," Janet echoed, with bewilderment, "if the
friends found it suitable!"
"Just so--nothing had been said about it," said the young man, "but
there had been an idea. And when, knowing he was young, I beheld--two
old ladies----"
"I dinna know what you call old," said Janet, with a little resentment.
"If Miss Margaret's forty, that's the most she is. She's twa-three
years younger than me. Ay, and so there was a marriage thought upon,
though your friend had never seen the leddy? and maybe the leddy was no
in the secret neither."
"Oh, certainly not," Lewis cried.
"It would be for her siller," said Janet, very gravely. "You would do
well to warn your friend, sir, that there's awfn' little siller among
them; they've been wranged and robbed, as I was telling you. Not only
they're auld, as ye say, but they're puir, that is to say, for leddies
of their consequence. I would bid him haud away with his plans and his
marriages, if I were you."
"Oh, there was, perhaps, nothing serious in it; it was only an idea,"
said Lewis lightly. "The trout has been excellent, Mrs. Janet. You cook
them to perfection. And I hope you are no longer angry with me or think
me a scoundrel, or even--the other thing."
"Oh, ay, sir, ye're just the other thing--ye're a whillie whaw--ye
speak awfu' fair and look awfu' pleasant, but I'm no sure how you're
thinking a' the time. When I'm down the stairs getting the collops
you'll maybe laugh and say, 'That's an old fuil' to yoursel'."
"I should be an ungrateful wretch if I did," said Lewis, "especially as
I am very anxious to see what pleasant surprise you have prepared for
me under the name of collops."
"Ah!" said Janet, shaking her head, but relaxing in spite of herself,
"you're just a whillie whaw."
When she was gone, however, Lewis shook his head still more gravely at
himself. Was it not very imprudent of him to have said anything about
that project?--and it was scarcely even a project, only an idea; and
now it was ridiculous. He had been very imprudent. No doubt this woman
would repeat it, and it would get into the air, and everyone would
know. The question now was whether he should confine himself in future
to the collops, or whether he should explain to Janet that he had meant
nothing, and that his communication was confidential. He had certainly
been a fool to speak at all. To tell the truth, he had never been alone
in a totally new world without any outlet for his thoughts before,
and his laugh had been so inevitable, and the explanation so simple.
When Janet re-appeared with the collops, however, she was in haste,
and nothing more was said; and by-and-by he forgot that he had said
anything that it was not quite natural to say.
The presence of this young stranger at a little village inn so
unimportant as the "Murkley Arms" was a surprising event in the
village, and set everybody talking. To be sure an enthusiastic
fisherman like Pat Lindsay, from Perth, had been known to live there
for a month at a time during the season, and to nod his head with great
gusto when Janet's merits as a cook were discussed. Most people in
Murkley were quite aware of Janet's merits, but the outside world, the
travellers and tourists who passed, so to speak, on the other side,
had no information on the subject. This was one of the points, indeed,
in which it was an endless vexation to her that her husband had "nae
pith" nor spirit in him. Had the little house been furbished up and
made into a fine hotel, Janet knew that she had it in her to make that
hotel a success; but with a man who could neither look imposing and
dignified at the head of such an establishment, nor do any of the hard
work necessary, what could a woman do? She had to give up the hope of
rising in the world; but, when it so happened that a guest did come,
Janet's treatment of him was royal. And she felt a certain gratitude to
the visitor who gave her an opportunity of showing what was in her.
"What is he here for?" she said. "What for should he no be here, if
ye please? He's here for his ain pleasure. He's from foreign parts,
and it's good for him to see what the life is in a real quiet,
honest place. They havena ower much of that abroad. They have your
gambling-tables, and music playing morning, noon, and nicht. Eh, but
they maun be sick o't! A band once in a way I say naething against,
and when it's a regiment marching it's grand; but trumpets blaring and
flaring like thae Germans, losh me! it would send a body out of her
wits in nae time. He's come away from that, and I think he's a wise
man. And though he's no fisher himself he likes to see Adam catch the
trout. And he's a fine lad. He's welcome to bide as long as he likes,
for me."
This was her answer to the many questions with which at first she was
plied on the subject. The minister, who was a man of very liberal
mind and advanced views was soon interested in the stranger, and made
acquaintance with him as he lingered about on Sunday after church
looking at the monuments in the church-yard. Lewis went to church
cheerfully as a sort of tribute to society, and also as the only
social meeting to which he could get admittance. He loved to be among
his fellow-creatures, to see other people round him, and, unknown
as he was, this was almost his only way of enjoying the pleasure.
The minister, whose name was Seton, accosted him with very friendly
intentions.
"You will find, I fear, a great difference in our services from those
you are used to," he said. "I would fain hope things were a little
better with us than they used to be; but we're far behind in ritual.
The sister Church has always held up a far different standard."
"Which Church is that?" said Lewis, with his friendly candour of mind.
"I am a very great ignoramus."
"Ah, I suppose you are High," said the minister, "and don't acknowledge
our orders. Of course, you cannot expect me to consent to that. The
Church of England is a great institution, but apt to carry things with
a high hand, and look down upon Protestant brethren."
"Ah, yes--but I don't know anything about England," said Lewis, still
puzzled; upon which Mr. Seton made many apologies.
"I ought to have known--of course, your complexion and all that; you
come from the land of enlightenment, where everything is subservient to
intellect. How glad I shall be of the opportunity ask to your advice
about some passages I am in doubt about! Your fatherland is the home of
biblical science."
"I am not a German," said Lewis, "but I know the language well enough,
and if I can be of any use----Oh, no, I am an Englishman, though I
never was in England--unless I may call this England."
"Which you certainly must not do," said the minister; "we've fought
hard enough on that account in our day. I suppose you are here
for the fishing," he added, as everybody did, but with a little
disingenuousness, for by this time all the world was aware that Lewis
did not fish, nor pretend to fish, nor, indeed, do anything but what
the good people of Murkley called idling his time away.
"I am no fisher," he said--"not a sportsman at all, and not much of an
artist either. I am not very good at anything. I came here because it
struck my fancy."
He laughed somewhat uneasily, because it was not true, and he was a bad
deceiver; but then Mr. Seton had no reason to suppose that it was not
true, and he took it with great composure as a natural reason enough.
"It is a fine country," he said. "I am free to say it, for it is not my
country. I am from the south myself."
"The south!" said Lewis, deceived in his turn, and looking with a
little surprise at the fine burly form and grizzled locks of the
clergyman, who seemed to him of the same type as Adam, and not like
anything that he realized as the south. "Do you mean of France, or
still nearer the mezzo-giorno? Oh, I know the south very well. I have
been through the wildest parts of Sicily and Calabria, as well as most
civilized regions."
"I meant Dumfriesshire," said the minister, with a blush. He felt as if
he had been guilty of false pretences. "That is south to us. You have
been a great traveller, Mr.----"
"Murray," said Lewis, quickly.
"You are a Murray, too? Then I suppose you had ancestors in this
district. That's very common; I have had people come here from all
the ends of the world anxious to look at the tombstones or the parish
register."
"I shall not need to do that," the young man said. "The name came to me
with some property," he added, with his usual mixture of caution and
imprudence--"from my god-father," he added, after another pause. This
was so far true that it was the name by which the young dependent on
his bounty had been used to call old Sir Patrick; his voice softened at
the word, which he had not used for so long. "He brought me up--he was
very good to me. I have lost him, there is about a year."
The minister felt that it was necessary to reply in his professional
capacity.
"Ah," he said, "such losses shatter the world to us; but so long as
they turn our thoughts to better things, to the land whither we must
all travel----"
Lewis was not used to spiritual consolation; he gave his companion a
nod of not uncheerful assent.
"He always wished me to travel," he said. "It has become to me a second
nature. I am told that it is to the Highlands that tourists go, but
otherwise this pleases me very much."
"And you are comfortable at Adam Burnet's? He is a character--the
sort of mind that we flatter ourselves is peculiarly Scotch," said
the minister. "I hope you will gratify my wife and me by taking your
luncheon with us. A stranger is always welcome," he continued, leading
the way after Lewis had consented with a smile and bow and flourish of
his hat, which made Mr. Seton smile, "in a Scotch manse; and if you are
making a long stay, Mr. Murray----"
It was thus that Lewis made his first entry into society in the village.
"You should have seen his bow, my dear," the minister said; "he is just
awfully foreign, but a good fellow for all that, or else my skill in
faces is at fault."
This was to prepare Mrs. Seton to receive the stranger, whom, indeed,
the minister brought in with a sense of an unauthorized interference in
what was not his department. He was at liberty to bring an old elder, a
brother minister, even a farmer of superior description; but Mrs. Seton
was particular about young men. Katie was sixteen, and "there was never
any telling," her mother said. In the present case the risks were even
greater than usual, for this young man was without an introduction,
nobody to answer for him or his respectability, and a foreigner
besides, which was at once more terrible and more seductive than an
intruder native born.
"Your father is so imprudent," she said to Katie. "How can we tell who
he is?"
"He looks very innocent," said that young woman, who had seen the
stranger a great many times, and found him entirely unlike her ideal.
Innocent was not what Miss Katie thought a young man ought to look.
She followed her mother to the early Sunday dinner, which Mr. Seton
entitled lunch, without the slightest excitement, but there was already
some one in the room whose presence disturbed Katie's composure more.
Of the three gentlemen there assembled, Lewis was the least in height
and the least impressive in appearance. The two stalwart Scotchmen,
between whom he stood, with vigour in every line of their long limbs
and every curl of their crisp locks, threw him into the shade. He was
shorter, slighter, less of him altogether. His hair was light, and
not very much of that. In all probability when he was older he would
be bald, and people who depreciated Lewis were apt to say of him that
he was all one colour, hair and complexion. His dress had a little
of a foreign cut, or rather it was elaborately English _à la mode de
Paris_, and he was not at all indifferent about his reception here, but
sincerely anxious to please and make a favourable impression, and did
not in the least hesitate to show that he was so. This went against him
with the party generally, but Lewis was quite unaware of that.
The other young man whom he had found there, when the minister showed
him into the little drawing-room and went to report what he had done to
his wife, was in reality half a head taller, and looked twice the size
of Lewis. He was brown and ruddy like most of the men about, accustomed
to expose himself to the weather, and to find his occupation and
pleasure out of doors. He was slightly shy, but yet quite at his ease,
knowing that it was his duty to talk and be friendly to the stranger,
and doing his duty accordingly, though he had none of Lewis's eager
desire to make himself agreeable. When the minister entered they were
introduced to each other as Mr. Murray and Mr. Stormont, upon which
Lewis said immediately, with a little effusive pleasure,
"Ah, I know your name very well; you must belong to the tower on the
other side of the river. I attempt to sketch you almost every day."
"Oh!" said young Stormont, and in his mind he added, "It's an artist,"
which seemed to account for the stranger at once.
"My attempts have not been very successful," Lewis added, laughing.
"I go out with Adam when he goes to fish, and when a trout is very
interesting my sketch-book falls out of my hands."
"You can't see much of the tower from the other side," said Stormont.
"I hope you will come and study it near at hand."
"That I will do with great pleasure," cried Lewis. It exhilarated him
to find himself again in good company. "You are very kind to admit me
into your house," he said, with frank gratification, to the minister.
"Mrs. Janet and her husband are very interesting; they throw a great
light upon the country: but I began to long to exchange a little
conversation with persons--of another class."
"I am sure we are very glad to see you," said Mrs. Seton. "It must be
lonely in an inn, especially if you have come out of a family. We have
seen you passing, and wondered what you could find in Murkley. There is
no society here. Even the tourists going out and in are a variety when
you are further north, but here we are just dropped in a corner and see
nothing. Oh, yes, old Pat Lindsay who thinks of nothing but his trout.
Trout are nice enough things on the table, but not as the subject of
conversation. Even Mr. Stormont here is away oftener than we would like
him to be."
"Only for the shooting," said Stormont, "and a little while in
Edinburgh in the winter, and sometimes a run up to town in the spring."
"How much does that leave?" said the lady, playfully. "But never mind,
we cannot expect to bind a young man here. I think of the time when my
own boys will grow up and want to be moving. Thanks be to Providence,
Katie's a girl and will stay at home."
Katie's eyes, which were bright and brown like the Tay, opened a little
wider at this, and gave out a glance which was half laughter across the
table. Lewis, looking on with great interest, felt that the glance was
winged to somewhere about that part of the table where young Stormont
sat, and felt a great sympathy and interest. He met her eyes with a
slight smile in his, making unconscious proffer of that sympathy, which
made Katie blush from head to foot, and grow hot with indignation as
well, as if she had been found out.
"Mr. Murray has been a great traveller," said the minister, "and,
Katie, you should seize the opportunity to try how your German sounds,
my dear. It is apt to be one thing on a book and another in the mouth.
I made so dreadful a failure in the speaking of it myself the first
time I tried to do it that I never made the attempt a second time. But
I suppose one language is the same as another to you."
"Katie speaks it very well, I believe," said her mother; "but, dear
me, where is the use of it here? We are out of the way both of books
and people, and how is a girl to keep it up? There's a great deal of
nonsense about teaching children foreign languages, in my opinion. But,
whisht, let me think what company we have that would suit Mr. Murray;
everybody is so far off. To be sure, there is one family, but then they
are all ladies--the Miss Murrays at the castle. We must not leave them
out, but they would be little resource to a young man."
"And perhaps they are not so kind, so hospitable as you," said Lewis.
"I have already, I fear, offended them, or if not them then their
admirers. It is they who are called the Misses? Then I thought that
must mean young ladies, very young. It was foolish, but I did so. And
when in the road with Adam we encountered these old ladies----"
"Oh, stop, stop, not old. I cannot have them called old," cried Mrs.
Seton. "Bless me, Miss Jean is not much more than my age."
"And it does not matter whether they are old or young," said Katie; "we
are all very fond of them."
"And I," said Lewis, putting his hand on his heart, "respect them
infinitely. I am much interested in those ladies. The oldness is
nothing--it does not affect me. I wish to know them above everything. I
have known their grandfather--abroad."
"Bless me," said Mrs. Seton; "old Sir Patrick? This is most
interesting. I never saw him; he was away before we came here. And
what did you think of him? He was a tyrant, I've always heard, and
a terrible egotist; thinking of nothing but his own pleasure. You
know the story, I suppose, of how he left all his money away from the
family; and nothing to any of them but the old house and that big folly
of a new one. I wonder they don't pull that place down."
"Oh, mamma, if money was to come into the family! that is what Lilias
says. If some uncle they never heard of was to come from India, or
somebody they had been kind to die all at once, and leave them a
fortune."
"I will not have you see so much of Lilias, if she fills your head full
of nonsense," said Mrs. Seton. "Such folly! for they have no uncle in
India, that ever I heard tell of; and people now-a-days don't make
those daft-like wills--though, to be sure, Sir Patrick's an example.
Did you ever see, Mr. Murray, the young man we've heard so much about?"
"The fellow that got the money," young Stormont said.
"What kind of a being was it?" said the minister. "Some supple foreign
lad that flattered the silly old man. It has always been strange to me
that there was nobody near to speak a word for justice and truth."
"You are hard upon foreigners," said Lewis. "It is not their fault
that they are foreign. Indeed they would not be foreign _there_, you
know, but the people of the country, and we the foreigners. I knew
this fellow, as you say. He was not even foreign, he was English. The
old gentleman was very fond of him, and good to him. He did not know
anything about the money."
"Ah, Mr. Murray, you'll never persuade me that. Would a young man give
up years of his life to an old one without any expectations? No, no, I
cannot believe that."
"Did he give up years of his life? Oh, yes, I suppose so. No one
thought of it--in that light. He loved him like his father. There was
no one else to take care of him, to make him happy. I see now from the
other point of view. But I do not think he meant any harm."
This Lewis said much too seriously and anxiously for his _rôle_ of
spectator, but at the moment, there being no suspicion, no one remarked
his nervous earnestness. He cast a sort of appealing glance round the
table, with a wistful smile.
"No one," he said, "_there_, thought any harm. He was the most
astonished himself."
"And what kind of a fellow was he," said Stormont, "a gentleman, or
just some cad the old man had picked up?"
At this Lewis grew red in spite of himself, then did his best to laugh,
though the effort was great.
"I do not know," he said, "having always lived abroad, what is exactly
a cad, and also what, when you come to its exact meaning, is a
gentleman?"
"Oh, a gentleman--" said Mrs. Seton. "Bless me, what a question? It
is just--not to be mistaken: there is no two words about it----No,
no--describe it! how could I describe it? A gentleman! my dear Mr.
Murray, you can be in no doubt about that."
"And a cad is just a cad," said young Stormont, "a fellow, don't you
know, that's not a gentleman--just as a hill isn't a river, and can
never be."
"As distinct as that?" said Lewis. "It is hard upon us who have always
lived abroad. It means, to be well-educated and well-bred----"
"And well-born, Mr. Murray; you must not leave out that. Well-born,
above all things; there's everything in race."
"But those whom you meet only in society," said Lewis, "even on the
Continent--where every man must have _ses papiers_--he does not carry
them about with him. He does not pin a little _carnet_ on his sleeve.
You must take him on trust."
"That is just the danger of promiscuous society," said Mrs. Seton,
briskly. "That is what I always say to papa. It is so easy to be taken
in by a fair exterior; and when you don't know who people are, and all
about them, it's a serious thing," said the lady, shaking her head,
"especially where there are young people. Oh, it is a very serious
thing, Mr. Murray. I am sure I always say about ball-room acquaintances
and persons of that sort, if harm comes of it, really you have nobody
to blame but yourself."
There was a pause after this, and a great sense of embarrassment. Katie
looked at her mother with anxious, telegraphic communications, of
which Mrs. Seton either would not or did not take any notice. Even Mr.
Stormont, though not very quick, saw the dilemma. Lewis was the most
self-possessed.
"I must be more grateful than ever," he said, turning to his hostess,
with that conciliatory smile which was so natural to him, "that you
have given your hospitality so kindly to one who has no vouchers, no
one to speak for him--a stranger."
"Bless me, Mr. Murray, I hope you never thought----Dear, dear, you
might be sure that was the last thing in my mind. Present company, you
know, of course; and then in some cases the first look is enough," said
Mrs. Seton, with a gracious bow to her guest.
This little episode distracted the company altogether from the question
propounded by Stormont about Sir Patrick Murray's heir, and during the
rest of the meal Lewis exerted himself to keep away from dangerous
subjects: which was a greater mental effort to him, perhaps, than
any he had ever made in his life. For he was ready by nature to take
everybody he met into his confidence. He had the most unbounded trust
in his fellow-creatures, and he wanted to be approved, to have the
sympathy of those about him. He, whose impulse it was to be always
looking out of the window--how could he put up shutters, and retire
into seclusion and mystery? It was the thing of all others most
difficult to him. But he was quick and ready, and kept his wits about
him, having been thus put on his guard. He betrayed something else with
great and simple pleasure--his own accomplishments, which were, in Mrs.
Seton's opinion, many. He showed them his amateur sketch-book, which
seemed the work of a great artist to these uninstructed people, and,
indeed, was full of fairly brilliant dashes at scenery and catchings up
of effect, which he himself was well aware were naught, but which were
very attractive to the uncritical. And it was all they could do to keep
him from the piano, where he sadly wanted to let them hear one or two
morceaux from the last opera. Mrs. Seton had to place herself in front
of the instrument with an anxiety to prevent the desecration of the
Sabbath without exposing herself to the charge of narrow-mindedness,
which was highly comic.
"That will be for to-morrow," she said. "We must not have all our
good things at once. No, no, we must leave something for to-morrow.
The servants, you see, have prejudices--we have to consider so many
things in a manse. A clergyman's family are always talked about: and
then economy's my principle, Mr. Murray; we must keep something for
to-morrow. And that just reminds me that I hope you will come in a
friendly way and spend the evening--we have no parties, you know,
here--but if you will just come in a friendly way: and _then_ it will
give us the greatest pleasure," Mrs. Seton said, nodding her head and
smiling.
Thus immediate advantage sprang from the over-boldness of his foreign
ways; and when he left the manse, young Stormont, though somewhat
contemptuous of a man who "went in for" music and spoke all sorts
of languages, yielded to the ingratiating ways of the stranger, and
invited him half surlily to lunch with him next day at the tower, which
Lewis accepted with his usual cordiality.
He went back with a sense of exhilaration to the parlour overlooking
the village street, all so still in the drowsy Sunday afternoon.
"Me voici lancé," he said to himself, with glee. He had known the
excitements of society very different from that of Murkley, but he knew
the true philosophy of being not only contented, but pleased, when you
cannot get everything you like, with what you are lucky enough to be
able to get.