Lord Erradeen was found next morning lying on his bed full dressed
sleeping like a child. A man in his evening dress in the clear air of
morning is at all times a curious spectacle, and suggestive of many
uncomfortable thoughts, but there was about Walter as he lay there fast
asleep an extreme youthfulness not characteristic of his appearance on
ordinary occasions, which made the curious and anxious spectator who
bent over him, think instinctively of a child who had cried itself to
sleep, and a convalescent recovering from a long illness. Symington did
not know which his young master resembled the most. The old man stood
and looked at him, with great and almost tender compassion. One of the
windows stood wide open admitting the air and sunshine. But it had
evidently been open all night, and must have chilled the sleeper through
and through. Symington had come at his usual hour to wake Lord Erradeen.
But as he looked at him the water came into his eyes. Instead of calling
him he covered him carefully with a warm covering, softly closed the
window, and left all his usual morning preparations untouched. This
done, he went down-stairs to the breakfast-room where Mrs. Methven, too
anxious to rest, was already waiting for her son. Symington closed the
door behind him and came up to the table which was spread for breakfast.
"My lady," he said, "my lord will no be veesible for some time. I found
him sleeping like a bairn, and I had not the heart to disturb him. No
doubt he's had a bad night, but if I'm any judge of the human
countenance he will wake another man."
"Oh, my poor boy! You did well to let him rest, Symington. I will go up
and sit by him."
"If ye will take my advice, my lady, ye will just take a little
breakfast; a good cup of tea, and one of our fine fresh eggs, or a bit
of trout from the loch; or I would find ye a bonnie bit of the breast of
a bird."
"I can eat nothing," she said, "when my son is in trouble."
"Oh, canny, canny, my lady. I am but a servant, but I am one that takes
a great interest. He's in no trouble at this present moment; he's just
sleeping like a baby, maybe a wee bit worn out, but not a line o' care
in his face; just sleepin'--sleepin' like a little bairn. It will do you
mair harm than him if I may mak' so bold as to speak. A cup of tea, my
lady, just a cup of this fine tea, if nothing else--it will do ye good.
And I'll answer for him," said Symington. "I'm well acquaint with all
the ways of them," the old servant added, "if I might venture, madam,
to offer a word of advice, it would be this, just to let him bee."
A year ago Mrs. Methven would have considered this an extraordinary
liberty for a servant to take, and perhaps would have resented the
advice; but at that time she did not know Symington, nor was she
involved in the mysterious circumstances of this strange life. She
received it with a meekness which was not characteristic, and took the
cup of tea, which he poured out for her, with a lump of sugar too much,
by way of consolation, and a liberal supply of cream, almost with
humility. "If he is not better when he comes down-stairs, I think I must
send for the doctor, Symington."
"I would not, my lady, if I were you. I would just watch over him, but
let him bee. I would wait for two or three days and just put up with
everything. The Methvens are no just a race like other folk. Ye require
great judgment to deal with the Methvens. Ye have not been brought up to
it, my lady, like me."
All this Mrs. Methven received very meekly, and only gratified herself
with a cup of tea which was palatable to her, after Symington, having
done everything he could for her comfort, had withdrawn. She was very
much subdued by the new circumstances in which she found herself, and
felt very lonely and cast away, as in a strange land where everything
was unknown. She sat for a long time by herself, trying to calm her
thoughts by what Symington had said. She consented that he knew a great
deal more than she did, even of her son in his new position, and had
come to put a sort of infinite faith in him as in an oracle. But how
hard it was to sit still, or to content herself with looking out upon
that unfamiliar prospect, when her heart was longing to be by her son's
bedside! Better to let him bee!--alas, she knew very well and had known
for long that it was better to let him bee. But what was there so hard
to do as that was? The shrubberies that surrounded the window allowed a
glimpse at one side of the loch, cold, but gleaming in the morning
sunshine. It made her shiver, yet it was beautiful: and as with the
landscape, so it was with her position here. To be with Walter, ready to
be of use to him, whatever happened, that was well; but all was cold,
and solitary, and unknown. Poor mother! She had loved, and cherished,
and cared for him all the days of his life, and a year since he had
scarcely seen Oona; yet it was Oona's love, and not his mother's, which
had made him understand what love was. Strange injustice, yet the
injustice of nature, against which it is vain to rebel.
While Mrs. Methven, sad and anxious and perplexed, sat in the unfamiliar
room, and looked on the strange landscape in which she found no point of
sympathy, Oona in the solitude of the isle, was full of similar
thoughts. The day which had passed so miserably to Walter had gone over
her in that self-repression which is one of the chief endowments of
women, in her mother's cheerful society, and amid all the little
occupations of her ordinary life. She had not ventured to indulge
herself even in thought, unless she had been prepared, as she was not,
to open everything to Mrs. Forrester--and thus went through the hours in
that active putting aside of herself and her own concerns, which is
sometimes called hypocrisy and sometimes self-renunciation. She smiled,
and talked, and even ate against her will, that her mother might not
take fright and search into the cause, so that it was not till she had
retired into the refuge of her own room that she was at liberty to throw
herself down in all the abandonment of solitude and weep out the tears
which made her brow heavy, and think out the thoughts with which her
mind was charged almost to bursting. Her candle burned almost all the
night long, until long after the moment in which the sight of it held
Walter back from the wild flight from her and everything to which his
maddening thoughts had almost driven him.
The conflict in Oona's mind was longer, if not so violent. With an
effort she was able to dismiss herself from the consideration, and with
that entire sympathy which may mistake the facts but never the
intention, to enter into the mind of her lover. There was much that she
could not understand, and did not attempt to fathom, and the process was
not one of those that bring happiness, as when a woman, half-adoring,
follows in her own exalted imagination the high career of the hero whom
she loves. Walter was no hero, and Oona no simple worshipper to be
beguiled into that deification. She had to account to herself for the
wanderings, the contradictions, the downfalls of a man of whom she could
not think, as had been the first impulse of pain, that any woman would
satisfy him, that Katie or Oona, it did not matter which--but who it was
yet true had offered himself to Katie first, had given himself to vice
(as she remembered with a shudder) first of all, and had been roaming
wildly through life without purpose or hope. In all the absolutism of
youth to know this, and yet to recognise that the soul within may not be
corrupt, and that there may be still an agony of longing for the true
even in the midst of the false, is difficult indeed. She achieved it,
but it was not a happy effort. Bit by bit it became clearer to her. Had
she known the character of the interview with Katie, which gave her
grievous pain even when she reasoned it out and said to herself that she
understood it, the task would have been a little less hard: but it was
hard and very bitter, by moments almost more than she could bear. As she
sat by the dying fire, with her light shining so steadily, like a little
Pharos of love and steadfastness, her mind went through many faintings
and moments of darkness. To have to perceive and acknowledge that you
have given your heart and joined your life to that of a man who is no
hero, one in whom you cannot always trust that his impulses will be
right, is a discovery which is often made in after life, but by degrees,
and so gently, so imperceptibly, that love suffers but little shock.
But to make this discovery at the very outset is far more terrible than
any other obstacle that can stand in the way. Oona was compelled to face
it from the first moment almost of a union which she felt in herself no
possibility of breaking. She had given herself, and she could not
withdraw the gift any more than she could separate from him the love
which long before she had been betrayed, she knew not how, into
bestowing upon him unasked, undesired, to her own pain and shame.
As she sat all through the night and felt the cold steal upon her, into
her very heart, and the desolation of the darkness cover her while she
pondered, she was aware that this love had never failed, and knew that
to abandon him was no more possible to her than if she had been his wife
for years. The girl had come suddenly, without warning, without any
fault of hers, out of her innocence and lightheartedness, into the midst
of the most terrible problem of life. To love yet not approve, to know
that the being who is part of you is not like you, has tendencies which
are hateful to you, and a hundred imperfections which the subtlest
casuistry of love cannot justify--what terrible fate is this, that a
woman should fall into it unawares and be unable to free herself? Oona
did not think of freeing herself at all. It did not occur to her as a
possibility. How she was to bear his burden which was hers, how she was
to reconcile herself to his being as it was, or help the good in him to
development, and struggle with him against the evil, that was her
problem. Love is often tested in song and story by the ordeal of a
horrible accusation brought against the innocent, whom those who love
him, knowing his nature, stand by through all disgrace, knowing that he
cannot be guilty, and maintaining his cause in the face of all seeming
proof. How light, how easy, what an elementary lesson of affection! But
to have no such confidence, to take up the defence of the sinner who
offends no one so much as yourself, to know that the accusations are
true--that is the ordeal by fire, which the foolish believe to be
abolished in our mild and easy days. Oona saw it before her, realised
it, and made up her mind to it solemnly during that night of awe and
pain. This was her portion in the world: not simple life and happiness,
chequered only with shadows from terrible death and misfortune, such as
may befall the righteous, but miseries far other, far different, to
which misfortune and death are but easy experiments in the way of
suffering. This was to be her lot.
And yet love is so sweet! She slept towards morning, as Walter did, and
when she woke, woke to a sense of happiness so exquisite and tender that
her soul was astonished and asked why in an outburst of gratitude and
praise to God. And it was not till afterwards that the burden and all
the darkness came back to her. But that moment perhaps was worth the
pain of the other--one of those compensations, invisible to men, with
which God still comforts His martyrs. She rose from her bed and came
back to life with a face full of new gravity and thoughtfulness, yet lit
up with smiles. Even Mrs. Forrester, who had seen nothing and suspected
nothing on the previous night except that Oona had perhaps taken a
chill, felt, though she scarcely understood, a something in her face
which was beyond the ordinary level of life. She remarked to Mysie,
after breakfast, that she was much relieved to see that Miss Oona's cold
was to have no bad result. "For I think she is looking just bonnier than
usual this morning--if it is not my partiality--like a spring morning,"
Mrs. Forrester said.
"Ah mem, and mair than that," said Mysie. "God bless her! She is looking
as I have seen her look the Sabbath of the Sacrament; for she's no like
the like of us, just hardened baith to good and evil, but a' in a
tremble for sorrow and joy, when the occasion comes round."
"I hope we are not hardened," said Mrs. Forrester; "but I know what you
mean, Mysie, though you cannot perhaps express it like an educated
person; and I was afraid that she was taking one of her bad colds, and
that we should be obliged to put off our visit to Mrs. Methven--which
would have been a great pity, for I had promised to Lord Erradeen."
"Do ye not think, mem," said Mysie, "that yon young lord he is very much
taken up with--the isle and those that are on it?"
"Hoots," said Mrs. Forrester, with a smile, "with you and me, Mysie, do
you think? But that might well be after all, for I would not wonder but
he felt more at home with the like of us, that have had so much to do
with boys and young men, and all the ways of them. And you know I have
always said he was like Mr. Rob, which has warmed my heart to him from
the very first day."
Perhaps the mother was, no more than Mysie, inclined to think that she
and her old maid won the young lord's attention to the isle: but a woman
who is a girl's mother, however simple she may be, has certain innocent
wiles in this particular. Lord Erradeen would be a great match for any
other young lady on the loch, no doubt: but for Oona what prince was
good enough? They both thought so, yet not without a little flutter of
their hearts at the new idea which began to dawn.
It was once more a perfectly serene and beautiful day, a day that was
like Oona's face, adapted to that "Sabbath of the Sacrament" which is so
great a festival in rural Scotland, and brings all the distant dwellers
out of the glens and villages. About noon, when the sun was at its
height, and the last leaves on the trees seemed to reflect in their red
and yellow, and return, a dazzling response to his shining, Hamish, busy
about his fishing tackle on the beach, perceived a boat with a solitary
rower, slowly rounding the leafy corners, making a circuit of the isle.
Hamish was in no doubt as to the rower; he knew everything as well as
the two who were most closely concerned. His brow, which for the last
twenty-four hours had been full of furrows, gradually began to melt out
of those deep-drawn lines, his shaggy eyebrows smoothed out, his mouth
began to soften at the corners. There was much that was mysterious in
the whole matter, and Hamish had not been able to account to himself for
the change in the young pair who had stepped out of his boat on to the
isle in an ecstasy of happiness, and had returned sombre, under the
shadow of some sudden estrangement which he could not understand.
Neither could he understand why it was that the young lord hovered about
without attempting to land at the isle. This was so unlike the usual
custom of lovers, that not even the easy explanation, half-contemptuous,
half-respectful, which the habits of the masters furnish to their
servants, of every eccentricity, answered the occasion--and Hamish could
not but feel that there was something "out of the ordinary" in the
proceeding. But his perplexity on this subject did not diminish his
satisfaction in perceiving that the young lord was perfectly capable of
managing his boat, and that no trace of the excitement of the previous
day was visible in its regular motion, impelled now and then by a single
stroke, floating on the sunny surface of the water within sight of the
red roofs and shining windows of the house, and kept in its course out
of the way of all rocks and projecting corners by a skill which could
not, Hamish felt sure, be possessed by a disordered brain. This solaced
him beyond telling, for though he had not said a word to any one, not
even to Mysie, it had lain heavily upon his heart that Miss Oona might
be about to link her life to that of a daft man. She that was good
enough for any king! and what were the Erradeens to make so muckle work
about, but just a mad race that nobody could understand? And the late
lord had been one that could not hold an oar to save his life, nor yet
yon Underwood-man that was his chosen crony. But this lad was different!
Oh! there was no doubt that there was a great difference; just one easy
touch and he was clear of the stanes yonder, that made so little show
under the water--and there was that shallow bit where he would get
aground if he didna mind; but again a touch and that difficulty too was
cleared. It was so well done that the heart of Hamish melted altogether
into softness. And then he began to take pity upon this modest lover. He
put his hands to his mouth and gave forth a mild roar which was not more
than a whisper in kind intention.
"The leddies are at home, and will ye no land, my lord?" Hamish cried.
Lord Erradeen shook his head, and sent his boat soft gliding into a
little bay under the overhanging trees.
"Hamish," he said, "you can tell me. Are they coming to-day to
Auchnasheen?"
"At half-past two, my lord," breathed Hamish through his curved hands,
"they'll be taking the water: and it's just Miss Oona herself that has
given me my orders: and as I was saying, they could not have a bonnier
day."
It seemed to Hamish that the young lord said "Thank God!" which was
perhaps too much for the occasion, and just a thocht profane in the
circumstances; but a lord that is in love, no doubt there will be much
forgiven to him so long as he has a true heart. The sunshine caught
Hamish as he stood watching the boat which floated along the shining
surface of the water like something beatified, an emblem of divine ease,
and pleasure, and calm, and made his face shine too like the loch, and
his red shirt glow. His good heart glowed too with humble and generous
joy; they were going to be happy then, these Two; no that he was good
enough for Miss Oona; but who was good enough for Miss Oona? The
faithful fellow drew his rough hand across his eyes. He who had rowed
her about the loch since she was a child, and attended every coming and
going--he knew it would be "a sair loss," a loss never to be made up.
But then so long as she was pleased!
At half-past two they started, punctual as Mrs. Forrester always was.
Every event of this day was so important that it was remembered after
how exact they were to the minute, and in what a glory of sunshine Loch
Houran lay as they pushed out, Mysie standing on the beach to watch
them, and lending a hand herself to launch the boat. Mrs. Forrester was
well wrapped in her fur cloak with a white "cloud" about her head and
shoulders, which she declared was not at all necessary in the sunshine
which was like summer.
"It is just a June day come astray," she said, nodding and smiling to
Mysie on the beach, who thought once more of the Sacrament-day with its
subdued glory and awe, and all the pacifying influence that dwelt in
it. And Oona turned back to make a little friendly sign with hand and
head to Mysie, as the first stroke of the oars carried the boat away.
How sweet her face was; how tender her smile and bright! more sorrowful
than mirthful, like one who has been thinking of life and death, but
full of celestial and tender cheer, and a subdued happiness. Mysie stood
long looking after them, and listening to their voices which came soft
and musical over the water. She could not have told why the tears came
to her eyes. Something was about to happen, which would be joyful yet
would be sad. "None of us will stand in her way," said Mysie to herself,
unconscious of any possibility that she, the faithful servant of the
house, might be supposed to have no say in the matter; "oh, not one of
us! but what will the isle be with Miss Oona away!"