It was very difficult for Rowland to decide what course he ought to
pursue practically at the moment after these bewildering experiences. He
was a man who had a great contempt for what he would himself have called
shilly-shallying, and for the impotence which could be mastered by
difficulties, and could not make the most of a trying situation. He
would a little time before have scoffed at the possibility of any such
thing happening to himself. No such thing had ever happened in the
course of his work, which had involved many interests far more important
than the interests of two insignificant creatures--girl and boy: which
had sometimes been weighted with the responsibility of life and death
for many; and yet he had not paused and hesitated as now. Two
insignificant creatures, girl or boy, will blot out earth and even
heaven from you, standing so near as they do, annihilating all
perspective. What short work would he have made with them had they been
a gang of navvies, or more difficult, a staff of clerks or engineers!
But Marion and Archie were a very different matter. They had a right not
only to all he could do for them, but to himself and everything that was
best in him. Nothing could do away with that claim of nature. Not
disapproval, dissatisfaction on his part, not even unworthiness on
theirs. And they were not unworthy, poor things. Their only fault it
was, and it was not their fault, that their father was in one
atmosphere and they in another. Not their fault! he it was who had left
them in that atmosphere--condemned them to it, and he must bear the
penalty.
They enjoyed their day in the carriage, driving about wherever they
liked, displaying their grandeur to admiring friends--at least Marion
enjoyed it to the bottom of her heart. And she was _bon prince_ in her
elevation. She waited in all her splendour at the door of a little
house, where everybody came to the window to stare at “the carriage”
while a sick girl was hastily dressed in her best--and took the invalid
out for a drive. There was a vain kindness in the girl, and a warm
desire to bestow favours which was partly the product of vanity and
partly of a better inspiration. She was really proud and happy when the
colour came faintly into the cheeks of her ailing friend, although she
never failed afterwards to attribute her recovery to “yon drive I took
you.” The kindness was vulgar, and fed conceit, yet it was kindness in
its way. Archie was not perhaps so happy. He soon tired of “the
carriage,” and desired to be left at the cricket ground, which they
again visited, and joined his friends, not without a certain glow of
superior rank and importance about him from the fact of his being
dropped there by the carriage, yet glad to escape from a position that
was tiresome.
They all dined that evening with Mr. Rowland at his hotel--Mrs. Brown in
such splendour of apparel that her brother-in-law was abashed by her
appearance. Marion was fortunately more simply arrayed, and her father
tried to believe that it was her own good taste which made the
difference. The poor man felt all their little solecisms at table with
double force, as remembering that he had once himself felt all the
perplexity which paralysed Archie as to what he was to do with his knife
and fork and table-napkin, and the finger-bowl which was put before him
at dessert. As for Mrs. Brown, she showed no perplexity at all, but
frankly broke every rule, stuck her fork into the potato she preferred,
helped herself to the salt with her knife, and then ate her peas with it
in the most assured simplicity, unconscious of criticism.
“Will you give me a little of that, sir,” she said to the waiter. “I’m
no just sure what it is, but I would like to try. I tell the bairns no
to be prejudiced, but just to try everything.”
Rowland felt that the imperturbable waiters were laughing in their
sleeves at this strange party. But Marion gave him a little comfort.
Marion was as sharp as a needle. She had all her wits about her. She
divined from the smallest indication what was the right thing to do; but
then she had read a great many novels, in some of which the very
circumstances in which she now stood were set forth. Novels are a great
help to an intelligent young lady endeavouring to acquire the manners of
society to which she has been unaccustomed. Between these several
sources of enlightenment she came out with credit from the ordeal, which
made Archie feel himself a clown, and which Jane blundered through
without being aware. This somehow eased the weight of trouble in
Rowland’s heart.
“And what are ye gaun to do the morn?” said Mrs. Brown, lying back in
an easy chair with her cap strings unloosed, and a genial glow upon her
countenance after her abundant meal. “Have ye some ferlies to let your
father see? But he just knew them all before ye were born.”
“I am afraid I have no time to see ferlies,” said Rowland. “I’ve seen a
great many in my time. I am engaged to-morrow: and I must get back to
London as soon as I can. I can’t leave my wife alone.”
“Oh, man, ye might first let the bairns have their turn,” said Jane,
with a cloud on her brow. But alarmed by the darkness of that which
gathered on his, she added hastily, “They might take a trip down the
water if ye’re so busy. Ye canna expect them to settle to anything and
you here.”
Then Rowland had a momentary struggle with himself. He came out of it
victoriously on the side of virtue. “I am going,” he said, “to Rosmore
to-morrow. Perhaps you would like to come with me, and see the house.”
There was a cry of eager acceptance from Marion of this proposal, and
Archie gave his father a look of pleasure. Mr. Rowland was emboldened to
add--“We must make the most of it, for in a day or two I must go to
London.”
“That’s just what they would like best of all,” said Mrs. Brown.
“Archie, puir laddie, would just give his little finger for a look of
London. I’ve always said no, for it’s a place full of temptations. But
to be with his own father makes a great difference.”
“And me,” said Marion. “Ah, papa,” she added, studying his countenance,
“I want to see London; but far more, I want to see mamma.”
“Don’t say----!” said Rowland, and then stopped. He felt a sort of pang
of indignation to think of this girl calling Evelyn by that name. This
girl--his own girl--his child! He stopped short with a hard drawn breath
of vexation. Of course she must say mamma if she would--or mother, a
more sacred title. And it would be necessary for Evelyn to submit to
it--Evelyn would desire it. Between these two certainties he felt
himself caught as in a vice.
“I am sorry,” he said, “that I can’t take you with me to London--it is
out of my power.”
“Dear, man,” said Mrs. Brown, “you that just have your pockets full of
money, how can it be out of your power? It’s a journey that costs dear,
and living in a hotel is just ruination; but you’re no one to consider
that. You mauna say it’s out of your power.”
“Money is not everything,” said Rowland shortly.
“Eh no--far be it from me to say it is; but in the matter of taking your
two children upon a veesit, what else is there to think o’? Na, na,
there are plenty things it canna buy. It can neither bring ease o’ body
nor peace o’ mind; but railroad tickets to London--Hoot! it’s siller
alone that’s wanted--and you that has just your pockets full!”
“It is out of the question,” said Rowland, and then he stopped suddenly
once more, for he had encountered the wistful look in Archie’s eyes--the
eyes that were his mother’s. It cost him an effort to repeat his
negative in the face of that silent appeal. “I cannot do it,” he said
hastily. “Another time--but not now. However, if you would like to come
with me and see the house--”
This proposal was accepted _faute de mieux_, and he set off next morning
accompanied by the two young people, who by this time had become a
little accustomed to him, and had learned to adapt themselves a little
to his “ways.” Marion at least had learned to note when he was worried
and put out, and though she was not yet at all aware what points in her
conduct disturbed him, or that it was her conduct that disturbed him,
her quick perception had already noticed that something did from time to
time derange his equanimity, and that it was his children who were the
cause.
“It will be Archie,” she said to herself. Already, so quick is the
contagion of a new sentiment, Marion had begun to be dissatisfied about
Archie’s clothes. His coat was rough and badly made in comparison with
his father’s coat; his boots were clumsy, his linen dingy. All these
things she had found out for herself. Archie was not bad-looking: he was
rather handsome than the reverse; but he had not at all the same
appearance as his father, who was old and without any graces. This
Marion discovered all by herself. She had not attained to any such
enlightenment on her own account.
When they got out at Rosmore pier, other revelations began. They found a
dog-cart awaiting them with a beautiful horse and a groom, the
perfection of whose get up was more than words could tell, though they
were not learned enough to perceive that. Only a dog-cart!--Marion felt
that she was coming down from the glories of “the carriage;” but the
obsequiousness of everybody around reconciled her a little to the less
dignified vehicle. The drive through the woods overawed the young
people. They gave each other a look of unmingled gratification and
dismay. When they reached the house itself, the dismay perhaps was
uppermost, but they did not as yet venture to say a word. Nothing could
be more beautiful than the situation of the house, or the woods which
approached it, when everything was in the full height of summer; the sun
blazing over a country in which at almost every corner there was a burn
to toss back a dazzling ray. From the colonnade the view had been opened
a little by judicious clearing, and the broad Clyde, like a silver sea,
lay glistening at the foot of the knoll, with all its passing boats and
sails, and the background of the smoky but not unpicturesque town
throwing up its towers and spires on the other side of the estuary. They
were impressed for a moment in spite of themselves, and lingered looking
at the view while their father went indoors.
“It’s awfully bonnie,” said Archie.
“So it is,” said Marion, holding her breath a little. They stood side by
side overawed, not venturing to say any more. Indoors they were still
more silent, following their father from room to room. In every one of
them were workmen, and every kind of luxurious article was being added
to the original furniture. By-and-bye they became bewildered by the
number of rooms and their names--dining-rooms and drawing-rooms were
comprehensible, but the libraries, morning rooms, boudoirs, studies,
made their heads go around.
“And what’s this?” said Marion in bewilderment.
“This is Mrs. Rowland’s own sitting-room,” said a polite functionary
with what the young people characterised as an English accent.
“What does she want,” said Marion, almost angrily, “with another
sitting-room? when she’s got the dining-room and the drawing-room, the
morning-room and the library.”
“Oh, that is just the thing, Miss,” said the functionary; an enigmatical
saying which made the girl stare at him for a moment in perplexity, but
added no light.
They wandered upstairs and downstairs, wondering where their own places
were to be in the middle of this bewildering space and unaccustomed
luxury. There were some small back rooms in the corner of a wing, to
which instinctive suspicion naturally pointed as the “holes” that would
be allotted to them.
“That’s where she’ll put us,” said Marion, “to get us out of the way.”
Archie did not make any reply, but he thought it very likely. To tell
the truth, those back rooms were larger and quite as well fitted up as
the rooms in Sauchiehall Road.
Rowland almost forgot their existence as he went over the house,
examining what had been done, pointing out what there was still to do.
So much of his ideal was in it, of which nobody knew save himself. He
had furnished the house in fancy many a time, fitted it up in such a
way as house was never fitted up before. It filled him at once with
sweet delight and disappointment, to see the reality growing before him.
It was not, and could not be, ever so fine as his dreams, and yet it was
Rosmore, and it was his. He went about anxious, yet elated, looking out
from every window to _savourer_ over and over again the well-known
prospect--the Clyde, visible in a different aspect from every corner;
the boats upon its dazzling surface, which seemed to hang in space,
which seemed to pause and quiver, as if upon the wing, as they crossed
the openings, to give the passengers a sight of the house. He knew what
was being said on the deck of the steamboats that rustled across and
across. “Oh, ay, it’s let--and maybe it will be sold--to Jims Rowland,
that was once a lad in a foundry in Glescow, nae mair, and now is the
great Railway Man from India, and has come hame very well-off, and
gotten the place he had aye set his heart upon. Oh, my lord doesna like
to part with it, nae doubt, but siller is not a thing to be turned from
the door.” He knew that was what was being said. He had heard it
himself, or something very near it; it kept singing in his ears like a
pleasant tune--“Jims Rowland, that was once a lad in a Glescow foundry,
and has gotten the place he had aye set his heart upon.” Yes, it was
what he had set his heart upon, and it was his at the last. And to make
it perfect was all his intent and thought. He forgot again that natural
difficulty which his own neglect and forgetfulness had gone so far to
make--the two standing under the colonnade, where they had strayed
after their examination of the newly furnished rooms, and looking out
again with a sullen shade over their eyes upon “the view.”
“Well?” he said, coming suddenly upon them, full of his own elation and
excitement, “and what do you think of the house?”
There was a pause; and then Marion answered him. “Oh, the house is very
well, papa. It is a great big house, and there is a fine view.”
“Is that all you have to say?”
“I don’t know what more I can say. It will be awfully lonely in the
winter-time, and when it’s raining; but perhaps you will only come here
in the summer, and have another place for the dark days.”
“The dark days,” he repeated with a little trouble. “You don’t know much
about it, I’m afraid,” he added with an attempt to be jocular; “the fine
folk go to London in the summer, and spend what you call the dark days
in the country. That’s the right thing to do.”
“But it’s awfully foolish,” said Marion with a very serious face.
Archie did not say anything in articulate words, but he made a sort of
murmur of assent.
“Now if it was me,” said the girl, “I would live here in the summer and
take one of the new houses, the new big houses out by the Park, or on
the Kelvin Road; they’re grand big houses, bigger than this, just like
palaces, to spend the winter in; and where we could go to all the grand
parties, and be near the football ground--where there was aye something
going on. There will be very little going on here.”
“Unless there might, maybe be a curling pond,” suggested Archie, but
very dubiously, and with a sigh.
Rowland was struck with a certain reasonableness in this suggestion,
which chilled his enthusiasm a little in spite of himself. “Come and
have some luncheon,” he said, “and afterwards we can talk of that.”
Lunch was set out for them in a small room, one of the many which had
bewildered Marion. There was already a tribe of servants in possession,
and the small, well-ordered table and silent servants overawed the young
people once more. The new butler had the air of a minister (he had,
indeed, though Marion did not understand these fine distinctions, the
airs of a Dean at the least), and it was all that the girl could do not
to call him sir. She accepted what he handed to her meekly with a
reverential submission to his better knowledge. As for Archie, he had
committed himself, but fortunately not so as to be comprehended by any
one but his sister, by offering the gentleman in black a chair.
“Well,” said their father again, “so you think Rosmore will be dull, and
there will be nothing going on?”
“That was my opinion,” said Marion firmly. Archie was not to be reckoned
upon in company as a steady backer up, and she thought it wisest not to
give him the opportunity of betraying her. “The rooms are very pretty,
and there’s a beautiful view; but you cannot be always looking at the
view. And it’s very rainy down here. It rains mostly every day. And then
there are so many trees. In the winter-time it will be terrible dark,
and not a shop on this side, or a place to go to.”
“You will have to lay in all your stores, my dear, before the winter
comes.”
“No, not that,” said Marion; “but the shops are always a diversion; it
is not for buying things. And there will be no parties to go to.”
“Have you many parties,” said Rowland with a laugh, “where you are?”
Marion gave a glance round, feeling it necessary to keep up her dignity
before the solemn servants. “Oh, yes,” she said, “plenty! We go out a
great deal. There was a ball last week at the MacColls. I was all in
white; at my age, just new _out_, that’s aye the proper thing.”
“So you are _out_, are you,” said Rowland somewhat grimly; “the MacColls
are----”
“Oh, papa, they are people of great consideration,” said Marion stopping
him; “it is a real good name, well-known everywhere.” Marion was making
very rapid progress. She was proud at their first interview of knowing
the MacColls, who had the great shop in Buchanan Street. Now she had cut
adrift the shop and sheltered her friends under the ægis of a well-known
name, with all the skill of a leader of society. “But there’s nobody
here,” she said, spreading out her hands and shaking her head.
“How do you know there is nobody here? There seem a number of houses as
far as I can see.”
“Not of people like us, papa,” said Marion; “not of houses that mamma
could visit at.” She had her eye upon the butler, who was visibly
impressed, and to whom she was consciously playing. “There are only
Glasgow people coming for the salt water--I mean for the sea-bathing;
and the Manse, and the like of that; no gentlemen’s houses. Of course it
was only _that_ I was looking for,” she added with the air of a
princess. Archie sat opposite and regarded his sister with wide-open
eyes. He did not know her in this new development. As a person of rank
standing on her dignity, Marion was to him a new revelation. He admired
yet wondered at her.
As for her father, he burst into a laugh which was louder and more
boisterous than became his usual character. “You might perhaps,” he
said, “recommend the place to your friends, the MacColls, for the salt
water.”
“Papa!” said Marion in dismay. The butler was just going out of the room
followed by his attendant footman. She watched him till he was quite
gone, and the door softly closed behind him. Then she said in a lower
tone, “I have always read that the servants know more about you than you
know yourselves, and I took care to say very little about the MacColls;
for though they are well-off, they are not--in our position, papa.”
“Oh May!” said Archie in consternation.
It was the comic side of this speech which first struck her father. He
laughed once more loud and long. “You will soon be quite fit for a
society lady,” he said. But immediately fell into absolute gravity
again, with a face blank as wood; discouraging and repressive, had
Marion been sensitive. It was very amusing, but one does not desire to
be so amused by one’s own child.
“I was thinking chiefly,” Marion resumed with dignity, “of mamma. She
will expect some society, and there will be none; just the Manse, and a
house or two like that, scarcely genteel, not in Our Position. We might
do very well, Archie and me, though it would be dull; but she will be
expecting to go out to her dinner, and to be asked to parties, and show
off all her grand gowns. And there will be nobody. And not even a shop
to go to, to spend an hour in an afternoon. And you cannot always be
looking at the view. It is mamma that I am thinking about,” Marion said.
He did not again bid her not to speak of Evelyn so; for was it not the
best thing he could hope for, that his child should think of his wife as
of a mother? but his heart revolted all the same, and the girl’s
commonplace prettiness, her little assured speech, even the undeniable
sense that there was in her remarks, sense of the most prosaic kind, yet
genuine enough in its way, exasperated him. He said dryly, “I think I
can take my wife in my own hand.”
“Yes,” said Marion; “but maybe it will be a great disappointment to her,
when she knows that it is so bonnie a place and all that and then comes
here, so far away, and finds that there is nothing but the view.”
Sense! undeniably it was sense, in its petty, miserable way; and what if
it might be true? After all, he had only known Evelyn on one side of her
character. She was much superior to himself in a hundred ways. She had
the habits of a life very different from his, the habits of good
society, of knowing “the best people.” Rowland himself, in his rough
practical way, had not a very profound admiration for the best people.
There were even more bores among them, he thought, than among the most
simple, and their views were not more elevated. But then Evelyn knew no
other life than theirs, and to bring her down here to an unbroken
solitude, or to the society of the sea-bathers, the people who came for
“the salt water,” might perhaps be a dangerous experiment. A cold shiver
ran over him, while his daughter prattled on in her cool precocious
wisdom. How could he tell that she would be sufficiently compensated by
“the view” as to forget everything else, or that she would be able to
bear from morning to night the unbroken enjoyment of his own society,
and of Marion and Archie? His mind went away into a close consideration
of her previous life as far as he knew it. The society at the Station
was perhaps not very choice, but it was abundant. The people there knew
people whom she knew, were acquainted with her own antecedents, and the
kind of life to which she had been accustomed, a life which he himself
did not know much about, much less his daughter and his son. A woman
brought up in a great country house, overflowing with company, such as
people in humbler positions know only by books, accustomed to go up to
town for the season, to make rounds of visits, etc., etc.--would not she
perhaps expect all that to begin over again after the period of her
humiliation was over, when she had become the wife of a rich man? And
if instead she found herself seated opposite to him for life, with his
two children only to diversify the scene, though it was in a beautiful
house with a beautiful view! how would Evelyn bear it? Nothing but a
view! The little monkey! the little wretch! Rowland in his heart was
still a man of the people, and he would have liked to take Marion by the
shoulders and give her a shake. And yet, probably, she was right.