The day of the funeral rose with a merciful cloud over its brightness--a
sorrowful bustle was in the house of Norlaw; some of the attendants of
the burial train were to return to dine, as the custom was, and Marget
and Jenny were fully employed in the kitchen, with the assistance of the
mother of the latter, who was a widow herself, full of sorrowful
experience, and liked, as is not unusual in her class, to assist in the
melancholy labors of such an “occasion.” The east room was open for the
reception of the funeral guests, and on the table were set out decanters
of wine, and liberal plates of a delicate cake which used to bear the
dismal title of funeral biscuit in Scotland. The widow, who put on for
the first time to-day, the dress which henceforward she should wear all
her life, kept her own apartment, where the wife of the principal farmer
near, and Catharine Logan, the minister’s daughter, had joined her; for
though she would much rather have been left alone, use and precedent
were strong upon the Mistress, and she would not willingly have broken
through any of the formal and unalterable customs of the country-side.
The guests gathered gradually about the melancholy house; it was to be
“a great funeral.” As horseman after horseman arrived, the women in the
kitchen looked out from the corner of their closed shutters, with
mournful pride and satisfaction; every household of any standing in the
district came out to show “respect” to Norlaw--and even the widow in her
darkened room felt a certain pleasure in the sounds which came softened
to her ear, the horses’ hoofs, the clash of stirrup and bridle, and the
murmur of open-air voices, which even the “occasion” could not subdue
beyond a certain measure.
The lads were all assembled in the east room to receive their guests,
and with them, the earliest arrival of all, was the minister, lending
his kindly support and aid to Huntley, in this earliest and saddest
exercise of his new duties as head of the house. One good thing was,
that the visitors did not feel themselves called upon to overwhelm the
fatherless youth with condolences. A hearty grasp of rough hands; a
subdued word of friendship and encouragement, as one by one, or in
little clusters, those great rustic figures, all in solemn mourning,
collected in the room, were all that “the family” were called upon to
undergo.
The hum of conversation which immediately began, subdued in tone and
grave in expression, but still conversation such as rural neighbors use,
interspersed with inquiries and shakes of the head, as to how this
household was “left,” was a relief to the immediate mourners, though
perhaps it was not much in accordance with the sentiment of the time. It
was etiquette that the wine and cake should be served to all present,
and when all the guests were assembled, the minister rose, and called
them to prayer. They stood in strange groups, those stalwart, ruddy
southland men, about the table--one covering his eyes with his hand, one
standing erect, with his head bowed, some leaning against the wall, or
over the chairs. Perhaps eyes unaccustomed to such a scene might have
thought there was little reverence in the fashion of this funeral
service; but there was at least perfect silence, through which the grave
voice of the minister rose steadily, yet not without a falter of
personal emotion. It was not the solemn impersonal words which other
churches say over every man whom death makes sacred. It was an
individual voice, asking comfort for the living, thanking God for the
dead--and when that was done the ceremonial was so far over, and Norlaw
had only now to be carried to his grave.
All the preparations were thus far accomplished. The three brothers and
Dr. Logan had taken their place in the mourning coach; some distant
relatives had taken possession of another; and the bulk of the guests
had mounted and were forming into a procession behind. Every thing had
progressed thus far, when some sudden obstruction became visible to the
horsemen without. The funeral attendants closed round the hearse, the
horses were seized by strangers, and their forward motion checked;
already the farmers behind, leaping from their horses, crowded on to
ascertain the cause of the detention; but the very fact of it was not
immediately visible to the youths who were most interested. When the
sudden contention of voices startled Huntley, the lad gazed out of the
window for a moment in the wild resentment of grief, and then dashing
open the door, sprang into the midst of the crowd; a man who was not in
mourning, and held a baton in his hand, stood firm and resolute, with
his hand upon the door of the hearse; other men conspicuous among the
funeral guests, in their every-day dress, kept close by him, supporting
their superior. The guides of the funeral equipage were already in high
altercation with the intruders, yet, even at their loudest, were visibly
afraid of them.
“Take out the horses, Grierson--do your duty!” shouted the leader at the
hearse door; “stand back, ye blockheads, in the name of the law! I’m
here to do my orders; stand back, or it’ll be waur for ye a’--ha! wha’s
here?”
It was Huntley, whose firm young grasp was on the sturdy shoulder of the
speaker.
“Leave the door, or I’ll fell you!” cried the lad, in breathless
passion, shaking with his clutch of fury the strong thick-set frame
which had double his strength; “what do you want here?--how do you dare
to stop the funeral? take off your hand off the door, or I’ll fell you
to the ground!”
“Whisht, lad, whisht--it’s a sheriff’s officer; speak him canny and
he’ll hear reason,” cried one of the farmers, hastily laying a detaining
grasp on Huntley’s arm. The intruder stood his ground firmly. He took
his hand from the door, not in obedience to the threat, but to the grief
which burned in the youth’s eyes.
“My lad, it’s little pleasure to me,” he said, in a voice which was not
without respect, “but I must do my duty. Felling me’s no’ easy, but
felling the law is harder still. Make him stand aside, any of you that’s
his friend, and has sense to ken; there’s no mortal good in resisting;
this funeral can not gang on this day.”
“Let go--stand back; speak to _me_,” said Huntley, throwing off the
grasp of his friend, and turning to his opponent a face in which bitter
shame and distress began to take the place of passion; “stand aside,
every man--what right have _you_ to stop us burying our dead? I’m his
son; come here and tell me.”
“I am very sorry for you, my lad, but I can not help it,” said the
officer; “I’m bound to arrest the body of Patrick Livingstone, of
Norlaw. It may be a cruel thing, but I must do my duty. I’m Alexander
Elliot, sheriff’s officer at Melrose; I want to make no disturbance more
than can be helped. Take my advice. Take in the coffin to the house and
bid the neighbors back for another day. And, in the meantime, look up
your friends and settle your scores with Melmar. It’s the best you can
do.”
“Elliot,” said Dr. Logan, over his shoulder, “do you call this law, to
arrest the dead? He’s far beyond debt and trouble now. For shame!--leave
the living to meet their troubles, but let them bury their dead.”
“And so I would, minister, if it was me,” said Elliot, twirling his
baton in his hand, and looking down with momentary shame and confusion;
“but I’ve as little to do with the business as you have,” he added,
hurriedly. “I give you my advice for the best, but I must do my duty.
Grierson, look to thae youngsters--dang them a’--do ye ca’ that mair
seemly? it’s waur than me!”
Cosmo Livingstone, wild with a boy’s passion, and stupefied with grief,
had sprung up to the driving-seat of the hearse while this discussion
proceeded; and lashing the half-loosed horses, had urged them forward
with a violent and unseemly speed, which threw down on either side the
men who were at their heads, and dispersed the crowd in momentary alarm.
The frightened animals dashed forward wildly for a few steps, but
speedily brought up in their unaccustomed career by the shouts and
pursuit of the attendants, carried the melancholy vehicle down the slope
and paused, snorting, at the edge of the stream, through which, the boy,
half mad with excitement, would have driven them. Perhaps the wild
gallop of the hearse, though only for so short a distance, horrified the
bystanders more than the real interruption. One of the funeral guests
seized Cosmo in his strong arms, and lifted him down like a child; the
others led the panting horses back at the reverential pace which became
the solemn burden they were bearing; and after that outbreak of passion,
the question was settled without further discussion. Patrick
Livingstone, his eyes swollen and heavy with burning tears, which he
could not shed, led the way, while the bearers once more carried to his
vacant room all that remained of Norlaw.
The mass of the funeral guests paused only long enough to maintain some
degree of quietness and decency; they dispersed with natural good
feeling, without aggravating the unfortunate family with condolence or
observation. Huntley, with the minister and the principal farmer of the
district, Mr. Blackadder, of Tyneside, who happened to be also an old
and steady friend of their father, stood at a little distance with the
officer, investigating the detainer which kept the dead out of his
grave; the melancholy empty hearse and dismal coaches crept off slowly
along the high road; and Cosmo, trembling in every limb with the
violence of his excitement, stood speechless at the door, gazing after
them, falling, in the quick revulsion of his temperament, from unnatural
passion into utter and prostrate despondency. The poor boy scarcely knew
who it was that drew him into the house, and spoke those words of
comfort which relieved his overcharged heart by tears. It was pretty
Katie Logan, crying herself, and scarcely able to speak, who had been
sent down from the widow’s room, by Mrs. Blackadder, to find out what
the commotion was; and who, struck with horror and amazement, as at a
sacrilege, was terrified to go up again, to break the tender, proud
heart of Norlaw’s mourning wife, with such terrible news.
Presently the mournful little party came in to the east room, which
still stood as they had left it, with the funeral bread and wine upon
the table. Patrick came to join them immediately, and the two lads bent
their heads together over the paper: a thousand pounds, borrowed by a
hundred at a time from Mr. Huntley, of Melmar, over and above the
mortgages which that gentleman held on the better part of the lands of
Norlaw. The boys read it with a passion of indignation and shame in
their hearts; their father’s affairs, on his funeral day, publicly
“exposed” to all the countryside; their private distress and painful
prospects, and his unthrift and weakness made the talk of every gossip
in the country. Huntley and Patrick drew a hard breath, and clasped each
other’s hands with the grip of desperation. But Norlaw lay unburied on
his death-bed; they could not bury him till this money was paid; it was
an appalling sum to people in their class, already deeply impoverished,
and in the first tingle of this distressing blow, they saw no light
either on one side or the other, and could not tell what to do.
“But I can not understand,” said Dr. Logan, who was a man limited and
literal, although a most pious minister and the father of his people; “I
can not understand how law can sanction what even nature holds up her
hand against. The dead--man! how dare ye step in with your worldly
arrests and warrants, when the Lord has been before you? how dare ye put
your bit baton across the grave, where a righteous man should have been
laid this day?”
“I have to do my duty,” said the immovable Elliot, “how daur ye, is
naething to me. I must do according to my instructions--and ye ken,
doctor, it’s but a man’s body can be apprehended ony time. Neither you
nor me can lay grips on his soul.”
“Hush, mocker!” cried the distressed clergyman; “but what is to be done?
Mr. Blackadder, these bairns can not get this money but with time and
toil. If that will do any good, I’ll go immediately to Me’mar myself.”
“Never,” cried Huntley; “never--any thing but that. I’ll sell myself for
a slave before I’ll take a favor from my father’s enemy.”
“It’s in Whitelaw’s hands, the writer in Melrose. I’ll ride down there
and ask about it,” said Blackadder; “whisht, Huntley! the minister’s
presence should learn you better--and every honest man can but pity and
scorn ane that makes war with the dead; I’ll ride round to Whitelaw. My
wife’s a sensible woman--she’ll break it softly to your mother--and see
you do nothing to make it worse. I suppose, Elliot, when I come back
I’ll find you here.”
“Ay, sir, I’m safe enough,” said the officer significantly, as
“Tyneside” rose to leave the room. Huntley went with him silently to the
stable, where his horse stood still saddled.
“I see what’s in your eye,” said Blackadder, in a whisper; “take heart
and do it; trust not a man more than is needful, and dinna be violent.
I’ll be back before dark, but I may not chance to speak to you again. Do
what’s in your heart.”
Huntley wrung the friendly hand held out to him, and went in without a
word. His old restless activity seemed to have returned to him, and
there was a kindling fire in his hazel eyes which meant some purpose.
Good Dr. Logan took the lad’s hands, and poured comfort and kindness
into his ears; but Huntley could scarcely pause to listen. It was not
strange--and it seemed almost hard to bid the youth have patience when
the vulgar law--stubborn and immovable--the law of money and
merchandise, kept joint possession with death of this melancholy house.