It was a kind of twilight in Aunt Jean’s room, though it was still
daylight out of doors; the sun, as it drew to the west, threw a ruddy
glory upon this side of the house of Melmar, and coming in at Aunt
Jean’s window, had thrown its full force upon the fire-place half an
hour ago. It was the old lady’s belief that the sun put out the fire, so
she had drawn down her blind, and the warm, domestic glimmer of the
firelight played upon the high bed, with those heavy, dull, moreen
curtains, which defied all brightness--upon the brighter toilet-glass on
the table, and upon the old lofty chest of drawers, polished and black
like ebony, which stood at the further side of the room. Aunt Jean
herself sat in a high-backed arm-chair by the fire, where she loved to
sit--and Desirée and Joanna, kneeling on the rug before her, were
turning out the contents of a great basket, full of such scraps as Aunt
Jean loved to accumulate, and girls have pleasure in turning over; there
were bits of silk, bits of splendid old ribbon, long enough for “bows,”
in some cases, but in some only fit for pin-cushions and needle-books of
unbelievable splendor, bits of lace, bits of old-fashioned embroidery,
bits of almost every costly material belonging to a lady’s wardrobe. It
was a pretty scene; the basket on the rug, with its many-colored stores,
the pretty little figure of Desirée, with the fire-light shining in her
hair, the less graceful form of Joanna, which still was youthful, and
honest, and eager, as she knelt opposite the fire, which flushed her
face and reddened her hair at its will; and calmly seated in her
elbow-chair, overseeing all, Aunt Jean, with her white neckerchief
pinned over her gown, and her white apron warm in the fire-light, and
the broad black ribbon bound round her old-fashioned cap, and the
vivacious sparkle of those black eyes, which were not “hard of hearing,”
though their owner was. The pale daylight came in behind the old lady,
faintly through the misty atmosphere and the closed blind--but the
ruddier domestic light within went flickering and sparkling over the
high-canopied bed, the old-fashioned furniture, and the group by the
hearth. When Joanna went away, the picture was even improved perhaps,
for Desirée still knelt half meditatively by the fire, turning over with
one hand the things in the basket, listening to what the old lady said,
and wistfully pondering upon her own thoughts.
“Some o’ the things were here when I came,” said Aunt Jean. “I was not
so auld then as I am now--I laid them a’ away, Deseery, for fear the
real daughter of the house should ever come hame; for this present
Melmar wasna heir by nature. If right had been right, there’s ane before
him in the succession to this house; but, poor misguided thing, fha was
gaun to seek her; but I laid by the bits o’ things; I thought they might
’mind her some time of the days o’ her youth.”
“Who was she?” said Desirée, softly: she did not ask so as to be heard
by her companion--she did not ask as if she cared for an answer--she
said it quietly, in a half whisper to herself; yet Aunt Jean heard
Desirée’s question with her lively eyes, which were fixed upon the
girl’s pretty figure, half kneeling, half reclining at her feet.
“Fha was she? She was the daughter of this house,” said Aunt Jean, “and
fhat’s mair, the mistress of this house, Deseery, if she should ever
come hame.”
The little Frenchwoman looked up sharply, keenly, with an alarmed
expression on her face. She did not ask any further question, but she
met Aunt Jean’s black eyes with eyes still brighter in their youthful
lustre, yet dimmed with an indefinable cloud of suspicion and fear.
What was in the old woman’s mind it was hard to tell. Whether she had
any definite ground to go upon, or merely proceeded on an impulse of the
vague anxiety in her mind.
“’Deed, ay,” said Aunt Jean, nodding her lively little head, “I’ll tell
you a’ her story, my dear, and you can tell me fhat you think when I’m
done. She was the only bairn and heir of that silly auld man that was
Laird of Melmar before this present lad, my niece’s good-man--she was
very bonnie, and muckle thought of, and she married and ran away, and
that’s all the folk ken of her, Deseery; but whisht, bairn, and I’ll
tell you mair.”
Desirée had sunk lower on her knees, leaning back, with her head turned
anxiously towards the story-teller. She was an interested listener at
least.
“It’s aye thought she was disinherited,” said Aunt Jean, “and at the
first, when she ran away, maybe so she was--but nature will speak. When
this silly auld man, as I’m saying, died, he left a will setting up her
rights, and left it in the hand of another silly haverel of a man, that
was a bit sma’ laird at Norlaw. This man was to be heir himsel’ if she
never was found--but he had a sma’ spirit, Deseery, and he never could
find her. She’s never been found from that day to this--but it’ll be a
sore day for Melmar when she comes hame.”
“Why?” said Desirée, somewhat sharply and shrilly, with a voice which
reached the old woman’s ears, distant though they were.
“Fhat for?--because they’ll have to give up all the lands, and all the
siller, and all their living into her hand--that’s fhat for,” said Aunt
Jean; “nae person in this country-side can tell if she’s living, or
fhaur she is; she’s been away langer than you’ve been in this life,
Deseery; and Melmar, the present laird--I canna blame him, he was the
next of the blood after hersel’, nae doubt he thought she was dead and
gane, as a’body else did when he took possession--and his heart rose
doubtless against the other person that was left heir, failing her,
being neither a Huntley nor nigh in blood; but if aught should befall to
bring her hame--ay, Deseery, it would be a sore day for this family, and
every person in this house.”
“Why?” asked Desirée again with a tremble--this time her voice did not
reach the ear of Aunt Jean, but her troubled, downcast eyes, her
disturbed look, touched the old woman’s heart.
“If it was a story I was telling out of a book,” said the old woman, “I
would say they were a’ in misery at keeping her out of her rights--or
that the man was a villain that held her place--but you’re no’ to think
that. I dinna doubt he heeds his ain business mair than he heeds
her--it’s but natural, fha would do otherwise? and then he takes comfort
to his mind that she must be dead, or she would have turned up before
now, and then he thinks upon his ain family, and considers his first
duty is for them; and then--’deed ay, my dear, memory fails--I wouldna
say but he often forgets that there was another person in the world but
himsel’ that had a right--that’s nature, Deseery, just nature--folk
learn to think the way it’s their profit to think, and believe what
suits them best, and they’re sincere, too, except maybe just at the
first; you may not think it, being a bairn, yet it’s true.”
“If it were me,” cried Desirée, with a vehemence which penetrated Aunt
Jean’s infirmity, “the money would burn me, would scorch me, till I
could give it back to the true heir!”
“Ay,” said Aunt Jean, shaking her head, “I wouldna say I could be easy
in my mind mysel’--but it’s wonderful how weel the like of you and me,
my dear, can settle ither folks’ concerns. Melmar, you see, he’s no’ an
ill man, he thinks otherwise, and I daur to say he’s begun to forget a’
about her, or just thinks she’s dead and gane, as most folk think. I
canna help aye an expectation to see her back before I die mysel’--but
that’s no’ to say Me’mar has ony thought of the kind. Folk that are away
for twenty years, and never seen, nor heard tell o’, canna expect to be
minded upon and waited upon. It’s very like, upon the whole, that she
_is_ dead many a year syne--and fhat for should Melmar, that kens
nothing about her--aye except that she could take his living away frae
him--fhat for, I’m asking, should Melmar gang away upon his travels
looking for her, like yon other haverel of a man?”
“What other man?” cried Desirée, eagerly.
“Oh, just Norlaw; he was aince a wooer himsel’, poor haverel,” said Aunt
Jean; “he gaed roaming about a’ the world, seeking after her, leaving
his wife and his bonny bairns at hame; but fhat good did he?--just
nought ava, Deseery, except waste his ain time, and lose his siller, and
gie his wife a sair heart. She’s made muckle mischief in her day, this
Mary of Melmar. They say she was very bonnie, though I never saw her
mysel’; and fhat for, think you, should the present lad, that kens
nought about her, take up his staff and gang traveling the world to
seek for her? Oh, fie, nae!--he has mair duty to his ain house and
bairns, than to a strange woman that he kens not where to seek, and that
would make him a beggar if he found her; I canna see she deserves ony
such thing at his hand.”
At first Desirée did not answer a word; her cheek was burning hot with
excitement, her face shadowed with an angry cloud, her little hand
clenched involuntarily, her brow knitted. She was thinking of something
private to herself, which roused a passion of resentment within the
breast of the girl. At last she started up and came close to Aunt Jean.
“But if you knew that she was living, and where she was?” cried Desirée,
“what would you do?”
“Me! Oh, my bairn!” cried Aunt Jean, in sudden dismay. “Me! what have I
to do with their concerns?--me! it’s nane of my business. The Lord keep
that and a’ evil out of a poor auld woman’s knowledge. I havena eaten
his bread--I never would be beholden that far to any mortal--but I’ve
sitten under his roof tree for mony a year. Me!--if I heard a word of
such awfu’ news, I would gang furth of this door this moment, that I
mightna be a traitor in the man’s very dwelling;--eh, the Lord help me,
the thought’s dreadful! for I behoved to let her ken!”
“And what if he knew?” asked Desirée, in a sharp whisper, gazing into
Aunt Jean’s eyes with a look that pierced like an arrow. The old woman’s
look fell, but it was not to escape this gaze of inquiry.
“The Lord help him!” said Aunt Jean, pitifully. “I can but hope he would
do right, Deseery; but human nature’s frail; I canna tell.”
This reply softened for the moment the vehement, angry look of the
little Frenchwoman. She came again to kneel before the fire, and was
silent, thinking her own thoughts; then another and a new fancy seemed
to rise like a mist over her face. She looked up dismayed to Aunt Jean,
with an unexplained and terrified question, which the old woman could
not interpret. Then she tried to command herself with an evident
effort--but it was useless. She sprang up, and came close, with a
shivering chill upon her, to put her lips to Aunt Jean’s ear.
“Do they all know of this story?” she asked, in the low, sharp voice,
strangely intent and passionate, which even deafness itself could not
refuse to hear; and Desirée fixed her gaze upon the old woman’s eyes,
holding her fast with an eager scrutiny, as though she trembled to be
put off with any thing less than the truth.
“Hout, no!” said Aunt Jean, disturbed a little, yet confident; “fha
would tell the like of Patricia or Joan--fuils and bairns! and as for
the like of my niece herself, she’s muckle taken up with her ain bits of
troubles; she might hear of it at the time, but she would forget the day
after; naebody minds but me.”
“And--Oswald?” cried Desirée, sharply, once again.
“Eh! ay--I wasna thinking upon him; he’s the heir,” said Aunt Jean,
turning her eyes sharp and keen upon her young questioner. “I canna tell
fhat for you ask me so earnest, bairn; you maunna think mair of Oswald
Huntley than becomes baith him and you; ay, doubtless, you’re right,
whatever learned ye--_he_ kens.”
Desirée did not say another word, but she clasped her hands tightly
together, sprang out of the room with the pace of a deer, and before
Aunt Jean had roused herself from her amazement, had thrown her cloak
over her shoulders, and rushed out into the gathering night.