mundane to find favour at the moment, 'Mr. Herries says that he takes
Danny down to the seaside on Saturday.'
'Does he, love?' said Nancy, coolly. 'Well, 'tis vastly good of him,
I'm sure. But if he expects dutiful maternal attendance from me on that
day, he can't get it; for I'm most particularly engaged at home.'
'He--he begged of us both to come,' said Alison, in rather a low voice.
'Well, dear, 'twill be a nice jaunt for you,' said Nancy, cheerfully.
'And with you there to take care of Danny, the less need for me. 'Twas
exactly so I planned it, in my own mind. Child, Ally, of what use you
are to me! What did I do before I had you?' She came over to Alison's
side of the hearth, patted the girl's cheek and playfully pulled a curl.
But Alison's heart was troubled.
'Nancy,' she said, timidly, 'don't you think 'twill seem a little--a
little odd to Mr. Herries that you do not go with poor Danny?'
'It may seem as odd as it pleases, love,' answered Nancy; 'I am not
going.'
Alison looked at her friend in sore perplexity. There was--there had
been for some time--a change working in the little woman, a hardening
process, it seemed. It was a hiding process, too, for it seemed to
raise a barrier between her and Alison, between her and the children,
between her and the common, wholesome, pleasant things of every-day
life. She let the girl, the children, the household,--the rest of the
world, for that matter,--go their own ways; while she, absorbed, intent,
wrapt in some dream, seemed to breathe a separate air. A kind of hard
eagerness was taking the place of her old bright gaiety; a certain
determined selfishness seemed to conquer the keen, if perhaps rather
shallow, sympathy, that made her personality so winning in its normal
phases. Wistfully, across the boundless levels of her girlish
inexperience, Alison looked at her little friend. What ailed her? How
could she help? One tremendous, one unswerving resolution formed itself
gradually in the girl's mind at this time; she was there to help Nancy,
to stand beside her through thick and thin. Nancy had helped her, had
saved her from an abyss of life-long misery. She would be Nancy's
friend to the last limits of undeviating loyalty.
But in the meantime, Alison being young, looked forward to Saturday;
with rather a fearful joy, perhaps, for how was one to meet an
offended--so justly offended--a friend as Mr. Herries, after the
offence? She half-feared some message would arrive, coldly declining
the pleasure of her society on Saturday's expedition. Was it not quite
possible--probable, even? But Saturday arrived, bringing no such cruel
message, however richly deserved; and Alison, from her little northern
window, saw the Rose of Day blush and quiver through the cloudless
winter sky, and knew that another glorious frost-bound day was granted
for Danny's safe removal to the sea.
They made quite a triumphal procession going down to the Grassmarket.
First went Jean, bearing in her stout arms the little invalid, almost
lost in shawls; then came Alison, with his bundle and his box of toys;
Willy capered in the rear; and Nancy, Nancy herself, armed with her own
inimitable, charming, dazzling impudence, tripped down with them to see
them off. She met her cousin with an unabashed front.
'I am not coming, Archie,' she said, in a plaintive tone, and with a
melting glance. 'My mother's tact tells me 'tis better to have the
parting with my poor Danny now, and here, whilst the child is excited
with the start and the pleasure of his drive. Were I to come, and then
leave him in a strange place, there'd be a sad scene, most detrimental
to his health, and shattering to my poor nerves.' Herries simply raised
his eyebrows; but he presently drew his cousin aside, while the others
were busy setting Danny and his belongings in the coach.
'I am rather doubtful,' he said, with an unusual air of indecision,
'doubtful of the propriety of my--ahem--taking Miss Graham upon this
excursion alone.'
'Doubtful of a fiddlestick, Archie,' retorted his cousin with vivacity.
'La, cousin, who could the poor child go with if not with you? Ain't
you safe as a convent? and then with the two little fellows and all--
You're joking, surely? You'd never disappoint the girl of her jaunt for
such a silly reason?'
Herries said no more, but he looked rather spitefully at his cousin.
Perhaps he was not flattered at being told he was 'as safe as a
convent.'
In the meantime, the coach was ready for its start. Herries had selected
a fine roomy vehicle, with a glass front, and had ordered three horses.
Danny was in a seventh heaven of delight, and so forgot the pain of
parting. There was a cracking of whips, a tremendous clatter of hoofs
on the cobbles, a cheer from the little crowd that had collected to see
the start. Nancy, from the causeway, fluttered a dainty
pocket-handkerchief, and Jean waved her work-worn hand. Hers were the
only tears that watered this farewell; one or two fell on her coarse
apron as she trudged home behind her mistress.
'Yon poor bairn will never come back,' she said to herself, and drew the
back of her hand across her eyes.
The village of Prestonpans lies, as all men know, about ten miles east
of Edinburgh, on the shores of the Firth of Forth, as it widens to the
sea. It is a fine drive down there, by the Portobello and the
Musselburgh roads, for you perceive that there widens out before you one
of the great waterways of the world--the ocean-path to this cold
northern country of our love. Perhaps only the trading vessels and the
fishing boats go there now, but it was the galleons of old that cleaved
that mighty swirl, half river and half sea, and the sailing ships that
brought Queen Mary to her fateful kingdom, curtseyed to that tawny tide.
The instructive Herries was not slow to point out these matters to his
young companions. There was no cloud upon his august brow, and so
Alison became very happy. They were busy with the little boys all the
way down, curbing the frantic excitement of Willy, who had been promised
an hour on the sands, and encouraging Danny, whose spirit flagged, and
who asked plaintive and difficult questions about his mother's absence.
It was high noon when they rattled into Prestonpans, and Alison stepped
out into the village street, where the queer, little, secretive-looking
white houses shouldered each other on to the road, and the growl of the
sea could be heard at their backs.
The woman who was to have the charge of Danny lived in a little house to
which you climbed by a wooden outside stair. She was a most cheerful
person, whom Herries addressed as 'Isabella,' and who, in her turn,
patted him on the shoulders, and called him 'Master Archie.' She
bustled them all into the warm, clean, homely cottage, and showed off
with pride her preparations for Danny's sojourn--his little bed covered
with a patch-work quilt, his chair with a cushion on it, the very kitten
to play with 'when he wearied.' She lugged out of some recess a curious
old battered tin vessel, bearing some faint resemblance to the modern
hip bath.
'Ye see,' she said, 'I'm well acquaint wi' they delicut bairns. It's a
while sin' syne, but I had ane wi' me--the brawest bairn ever ye
saw--but he had the one leg shorter than the t'ither, and ay the
somethin' wrong wi' the one foot; an' it was the sea watter for him too.
Here's his bit bath--I hae ay keepit it. One Walter Scott they ca'd
him,' she added, 'a writer's son; a gran' strappin' callant now, though
he hirples yet; but he's mindfu' o' an auld body, and comes to see me
whiles.' And her listeners of that benighted generation heard that
wonder-working name, and knew it not for a magician's!
Then it was arranged that Alison and her escort should take Willy to the
sands while the day was at its best, and when they came back Isabella
would give them a 'sup o' broth and a tattie,' she said, 'to warm them
up before the long drive home.'
*CHAPTER XXV.*
It was one of those days when the land lies under the spell of a long
and sunny frost; the ground rang iron to the foot, but the sea smiled
and sparkled to the sun, and the Lomonds of Fife, beyond the Firth, were
clear against the winter sky. Herries and his companions walked briskly
down the village and along the links. Away to their right stretched the
fields, where, not a generation since, the blood of a great battle had
been spilt, but where now the peaceful stubble grew over the scattered
implements of war and over the bones of men,--and quiet cottages smoked
to tranquil skies.
'Shouldn't you like to be a soldier, Willy?' Alison asked the little
boy, who pranced beside her, tugging at her arm.
'Yes,' said Willy, 'I'd like to be a soldier. But I shouldn't like to
be shot,' he added, cautiously.
''Tis a fancy of all boys,' said Herries. 'They don't all qualify it,
like Willy here. It was more than a fancy with me, God knows!'
'With you, sir?' asked Alison, in surprise.
'I dreamed of soldiering,' said Herries, bitterly, 'till I waked to find
myself tied to a desk.'
'Was--was it a great disappointment, sir?' asked Alison, timidly.
'One of those disappointments that mark a man for life, I think,' said
Herries, tersely. 'Nearly all my family in the past bore arms, and the
love of it is in my blood. 'Tis the gentleman's profession, to my mind.
But I was a sickly boy, and held unfit to apply for His Majesty's
commission, so behold me, a poor scrivener, at your service!'
Alison stole a look at the speaker. Could it be the fine, the
successful, the apparently self-sufficient Mr. Herries who spoke thus
feelingly of disappointment? To Alison, it seemed that such a man must
always have,--must always have had,--all that he wanted. But,
evidently, this was not so.
'I'll not be so afraid of him now,' thought Alison.
They had come to another little village, just of fishermen's huts, that
seem to cling to the very rocks of the sea. Here there was a harbour,
and the delicate tracery of masts and rigging rose against the sky. As
they stood watching, a little fleet of fishing boats--catching a faint
breath of the freezing wind--unfurled their tanned brown sails, and put
to sea.
'Ah, Willy, see the bonny boats!' cried Alison; and catching the boy by
the hand, she ran with him away down the little street, and out upon the
sandy links beyond.
Herries followed at his leisure, his hands behind him, and his head
bent. The few words-that, he had spoken of himself to Alison had
disturbed his serenity; such words, however commonplace, when spoken of
the inner self by a man so wrapt in reserve as Herries, are apt to
affect the speaker thus, for their utterance is the breaking of the rule
and habit of a life. He stood, and looked absently seawards. A
schooner, under full sail, was beating up the firth. How slow, how
infinitely tedious, was her tacking course! It seemed to Herries, just
then, to typify his own life, for ever beating up against the wind of
his tastes and inclinations, in the uncongenial profession of his
adoption. Had anyone asked Herries the ruling motive of his existence
at this time, he would have answered, drearily enough, and with no
thought of taking credit to himself, 'A sense of duty.' Sober, in an
age of drunkenness, and constitutionally fastidious where the manners of
the times permitted, and even sanctioned, an extreme of licence--Herries
had something of the melancholy in him, which dogs a man who is born
before his time. Neither boon companions had he, nor social pleasures,
nor tender friendships; all these he seemed to have outgrown. Life, at
the very springs of it, seemed to have gone dry. And yet he was a man
with all the appurtenances of success, who commanded the respect of
other men, and held his head above the crowd. Duty--success--respect....
How laudable it sounded! And yet there was something wanting, greater
than all these.
He strolled on along the links, while Alison and Willy ran races on the
sands. Evidently the races were warm work, for Alison had dropped her
pelisse, and left it on the grassy ledge where the links break into the
shore. Herries sat down beside it, in the sun. He slipped a
half-frozen hand beneath its folds; it was still warm from her wearing,
and a curious emotion thrilled him at the contact, as though his blood
ran warmer. Presently Alison came herself to where he sat, glowing from
her run--panting, rosy, happy. Heavens! what a breath of life--young
life--the creature brought along with her. Her curls were blown about
by the wind; her eyes were bright--they had the wide-open, innocent look
of a child's. Herries looked at her, and a terrible ache of longing
took hold of him--whether it was for her, or just for what she stood
for, of all that was lacking in his own life--he could not tell. It is
very difficult to say when, to a nature of Herries's reserve, his
critical hesitancy and profound fastidiousness--the divine moment comes,
and the proud man's approval first melts into the tenderness of passion.
But with Herries, I rather think it was then--on that sunny morning on
the sandy links--when Alison stood before him, with the sea behind her,
and the ribbon falling from her loosened curls. True, all that he said
was, pointing with an instructive arm,--
'That is the Berwick road, Miss Graham. And over there, that odd-shaped
hill you see--that is North Berwick Law.' But there, again, was the
nature of the man; once a feeling had him, it then became too inward for
common recognition, and far too sacred for speech.
After that, they retraced their steps, and Herries, who felt somehow
that he had been erring on the side of sentimentality, instituted a
thorough and improving examination of the antiquities of Prestonpans.
Willy, it is true, showed symptoms of rebellion, but Alison, though
rather cold and hungry, followed, ready and smiling, with that infinite
patience for the foibles of a man, as for the gambols of a child, which
comes as naturally to some women--well, as naturally as love itself.
They had a very pleasant hour in Isabella's cottage, as a subsequent
reward. They supped broth at the fireside, and got warmed through and
through. There was a grand platter of potatoes, boiled in their
jackets, so hot that nobody could touch them.
'You'd be astonished how long they keep their heat, too,' Herries said
to Alison. 'We'll put one in your muff, and you'll see how 'twill keep
your hands warm all the way home.' And he popped the biggest into
Alison's muff, and was very 'jokey' with Isabella, and Isabella with
him, and so the time went very pleasantly. But, alas! as the end drew
near, and Danny heard the horses' feet upon the street, and knew he was
to be left behind, he began to cry, not with the robust roar of healthy
childhood, but with silent tears, that overflowed his piteous dark eyes,
and wet his small pale face. Alison gathered him in her arms, and
cuddled him against her shoulder. She spoke to him of the coming
summer--of the time when he would be well again and able to run about,
and Willy should come down and play with him on the sands. And
Danny--who would never see another summer, or run about again, or play
with his little brother more--looked up in her kind face, and was
comforted.
The afternoon had settled to a piercing cold, as they drove home. For a
mile, the horses, maddened with the frost, and fresh from their long
rest, ran away, and the coach swayed from side to side, Willy shrieking
with delight. Alison felt a strange excitement in the air; the evening
was so lovely--earth and sky and sea wore those strange, gem-like tints
which are part of the magic accompaniment of a great frost. There rose,
to their left, out of the ruddy haze--the craggy mass of Arthur's Seat;
and tower and crown, and citadel and spire rose, one by one, and the
great rock-built city wore all its classic air--a smoky fane, spread to
the cold gods of the north. Herries was very silent; in the dark of the
coach, silhouetted against the window, Alison could see the fine, cold
profile, the severe, set mouth. She was very silent too, and presently
Willy fell asleep, and lay against her knee in a tired heap.
When they got out at the Grassmarket it was in the gloaming, and Herries
said he would see his charges to their door. A slip of the new moon
swam in the limpid sky; every now and then she looked down at them
between the high houses. Alison was turning over in her mind the pretty
speech that she must make to Mr. Herries for this pleasant day. Ah, how
to say enough, and not too much! The very thought of it made her heart
beat--with sheer nervousness, was it? Or was it that Herries's extreme
silence was burdened with a meaning which made itself felt, in the
strange way of such things?
When they got to the General's Entry, Willy clattered up the stair. The
lamp flared, and in its doubtful light Herries stood waiting. And then,
because, perhaps, being of a masterful mind, he meant to wait no longer
for what he wanted; or just because what he wanted was so near, so
sweet, so terribly desirable,--his arm crept to Alison's waist, and he
kissed her, and the ice of his life seemed broken, all the sweet springs
of summer to gush in his heart.
'Ally, Ally,' he whispered--and why his first words were jealous ones he
could not have told you--'Ally, tell me, did a man ever kiss you
before?'
'Never in all my life!' said Alison, staring straight out before her
into the dark, with wonder-struck eyes. And lo! that which had been a
reproach at The Mains became the crowning glory of her life, and at that
Pygmalion-like touch of a lover's lips, the soul of Alison awoke to
passion, as the marble awoke to life.
But--such is the relentlessness of the prose of life--Jean must choose
this interesting moment in which to open the door above them and let a
light down the shaft of the stair. The pair started asunder, Herries
stammered good-night, and Alison walked up the dirty steps of that
Edinburgh common stair as though they were the rungs of a golden ladder
leading straight to heaven.
*CHAPTER XXVI.*
It might generally be supposed that one great emotion of the mastering
kind possesses the soul to the temporary exclusion of all others. But
this is not the case; for it is, rather, when the soul is
awake--quivering to the touch of some novel experience--that its
sensitiveness to new impressions is the greatest, and its capacity for
seeing all things and understanding all things is at the fullest
stretch. Thus, when Alison walked into Nancy's room that night, full of
her own bliss, her heart gave only one bounding throb the more when she
found a stranger there, and realised that at last she beheld the
longed-for visitor, stood in the presence of genius, and touched the
hand of Robert Burns.
The familiar room wore its cosiest and most seductive aspect--the
curtains drawn, and fire- and candle-light shining on the wall. The
figure, which, at Nancy's motion, rose to meet Alison, seemed to her
almost colossal; but only so, because her mind's-eye was filled with the
slenderer proportions of a very different figure. The man was indeed of
peasant build, of a goodly height, but heavy and thick-set, dressed
decently and yeoman-wise, 'like a farmer to dine with the laird.' As he
bent towards her the full-blooded, warm-hued, powerful face, she became
conscious of his eyes, black as night, with their fringe of
shadow-casting lashes--commanding and compelling eyes, almost surcharged
with brilliance. Nancy was speaking, lightly, gracefully.
'I told you of my song-bird,' said she to the poet; 'here she is.
She'll warble your lays with the very "wood-note wild" you are always
asking for. Ally, love, welcome home! We were waiting for you. Run,
child, and take off your things, and come and sing. Must she not,
Sylvander?'
The poet bowed. It could not be said that his gestures were clumsy, for
the man had ever a natural dignity; but they had the air of
indifferently controlled strength, which spoke the peasant struggling
with the conventions of the parlour. His great, black glance covered
Alison; half-wondering and half-shrinking, she felt it search her.
'If Miss Graham,' he said, with a low bow, 'will honour me with a song,
she will make a poor poet the richer. I find no inspiration in the
world like the lilt of a bonny voice in a bonny tune.'
Alison smiled to herself as she went to put off her hood and pelisse and
smooth her curls. The deep, flattering voice rang oddly in her ears,
for they were full of the curt speech and clear, incisive utterance of
her lover--who was certainly no poet.
In her absence, the Bard leaned against the mantel-piece and glowered
down with his dark look upon his hostess. She--flushed, radiant,
passionate, fluttered like a bird in the big hand of the fowler, but a
willing bird.
'Are all our interviews, madam,' began the Bard rather moodily, 'to be
held in the presence of a third person? Are Clarinda and Sylvander
never to be alone?'
'Nay, but our third person--such a sweet, interesting girl,' said Nancy,
persuasively. 'The companion of my dreary solitude--think of it!
'Twill not be always possible to dispense with her society,' she added,
pensively, 'nor--nor desirable, perhaps.'
A warm look shot from the poet's eye.
'Has _she_ no kindred soul compelling her society when we wish mutually
to enjoy each other's?' demanded he, harping on the unexpected intruder.
'Nay, never a one!' said Nancy, laughing archly. 'And 'tis a girl I
promised to find a swain for, too. Can Sylvander's romantic ingenuity
not help me here?'
'Sylvander has the kettle on the other hob, I'm thinking!' said the poet
with a short, meaning laugh. His manner varied from the rather stilted
politeness into which he had schooled it, sometimes to a racy reversion
to his native ways of speech and gesture, sometimes, when an opening
offered, to an uncontrollable and not always inoffensive familiarity.
Sundry mistakes in such matters had cost him more than one friendship in
the feminine great world--a cruel but perfectly inevitable injustice.
Here, however, and with his present hostess, he was but too little
likely to offend. Nancy was constitutionally lenient to the stronger
sex in its warm moments. She had that curious insensitiveness to
encroachment--that lack of resentment to the taking of small
liberties--which may be sometimes seen in perfectly-refined and
gently-nurtured women. It did not offend her now, for instance, that
the poet--seen only for the second time in her life--should bend so
closely over her, covering her with ardent, covetous eyes ... and then
abruptly straighten himself as Alison came in.
'Come along, child,' she cried, 'and sing! No, not with the
harp--alone.' She blew out two candles that were guttering low, so that
the room was in firelight only. Alison sat down, and with her hands
folded in her lap and her grave eyes fixed upon the fire, sang--sang, I
think, as she had never sung before, because, at last, there had come to
her a full understanding of the song. She chose one or two of the
simpler and older ballads, love-songs of a peasant people long ago.