Duncan gave a great start at this strange intimation--“Tummult over the
linn!” That was not an accident to be spoken of in such an easy way. He
put down the noisy pail he had been carrying in his hand. “Lord!” he
said to himself; but he was a man slow to move. Nevertheless after two
or three goings back upon himself, and thoughts that “the maister must
have gone gyte,” Duncan set himself slowly in motion. “A man tummult
o’er the linn--that’s a very sarious thing,” he said to himself. It was
a great ease to his mind to see Glendochart coming down the path from
the hill, and he stopped until they met. “Sir,” said Duncan, “have ye
noticed anything strange about the maister?” “Strange about Drumcarro? I
have noticed nothing beyond the ordinary,” was the reply. “What has he
been doing, Duncan?” “He has been doing naething, Glendochart. But he
just came upon me when I was doing my wark in the yaird. And I says,
‘Are ye wanting me, maister?’ And he says, ‘Me wanting ye? No, I’m no
wanting ye.’ But afore I can get back to my wark I hear him again,
‘Duncan!’ ‘What is it, maister?’ says I. And says he, ‘I think there’s a
man tummult over the linn. Ye can go and see.’”
“Tumbled over the linn!” cried Glendochart “Good Lord! and did ye go and
see?”
“I’m on the road now,” said Duncan; “a man cannot do everything at
once.”
“The man may be drowned,” cried Glendochart, turning round quickly. “Run
on, Duncan, for the Lord’s sake. I’m not so surefooted as the like of
you, but I’ll follow ye by the road, as fast as I can. A man over the
linn! Dear me, but that may be a very serious matter.”
“I was just saying that,” said Duncan plunging down upon the spongy
grass. He slid and stumbled, tearing long strips of moss off the roots
of the trees with which he came in heavy contact, striding over the
fallen trunk which had played so great a part in the drama of that
afternoon. There were signs of footsteps there, and Duncan slid on the
slippery and trampled soil and came down on his back, but got up again
at once and took no notice. This accident perhaps delayed him for a
moment, and the need of precaution as he descended after such a warning.
At all events Glendochart coming quickly by the roundabout of the road
arrived only a moment after, and found Duncan dragging out upon the bank
an inanimate figure which had apparently been lying half in half out of
the stream. Duncan’s ruddy face had grown suddenly pale. “Lord keep us!
Do ye think he’s dead, sir?”
“I hope not, Duncan,” said Glendochart, kneeling down by the body; but
after a few minutes, both men scared and horror-stricken bending over
the figure on the grass, “God preserve us,” he said, “I fear it is so.
Do you know who it is?”--then a hoarse exclamation burst from them both.
“It’s the young lord from the lodge on the hill--It’s Lord John! God
preserve us!” cried Glendochart again. “What can this mean? But a man
that’s drowned may be brought to life again,” he added. “How are we to
get him home?”
Duncan, roused by the wonderful event which had thus come in a moment
into the tranquil ordinary of his life, rushed along the road calling
with a roar for help, which it was not easy to find in that lonely
place. However there proved to be one or two people within call--the
gamekeeper who lived at the lodge inhabited by Lord John, and the
blacksmith from the clachan, who had been carrying some implement home
to a distant mountain farm. They managed to tie some branches roughly
together to make a sort of litter and thus carried the dead man to
Drumcarro, which was the nearest house. The sound of the men’s feet and
Glendochart’s call at the door, brought out every member of the
household except the laird, who remained in his room with the door
closed and took no notice. Glendochart and the gamekeeper had both some
rude notion of what to do, and they acted upon their knowledge, roughly
it is true, but with all the care they were capable of. Duncan on
horseback, and less apt to spare his horse’s legs than his own,
thundered off for a doctor. But the doctor was not easily found, and
long before his arrival the rough methods of restoring animation had all
been given up. Lord John lay on the mistress’s unoccupied bed to which
he had been carried, like a marble image, with all the lines that a
careless life had made showing still upon the whiteness of death, the
darkness under the eyes, the curves about the mouth. His wet clothes,
which had been cut from the limbs to which they clung, lay in a muddy
heap smoking before the now blazing fire. They had piled blankets over
him and done everything they knew to restore the vital heat--but without
avail.
“How did it happen?” the doctor said--but this no man could tell. They
gathered together in an excited yet awestricken group to consult
together, to put their different guesses together, to collect what
indications might be found. Duncan thought that the collar of the coat
was torn as if some one had grasped the poor young man “by the scruff of
the neck.” There was a bruise on his throat which might have come from
the hand thus inserted--but his face had several bruises upon it from
contact with the rocks, and his clothes had been so torn and cut up that
they afforded little assistance in solving the problem. To send for some
member of his family, and to make the sheriff aware of all the
circumstances was evidently the only thing to do.
Jeanie had fled without a word, without a look behind her, when her
lover’s arm loosened from her waist, and her father’s hoarse and angry
voice broke in upon the scene. No thought of any tragedy to follow was
in Jeanie’s mind. She had never seen her father take any violent action;
his voice, his frowns, had always been enough, there had been no need
for more. She thought of an angry altercation, a command to come near
the house no more, so far as she thought at all. But she scarcely did
think at all. She fled, afraid of her lover, afraid of her father, not
sure, to tell the truth, which she feared most--glad that the situation
was over, that she could escape by any means. She sped up the wooded
bank, out of the shadow of the bare trees about the linn, like a
frightened bird--flying, never looking behind. Pausing a moment to take
breath before she ran round to the house door, she was thankful to hear
no voices in anger, but all fallen into quiet again, nothing but the
sound of the linn, louder she thought for the cessation of other sounds;
and concluding rapidly in her mind that her father had reserved his
anger for her, and let Lord John go--not a just, but according even to
Jeanie’s small experience, a sufficiently usual turn of affairs--she
went on more quietly to the house, that no hasty rush on her part, or
self-disclosure of agitation, might call forth Mary’s remarks or the
questions of Marg’ret. But the agitation of the moment was not over for
Jeanie. She saw some one approaching the door from the road as she came
within sight. It was too late to escape, and she instinctively put up
her hand to smooth her hair, and drew a few long breaths to overcome
altogether the panting of her heart, that the stranger, whoever he
might be, might not perceive how disturbed she was. But when Jeanie had
taken a step or two further, her heart suddenly made a leap again, which
swept all her precautions away. “Oh!” she cried, with almost a shriek of
agitated recognition, “now of all moments in the world---- That he
should come now!”
“I am afraid,” he said, “I cannot think that cry means any pleasure to
see me, though I am so glad to be here.”
Oh, to think he should be able to speak, to use common words, as if they
had parted yesterday--as if nothing had happened since then!
“Oh, Captain Gordon,” she said, breathless; then added, not knowing what
she said, “You’ve been long away.”
“Not with my will. I’ve nothing but my profession, and I was forced to
do all I could in that. If it had been my will--”
“Oh,” said Jeanie, “I cannot talk; my sister is here, you will want to
see her--but for me, I cannot talk. I am--not well. I am in--grief and
trouble. Don’t stop me now, but let me go.”
He stood aside, without a word, his hat in his hand, looking at her
wistfully. His look dwelt in her mind as she hurried up stairs. It was
not like the look of Lord John--the look that terrified, yet excited
her. He had come for her, for her and no one else; but he would not stop
her, nor trouble her. It was of her he thought, not of himself. Jeanie’s
heart came back like an unbent bow. This was the man that she loved.
She fled from him, not daring to meet his eyes--but she felt as if some
chain had been broken, some bond cut. Lord John! What was Lord John? She
was afraid of him no more.
Major Gordon did not know what to do. He lingered a little, unable with
the excitement in his veins of having seen his love again, to knock
presently at the door and ask for the lady of Glendochart. After a time
the sound of a heavy step caught his ear, and the loud interchange of
words between Duncan and his master. Then the heavy steps came on
towards the door. It must be Drumcarro himself who was coming. Major
Gordon drew aside to await the coming of Jeanie’s father. Mr. Douglas
came round the side of the house, with his hands thrust deep into his
pockets and his shoulders up to his ears. He was staring before him with
a fierce intensity, the kind of look which sees nothing. Gordon made a
step forward, and said some common words of greeting, at which Drumcarro
lifted his puckered eyelids for a moment, said “Eh?” with a sort of
hasty interrogation, and then turning his back went in and closed the
door behind him, leaving the stranger astonished. What did it mean?
Gordon thought at first a studied slight to him, but farther thought
showed him that this was absurd, and with some surprise he set it down
to its true cause--some secret trouble in Drumcarro’s mind, some thought
which absorbed him. After a moment’s astonished pause he turned back
upon the road, concluding that whatever this excitement was, by and by
it would die away. He walked, perhaps a mile, occupied by his own
thoughts, by Jeanie, who was more lovely, he thought, than ever, and by
eager speculations what she would say to him; whether perhaps after all
she might not be glad to see him when she had got over the first
surprise; whether it was merely haste and that great surprise that made
her turn away. Gordon had occupation enough for his thoughts had he
walked on the whole afternoon; but presently he turned back, remembering
what Jeanie had said, that her sister was at Drumcarro, and glad to
think of so reasonable a way of getting admittance. He had just come up
to the house again, and was approaching the door, when he was met by the
group of men coming down from their hopeless attempts to resuscitate the
dead. He was much surprised to see this party come to the door, and
stepped out of the way with vexation and annoyance, feeling himself and
his urgent affairs thrust as it were into a secondary place by this
evidence of something going on at Drumcarro. The men, of whom at first
he recognized none, were exchanging grave observations, shaking their
heads, with puzzled and troubled looks. At the sight of him there was a
visible stir among them. One of them stepped forward hastily, and caught
him by the arm, “Who are you? And what are you doing here?”
“Glendochart, you seem to have forgotten me. I am Lewis Gordon, whom you
were once very kind to.”
“Captain Gordon!”
“Major, at your service; I got my step in India.”
“Gordon!” repeated Glendochart. It was natural enough that every new
idea should chime in with the terrible one that now possessed his mind.
He remembered in a moment who the young man was, and all that had been
said and thought of him. He had been Jeanie’s lover. It seemed to throw
a sudden gleam of illumination on the mystery. “Step in, step in here,
and come you with me,” he said, laying his hand on the doctor’s arm.
With a slight summons at the door, but without waiting for any reply he
led them into his father-in-law’s room. Drumcarro was sitting at his
usual table with his head leant upon his hands. He turned half round but
did not otherwise change his attitude, as these newcomers entered,
darkening the little room.
“I beg your pardon, Drumcarro,” said Glendochart, “but it’s urgent. I
must ask this gentleman a few questions in the presence of some
responsible person--Captain Gordon, or Major if ye are Major, answer me
for the love of God. Ye may do a hasty act, but you’re not one that will
shrink from the consequence, or I’m far mistaken in you. When did you
come here?”
“This is a strange way of receiving a friend,” said Gordon with
surprise. “I came here about half an hour ago.”
“But you did not come in?”
“No--I saw--one of the family.”
“And then? Still you did not come in?”
“No, I walked back a mile or so to wait--and then hearing that you were
here, and Mrs. Campbell--I returned.”
“Why did you not come in?”
“I really cannot tell you the reason,” said Gordon, a little irritated.
“There was no particular reason.”
Said the doctor, perceiving where Glendochart’s questions were tending:
“It will be far better for you to tell the truth. It might be an
accident, but denial will do no good.”
“Am I accused of anything?” said the stranger in great surprise.
“A stranger about the place at such a time is very suspicious,” said the
doctor, shaking his head. “The best thing you could do, Glendochart,
would be to detain him till the sheriff comes.”
Drumcarro raised his head from his supporting hands. His habitual
redness had changed to grey. He spoke with some difficulty moistening
his lips. He said, “Whatever ye may be thinking of, this lad’s tale’s
true. I saw him come, and I saw him go. If there’s any man to blame it’s
not him.”
They all turned round to where Mr. Douglas sat; the afternoon light was
by this time waning, and they had difficulty in seeing each other’s
faces. Drumcarro after a moment resumed again. The want of light and the
deep sound of his voice, and the scene from which they had just come,
made a strange horror of impression upon the men. He asked, “Is he
dead?”
“Yes, he is dead. And that minds me it was you that gave the alarm. What
did you see, Drumcarro?”
“I heard a rumbling as if the linn rose up to meet him, like hell in the
Scriptures to meet that king--and a thud here and there upon the
rocks--that’s all I heard.”
Nobody made any reply. No suspicion of the truth had occurred to any
mind, but something in the voice, and the language not familiar to the
man gave a vague sensation of solemnity and horror. The darkness seemed
to deepen round them, while this pause lasted. And Drumcarro said no
more, but leant his head upon his hands again. The silence was broken by
the doctor who said in a subdued tone: “We’ll better leave Mr. Douglas
quiet. It is a time of trouble--and the shock of this accident on the
top of all the rest--”
Drumcarro did not move, but he said between the two hands that supported
his head, “That man has nothing to do with it. I saw him come. And now
ye can let him go his way.”
They filed out of the room in silence with a vague dread upon them all.
Something strange was in the air. The dark figure by the table never
moved, his head on his hands, his big frame looking colossal in the
quivering twilight. The fire in the grate behind burned up suddenly and
threw a little flickering flame into the gloom relieving still more
that, motionless shadow. “It has been too much for the old gentleman,”
the doctor said in a whisper, as he closed the door.
“He’s none so old,” said Glendochart with a little irritation, mindful
of the fact that he was not himself much younger, and feeling the thrill
of nervous discomfort and alarm.
“I doubt if he’ll live to be much older. I do not like the looks of
him,” the doctor said.
It seemed to have become almost night when they came out into the hall.
The blacksmith and the gamekeeper and Duncan were standing in a group
about the door, the sky full of a twilight clearness behind them, and
one star in it, like a messenger sent out to see what dreadful thing had
happened. The air blew cold through the house from the open door, and
Mary crying and nervous stood at the door of the parlour behind. The
mother’s death which she had taken with such calm propriety was in the
course of nature, but the dreadful suddenness of this, the mystery about
it affected even her calm nerves. A second death in the house, and the
Duke’s son! It comforted Mary when Gordon left the group of men whose
meaning he did not even yet comprehend and joined her, to hear the
whole story, and yet not all.
The other men still stood consulting when the Glendochart carriage
arrived at the door; everybody had forgotten that the departure of the
visitors had been settled for that afternoon, Glendochart seized the
opportunity at once. “I will send the ladies away; this is no place for
them with all these new troubles,” he said, “and the express to the Duke
can travel so far with them.” It had occurred to Glendochart that the
less that could be made of Lord John’s intercourse with the family at
Drumcarro the better. He had not discouraged it himself; had it come to
a marriage which would have allied himself and his children so much more
nearly with the ducal family, it would have been no bad thing; but now
that there could be no marriage it was clear that it was neither for
Jeanie’s advantage, nor indeed for his own, to give any more publicity
than was necessary to the cause of Lord John’s presence here. And thus
it was that Jeanie without knowing why, yet willing enough to be carried
off at such a crisis even to Glendochart, found herself within half an
hour seated by her sister’s side driving off, with the darkness of night
behind her, and the clearness in the west reflected in her startled
eyes. Jeanie neither knew nor suspected that anything dreadful had
happened; but to escape her father’s eye and his questions after the
discovery he had made was relief enough to make her forget the bustle
and haste with which she was carried away. They were to give Major
Gordon “a lift as far as the town,” but Jeanie did not know this until
he followed her into the carriage, and then her heart so jumped up and
choked her with its beating that she thought no more of Drumcarro’s
wrath, nor of the deliverance from Lord John which she knew her father’s
interposition would make final.
And so Drumcarro House was once more, but with a deepened mystery and
terror, left with its dead. Mr. Douglas did not leave his room all the
evening. The call to supper made first by Marg’ret, then by Glendochart
knocking cautiously at his door, produced only the response of a growl
from within. No light was visible from under the door. No sound was
heard in the room. To all appearance he remained without moving or even
lighting his candle, until late at night his heavy step was heard going
up stairs to bed. Without a light, that was the strangest thing of all
to the keen but silent observers. There could be nothing on the master’s
mind or he could never have sat all the evening through knowing what it
was that lay in his wife’s room up stairs, without a light. They could
not imagine indeed how in any circumstances Drumcarro, an old man, could
have had anything to do with the death of Lord John, a young one, nor
what reason there could be for seeking his death, yet an uneasy fear was
in the air, and there was no one else who could be thought of. But that
circumstance cleared him. Without a light no man could sit who had been
instrumental in causing a man’s death, while that man lay dead in the
same house. Glendochart, whose mind was disturbed by many miserable
surmises, was comforted by this thought, though almost unconsciously to
himself.
And nobody knew what thoughts were going on in the dark in that closed
room. They were not thoughts specially about Lord John. They were the
bewildering circling of a mind suddenly driven into tragic
self-consciousness, about the entire chapter of his life now perhaps
about to be brought to an end. The sudden pang of the moment, his clutch
upon his victim (his hand hurt him still from the strain, and still now
and then he raised it to his mouth, to blow his hot breath upon it), the
whirl of that figure through the air, came back at intervals like a
picture placed before his eyes. But between those intervals there surged
up all manner of things. Old scenes far off and gone, incidents that had
taken place in the jungle and swamp, cries and sounds of the lash, and
pistol shots all long over and forgotten. One face, not white like Lord
John’s, but grey in its blackness, like ashes, came and wavered in the
darkness before him more distinct than the others. No ghost, he had no
faith in ghosts, nothing outside of him. Something within from which
even if they should hang him he knew he would not get free. Lord
John,--he thought very little of Lord John! And yet his hand hurt him,
the picture would come back, and the scene re-enact itself before his
eyes. Sometimes he dozed with his head in his hands. The chief thing was
that he should not be disturbed, that no one should come in to question
him, to interfere with his liberty, that night at least. That he should
be quiet that night if nevermore.