HOPES AND FEARS.
'That was the way our affair of the heart came about, and was ended
by my pride, vacillation, and suspicion,' said Fotheringhame; 'and
now I have little doubt that she is quite aware that I--the Lancer
lover--was her cousin, though I never told her so.'
'How odd of you to act so!' exclaimed Cecil.
'Odd--I was mad, I think!'
'From her manner and words, I thought that you and she possessed in
common some mysterious antecedents.'
'An unpleasant way of putting it,' said Fotheringhame, with a shade
of annoyance in his face; 'all that time was one of gloom to me.
When I had to leave the Lancers I shall never forget the shock it
gave me--though of course expected--to see the 'Army List' without my
name in it; nor was I ever satisfied till I saw it there again, as a
Cameronian. So you see, Falconer, that with all my general
heedlessness of bearing, my life has not been without "its little
romance, as most lives have, between the age of teetotum and
tobacco," as George Eliot has it.'
'I may yet be the means of relighting this old flame again,' said
Falconer; 'though it is said that there is nothing so difficult to
revive as an old flirtation.'
'It was no flirtation----'
'Save in so far as you were concerned.'
'Until I lost Annabelle, I never knew how much I loved her, and how
dear she was to me.'
'If Annabelle Erroll ever loved you she loves you still.'
'Why do you think so?'
'Because true love never dies,' said Falconer enthusiastically, for
his mind was full of Mary's image; 'and I can now recall much that
was strange in her mode and manner, if I mentioned you
incidentally--of which I thought nothing then, but to which you have
now given me a clue.'
'For all that you can tell, Falconer, she may only remember me with
hatred, therefore it were better to forget the past and all about it.
After confiding the matter to my two other friends--a quiet weed and
M. de Cognac--I'll turn in, and so good-night.'
Most uneventfully passed the early days of spring, to Falconer, in
the solitary castle of Dumbarton, which shoots up abruptly from a
flat level, and stands completely isolated, the most prominent and
picturesque object amid the beautiful scenery of the blue and
majestic Clyde, into the channel of which it projects--a channel
through the clear waters of which on a calm day, one may see whole
forests of luxuriant seaweed, waving fathoms deep below.
Perched in the hollow or rift between the two great volcanic peaks
into which this singular, mitre-shaped rock is cleft--the highest
being five hundred and sixty feet in height--the old-fashioned
barracks contain accommodation for only about a company of soldiers,
and an ancient armoury (among the stores of which is the blade of
Wallace's sword, fitted with a new hilt of a later period), and which
is still identified as having been the prison of the Scottish
Patriot, after his betrayal by the infamous Menteith. The
circumstance of his sword having a hilt more modern than the blade,
has led to its identity being doubted by those who are ignorant of
the fact, that in the accounts of the Lord High Treasurer in 1505, we
find mention made of the 'binding of Wallas's sword (in the castle of
Dumbarton) with cords of silk and a _new hilt_ and plomet (pommel),
new skabbard and new belt to the said sword, xxvj sh.'
The entrance to the castle is by a barrier-gate at the foot of the
rock and fronting the south east. It is defended by ramparts and
guns, and immediately within it are the officers' quarters. A steep
flight of stone steps gives access to the barracks, the well, and
other batteries; from whence, and especially from Wallace's Seat--the
highest peak of this stupendous rock--and the circular Roman tower,
or fragment, perchance, of the days when Balclutha was the abode of
Roderick Hael 'the Generous,' there is a glorious panorama of
scenery: the far expanse of the Clyde, the sylvan vale of the Leven,
the vast blue mass of Ben Lomond and the mountains of Arrochar, their
peaks sometimes veiled in silvery mist.
On the giddy summit Falconer lingered for many an hour, and fancied
he could see, more than twenty miles distant, as the crow flies, the
hills that looked down upon Eaglescraig. There, when Fotheringhame
was absent on some duty or pleasure, he smoked many a solitary
havanna in solitude, in the evening and the gloaming, conversing in
imagination with Mary Montgomerie, with a fond enthusiasm and a
passion inflamed by obstacles and opposition, long after the shadows
had deepened in the vale of the Leven, and all around beneath the
rocks; after the drum had beaten tattoo, and the lights of the last
ocean-bound steamers had faded out beyond the point of Ardmore.
Then he would skilfully torment himself by recalling all that Mrs.
Garth, with the best intentions in the world, had said concerning
what Sir Piers would be certain to insist upon and carry out--the
union of Mary Montgomerie, the heiress, with his own heir of entail;
and well Falconer knew how Sir Piers would view his own slender means
and want of family rank. And though he hoped much, he could not know
how, in the secrecy of her own room, and in the long hours of 'the
stilly night,' Mary treasured the memory of the few precious moments
spent in the grotto, and thought of him and him only--of the
influence he had exerted over her when present, and the memory he had
left of himself when gone.
At times there was in his manner a passionate dejection, which quite
bewildered and provoked the more matter-of-fact Leslie Fotheringhame.
''Pon my soul, old fellow, you're in a bad way,' the latter sometimes
said; 'you can't live on this Mary Montgomerie, and nothing but Mary
Montgomerie! You must get up a relish for something else when the
drum beats for mess, or we shall soon have you on the doctor's list.'
So the days and weeks went by till the middle of March came. Six
weeks had elapsed since he left Eaglescraig--six centuries,
apparently, as lovers count their time!
The few words so hastily spoken in the grotto were deeply graven in
his memory, and graven, too, was the kiss--the unpremeditated
kiss--pressed so passionately on her unresisting lips. It seemed to
haunt him with joy, for ever and aye.
'If she loves me, as I know she does,' he often thought, 'I am a fool
not to carry her off in defiance of her guardian and all the world.
Heaven knows, it is not her fortune I value, but of course that
charitable world would think otherwise, though it is entirely in the
hands of Sir Piers.'
After the impression made upon him at his departure from Eaglescraig,
he felt that he could go back there on no pretence whatever, as no
welcome, save from one, would await him, and another invitation would
never be accorded. He knew that too well.
Times there were when he threw open his desk, and thought he would
write to the general on the subject nearest his heart, at all
hazards, and cast himself upon his generosity; and then hope died,
and his courage failed, as he remembered his own slender exchequer,
his humble rank, apart from his commission, and the general's
inordinate pride of birth and value of long descent.
So he dared not write to Eaglescraig, and from thence came no word,
no news, or sign.
He remembered how Mary had, with much agitation, interrupted his
suggestion that he should tell Sir Piers of his love for her. What
did she mean, then, unless it were her dread of the latter's power
and influence over her, and his future plans with reference to Hew?
But what would he have thought, what would his emotions have been,
and how great his indignation, had he known how, thanks to the
malignity and perfidy of that personage, the good old general, a
mirror of honour himself, viewed him as a trickster at cards, and a
scandal to the uniform he wore! Had Falconer been aware of this
circumstance, it would simply have maddened him; but fortunately for
himself, and the bones of Mr. Hew Caddish Montgomerie, he knew
nothing of it.
He was roused from cogitations such as these by an order which
recalled the detachment to headquarters.
'We start for Edinburgh to-morrow, Fotheringhame,' he cried, hurrying
into his friend's room.
'Hurrah!' responded the latter, springing up; 'thank heaven we are to
quit this dull hole! The scenery, of course, is picturesque, and all
that sort of thing, but the picturesque, is not in my line. The
weekly assemblies and all the gaieties are on just now in 'Scotia's
darling seat,' and the regimental ball will soon be coming off, so,
with genuine satisfaction, I hail the order to rejoin at last. Well,
it is a jolly change, anyway.'
And as such, Cecil welcomed it too, though it increased the distance
between himself and Eaglescraig, and he could little foresee the
calamities that awaited him in Edinburgh, and the crisis that would
come in his affairs.
The departure of the detachment was not so duly chronicled in the
local prints as its arrival had been; thus Mary knew nothing of
Falconer's movements.
In her own heart she fully conceived herself to be engaged--tacitly
engaged--to him, and loved to think she was so. Long engagements are
perilous things, even when the pair can see each other at will, or
freely correspond, daily or even weekly; tiffs and petty quarrels,
even little bitternesses, may come to pass that weaken regard, unless
they be like 'lovers' quarrels, love renewed:' but such a tie as that
which existed between Falconer and Mary Montgomerie--never hearing of
each other, and debarred all correspondence, having only hope for an
anchor, was altogether peculiar in its features.
'She is always sad and weary now, Sir Piers,' said Mrs. Garth one
day; 'weary at night, and weary at morning, though she tries to
conceal it, or deceive us, by occasional bursts of gaiety.'
'Poor little fool! Her mind is still running on that fellow whom I
should never have brought to Eaglescraig. But, with all Hew's faults
of temper and so forth, she had better think of him and my wishes,
Mrs. Garth; so lead her up to it, for that is our _point d'appui_,'
replied the general.
'By Jove!' said the amiable Hew, with one of his ugly grimaces, 'she
has no more brains than a hen pheasant, I think, to sit as she does
all day long looking like a sick monkey.'
Meanwhile Hew was having no better success with his wooing, a fact
which was the more perplexing and even harassing now, as he had
resigned his Indian Civil Service appointment, and had no dependence,
save upon the purse of Sir Piers, who, as the former grudgingly
thought, seemed likely to live for ever; and who hoped, and indeed
never doubted, that when Mary got over her girlish fancy for Cecil
Falconer all things would come right in the end; and to change the
scene, as the Edinburgh season was then in its flush, Sir Piers
removed his entire household from Eaglescraig to his town residence
at the west end of the grey metropolis of the north, a few days after
Falconer's detachment had quitted the castle of Dumbarton.