He had come back; he had come--could there be any doubt on that
point?--to take his wife away, to take her home.
Lily, at least in her own mind, would admit of no doubt. She was
transported in a moment from the depths to the heights. So much the more
as it had been impossible yesterday to see any light, there was now such
a flushing of the whole horizon that doubt was out of the question. She
came toward the house with him with his arm around her, thinking of no
precautions. Why should they conceal any thing, this young pair? The
man had come to take his wife away. When he withdrew his arm from her
waist and drew her hand through it, it did not, however, strike her that
there was any thing in that. It was more decorous, like old married
people, no longer mere lad and lass. She walked proudly by his side,
leaning on his arm. Who cared if Sir Robert himself were there to see?
Lily had never cared much for Sir Robert, had always been ready to defy
him and vindicate her rights over her own life. As it happened there was
nobody but Katrin standing at the door, looking out with her hand over
her eyes. Katrin was very quick to make believe that she was dazzled by
any little bit of light.
And the lonely moor lighted up and became as paradise to Lily. He
brought her all kinds of news, besides the best news of all, which was
to see him there. He brought back her old world to her--the world where
she had been so happy and so full of friends; her new world, where so
soon, in a day or two, she was to find her young companions again, and
resume the former life more cordial, more kind, more full of friendship
and every gentle affection than ever.
While he sat there thawing, expanding, shaking the cold from him, Lily,
who a little while ago had been the fastidious little maiden, courted
and served, began to move about the room serving him, eager to get every
thing for him he wanted, to undo his muffler, to bring him his slippers.
Yes, she would have liked to bring him his slippers as she brought him,
like a house-maid, on a little silver salver, not a cup of tea, which
probably Ronald would not have appreciated, but something stronger, “to
keep out the cauld,” which Katrin recommended and brought upstairs with
her own hands to the drawing-room door. “You are not going to serve me,
my Lily?” Ronald said. “But I am just going to serve you,” she cried,
with a little stamp of her foot, “and who has a better right? and who
should wait on my man but me that am bound to take care of him? and him
come to take me away.”
Was she afraid to say these words out loud lest they should break the
spell? or was he afraid that she might say them and he not be able to
ignore them? But between them something was thrown down, a noise was
made in which they were inaudible. I do not know if Lily had any little
tremor that made her avoid explanation that evening; at all events she
had a sort of hunger to be happy, to enjoy it to the utmost. She laid
the table with her own hands, shutting the door in the face of the
astonished Robina, who hurried up as soon as she came in to have her
share. “I can do without you for all so grand as you think yourself,”
Lily cried; “I am just going to wait upon my own man!”
“Oh, Miss Lily!” cried Beenie, terrified; but she added to herself:
“What a good thing there’s naebody in the house! Dougal will not be in
till it’s late, and most likely he’ll be fou when he comes--and be nane
the wiser. And naething will need to be said.” I cannot tell whether
Katrin made quite the same explanation to herself; but she had taken her
precautions in case that should happen to Dougal which happened in these
days to many honest men on a market night without much infringement of
their character for sobriety. It would make the explanation much simpler
about the gentleman upstairs. In short, it would not be necessary to
make any explanation at all.
“Get out the boxes, Beenie,” said Lily, at a later hour. “Do not make
any fuss or have things lying about, for gentlemen, you know, cannot
endure that; but just prepare quietly, without any fuss.”
“Oh, Miss Lily! do you think it has come to that?” Beenie cried,
clasping her hands with a start of joyful surprise, but with a
countenance full of doubt.
“And what else should it come to?” cried Lily, radiant. “Is this what
folk are married for, to live one in Edinburgh and one up far in the
Hielands? And what should my man come for but to take me home?”
She must have believed it or she would not have said it with such
boldness. She gave Beenie a shake and then a kiss, but cried: “Don’t
make a confusion, don’t leave the things lying about, for that is what
gentlemen cannot endure,” as she ran away to rejoin her husband. Robina
stood immovable, looking after her. “Who has learnt her that?” she said
to herself; and then she began to shake her head. “They soon, soon learn
what a gentleman canna bide; and set him up! that he should not bide any
thing coming from her!” But Beenie did not bring out any boxes. She
concluded that at all events it would be time enough for that to-morrow.
Ronald remained for three or four days, during which time Dougal, who
had carried out the judicious previsions of the women, and had required
no explanations of any kind on the market night, maintained a very
sullen countenance and did not welcome the visitor, of whom he was
suspicious without well knowing why. During this time there was scarcely
any pretence kept up of sending Ronald off to the cottage of Tam Robison
or in any way making a stranger of him. He was “the young leddy’s
freend.” “Young leddies had nae sic freends in my time,” said Dougal.
“They have aye had them in my time,” said Katrin, “and that cannot be
far different.” He did not know what to say; but he was very glum, and
open to no blandishments on the part of the stranger. And those were
days of anxious happiness for Lily. Ronald said nothing upon that one
sole subject which she longed to know of. He sounded no note of freedom
amid all the litanies he sang to her about her own sweetness, her
beauty, her kindness. Lily grew sick of hearing her own praises. “Oh, if
he would but say I was an ugly, troublesome thing! and then say: ‘You
must be ready, Lily, for we’re going home to-morrow!’” But Lily was very
sweet to her husband; this short visit was full of delight to him; he
loved to look at her, to take her in his arms, to know she was his.
Going away from her was hard to bear. He would have bemoaned his very
hard case if he had not feared that she would beseech him to put an end
to it, to take her away with him, and that it need be hard no longer.
That was not what he wanted. He preferred the moments of rapture and
the separations between. At least he preferred them to the loss of many
other things which would be otherwise involved.
One day they went down to the Manse, Lily riding upon Rory, and her
husband walking by her side. “You can say I have just come over for the
day,” he said. “The minister of course knows very well, but your friend
Miss Helen----”
“Why should we tell lies about it, Ronald? Isn’t it very easy, very easy
to understand?”
“Oh, yes,” he said, “in any case it’s easy to understand; but we might
as well avoid gossip if we could.”
“There would be no gossip,” cried Lily, “about a man coming to see his
wife! The only thing would be that folk would wonder why he did not take
her home.”
“Folk would wonder about something, you may be sure; but I’ve noticed
that ladies think less of that than men. You think it is natural that
people’s minds should be occupied with you, my bonnie Lily. And so it
is; but not with a common man. Maybe it is the jealousy that’s in human
nature. I hate the chance of it, you see!”
He spoke with a little vehemence, and Lily’s eyes filled with tears. It
was almost approaching the border of a first quarrel. “You and me,” she
said plaintively, “though I would not have believed it, Ronald, do not
always think the same.”
“Did we ever think the same? No, Lily. But so long as we feel the
same--and it’s best to be on the safe side. I’ll say I have come over
for the day from--what do you call that place?--Ardenlennie, on the
other side, where I had to see Sir John’s man of business--which is
true. And I found you coming out to pay your visit and came with you.
Will that do?”
“Oh, it will do as well as any other--false story,” said Lily, “if we
are to go on telling lies all our days!”
“Not all our days, I hope,” he said gently. He was very good to her. No
lover could have been more devoted to her service, with no eyes or ears
but for her. That ride, though Lily was not happy in the depths of her
heart, though she was fretted almost beyond endurance, was yet sweet to
her in spite of herself. “Do you mind how we careered along that other
day, me riding, you running,” he said, “pushing at Rory behind, and
pulling him before, and the poor little beast astonished with the weight
on him of a long-legged chield instead of a bonnie lady? My Lily, what
you did for me that day! What should I have done without you--at that or
any other time?”
“You have to do without me--not that I think I am much good--when you go
away.”
“Come,” he said, “you must not harp forever on this going away. Holloa!”
he added immediately, retiring from her side with a sudden impulse as if
some hand had pushed him away, “there is a man I know.”
“A man you know!” she cried, startled, not so much by this intimation as
by the start it produced in him.
“Not a very creditable acquaintance,” he went on, with a short laugh,
dropping Rory’s bridle and keeping, as Lily remarked with a pang, quite
apart from her. “I thought he had been at the other end of the world. He
is Alick Duff, one of the Duffs of Blackscaur. They were once the great
people up here; but the present laird, I believe, is never at home. You
might ride on while I say a word to him. He’s not an acquaintance for
you.”
Rory, however, at this moment did not show any inclination to quicken
his pace, and Lily heard the greeting between the two men. “Holloa,
Lumsden, is that you?” and “Duff! I thought you were at the other end of
the world!”
“Well, no, here I am--no in such clover as you,” said the new-comer,
with a rough laugh. “Present me to the lady, Ronnie--Miss Ramsay, I’m
sure.”
“This is Mr. Alick Duff--Miss Ramsay,” Lumsden said with a dark color on
his face. “We are going the same way.”
“And I’m going the contrary road--I’m sorry,” said the stranger, who
was a heavy man, older and far less well looking than Ronald. “I’m going
to have a look at the old place and see if they’ll have any thing to say
to me there. Then I’m off again to the ends of the world, as you say;
and the further the better,” he added, again with a harsh laugh. Rory by
this time had moved on, and Lily, though she heard the men’s voices
almost loud on the still air, did not make out what they said. In a few
moments Ronald rejoined her almost out of breath.
“That’s the black sheep of the family,” he said; “not likely he’ll get
much of a reception at home, even if there’s any body there. The only
thing that could be wished, for all belonging to him, is that he should
never be heard of more.”
“He is a dreadful-looking man,” said Lily, with a shudder, “and seems to
laugh at every thing, and looks as if he might do any terrible thing.”
“You should ask Helen Blythe about that,” Ronald said. He was still
keeping at a certain distance, the other wayfarer being still in sight.
Ronald did not know that, when at the sudden turn of the next corner he
resumed his place at Rory’s bridle, it was almost in the heart of his
wife to have pushed him back with her hands. This incident stopped the
question about Helen Blythe which was trembling on Lily’s lips. What
could he know about Helen Blythe, and what could she have to do with
this dreadful man?
The minister sat in his big chair as usual, immovable, by the fire, with
a keen glance at Ronald and another at Lily as they came in. Lily was a
little flushed with the fresh air and exercise, and with the
associations of the place, and the sense that to one person here at
least her secret was known. She would not take upon herself a syllable
of the explanation which Ronald hastened to give fluently over her
shoulder. “I am up at Ardenlennie, on business with Sir John’s factor,”
he said, “and I was so fortunate as to find Miss Ramsay just setting out
on a visit to you, so I thought I might come too.”
“You’re welcome,” said the minister curtly. “Come in to the fire, my
dear young lady, and take a seat here.”
“Eh, Lily, my dear,” cried Helen, “I am feared you are not well, for
you’ve turned white in a moment after that bonnie color you had!” Helen
herself was not looking well. There was a little redness in her eyes, as
if she had been crying, and her cheeks were still paler than Lily’s. She
was interrupted by her father’s peremptory voice:
“If you would but let your friends be! Sit down here and rest. No doubt
ye’re both tired and cold. And, Eelen, if you had any sense, you would
get the tea.”
“That’s one word for you, Lily, and two for himself,” said Helen, with a
smile. “He’s as fond of his tea as if he were an old woman. I will just
tell Marget and come back in a moment.” Perhaps she was glad to be out
of sight, even for that moment; but poor Lily, wholly occupied with her
own concerns, and wondering whether Helen knew any thing, or how much
she knew, or what she would think of this dreadful deception, had no
leisure in her mind to think of any possible troubles of Helen’s own.
“Did you meet any--waif characters on the road?” the minister said, with
a bitter pause before the last words to give emphasis. It was said loud
enough for Helen to hear.
“We met--Alick Duff; I thought he was in Australia or America. He is not
precisely what one would call a--fine character,” Lumsden said.
“There are not very many of them about,” said the old man; “some take
one turn and some another; but them that stick to the straight road are
few, as was said on a--more important occasion. And how will you be
liking your stay in Dalrugas, Miss Lily, after all the daffing of the
New Year is over? A visitor for a day or so maybe makes it bearable; but
it’s lonely for the like of you.”
“Oh,” cried Lily, involuntarily putting her hands together, “I get very
tired of it! But I think,” she added, with a confidence she was far from
feeling, “that I shall not be very long there now.”
“Oh! ye think ye will not be very long there?” he repeated after her.
There was not very great assurance or encouragement in his voice.
“Well,” said Helen, who had come back, “I understand it’s dull for you;
but here is one person that will be very sorry, Lily. It will, maybe, be
better for you, but the whole countryside will miss you; for many a one
takes pleasure to see you pass--you and the powny--that never has said a
word to you. She is just a public benefit,” said the minister’s
daughter, “with her bonnie face.”
A silence ensued, nobody said a word, and it became visible that Helen’s
cheeks were a little glazed, as if by sudden application of cold water
to wash away certain stains from her eyes. She had seated herself for a
moment where all the light from the window fell on her, but restlessly
jumped up again and began to remove her work and some books from the
table in preparation for tea. “And when are you leaving this
neighborhood, Mr. Lumsden? I hope you have some time to stay.”
“Alas! I am going to-morrow. A man who has his work to do has little
leisure,” said Ronald. “We must keep our noses to the grindstone
whatever happens. Ladies are better off.”
“Do you think we are better off,” said Helen, with a sigh, “to bide at
home whatever happens, and wait for news that maybe never comes? to see
the others go away, and never be able to follow them, except with the
longings of our hearts? I have had two brothers----” she said, with a
sudden little catch in her throat.
“Eelen,” said the minister, “I never knew you for a hypocrite, whatever
you were. It is none of your brothers----”
“Oh, father, how can you ken? Do I wear my heart on my sleeve that you
can tell what’s in it? You never thought much about them yourself, and
how could you know what was in another’s heart? But it’s not for me to
speak. I have aye my duty. It’s just Mr. Lumsden’s notion that it’s a
fine thing for us to sit quiet at home and endure all things and never
hear.”
“Well, here is your tea at all events,” said Mr. Blythe, “and I see
James Douglas passing the window to get a cup. When there’s nothing to
do in an afternoon and every thing low, as it is at that period in the
day, there is a great diversion in tea. In fact,” he added, “the best of
meals is just the diversion they make. You are shaken out of yourself.
Ye say your grace and ye carve your chuckie, or even a sheep’s head on
occasion, and your thoughts are taken clean away from the channel, maybe
a troublesome one, that they are in. Still better is a cup of tea. Come
ben, come ben, Mr. Douglas; there’s plenty of room for you. We were just
thinking, Eelen and me, that it is a long time since you have been
here.”
A pleasant light shone in the young minister’s face. “If I thought I
could make myself missed, I would have the heart to stay away longer
still,” he said, “but then I think that out of sight is often out of
mind.”
It was pathetic to observe how he sought the eyes of Helen, and how he
contrived to put his chair next hers at the table, round which they all
sat. Helen took but little notice of the gentle young man; she set down
his cup before him with a precipitation that was almost rude, and turned
away to Lily, with whom she talked in an undertone. What about? Neither
one nor the other knew. Yet neither one nor the other had any perception
of what was in her neighbor’s bosom. Helen’s trouble to her filled all
the world. It was greater than anything else she knew; the air tingled
with it; the very horizon could scarcely contain it. Lily, a child, with
all the world smiling upon her!--what could there be in her lot to
approach the greatness of the pain which Helen had to bear? She was half
angry with the girl for making a fuss about being dull, as if that
mattered; or seeing her sweetheart only by intervals, which was all, she
thought, that Lily had to complain of. The little spoiled child! but
what a real heartbreak was, Helen knew.