Kitabı oku: «The Entail», sayfa 28
CHAPTER LXXXII
Mr. Walkinshaw had not left Camrachle many minutes when his nephew appeared. James had in fact returned from Glasgow, while his uncle was in the house, but, seeing the carriage at the door, he purposely kept out of the way till it drove off.
His excursion had not been successful. He found his father’s old acquaintance sufficiently cordial in the way of inquiries, and even disposed to sympathise with him, when informed of his determination to go abroad; but when the army was mentioned the merchant’s heart froze; and after a short pause, and the expression of some frigiverous observations with respect to the licentiousness of the military life, it was suggested that his uncle was the proper quarter to apply to. In this crisis, their conversation was interrupted by the entrance of a third party, when Walkinshaw retired.
During his walk back to Camrachle, his heart was alternately sick and saucy, depressed and proud.
He could not conceive how he had been so deluded, as to suppose that he had any right to expect friendship from the gentleman he had applied to. He felt that in so doing he acted with the greenness of a boy, and he was mortified at his own softness. Had there been any reciprocity of obligations between his father and the gentleman, the case would have been different. ‘Had they been for forty or fifty years,’ thought he, ‘in the mutual interchange of mercantile dependence, then perhaps I might have had some claim, and, no doubt, it would have been answered, but I was a fool to mistake civilities for friendship.’ Perhaps, however, had the case been even as strong as he put it, he might still have found himself quite as much deceived.
‘As to making any appeal to my uncle, that was none of his business,’ said he to himself. ‘I did not ask the fellow for advice, I solicited but a small favour. There is no such heart-scalding insolence as in refusing a solicitation, to refer the suppliant to others, and with prudential admonitions too – curse him who would beg, were it not to avoid doing worse.’
This brave humour lasted for the length of more than a mile’s walk, during which the young soldier marched briskly along, whistling courageous tunes, and flourishing his stick with all the cuts of the broadsword, lopping the boughs of the hedges, as if they had been the limbs of Frenchmen, and switching away the heads of the thistles and benweeds in his path, as if they had been Parisian carmagnols, against whom, at that period, the loyalty of the British bosom was beginning to grow fretful and testy.
But the greater part of the next mile was less animated – occasionally, cowardly thoughts glimmered palely through the glorious turbulence of youthful heroism, and once or twice he paused and looked back towards Glasgow, wondering if there was any other in all that great city, who might be disposed to lend him the hundred pounds he had begged for his outfit.
‘There is not one,’ said he, and he sighed, but in a moment after he exclaimed, ‘and who the devil cares? It does not do for soldiers to think much; let them do their duty at the moment; that’s all they have to think of; I will go on in the track I have chosen, and trust to Fortune for a windfall;’ again ‘In the Garb of Old Gaul’ was gallantly whistled, and again the hedges and thistles felt the weight of his stick.
But as he approached Camrachle, his mood shifted into the minor key, and when the hazel bank and the ash-trees, with the nests of the magpies in them, appeared in sight, the sonorous bravery of the Highland march became gradually modulated into a low and querulous version of ‘Lochaber no more’, and when he discovered the carriage at his mother’s door, his valour so subsided into boyish bashfulness, that he shrank away, as we have already mentioned, and did not venture to go home, till he saw that his uncle had left the house.
On his entrance, however, he received a slight sensation of pleasure at seeing both his mother and sister with more comfort in their looks than he had expected, and he was, in consequence, able to tell them, with comparative indifference, the failure of his mission. His mother then related what had passed with his uncle.
The news perplexed Walkinshaw; they contradicted the opinion he had so warmly felt and expressed of his uncle; they made him feel he had acted rashly and ungratefully – but still such strange kindness occasioned a degree of dubiety, which lessened the self-reproaches of his contrition.
‘However,’ said he, with a light and joyous heart, ‘I shall not again trouble either myself or him, as I have done; but in this instance, at least, he has acted disinterestedly, and I shall cheerfully avail myself of his offer, because it is generous – I accept it also as encouragement – after my disappointment, it is a happy omen; I will take it as a brave fellow does his bounty-money – a pledge from Fortune of some famous “all hail hereafter”.’
What his sentiments would have been, had he known the tenor of his uncle’s mind at that moment, – could he even but have suspected that the motive which dictated such seeming generosity, so like an honourable continuance of his former partiality, was prompted by a wish to remove him as soon as possible from the company of Ellen Frazer, in order to supplant him in her affections, we need not attempt to imagine how he would have felt. It is happy for mankind, that they know so little of the ill said of them behind their backs, by one another, and of the evil that is often meditated in satire and in malice, and still oftener undertaken from motives of interest and envy. Walkinshaw rejoicing in the good fortune that had so soon restored the alacrity of his spirits – so soon wiped away the corrosive damp of disappointment from its brightness – did not remain long with his mother and sister, but hastened to communicate the inspiring tidings to Ellen Frazer.
She was standing on the green in front of the manse, when she saw him coming bounding towards her, waving his hat in triumph and exultation, and she put on a grave face, and looked so rebukingly, that he halted abruptly, and said – ‘What’s the matter?’
‘It’s very ridiculous to see any body behaving so absurdly,’ was her cool and solemn answer.
‘But I have glorious news to tell you; my uncle has come forward in the handsomest manner, and all’s clear for action.’
This was said in an animated manner, and intended to upset her gravity, which, from his knowledge of her disposition, he suspected, was a sinless hypocrisy, put on only to teaze him. But she was either serious or more resolute in her purpose than he expected; for she replied with the most chastising coolness, —
‘I thought you were never to have any thing to say again to your uncle?’
Walkinshaw felt this pierce deeper than it was intended to do, and he reddened exceedingly, as he said, awkwardly, —
‘True! but I have done him injustice; and had he not been one of the best dispositioned men, he would never have continued his kindness to me as he has done; for I treated him harshly.’
‘It says but little for you, that, after enjoying his good-will so long, you should have thrown his favours at him, and so soon after be obliged to confess you have done him wrong.’
Walkinshaw hung his head, still more and more confused. There was too much truth in the remark not to be felt as a just reproach; and, moreover, he thought it somewhat hard, as his folly had been on her account, that she should so taunt him. But Ellen, perceiving she had carried the joke a little too far, threw off her disguise, and, with one of her most captivating looks and smiles, said, – ‘Now that I have tamed you into rational sobriety, let’s hear what you have got to say. Men should never be spoken to when they are huzzaing. Remember the lesson when you are with your regiment.’
What further followed befits not our desultory pen to rehearse; but, during this recital of what had taken place at Glasgow, and the other incidents of the day, the lovers unconsciously strayed into the minister’s garden, where a most touching and beautiful dialogue ensued, of which having lost our notes, we regret, on account of our fair readers, and all his Majesty’s subalterns, who have not yet joined, that we cannot furnish a transcript. – The result, however, was, that, when Ellen returned into the manse, after parting from Walkinshaw, her beautiful eyes looked red and watery, and two huge tears tumbled out of them when she told her aunt that he intended to set off for Glengael in the course of two or three days.
CHAPTER LXXXIII
Next day Walkinshaw found himself constrained, by many motives, to go into Glasgow, in order to thank his uncle for the liberality of his offer, and, in accepting it, to ask pardon for the rudeness of his behaviour.
His reception in the counting-house was all he could have wished; it was even more cordial than the occasion required, and the cheque given, as the realization of the promise, considerably exceeded the necessary amount. Emboldened by so much kindness, Walkinshaw, who felt for his cousins, and really sympathised with the Leddy under the burden of expense which she had brought upon herself, ventured to intercede in their behalf, and he was gratified with his uncle’s answer.
‘I am pleased, James,’ said he, ‘that you take so great an interest in them; but make your mind easy, for, although I have been shamefully used, and cannot but long resent it, still, as a man, I ought not to indulge my anger too far. I, therefore, give you liberty to go and tell them, that, although I do not mean to hold any intercourse with Robina and her husband, I have, nevertheless, ordered my man of business to prepare a deed of settlement on her, such as I ought to make on my daughter.’
Walkinshaw believed, when he heard this, that he possessed no faculty whatever to penetrate the depths of character, so bright and shining did all the virtues of his uncle at that moment appear; – virtues of which, a month before, he did not conceive he possessed a single spark. It may, therefore, be easily imagined, that he hastened with light steps and long strides towards his grandmother’s house, to communicate the generous tidings. But, on reaching the door, he met the old lady, wrapped up, as it seemed, for a journey, with her maid, coming out, carrying a small trunk under her arm. On seeing him, she made a movement to return; but, suddenly recollecting herself, she said, – ‘Jamie, I hae nae time, for I’m gaun to catch the Greenock flying coach at the Black Bull, and ye can come wi’ me.’
‘But, what has become o’ Robina?’ cried he, surprised at this intelligence and sudden movement.
His grandmother took hold of him by the arm, and giving it an indescribable squeeze of exultation, said, – ‘I’ll tell you, it’s just a sport. They would need long spoons that sup parridge wi’ the de’il, or the like o’ me, ye maun ken. I was just like to be devour’t into beggary by them. Ae frien’ after another calling, glasses o’ wine ne’er devauling; the corks playing clunk in the kitchen frae morning to night, as if they had been in a change-house on a fair-day. I could stand it no longer. So yesterday, when that nabal, Dirdumwhamle, sent us a pair o’ his hunger’t hens, I told baith Beenie and Walky, that they were obligated to go and thank their parents, and to pay them a marriage visit for a day or twa, although we’re a’ in black for your aunty, her mother; and so this morning I got them off, Lord be praised; and I am noo on my way to pay a visit to Miss Jenny Purdie, my cousin, at Greenock.’
‘Goodness! and is this to throw poor Beenie and Walky adrift?’ exclaimed Walkinshaw.
‘Charity, Jamie, my bairn, begins at hame, and they hae a nearer claim on Dirdumwhamle, who is Walky’s lawful father, than on me; so e’en let them live upon him till I invite them back again.’
Walkinshaw, though really shocked, he could not tell why, was yet so tickled by the Leddy’s adroitness, that he laughed most immoderately, and was unable for some time in consequence to communicate the message, of which he was the joyous bearer; but when he told her, she exclaimed, —
‘Na, if that’s the turn things hae ta’en, I’ll defer my visit to Miss Jenny for the present; so we’ll return back. For surely, baith Beenie and Walky will no be destitute of a’ consideration, when they come to their kingdom, for the dreadfu’ cost and outlay that I hae been at the last five weeks. But, if they’re guilty o’ sic niggerality, I’ll mak out a count – bed, board, and washing, at five and twenty shillings a-week, Mrs. Scrimpit, the minister’s widow of Toomgarnels, tells me, would be a charge o’ great moderation; – and if they pay’t, as pay’t they shall, or I’ll hae them for an affront to the Clerk’s Chambers; ye’s get the whole half o’t, Jamie, to buy yoursel a braw Andrew Ferrara. But I marvel, wi’ an exceeding great joy, at this cast o’ grace that’s come on your uncle. For, frae the hour he saw the light, he was o’ a most voracious nature for himsel; and while the fit lasts, I hope ye’ll get him to do something for you.’
Walkinshaw then told her not only what his uncle had done, but with the ardour in which the free heart of youth delights to speak of favours, he recapitulated all the kind and friendly things that had been said to him.
‘Jamie, Jamie, I ken your uncle Geordie better than you, – for I hae been his mother. It’s no for a courtesy o’ causey clash that he’s birling his mouldy pennies in sic firlots, – tak my word for’t.’
‘There is no possible advantage can arise to him from his kindness to me.’
‘That’s to say, my bairn, that ye hae na a discerning spirit to see’t; but if ye had the second sight o’ experience as I hae, ye would fin’ a whaup in the nest, or I am no a Christian sister, bapteesed Girzel.’
By this time they had returned to the house, and the maid having unlocked the door, and carried in the trunk, Walkinshaw followed his grandmother into the parlour, with the view of enjoying what she herself called, the observes of her phlosification; but the moment she had taken her seat, instead of resuming the wonted strain of her jocular garrulity, she began to sigh deeply, and weep bitterly, a thing which he never saw her do before but in a way that seldom failed to amuse him; on this occasion, however, her emotion was unaffected, and it moved him to pity her. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ said he, kindly; – she did not, however, make any answer for some time, but at last she said, —
‘Thou’s gaun awa to face thy faes, – as the sang sings, “far far frae me and Logan braes,” – and I am an aged person, and may ne’er see thee again; and I am wae to let thee gang, for though thou was ay o’ a nature that had nae right reverence for me, a deevil’s buckie, my heart has ay warm’t to thee mair than to a’ the lave o’ my grandchildren; but it’s no in my power to do for thee as thy uncle has done, though it’s well known to every one that kens me, that I hae a most generous heart, – far mair than e’er he had, – and I would na part wi’ thee without hanselling thy knapsack. Hegh, Sirs! little did I think whan the pawky laddie spoke o’ my bit gathering wi’ Robin Carrick, that it was in a sincerity; but thou’s get a part. I’ll no let thee gang without a solid benison, so tak the key, and gang into the scrutoire and bring out the pocket-book.’
Walkinshaw was petrified, but did as he was desired; and, having given her the pocket-book, sewed by his aunt, Mrs. Milrookit, at the boarding-school, she took several of Robin’s promissory-notes out, and looking them over, presented him with one for fifty pounds.
‘Now, Jamie Walkinshaw,’ said she, ‘if ye spend ae plack o’ that like a prodigal son, – it’s no to seek what I will say whan ye come back, – but I doot, I doot, lang before that day I’ll be deep and dumb aneath the yird, and naither to see nor hear o’ thy weel or thy woe.’
So extraordinary and unlooked-for an instance of liberality on the part of his grandmother, together with the unfeigned feeling by which she was actuated, quite overwhelmed Walkinshaw, and he stood holding the bill in his hand, unable to speak. In the meantime, she was putting up her other bills, and, in turning them over, seeing one for forty-nine pounds, she said, ‘Jamie, forty-nine pounds is a’ the same as fifty to ane that pays his debts by the roll of a drum, so tak this, and gie me that back.’
CHAPTER LXXXIV
The time between the visit to Glasgow and the departure of Walkinshaw for Glengael was the busiest period that had occurred in the annals of Camrachle from the placing of Mr. Eadie in the cure of the parish. To the young men belonging to the hamlet, who had grown up with Walkinshaw, it was an era of great importance; and some of them doubted whether he ought not to have beaten up for recruits in a neighbourhood where he was known rather than in the Highlands. But the elder personages, particularly the matrons, were thankful that the Lord was pleased to order it differently.
His mother and sister, with the assistance of Ellen Frazer, were more thriftily engaged in getting his baggage ready; and although the sprightliness of Ellen never sparkled more brilliantly for the amusement of her friends, there were moments when her bosom echoed in a low soft murmur to the sigh of anxiety that frequently burst from his mother’s breast.
Mr. Eadie was not the least interested in the village. He seemed as if he could not give his pupil advice enough, and Walkinshaw thought he had never before been so tiresome. They took long walks together, and ever and anon the burden of the worthy minister’s admonition was the sins and deceptions of the world, and the moral perils of a military life.
But no one – neither tutor, mother, nor amorosa – appeared so profoundly occupied with the event as Mrs. Eadie, whose majestic intellect was evidently touched with the fine frenzy of a superstition at once awful and elevated. She had dreams of the most cheering augury, though all the incidents were wild and funereal; and she interpreted the voices of the birds and the chattering of the magpies in language more oriental and coherent than Macpherson’s Ossian.
The moon had changed on the day on which Walkinshaw went into Glasgow, and she watched the appearance of its silver rim with the most mysterious solicitude. Soon after sunset on the third evening, as she was sitting on a tombstone in the churchyard with Mr. Eadie, she discovered it in the most favourable aspect of the Heavens, and in the very position which assured the most fortunate issues to all undertakings commenced at its change.
‘So it appears,’ said she, ‘like a boat, and it is laden with the old moon – that betokens a storm.’
‘But when?’ said her husband with a sigh, mournfully disposed to humour the aberrations of her fancy.
‘The power is not yet given to me to tell,’ was her solemn response. ‘But the sign is a witness that the winds of the skies shall perform some dreadful agency in the fortunes of all enterprises ruled by this lunar influence. Had the moon been first seen but as a portion of a broken ring, I would have veiled my face, and deplored the omen. She comes forth, however, in her brightness – a silver boat sailing the azure depths of the Heavens, and bearing a rich lading of destiny to the glorious portals of the sun.’
At that moment a cow looked over the churchyard wall, and lowed so close to Mr. Eadie’s ear, that it made him start and laugh. Instead, however, of disturbing the Pythian mood of his lady, it only served to deepen it; but she said nothing, though her look intimated that she was offended by his levity.
After a pause of several minutes she rose, and moved towards the gate without accepting his proffered arm.
‘I am sorry,’ said he, ‘that you are displeased with me; but really the bathos of that cow was quite irresistible.’
‘Do you think,’ was her mystical reply, ‘that an animal, which, for good reasons, the wise Egyptians hardly erred in worshipping, made to us but an inarticulate noise? It was to me a prophetic salutation. On the morning before my father left Glengael to join the royal standard, I heard the same sound. An ancient woman, my mother’s nurse, and one of her own blood, told me that it was a fatal enunciation, for then the moon was in the wane; but heard, she said, when the new moon is first seen, it is the hail of a victory or a bridal.’
‘It is strange,’ replied the minister, unguardedly attempting to reason with her, ‘that the knowledge of these sort of occurrences should be almost exclusively confined to the inhabitants of the Highlands.’
‘It is strange,’ said she; ‘but no one can expound the cause. The streamers of the northern light shine not in southern skies.’
At that moment she shuddered, and, grasping the minister wildly by the arm, she seemed to follow some object with her eye that was moving past them.
‘What’s the matter – what do you look at?’ he exclaimed with anxiety and alarm.
‘I thought it was Walkinshaw’s uncle,’ said she with a profound and heavy sigh, as if her very spirit was respiring from a trance.
‘It was nobody,’ replied the minister thoughtfully.
‘It was his wraith,’ said Mrs. Eadie.
The tone in which this was expressed curdled his very blood, and he was obliged to own to himself, in despite of the convictions of his understanding, that there are more things in the heavens and the earth than philosophy can yet explain; and he repeated the quotation from Hamlet, partly to remove the impression which his levity had made.
‘I am glad to hear you allow so much,’ rejoined Mrs. Eadie; ‘and I think you must admit that of late I have given you many proofs in confirmation. Did I not tell you when the cock crowed on the roof of our friend’s cottage, that we should soon hear of some cheerful change in the lot of the inmates? and next day came Walkinshaw from Glasgow with the news of the happy separation from his uncle. On the evening before I received my letter from Glengael, you may well remember the glittering star that announced it in the candle. As sure as the omen in the crowing of the cock, and the shining of that star, were fulfilled, will the auguries which I have noted be found the harbingers of events.’
Distressing as these shadows and gleams of lunacy were to those by whom Mrs. Eadie was justly beloved and venerated, to herself they afforded a high and holy delight. Her mind, during the time the passion lasted, was to others obscure and oracular. It might be compared to the moon in the misty air when she is surrounded with a halo, and her light loses its silveryness, and invests the landscape with a shroudy paleness and solemnity. But Mrs. Eadie felt herself as it were ensphered in the region of spirits, and moving amidst marvels and mysteries sublimer than the faculties of ordinary mortals could explore.
The minister conducted his wife to the house of Walkinshaw’s mother, where she went to communicate the agreeable intelligence, as she thought, of the favourable aspect of the moon, as it had appeared to her Highland astrology. But he was so distressed by the evident increase of her malady, that he did not himself immediately go in. Indeed, it was impossible for him not to acknowledge, even to the most delicate suggestions of his own mind towards her, that she was daily becoming more and more fascinated by her visionary contemplations; and in consequence, after taking two or three turns in the village, he determined to advise her to go with Walkinshaw to Glengael, in the hope that the change of circumstances, and the interest that she might take once more in the scenes of her youth, would draw her mind from its wild and wonderful imaginings, and fix her attention again on objects calculated to inspire more sober, but not less affecting, feelings.
