CHAPTER VIII.
FAERY QUEEN.
That day, beginning with deep sadness to one member of the family, and with anxious sympathetic concern to the rest, was the last day of hope and peace in Allenders.
For on the very next—another June day, rich with the most glorious mockery of joy and sunshine—Martha’s last desperate hope died in her heart. It had struggled long in its strange, feverish lifetime; now it fell at a blow.
A gracious invitation to Sir John Dunlop’s had come that evening to Harry; and Harry spent the day with Gilbert Allenders in a ride to Stirling, from which he did not return, until the full time when Sir John would enter his stately dining-room. Agnes, dressed for a full hour, stood at the window trembling and miserable, looking for Harry; and Martha was on the turret; and Rose, roused out of her own trouble, wandered along the road with the children, to meet him. But when Harry came, he came with glittering eye and ghastly smiles, as they used to see him, long ago, in Glasgow; and bidding Gilbert good-bye, with loud demonstrations of friendship, at the gate, came in great haste, and ran up-stairs, taking three steps at a time, to get to his dressing-room, and make ready for Lady Dunlop’s party. Agnes went after him timidly, to say it was too late, and to beg him not to go; but Harry laughed first, and then frowned, and then commanded—he was resolved to go, whatever was the hour.
“He is not fit to go, he will disgrace himself for ever, they will never speak to him again,” sobbed the little wife. “Oh! Martha, speak to him, tell him it is too late.”
Poor little Agnes! she could not believe that Martha’s “speaking to him” would have no effect.
In half an hour, he came down stairs, dressed, and considerably subdued, though still with an excitement only too easily perceptible.
“Where’s John with the carriage?” exclaimed Harry. “Why does that fellow always keep us waiting? why is he not at the door?” and he rang the bell violently.
“You are much too late, and they are punctilious people; I beg you will not go to-night. It is easy to send an apology,” said Martha, who was calmer now than she had been through all her time of hope.
“It is this night, and no other, that I intend to go,” said Harry; “and I am not inclined to suffer any more dictation. What’s the matter, Agnes? why do you make her cry, Martha? Must I take her away with red eyes, all for your pleasure? Tell John to bring round the carriage instantly—instantly, do you hear? he has kept his mistress waiting long enough already.”
And as the maid withdrew, startled and astonished, Harry himself went to the door, and stood upon the threshold, waiting for John.
“You’re not angry, Martha,” pleaded poor little Agnes; “he does not know what he is saying. And never mind sitting up, it would only grieve you; I must try to take care of poor Harry myself to-night.”
Martha made few demonstrations, but she put her arm round the little wife now, and kissed the cheek upon which the tears were still wet. This caress nearly overcame Agnes, but with a strong effort, she wiped her eyes, and went away.
Drearily passed that evening. A heavy shower came on as it darkened, and all the night through beat upon the leaves, so that Lettie, holding her breath as she learned her lessons, fancied that footsteps were travelling round and round the house—continually, without pause or intermission, round and round. And the wind whistled with a little, desolate, shrill cry, about the silent walls, and the burn ran fast and full into the river. Every sound without became distinctly audible in the extreme quietness, and other sounds which did not exist at all, stole in, imagined, upon their strained ears. Sounds of carriage-wheels, which never advanced, but always rumbled on at a distance, shrill cries of voices hovering in the air, footsteps upon the stair, footsteps without—it was a dreary night!
And when it became late, and it was full time for Harry’s return, Martha stole down stairs to the lower room, and opened the window, and stood by it in the dark, watching for their carriage-wheels. The jasmine rustled on the walls, with an early star of white specking its dark luxuriance—alas! those jasmine flowers! Martha plucked this half-opened one hastily, and threw it away—she could not bear its fragrance.
And Rose crept after her, and sat upon a chair at the window, leaning her throbbing brow on Martha’s arm: “Hush! I hear them,” said Martha; it was nothing but this imagined sound which had rung through all the night.
At last they came, and though the sisters heard Harry’s voice while yet the carriage was hidden in the darkness, he handed his wife out very quietly, when they came to the door. On their way up-stairs, Agnes felt her hand caught in Martha’s, and answered the implied question, in a tremulous whisper: “No doubt they saw—no doubt they saw—and pity me, Martha, for such a night; but maybe, maybe, it was not so bad as we might have feared.”
That night nothing more was either asked or told, and it was not till the forenoon of the next day, when Harry had gone out, that Agnes, leaning on Martha’s arm, and with Rose bending eagerly over her on the other side, walked slowly along the mall, and told her story. They had been received with much stiffness and ceremony by Sir John, his son, and his daughter, who evidently thought their late arrival a quite unwarrantable assumption of familiarity. Kindly good-humoured, Lady Dunlop had soothed and comforted Agnes; but the hauteur of their reception plunged Harry into a fit of sullen silence, which was even more painful to see than his excitement. Then, Agnes said, some stranger present began to comment severely on the rude cothouses at Maidlin Cross, and to wonder why none of the neighbouring landlords interfered to provide better accommodation for their workmen. That Harry fired at this, and challenging Sir John to do his part, pledged himself that on his property it should be immediately looked to, was only what the listeners expected to hear; but he did it with such vehemence and energy, Agnes reported, that some smiled, some looked grave and pitiful, all turned away, and for half an hour before they left, no one spoke to Harry or herself, save good Lady Dunlop, who called her my dear, and patted her shoulder, and did all she could to soothe the shame and bitter feelings, which the neglect of the others wounded beyond soothing.
But Harry was gone this morning to the builder who erected his barns, to see about model cottages; and Agnes almost for the first time began to be alarmed about the means. Could Harry afford to build model houses after all the outlay of his expensive life? He who had pulled down houses and barns to build greater, and who had nothing to put into them, could he afford to go out of his way and spend money thus? But they had all been kept totally in the dark as to Harry’s money matters. They had no idea how much he had wasted—how much had gone to Gilbert Allenders, and to the pleasures shared by him; but a momentary review of the past year startled them all. They looked in each other’s scared faces, and shook their heads in sudden clear-sightedness, as Agnes asked the question, and the truth dawned upon them all.
“Na, na, lad; Allenders has plenty siller bye the land, ye may take my word for it,” said the slow voice of Geordie Paxton, speaking out of the hay-field at the end of the mall, opposite to Rose’s favourite oak. “I spoke to him mysel about that grand new harrow, and an improvement o’ my ain in the plough-graith, when he started farming, and he never boggled at it a minute, though they baith cost siller. Then he has a free hand himsel, and keeps a plentiful house; and you’ll no tell me that a man like Allenders—a fine lad, but apt to gang ajee whiles like ither folk—doesna take a good purse to keep himsel gaun, let alane the house and a’ thae braw leddies. And so I have reason in my ain mind, as guid as positive knowledge—which I could only have, if he telled me himsel, Rob—to say that Allenders has a guid income coming to him, forbye the land; ten hunder a year—ay, twelve ye may ca’ it—would not do more than keep up that house.”
Agnes started in dismay, and instinctively put her hand in her pocket for her little book; but, unfortunately, Agnes always forgot to put down her housekeeping in this little book, though she had bought it herself expressly for the purpose; and it was not Agnes’s housekeeping that was called in question.
“Sir John’s man telled me,” said Geordie’s companion, with the deliberation of certainty, “that Allenders was naething but a writing clerk in an office afore he got the estate, and that he hasna a penny o’ his ain; the story is no mine, but I would like to hear wha should ken if it wasna Sir John’s man?”
“I dinna believe a word o’t,” said Geordie, hastily. “Would Sir John keep that auld body of an uncle of mine useless about the house, do you think, and gie him a’ his ain gait, and cleed him, and feed him, for the auld family’s sake, and because he’s been a faithful servant? I trow no; and folk that live in glass houses shouldna throw stanes. I reckon Sir John’s no fashed wi’ ower muckle siller himsel.”
“That’s naething to the question,” returned his dogmatical opponent, after one or two sweeps of the scythe among the fragrant grass bore witness that they had resumed their work. “What I say is, that Allenders has naething but the estate, and there’ll be a great smash some of thir days; ye can believe me or no, just as you like.”
“He has his faults, puir lad, but he’s young, and he’ll mend,” said Geordie; “and you wadna ask me to believe that Allenders is clean mad, and out of his wits, which is just the same as saying that he lives at this rate, and has nae siller o’ his ain.”
The listeners withdrew in dismay and alarm. To Martha this gossip only confirmed many previous fears, but to the others it came like a revelation.
“If we were ruined, Martha, what would Harry do?” said Agnes. “We could work for ourselves, and I am sure I would never mind the change; but Harry—poor Harry it would break his heart. I thought there could be nothing harder to bear than last night, but, Martha, I think if there is no good change, it will kill me.”
“It must not kill you, Agnes,” said Martha, speaking very low. “Bairns, hear me; you must let nothing kill you, nothing crush you, even in your inmost hearts, till God sends the messenger that will not be gainsaid; and God grant that he may be far off from you both. Now it is coming—maybe ruin, maybe destruction, certain distress and anguish. If I could bear it all, you should never hear when it drew near; but it must come upon you both—upon you both, tender delicate things, that should be blessed with the dews of your youth. But the end is coming which God knows; you must not pine, you must not weep, you must not waste your strength with mourning. Bairns, we have to wait, and be ready and strong, to meet it when it comes. This is what we have to do.”
As Martha spoke, she held in her grasp the soft warm hands of Agnes and Rose. They looked up to her, one on either side, like children to a mother, with lifted eyes, wistful and eager. It was not necessary to answer, but they went back again to the house together, with a strange strain in their hearts, something like the bodily strain which their eager bend towards Martha and anxious look up to her had produced. They were warned, prepared, ready for the evil; and they thought they had reached to the sublime sadness of patience, and would not fret or chafe over the daily griefs again, but rather would be strong for the end.