Harry Muir

The next day Harry entered blithely upon his old duties again. The morning was sunny, and bright, and Agnes stood at the window with the baby, to watch him as he emerged from the outer door below, and turned to look up to her, and take off his hat in playful salutation. He had a little cluster of fresh spring primroses, pulled last morning in the Ayr garden, gracing his button-hole, and there was a spring in his step, and an elastic grace in his manner as he went away, that made glad the heart of the little wife. They were all very blithe this morning—the gladness came involuntarily from Agnes’ lips in the familiar form of song; she sang to the baby—she sang to them all.

She was still a girl, this pretty wife of Harry Muir—a girl belonging to that very large class, who never discover that they have hearts at all, until they have sent them forth on some great venture, perilling all peace for ever. Agnes had been a very gay, perhaps a rather foolish girl—liking very greatly the small vanities which she could reach, and managing to keep out of sight the graver matters of life. She knew what it was to be poor—but then she had known that all her life, and the difficulties fell upon elder people, not on herself, and Agnes sailed over them with innocent heedlessness. The heart slumbered quietly in her bosom—she scarcely knew it was there, except when it beat high sometimes for some small merry-making; scarcely even when she married Harry Muir were those gay placid waters stirred. She liked him very much—she admired him exceedingly—she was very proud of him—yet still she had not found out her heart.

But when the cloud began to steal over the gay horizon of her life—when she had to watch for his coming, and tremble for his weakness, and weep over his faults those sad apologetic tears, and say, poor Harry! then this unknown existence began to make itself felt within the sobbing breast of the little, pretty, girlish wife. The sad and fatal weakness, which made him in a certain degree dependant upon them—which aroused the feelings of anxious care, the eager expedients to protect him from himself, gave a new character to Agnes. In sad peril now was the happiness of this young, tender, sensitive heart; but the danger that threatened it had quickened it into conscious life.

He went away with smiles, and hopeful freshness to his daily labour. He came home, honestly wearied, at an earlier hour than usual, having his conscience free of offence that day. So happily they all gathered about the little tea-table; so gaily Agnes presided at its tea-making, and Martha placed on the table the little crystal vessel full of honey—odorous honey, breathing out stories of all the home flowers of Ayr—so much the travellers had still to tell, and the dwellers at home to hear.

“And now, Martha,” said Harry, “put on your bonnet, and come out. I believe she has never been out, Agnes, all the time we have been away.”

“Yes, indeed, Harry—Martha was always at the Kirk,” said the literal Violet.

“But we are not going to the Kirk to-night—come Martha, and taste this April air.”

Martha looked at her work. “It is a temptation, Harry; but I think you had better take Rose—see, Rose looks white with working so long, and I have to go to the warehouse to-morrow.”

“To the Candleriggs!” said Harry, laughing. “Where you scarcely can tell when it is June and when December; and if Rose is white, you are absolutely green with sitting shut up here so long—come, Martha.”

It was not very complimentary, but the pallid faded cheek of Martha actually bore, to eyes which had been in the sunshine, a tinge of that undesirable hue. Save for the beneficent rest of the Sabbath-day, and the walk through the hushed streets to church, Martha had indeed, since her brother went to Ayr, never been out of doors. The luxury of sending Harry to the pure home atmosphere was not a cheap one. She had been labouring for, while he enjoyed it.

“But what if Mr. Charteris comes?” said Rose, with a little shyness: no one else seemed to remember that Mr. Charteris was to come.

“We shall not stay long,” said Harry; “you must keep him till we return.”

Rose seemed half inclined to go too; but she remembered how often Martha had sent her out to enjoy the walk which she had denied herself; and there were a great many “holes,” as those very prosaic sempstresses called the little spaces in the centres of the embroidered flowers, at which they worked, to be finished before they were returned to the warehouse to-morrow—so even at the risk of a little additional conversation with the formidable Mr. Charteris, Rose made up her mind to stay.

And Martha and Harry went out alone. They were not within reach of any very pleasant place for walking, but they struck off through some of those unsettled transitionist fields which hang about the outskirts of great towns, to the side of the canal. Those soft spring evenings throw a charm over the common place atmosphere, of even such ordinary haunts as this—and it is wonderful indeed, when one’s eyes and heart are in proper trim, how the great sky itself alone, and the vast world of common air, in which we breathe, and through which human sounds come to us, can suffice to refresh our minds with the Nature, which is beautiful in every place.

The distant traffic of the “Port,” to which this canal is the sea; the flutter of dingy sloop sails, and a far-off prospect of the bare cordage, and brief masts of little Dutch vessels, delivering their miscellaneous cargoes there, gave a softened home look, almost like the quiet harbour of some little seaport, to a scene which, close at hand, could boast of few advantages. But the air was bright with the haze of sunset, and in the east the sky had paled down to the exceeding calmness of the eventide, lying silently around its lengthened strips of island cloud, like an enchanted sea. Dull and blank was the long level line of water at their feet, yet it was water still, and flowed, or seemed to flow; and along the bank came the steady tramp of those strong horses, led by a noisy cavalier whose accoutrements clanked and jingled like a steam-engine, piloting the gaily-painted “Swift” boat from Edinburgh, with its crowds of impatient passengers, to the end of their tedious journey. These were homely sights—but the charmed atmosphere gave a harmony to them all.

And there were some trees upon this side of the canal—and grass as green as though it lived a country life, and stout weeds, rank and vigorous, by the side of the way—and the hum of the great town came softly on their ear, with here and there a distinct sound, breaking the inarticulate hum of that mass of busy life. Better than all these, there was such perfect confidence between the brother and sister, as had scarcely been before, since he was the unstained boy, innocent and ignorant, and she the eager teacher, putting forth a second time in this young untried vessel, the solemn venture of her hopes. It was not that Harry had anything to confide to the anxious heart, which noted all his thoughts and modes of feeling so narrowly; but the little daily things which sometimes have so weighty a bearing upon the most important matters of life—the passing fancies, the very turns of expression, which show the prevailing tone of the speaker’s mind, were so frankly visible to the eye of the watchful sister, that Martha’s heart rejoiced within her with solemn joy.

Meanwhile, Rose sat alone in the parlour doing her work, somewhat nervously, and hoping fervently that Mr. Charteris would not come till “somebody was in” to receive him.

The baby lay sound asleep in the cradle. Agnes had gone down to Mrs. McGarvie to negotiate about some washing, and was at this moment standing in Mrs. McGarvie’s kitchen, near the small table where Mrs. McGarvie herself, with the kettle in one hand, and a great horn spoon in the other, was pouring a stream of boiling water into a bowl half filled with the beautiful yellow peasemeal, which keeps the stomachs of Glasgow in such superlative order, compounding the same into brose, for the supper of Rab, who newly come in, had just removed his blue bonnet from his shaggy red head in honour of his mother’s visitor. Mrs. McGarvie had undertaken the washing, and Agnes in her overflowing happy spirits, was telling her about the journey, from which they had just returned.

Violet, last of all, was in Mrs. Rodger’s “big room,” a very spacious, fine apartment, which was generally occupied by some lodger. They had no tenant for it at present, and were this evening entertaining a party in the large, lofty, shabbily-furnished dining room. Violet had gone in among these guests with the natural curiosity of a child, and poor Rose, nervously apprehensive of the coming of this formidable Mr. Charteris, sat in the parlour alone.

Her busy fingers began to flag as she filled up these “holes;” and now and then, the work dropped on her knee. The ordinary apprehensions about Harry, which generally formed the central object of her thoughts, were pleasantly hushed to-night. Rose was not thinking about anything particular—she would have said so, at least—but for all that, long trains of indefinite fancies were flitting through her mind, and her thick blunt needle was altogether stayed now and then—only recovering in hysteric bursts its ordinary movements, when Rose trembled to fancy that she heard a step on the stair. If Agnes would only come in—if Harry and Martha were but home again!

At last a step was on the stair in reality. “Maybe it is Agnes,” said Rose to herself as her needle began to fly again through the muslin—but it was not only Agnes—it was the foot of a man—poor Rose wondered if by any possibility she could run away.

And there he was, this sad ogre whom Rose feared, quietly opening the parlour door, as if he had some right to be there. Mr. Charteris was almost as shy as Rose herself. He sat down with pleased embarrassment, and looked exceedingly awkward, and spoke by no means so sensibly as he was used to do. Rose eagerly explained the reason why she was alone, and went to the window in haste to look for Agnes.

Mr. Charteris’ eye had been caught by something of a very faded neutral hue, in a black frame, which hung above the mantelpiece. He asked Miss Rose if it was embroidery.

Miss Rose was moved to laughter, and her laugh dispersed the mist of shyness very pleasantly. “It is only an old sampler of my grandmother’s, Mr. Charteris.”

Mr. Charteris rose to look at it.

“There is not much art in it,” said Rose, “it seems that all the landscapes on samplers are of one style—but my mother gave it to me when I was a girl—a little girl—and I used to be proud of it, because it was my own.”

Mr. Charteris took it down to examine its beauties more closely. It bore the name of the artist at full length “Rose Allenders,” and had a square house, and some very original trees, like the trees of very old paintings, elaborately worked upon it.

“I think you said she had been long dead,” said Cuthbert.

“Long ago—very long ago,” said Rose. “When my mother was only a child, my grandmother died. Her name is on the stone, among the rest of the Calders, and her father and her little sister are near her, in the churchyard. Uncle Sandy used to take us there when we were children. I believe he thought they would feel lonely in their very graves, because they lay among strangers.”

There was a pause. Cuthbert again hung up the faded sampler, and Rose worked most industriously at her opening. Each was earnestly endeavouring to invent something to say—and both of them were singularly unsuccessful. It was the greatest possible relief to Rose to hear Harry’s voice in the passage.

The two young men greeted each other heartily—it seemed that there was some charm in these very faults of poor Harry—for everybody learned to like and apologise for, even while they blamed him.

“And so you are going to Ayr,” said Harry, “why did you not come a little earlier, Mr. Charteris, that I might have shown our town to you. You will not appreciate the beauties it has, unless some one, native to it, points them out.”

“For which cause I am here to seek an introduction which Miss Muir promised me to your uncle,” said Cuthbert.

“To my uncle? are you a character hunter, Mr. Charteris?” said Harry quickly, and with something which Rose thought looked like rudeness.

“No, I don’t think so—but why do you ask me?”

“Because the vulgar call my uncle a character and an original,” said Harry. “I thought your cousin, who saw him once, might have told you so,—and he does not like the imputation. We are jealous of my uncle’s feelings, as we have a good right to be, for he has been father, and teacher, and companion alike to all of us.”

“I had some business in the neighbourhood of Ayr,” said Cuthbert, with a little conscious embarrassment—“one of those things in our profession that border upon the romantic,—there are not many of them, Miss Rose;—I want to trace out some links of descent—to find some lost members of an old family. I shall find them only by means of gravestones I apprehend, but that will answer my purpose. It is not quite in my department, this kind of business; but it is pleasant to have some excuse for seeing so fine a country in this time when ‘folk are longen to gon on pilgrimages.’—I think you must begin to feel this longing, Miss Muir?”

“It is wonderful how easily one can content oneself,” said Martha, with a smile which spoke of singular peace. “We have only to shut our eyes, Rose and I, and straightway we are at home—or to send some one else to enjoy it, Mr. Charteris. Harry and Agnes, have brought us so much of the atmosphere that I scarcely desire it now for myself.”