"You are looking at our grandfather's grand castle," Miss Margaret said.
"It is a wonderful place to find here, out in the wilderness; it is like a palace that has been walking about and has lost its way," Lewis said, with an attempt to cover the quickened movement of his own pulses in the surprise of the encounter.
"I would not call this the wilderness," said Miss Margaret, with a momentary tone of pique. "A great deal of care was taken about the place before this great barrack was built—it's more like a barrack, in my opinion, than a palace."
"It is like the Louvre," said Lewis; "it must have been planned by some one who had travelled, who knew the French renaissance." He felt a little jealous for the credit of his old friend.
"Oh, as for that," Miss Margaret said, with a wave of her hand, "knowledge was not wanting, nor taste either. Our grandfather, Sir Patrick Murray, was a man of great instruction: all the worse for his descendants. This is how he wasted our substance—and in other ways."
"He was a collector, I suppose?"
"I perhaps don't understand what you call a collector—a gatherer of costly things that are of no use to any mortal? Oh, he was that, and more. And there are other ways in which a man can wrong his family; but it's not a subject that can be interesting to a stranger," Miss Margaret added, closing her mouth with a certain peremptory firmness, as if to conclude the discussion. "Yon," she resumed, "was to have been the great banqueting hall: and the drawing-rooms, you see—there were to be three of them, the outer and the inner, and the lady's bouédwore—were to occupy the other side; where he was to get the lady and the banquet Sir Patrick never took thought. He was not a man to take thought; but he was very well instructed, and knew what he was doing—from that point of view. If he had known better about the money, and counted the cost like the man in the Gospel, it would have been better for them who came after him. But the Murrays were never careful at counting the cost,"—that air of pride with which prodigality in a family is always confessed came over Miss Margaret as she said this, throwing up her head and animating her countenance. Nobody ever yet made a statement of thrift and carefulness with the same proud gratification. It is unpleasant to be poor, but Nature is always more pleased with the lavish than the careful. Lewis suffered himself to be led round the further side of the building, while she talked and pointed out the position of the rooms. It was a moment full of excitement for the young man; he listened eagerly while she spoke of Sir Patrick, with the strongest sense of that link between them to which she had not the slightest clue. Nor had he the slightest clue to the motive which induced her to expatiate upon the building and lead him round by the other side. The blue veil and the wondering, youthful face it guarded had not done more as yet than touch his mind with a momentary suspicion; his interest was engaged, not in secret questionings about Lilias, as the elder sister thought, but in recollections and associations of a very different kind.
"Perhaps," he said, following out his own thoughts, "had he waited and gone more softly there would have been no imprudence."
"Waiting and going softly are not in our nature: no: I'm but a woman, with little money, and very seriously brought up—and with my youth past, and no motive; but if I were to let myself go—even now!"
A sudden flush came over her face, her eyes shone, and then Lewis perceived that Miss Margaret, if she had not made up her mind to be elderly and homely, would still be a handsome and imposing personage, whom the society he had known would have admired and followed. He thought that if she had been Sir Patrick's companion his salon might have been very different. With this view he could not help gazing at her with a great curiosity, wondering how she would have filled that place, and thinking what a pity that this, which would have ruined his own prospects, had not been.
She looked at him quickly, meeting his gaze, and her eyes fell momentarily under it.
"You think me an old fool," she said, "and no wonder. Imprudence—that is always folly when it takes the power of beginning what you cannot finish—would be worse folly than ever in a person like me; but, you see, I never let myself go."
"That is not what I was thinking," said Lewis. "I was thinking—wondering, though I had no right—why you did not go to him when he was old."
"Go to him—to whom?" she cried, astonished.
"Ah! pardon! I have met Sir Patrick—abroad."
Miss Margaret turned upon him, and made a close and, as Lewis thought, suspicious inspection of his face.
"If you met Sir Patrick abroad, you must have seen that he had no need of his natural family, nor wish for them. There was no place for us there. Perhaps you have not heard that he withdrew his property from his family and gave it to one that was not a drop's blood to him—a creature that had stolen into a silly old man's favour? But no, that would not be known abroad," she added, with a long-drawn breath. Lewis felt himself shrink from her eye; he made a step backward, with a sense of guilt which in all the many discussions of the subject had never affected him before.
"No," he said, with an involuntary tone of apology, "no, it was not known, I think, that he had—any relations——"
Miss Margaret turned on him again with indignation more scathing than before.
"Not known that he had relations!" then she paused, and gave vent to a little laugh, "that must have been by persons who were very ignorant—by people out of society themselves," she said.
To this Lewis made no reply. What could he say? It was true that he had no standing in society himself, and he now perceived that he had been guilty of one of his usual imprudences in drawing the attention of a mind much more keen than Miss Jean's, and able to put things together, to himself and his antecedents. After a moment she resumed.
"I am speaking too strongly perhaps to you, a stranger. It was perhaps not to be expected—abroad—that everybody should know the Murrays of Murkley. That is just one of the evils of that life abroad, that it is lost sight of who you belong to. In your own country everybody knows. If you put a friendly person, in the place of your flesh-and-blood, the whole country cries out; but among strangers, who thinks or cares? No, no, I was wrong there; I ask your pardon. In Scotland, or even in England, Sir Patrick Murray's relations would be as well known as the Queen's, but not abroad—that was his safeguard, and I forgot. Poor, silly old man!" Miss Margaret said, after a pause, with energy, "he was little to me. I have scarcely seen him all my days, and Lilias never at all."
It seemed to Lewis that in this, perhaps, there was some explanation and apology for the unfortunate position of affairs; but he was so glad to escape from further questions that he did not attempt to follow the subject further. They had by this time come round the other corner of the building, and he perceived that the two other ladies had not waited for Miss Margaret, but were already half-way along the broad and well-kept drive which led from the unfinished palace to the old house. The blue veil fluttering in advance caught his eye, and he said, more with the desire to divert his companion from the previous subject than out of any special interest in this,
"Your sister, whom I have not seen, is the youngest?"
Here Miss Margaret, with a little start, recalled herself to a recollection which had temporarily dropped from her mind. She fixed him with her eye.
"Yes, she is the youngest," she replied. And what of that? her tone seemed to say.
"I had made one of the ridiculous mistakes strangers make," he said, very conciliatory, his reason for this being, however, totally different from the one she attributed to him. "I had supposed—you will say I had no right to suppose anything, but one guesses and speculates in spite of one's self—I had supposed that Miss Lilias was the eldest, and in bad health; whereas by the glimpse I had she is——"
"Quite young," said Miss Margaret, taking the words out of his mouth—"that is, quite young in comparison with Jean and me: but not so strong perhaps as might be desired, and an anxious and careful charge to us. Are you staying long here?"
"That will depend upon—various matters," Lewis said. "It is your sister Miss Jean whom I have had the pleasure to see most. You will pardon me if I say to you that I find a great attraction in her society. It is presumptuous perhaps on my part, but it is thought right where I have been brought up that one should say this when it occurs, without delay, to the family——"
Miss Margaret looked at him with eyes of unfeigned astonishment.
"Say—what?" she asked, pausing to survey him once more. Was the young man out of his senses? she said to herself.
"I mean," said Lewis, with that smile with which he assured everybody that he was anxious to please them, "that in all other countries but England things are so. The head of the family is consulted first before a man will dare to speak to a lady; I understand it is not so here."
"And you mean to speak to me as the head of the family?" said Miss Margaret. "Well, perhaps you are not far wrong; but my sister Jean and I are equals—there is no superior between us. The only thing is, that being a sweet and submissive creature, a better woman than I will ever be, she leaves most things in my hands."
"That was my idea," Lewis said.
"And you wanted to speak to me of something that concerned Jean? Well, there could be to me no more interesting subject: though what a young man like you that might be her son, and a stranger, can have to say to me about Jean——"
Lewis paused. He had not considered how awful it was to confront the keen, inquiring eyes of the head of the family, who looked him, he thought, through and through, and who, if he submitted his over-candid countenance for long to her inspection, would probably end by reading everything that was in him both what he meant to show and what he wished to conceal.
"Perhaps," he said, "I am premature. What I would have said was to ask if—I may come again? What further I wish will remain till later. If Miss Murray will afford to me the happiness of coming, or recommending myself so far as I can——"
"You speak," said Miss Margaret, somewhat grimly, and with a laugh, "as if you were wanting to come wooing to our house. Now speak out, and tell me to whom. I'll allow there's good in your foreign notions, if you give me this warning; and I will warn you in your turn, my young friend."
"I hope you will pardon my ignorance, if I do wrong," said Lewis. "It is your sister, Miss Jean, whom I have seen most. I have not known before such a woman. There is to me a charm—which I cannot explain. If I might see her—if it might be permitted to me to recommend myself——"
Miss Margaret had been gazing at him with eyes of such astonishment that he was disconcerted by the look. He came to a somewhat confused pause, and stood silent before her, with something of the air of a culprit on his trial. Then she cried out suddenly, "Jean!" and burst into a resounding laugh, which seemed to roll forth over all the landscape, and return from the tops of the trees. There is no more crushing way of receiving such a suggestion. The young man stood before her, silent, his face flushed, his eyes cast down for the moment. At length, being a sanguine youth, and too entirely good-humoured himself to impute evil intentions to anyone, he began to recover. He looked up at her with a deprecating smile.
"I amuse you, it seems——" he said.
"Amuse me!" said Miss Margaret, with another peal of laughter; and then she dried her eyes, and recovered her composure. "Mr. Murray—if your name is Murray—" she said; "if you mean this for a joke—but I will not do you that injustice; I see you mean it in earnest. It is very unexpected. Do you think you have had time enough to consider whether this is a wise resolution? Do you remember that she is twice your age? No, no, I would not advise you to go that length," Miss Margaret said.
"The question is, if you will forbid me," said Lewis; "if you will say I must not come."
"Ay! And what would you do then?"
"I think," he said, with a little hesitation, "I should then adopt the English way. I should submit my cause to your sister herself. But then there would be no deception, you would know."
He met her with such an open look that Miss Margaret was disarmed.
"You are a strange young man," she said, "with a strange taste for a young man: but I think you're honest: or else you are a terrible deceiver—and, if your meaning is what you say, you have no motive, that I can see, to deceive."
"I have told you my motive," said Lewis. "I speak the truth."
She looked at him again with her searching eyes.
"Perhaps you think we are rich?" she said.
"I have heard, on the contrary, that——"
She waved her hand. It was not necessary that he should say poor.
"Perhaps you think—but I cannot attempt to fathom you," she said. "You are a very strange young man. Jean! have you considered that she's twice your age? I have no right to interfere. I will not forbid you the house. But she will never take you, or any like you; she has more sense," Miss Margaret cried.
To this Lewis only answered with a bow and a smile, in which perhaps there was something of the conqueror; for indeed it did not occur to him, as a contingency to be taken into consideration, that she might refuse him. They walked on together for some time in silence, for Miss Margaret was too much confused and excited to speak, and Lewis had no more to say to her, feeling that it was only justice to the sister he had chosen that she should have the first and the best of the plea. It might be ten minutes after, and they were in sight of the old house, within which the two figures before them had disappeared, when Miss Margaret suddenly stopped short, and turned upon him with a very serious and indeed threatening countenance.
"Young man," she said, in a low and passionate voice, "if you should prove to be making a mask of my sister for other designs, if it should be putting forward one to veil a deeper design upon another, then look you to yourself—for I'll neither forgive you, nor let you slip out of my hands."
Lewis met this unexpected address with sincere astonishment.
"Pardon me, but I do not know what deeper design I could have. What is it that I could do to make you angry?" he said.
She looked at him once more from head to foot, as if his shoes or the cut of his coat (which was somewhat foreign) could have enlightened her as to his real motives: and then she said,
"I will take upon me to give you useful information. In the mornings I am mostly occupied. You will find my sister Jean by herself before one o'clock, and nobody to interfere."
CHAPTER XIII.
It was with a mixture of indignation and somewhat grim humour that Miss Margaret gave the permission and sanction to Lewis's addresses which have been above recorded. There was a smile upon her face as she left him and went indoors, which burst forth in a short laugh as she entered—a laugh of derision and mockery, yet of anger as well, mingled with a sort of satisfaction in the idea of luring this presumptuous young man to his fate. Jean to be made love to at this time of day by a young man who might have been her son! (this, of course, was an exaggeration, but exaggeration is inevitable in such circumstances).
The purely comic light in which she had at first contemplated the idea gradually changed into an angry appreciation of the absurdity which seemed to involve her sister too, and a lively desire to punish the offender. That would be best done by giving him unlimited opportunity to compromise himself, she decided, and it was with this vindictive meaning, and not anything softer or more friendly, that she had so pointedly indicated to Lewis the best time and manner of approaching Miss Jean. He partially divined the satire and fierce gleam in her eyes, but only partially, for to him there was no absurdity in the matter.
Miss Margaret's heart almost smote her as he stood with his hat off, and his genial young countenance smiling and glowing, thanking her for what she had said; but this was only a momentary sensation, and when she went in she laughed with derision and the anticipation of a speedy end to a piece of folly which seemed to her beyond parallel. Such things had been heard of as that a young man who was poor, should basely and sordidly decide upon marrying, if he could, an old woman who was rich; but when there was no such motive possible—when, instead of being rich, the suitor was aware that the woman he sought was poor, then the matter was beyond comprehension altogether.
Miss Margaret was not sufficiently impartial to pause and think of this now, but as the day went on, and especially as she sat silent in the evening, and heard Lilias prattling to Jean, there were various points which returned to her mind with wonder. Why should he wish to marry Jean? Miss Margaret glanced at her, then looked steadily, then began to contemplate her sister with changed eyes. Something was different in Jean—was it that she looked younger?—something like what she used to look fifteen years ago? Was it that new hopes, new plans were rising in her mind? For the first time there breathed across Miss Margaret a cold and chilling breath of doubt—was it so sure that Jean would teach him his place, would reject all his overtures? The thought of anything else filled her with horror and shame. A young man, young enough to be her son—was it, could it be possible that she would listen to him? A groan came from Miss Margaret's breast in spite of herself.
"What is the matter?" cried Miss Jean, wondering.
"Oh, just nothing's the matter—an idea that came into my mind—nothing that you could be interested in," said Miss Margaret.
"Am I not interested in everything that can make you sigh or make you think?" said Miss Jean, with her soft voice.
"Yes, tell us—tell us what it is," said Lilias.
And then Miss Margaret laughed.
"You will know sooner or later, if it comes to anything," she said, getting up with a little impatience and leaving them.
The new turn which her thoughts had taken filled her with dismay. She went out to the lime-tree walk which lay between the house and the high wall, all clothed with ivy, with bunches of honeysuckle hanging from its embattled height. This was the walk that was considered to be haunted, though no one was afraid of the gentle ghost that dwelt there. Miss Margaret came out hastily to cool her cheeks, which were burning, and divert her mind, which was full of uncomfortable thoughts. It was still light, though it was nearly bed-time; the trees, so silken green, kept their colour, though in a sort of spiritualized tint, in the pale clear light. The sound of footsteps (which no doubt a scientific inquirer would have decided to come from some entirely natural phenomena of acoustics quite explainable and commonplace) was more distinct than usual in the complete stillness of the evening. It was said to be a lady who had died for love—one of the daughters of Murkley in a distant age, who was the ghost of this pensive walk. She was never visible; her steps softly sounding upon the path in a regular cadence, coming and going, was all that was known of her. Sometimes, when the family was in difficulty or danger, it had been reported that a sigh was heard. But no one living had heard the sigh. And even the maids were not afraid to walk in daylight in this visionary place. There was a certain green line close by the trees which was never encroached upon, and which was coloured by patches of mosses. It was there the lady walked, so people said, without considering that no footsteps could have sounded clear from that natural velvet. Miss Margaret threw her little shawl over her cap, and went out into the mysterious stillness, broken by those still more mysterious sounds which she had been accustomed to from her childhood. It soothed her to be there, and she took herself to task with a little indignation. That she should suspect her sister! that she should think it possible that Jean could "make a fool of herself!" When she had spent half an hour in the walk, slowly pacing up and down, hearing the steps of that other mysterious passenger going and coming, she returned to the house subdued. But she did not go back to the drawing-room where Jean was. Her fears on the subject of Lilias had altogether departed from her mind with Lewis' extraordinary announcement; but even the risk of an entanglement for Lilias, though more likely, and perhaps more serious, would have been in the course of nature. It would not have affected her with a sense of shame and intolerant passion like any short-coming on the part of Jean.
As for Lewis, he went home to his inn pleased, but not agitated, like Miss Margaret. He was very much satisfied with the sanction thus accorded to him, and with the approval implied in it, as he thought. If the elder sister had been disposed to oppose him, or, indeed, if she had not approved of what he was about to do, she would not have gone so far as to indicate to him when he might come. Miss Margaret's angry enjoyment of the idea of his discomfiture, her eagerness to lead him to the point so that he might be crushed at once, never occurred to Lewis. There was nothing in his own honest intentions to throw light upon such a meaning. For his own part, he did not contemplate the idea of failure at all. He thought that Miss Jean, though she might be surprised at his proposal, could have no reason to be offended by it, and he believed that he would be successful. It seemed to him entirely to her advantage, modest as he was. Her age, he thought, would make the idea of a husband not less, but more agreeable to her. It was an advancement in life of which she had probably given up all hopes. This was his idea in an economical point of view, so to speak, and not from any overweening opinion of himself. Marriage, he had been trained to believe, was often irksome and disagreeable to a man, but for a woman it was a necessity of well-being, of dignity, almost of self-respect. It was this that gave him the calm confidence he had in respect to Miss Jean. She would be startled, no doubt. It would take away her breath to find herself, after all, still within the brighter circle of existence; but she would not throw away this last and probably unexpected chance. Personal vanity had nothing to do with Lewis' calm conviction. It was not he that would be irresistible to her; but the fact of having a step in existence offered to her—a higher place.
It was about noon next day when he set out for the Castle; and when he was shown into the drawing-room, he found Miss Jean, as before, seated over her table-cover, with all her silks arranged upon her table, and her carnation in a glass being copied. She did not get up to greet him, as she had done before. Even her old-fashioned ideas of politeness, which were more rigorous than anything in the present day, yielded to the friendly familiarity with which she was beginning to regard him. She gave him her hand with a kind smile.
"This is very good of you, Mr. Murray," she said, "to give up a bonny morning to me;" her eyes went instinctively to the piano as she spoke. This piqued Lewis a very little; but he loved music too well to disappoint her.
"The finer the morning," he said, "the more congenial it is to music." There was time enough to indulge himself and her before beginning the serious business of the matter between them, and indeed it was not even necessary that there should be anything said upon that serious matter to-day.
"And that is true," said Miss Jean, fervently; "the evening perhaps is the best of all; the fading of the daylight, and the hushing of the world, and the coming on of rest—that is beautiful with music. I like it in the dusk, and I like it in the dark, when ye can only hear, not see, and your soul goes upon the sound. But I like it as well in the day, in the brightness, in the middle of life, at all times; it is never out of season," she added, with an enthusiasm which elevated her simple countenance.
Lewis felt a sensation of pride and happiness as he looked at her. No one could say she was unworthy a man's choice or affections. It would do him honour among all who were qualified to judge that he had made such a choice. Miss Jean was somewhat astonished by the way in which he turned upon her. It half confused, half pleased her. For a long time no man had looked so intently upon her tranquil, middle-aged countenance. She thought he was "an affectionate lad," probably being without mother or sister to spend his natural kindness upon, and therefore eager to respond to it wherever he found it. His compliments on their former meeting she had put away out of her mind, though they had startled and almost abashed her for the moment; but then compliments were the common-places of foreigners, everybody knew that they meant nothing, certainly no harm. It was just the same, she thought, as if a Scotchman had said, "I am glad to see you looking well," no more than that.
And then he began to play. He chose Mozart after their talk about the times and seasons. Lewis was not naturally given to much exercise of the fancy, but he was very sympathetic, and readily took his cue from any mind which was congenial to him. He thought that the splendour of this great composer was appropriate to the richness and fulness of the noon. Themes more dreamy, more visionary, more simply sweet would be the language of the evening. And once more he watched, with an interest and sympathy which he thought must be as nearly like love as possible, the gradual forgetfulness of everything but the music which came over Miss Jean. First her work flagged, then she pushed away the carnation which she was copying to one side, and let her table-cover drop on her knees; then she leant forward on the little table, her head in her hands, her eyes fixed upon him; then those eyes filled with tears, and saw nothing, neither him nor any accessory, but only a mystic world of sweetness and emotion which she was utterly incapable of describing, but which shone through her face with an eloquence which was beyond words. Lewis, as he looked at her in this ecstatic state, which he had the power of throwing her into, knew very well that, though he was the performer and she only the listener, the music was not half to him what it was to her. It filled her soul, it carried her away above the world, and all that was in it. When he paused she sank back in her chair overwhelmed, unable to say anything. He was fond of applause, but applause was not necessary here.
"I wish," he said, rising, and coming towards her, full of a genuine warmth and enthusiasm, "that I could play to you for ever."
She did not speak for a little, but smiled, and dried her soft eyes.
"No—no—that would be too much," she said.
"It would be too much to continue always, oh, yes—but I do not mean that. To play to you whenever you pleased, as often as you pleased; when you wished to come out of the common, to be happy; for it makes you happy?"
"I think it must be like Heaven," said Miss Jean, fervently; "that is all I can think of—the skies opening, and the angels singing."
"That is beautiful," he cried, "to open Heaven. That is what I should like to do for you—always. To have it ready for you when you pleased."
"You have a kind heart," said Miss Jean; "oh, you have a kind heart. But, if it cannot be always," she said, with a tender smile, "you must just let it be as often as you can, as long as you are here."
"I am going to stay here," said Lewis, "that is, if you will let me."
"Me! Let you! But it is little I can have to do with it: and you may be sure I would let you—and kindly welcome, kindly welcome," said Miss Jean, recovering herself.
She was a little ashamed of feeling so deeply, but the beauty of the music so completely occupied her mind that, save as "a kind lad," she did not think of Lewis at all.
"If you will make me welcome, then I will stay. It depends upon you altogether; I will stay or I will go away, as you please. It is you that must decide," the young man said.
He was standing on the other side of the little table, his face lit up with the enthusiasm of sympathy and pleasure. It was sweet to him to have made so profound an impression, and the emotion in Miss Jean's mind reflected itself in him. He admired her, he loved her for feeling so much. It threw a tender light upon everything about her; there was no effort wanting to look tenderly and speak tenderly with all the emotion of a genuine sentiment. His eyes glowed with softness and warmth, his voice took a pleading tone, he was ready to have put himself at her feet, actually as well as metaphorically, so much was he touched and moved by this sympathetic strain of feeling. Miss Jean, for her part, gathering her work into her hand, and recovering her self slowly, looked up with eyes of simple surprise at the extraordinary aspect of the young stranger.
"You are meaning—? to be sure, we will be very glad, very happy to have you for a neighbour; but, knowing so little of the circumstances, how can we, that are but strangers——"
They were both so pre-occupied that they had not heard anything but the sound of their own voices, and, when another suddenly interposed, they started as if a shot had been fired beside them.
"Jean, Margaret sent me to tell you dinner was on the table," was the peaceful intimation this voice made.
Lewis turned round with a nervous impatience, finding the interruption vexatious. He turned round and found himself suddenly in a presence he had never been clearly conscious of before. What was it? To external appearance a young, slight girl, fair as Scottish beauty ought to be, with light locks just tinged here and there with the brighter light which makes them golden, a complexion of the most dazzling purity, eyes, somewhat astonished, of deep blue, and features perhaps not equal in quality to all the rest, but harmonious enough in their youth and softness. This was what she was in actual flesh and blood; but as she appeared to Lewis, at that moment actually feeling, and with all his might endeavouring to impress upon a middle-aged woman, the fervour of his devotion, and his dependence upon her fiat, she was something more. She was Youth in person, she was Love, and Hope, and a sort of incarnate delight. He looked at her, and the words he had been speaking died from his lips, the enthusiasm he had been feeling was blown out as if it had been the flame of a candle. He forgot himself and good manners, and his position as a stranger, and stood, his lips apart, his eyes wide opened, gazing at her at once in amazement and admiration.
Lilias looked at him too with much astonishment and a good deal of curiosity. Was this the person whom Margaret had suggested to be the man from Kilmorley come to tune the piano? Though she was a very docile little girl, there were moments when she could be wilful. She made Lewis a little curtsey, and gave him a smile which went to his head like wine.
"And Margaret hopes the gentleman will come too," Lilias said.
"Oh!" cried Miss Jean with a tremor of conscience, and a questioning look towards her little sister. Could it be possible that Margaret—"I am sure," she said, "we will all be pleased if you will come and eat something with us; it is our dinner, as we are only ladies, without a man in the house; but it will do for luncheon for you."
"If you will permit me," said Lewis, with that profound bow which they all thought foreign.
He drew away from the little table, so as to leave Miss Jean room to gather together her embroidery before she rose from her chair, and waited, ready to follow the ladies. The proposal was delightful to him. He did not pause to ask whether the message had really come from Miss Margaret; he had none of Miss Jean's tremor. He thought only that he was ready to follow this nymph, this vision, to the end of the world if she pleased. Had he ever seen anything so beautiful? he asked himself: and, as may easily be supposed, said "No" with hasty readiness. Lilias was in the perfection of youthful bloom and freshness, with the down upon her like a peach, untouched by anything that could impair that dazzling, morning glory; the dark old house, and the companionship of the two sisters who in her presence became old and faded, threw up her bloom all the more, and so did her simple frock, the girlish fashion of her hair, her school-room apron, her position as Margaret's messenger.
"Come along, then," she said, lightly, and ran off in advance.
Lewis offered his arm to Miss Jean. She was very nervous, he thought, because of what he had been saying to her—but Miss Jean had by no means taken up, as he meant them, the things he had been saying to her, and was nervous because of her doubt whether Margaret really meant this invitation. What if it was a sudden thought of Lilias alone? The girl did wicked things now and then of this sort, little rebellions "in fun," audacities which sometimes vexed Margaret. But Miss Jean's instincts of hospitality would have tempted her, even without this proceeding on the part of Lilias, to invite her visitor, towards whom she felt kindly. She put her arm within his with a little tremor: and Lewis felt the quiver, and thought that he had been successful in his suit. He pressed her hand softly against his side. Though he had been so startled, shaken out of his previous thoughts by this sudden apparition, yet it did not occur to him to be unfaithful. Nothing yet occurred to him except that here was a new thing, a new glory and beauty returned into life. This fairy creature glided out of the room before them, ran downstairs like a ray of sunshine, making the dark old oak staircase bright, and darted in at the open door of the dining-room, where she evidently announced their coming with a laugh. The laugh made Lewis smile in sympathy, but it made Miss Jean tremble, for it proved that her alarm was justified, and so did the sudden, startled sound of Miss Margaret's deeper voice. What Lilias said was, with that laugh,
"Margaret, I have asked the music man to come too."
"The music man! He is no music man," cried Miss Margaret, and then she said, "Quick, Simon, quick, lay another place." There was no time for further explanations now.
Lewis thought this meal was the most delightful he had ever eaten in his life. The two elder sisters sat at the head and foot of the table, and opposite to him was Lilias, with a little flush of triumph in her face, and a mischievous smile about the corners of her mouth. She did not talk very much, and to him not at all. The other ladies maintained the conversation chiefly between them. For his own part he was content to say very little, to confine himself to replying when they spoke to him, and listening eagerly to their talk, and watching the beautiful girl whom he could not raise his eyes without seeing, and whose glance he met now and then with something of the freemasonry of youth. He did not know her, nor she him, while he was acquainted with both the other ladies, and felt himself already in a position of intimacy and sympathetic friendship, if no more, with Miss Jean; but yet instinctively, and in a moment, they two, he felt, constituted a faction, a party, youth against age.
While the elders talked, she would shoot a little glance at him across the table, a glimmer of a smile would go over her face, in which there was an appeal to him for an answering smile; a sort of unconscious telegraph of mutual understanding was set up between them. When Miss Margaret questioned him, he replied with a look to Lilias first to see if she were listening. When she spoke, though it was only a monosyllable, he paused to listen. After, when it was over, the whole scene appeared to him like a dream; the dark wainscot of the room, with the bloom of that young face against it, Miss Margaret against the light, Miss Jean, with her sweet but faded face in the full illumination of the window, old Simon making slow circles round the table. His own heart was beating with pleasure, with suspense, with excitement, the feeling that something had happened to him, something new which he scarcely understood. He did not realize that he had been suddenly stopped in his love-making to Miss Jean by this apparition, nor that it had taken from him all desire to carry on that love-making. Indeed, his mind had not taken in the new occurrence at all; he was still in this state of sensation, knowing that here was a new event which had suddenly happened to him, but not knowing what it was.
CHAPTER XIV.
Lewis left the Castle like a man in a dream. There was an intoxication about him which affected his whole being vaguely, as actual intoxication might do, in which there was not the slightest self-reproach or sense of doing wrong. He was elated, delighted, happy; a sort of suffusion of sweetness and brightness was in his veins, filling up everything. It affected him like a new sensation, a new event, a revelation of new possibilities. It never had occurred to him that the world could be so sweet, or any mortal creature so happy. Why was he so happy? Because there was in existence a creature so young, so fair, so sweet, as to make life itself look beautiful. What reason was that for the happiness of one who had nothing to do with her, whose life could not be affected one way or other by her existence? But he did not at first ask himself that question. It made him glad without any reason; it affected him foolishly. He could have laughed for pleasure; he thought better of everything for her sake. She seemed to fill the fresh country with a reflection of herself. He thought of nothing else as he walked down to his inn in the afternoon. She had not cared for his society, but disappeared immediately after dinner on a sign from her sister, turning and making him a salutation which was half a curtsey and half a smiling nod of familiarity. She too, perhaps, had felt the youth in him, and had not felt herself capable of curtseying ceremoniously as she had been taught. There was a merry glimmer in her eyes, though the rest of her was so demure, and this conjunction was delightful to him. He had not known what the other ladies said to him after; a kind of golden mist had seemed to him to fill the air. The place was not desolate when she went out of it, because she left it full of herself, full of vibrations and echoes. He had heard the kind elder voices in his ears, with their long sentences and the responsive waves of their talk, and had been aware that he took some share in it, had answered them when they spoke, and was not without comprehension of their meaning. But he had felt that he was in haste to get away, to be alone, to think over this new thing. And accordingly he did think it over, or rather he walked into the unbroken enjoyment of it, into the contemplation of Lilias, when he walked out of those old-fashioned doors into the afternoon sunshine. He did not think of her, he only moved along in a current which was her, in air which was full of her. He did not understand the sensation; it was as new to him as she was—new and delightful, entrancing his soul.
Lewis moved along down the country-road and through the village with his heart full of this strange and novel flood of feeling. Her look, as, turning his head suddenly in the midst of the genuine fervour of his address to Miss Jean, he had caught sight of her, and the words had gone out on his lips: the turn of her head, the going and coming of her smile as she sat opposite to him at table, the few words she said, the simplicity of appearance and movements, only a little girl, and yet the queen of all—these were before him as he walked, and not the features of the landscape. Now it was one recollection, now another; the manner in which she turned to go out of the room, the half curtsey, the half laugh, full of a sweet malice, the glance of her blue eyes, half mocking, half ceremonious. Never had drama been so full of interest for a spectator. He went over everything. Then he went into his parlour and threw himself down upon his hard angular sofa, and went over it all again—every look, every movement, every raising of the eyelids. He seemed to himself not to have forgotten a single movement, or step, or word, or almost breath. She came in with him to the dingy room just as she had come along the road. It was all a revelation, and so full of dazzling light that it confused his mind and everything about him; the sun was not so bright, nor the world so fair, as this new creature who had suddenly made of herself a new centre to the universe.
Lewis had never in his life been so happy as he was in that curious ecstasy. He did not ask himself why he went into details, he did not say to himself that to have her, to appropriate her to himself, was henceforward to be the object of his life. Many men have declared in a moment, "This of all maids is the one maid for me." But Lewis did not go so far as this; he had not thought as yet of appropriation. What he felt was that here, in the world, was a creature more sweet, more beautiful than he had ever dreamt of, and that the place was transfigured, and mere living made into a delight because she was there. This made the blood course through his veins with a warmth and fulness he had never known before; he felt as if some great happiness had come to him. But even when he paused and asked himself what was the meaning of it, what good could come to him from it, he found no answer to give to that question. He pushed it aside indeed; he had nothing to do with it in his present mood.
Later, as it began to approach evening, Lewis met Mr. Seton on the river-side, and, having nothing better to do, walked with him for a mile or two on his way to some piece of parochial duty. The minister complained a little of his work, as everybody is apt to do.
"They expect to be visited, however far-off they may be," he said, with a pucker in his forehead and a quiver of complaint in his voice, "and instead of bringing their children to church, as is their duty, they will find some reason for a private christening. It is far too much the way in these parts. Of course, the session might make a stand on the subject, and some of my elders would be very well inclined, but what is the use of making a commotion? I am fond of peace. I always say just for this once—and that is how they come over me—rather that than make a disturbance. I am always for yielding—when the question is not vital—when the question is not vital! Of course, I make my stand upon that."
"To be sure," said Lewis, vaguely, though he had only the faintest idea what was meant.
"Better be baptized privately than not be baptized at all," said the minister, solemnly. "But, to do the people justice, they are not so bad as that. They will go to the Free Kirk, or the U. P., but they will not leave a child unchristened. It is in the great towns that you find that kind of heathenism, not in the country. The country, there is little question, is better in some ways. There is not so much scepticism. Perhaps you will say there is more indifference on all subjects, and that our ploughmen just take things for granted?"
"Oh, no," said Lewis, more vague than ever, "I certainly should not say that."
"You think not? Well, there are just very curious intellects among them, I must allow that—strange bits of thought, you know, but seldom sceptical." Mr. Seton spoke with a certain regret, for he felt himself qualified to meet the legions of infidelity, and longed for nothing so much as the opportunity of converting an unbeliever. "The doubts they entertain are upon high points of doctrine which probably a young man like you would never have heard of; but they make nothing of what is often a great difficulty to a cultivated spirit—the standards, Mr. Murray. You will sympathize with that difficulty. The Westminster confession may be a stumbling-block to me, and the like of me, but as for these ploughmen they will put-to their hand to the confession, or to a dozen confessions. They swallow the longer and the shorter catechisms without even wishing—they have very strong stomachs in the way of doctrine. It is not on that point you will ever find them wanting. The difficulties and dangers of more delicate minds——" Mr. Seton said, bending upon Lewis a benignant eye.
"I suppose go with more delicate bodies," said that young man, with a laugh, which was profoundly inappropriate. And he had to laugh alone at his own jest, the minister looking upon him with gravity and disapproval, both shocked and disappointed that he should show so little appreciation. "But the ploughmen," he said, hastily and humbly, "are not the most interesting part of the people?"
"If you think a small country-gentleman, such as we have here, is more interesting, Mr. Murray, in an intellectual point of view——"
"No, no," said Lewis, half abashed, half amused. "You must not think so badly of me; I was thinking of—some of the ladies."
At this the minister paused, and gave him a doubtful look, apprehensive that the stranger was indulging in a little satire; but as Lewis laughed with ingratiating simplicity and blushed a little, and added, "I own they are more interesting to me," the minister too unbended, and joined in the laugh, and shook his head the while.
"Ah! if we were all young men. But, to be sure, we must make allowance for those that are. And which of the ladies is it that you find so interesting, if it is not indiscreet to inquire?"
This question brought Lewis back to a perception that he was on delicate ground.
"All whom I have met with," he said. "The intercourse is different, very different from what I have been used to. The young ladies, who are so frank, who meet us so—simply."
"Ah, that is your foreign way of thinking," said Mr. Seton. "No doubt it seems strange to you, but we have every confidence in our daughters. It is rarely, very rarely that it is found to be an undeserved confidence."
"But some are not so," said Lewis. He had thought a few minutes before that it would be impossible to bring the conversation to this subject, and he could scarcely believe now in the easy success of his own bold attempt. "Some are not so. I think there is one young lady who is guarded as people do abroad. I have been here so long, and I saw her but for the first time to-day."
"How long have you been here—three weeks? That is not a lifetime," said the minister. "And who may this be that is taken such care of? I cannot call to mind——"
"It is the ladies at the Castle who interest me so much," said Lewis, "especially the less old one, she whom you call Miss Jean, and who is so susceptible to music. I have seen no one who is more susceptible. It takes possession of her; it carries her away. To see it is beautiful," cried Lewis. "I am very much interested in Miss Jean; but there is one, much more young, whom I have only seen for the first time——"
"Indeed!" said Mr. Seton. "Who could that be?" And then his tone changed in a moment. "Oh, Lilias! Yes, to be sure. The old sisters, you see, they are two old maids; they have got I don't know what ideas in their heads. Poor little thing! they will make an old maid of her like themselves. I hear my wife and Katie say that she sees nobody. Poor girl! But then the old ladies are peculiar," the minister said.
"Are they such very old ladies?" said Lewis, somewhat piqued. "I think that, on the whole, I like that—to have a lovely young lady, like a flower, kept apart from the world, that pleases me. Perhaps it is that I, too, am old-fashioned."
"Is she so lovely?" said the minister with a laugh. "Well, well, perhaps she is so. I am saying nothing against it. She is just little Lilias Murray to me. I've seen her grow up like my own. She is older though than Katie. And so you admire her very much? I must tell my wife. My wife will be very much amused to hear that somebody has seen her after all, and that she is thought to be lovely, poor little thing!" Mr. Seton repeated, with a laugh of amusement.
This annoyed Lewis more than he could say.
"It is a very distinguished family," he said, with gravity. "I find it so. The two ladies like châtelaines of the old time; and the younger one so beautiful, like a young princess who is in their charge."
"Well, that is very poetical," said Mr. Seton, but it was evident that he felt it very difficult to restrain his sense of the ludicrous. "You see we are too familiar with them," he said. "Familiarity, you know, breeds contempt. No, not contempt in the ordinary sense of the word, for two more respectable women don't exist; but I'm not sure that I would just use the word distinguished. It is a very good old family, the Murrays of Murkley—but distinguished, no."
"I used the word in another sense. It is their appearance—and manner that is distinguished: as they say in France."
Upon this the minister broke forth again into a low laugh.
"They are just two very respectable, elderly women," he said.
Lewis made no reply. It appeared to him that here for the first time he had encountered in his idyllic village the spirit of detraction, the petty scorn of limited minds for people superior to themselves. He felt that, if he spoke, it would only be to call forth the minister's laughter more and more, and raise that feeling of ungenerous opposition in his mind. Lewis did not leave Mr. Seton, as was his first impulse, for he still felt the charm of being able to talk of them, and of probably learning something more about Lilias, even though it were not in a favourable sense, to be worth lingering for. He walked on by Mr. Seton's side, saying as little as possible, and unaware that there was in his aspect that air of slightly-injured dignity which, more than anything else, amuses those who have been engaged in the congenial work of pulling down idols, and making them appear to their worshippers in a proper light. But the minister was infinitely tickled by Lewis's look. And that anybody should contemplate the Misses Murray in an exalted light was delightfully ridiculous to their neighbour, who had laughed at them and their ways, and criticised their actions more or less for years of his life.
"The ladies," he said, after a pause, "have been rather hard upon the little one, or so my wife says—and women understand each other best. They will never let her come out to a young party even at the manse. I hear they are very ambitious for Lilias, and are reserving her, poor innocent women—reserving her," Mr. Seton said, shaking his head with an expression of amused pity, "for some grand match."
"For—some—" Lewis felt as if for one moment the wheels of his being stood still; the earth was arrested in its progress. What could it mean? he asked himself vaguely. A grand match! The words made a wonderful commotion in his ears, but he said to himself that he did not understand what they meant.
"That is it," said the minister, shaking his head, and with that smile always on his face. "Poor things! they want her to build up the family again. I hear they are going to take her to court, and make a great fuss, all in the hopes that she will marry some great potentate or other, and restore the credit of the Murrays. Well, since you think her so lovely as all that," he added, with a little burst of laughter, as if overcome with the ridicule of the idea, "it may be that it's us that are the idiots after all, and that the ladies are right."
Lewis scarcely heard these remarks; his whole being was in a ferment. Up to this moment it had not occurred to him what was the natural way in which to regard this new apparition which had come into his life. He had been wooing (so to speak) her sister, the old sister who was as a mother to Lilias, when this wonder appeared to him, and it was not that his mind changed about Miss Jean, but only that something entirely new and extraordinary burst upon him, something he had never dreamt of before. His words, his thoughts, the very action of his mind was arrested. He had no longer the power of fixing upon that project or any other, his mind being entirely engrossed and occupied by the new thing presented to it. But his feelings had been entirely those of joy and delight in his discovery. It was something that lighted up the earth and made the whole world more sweet; but it had not yet occurred to him to appropriate this lovely creature to himself, or to make her the centre of his individual enjoyment. Now there burst upon him another revelation, something of an entirely different nature. That she was sweet, but not for him; that her beauty was not intended only to make the whole world happier, but to be a special fountain of joy to one, but that not himself, but some one else. Lewis did not himself understand, in the rush and hurry of his feelings, what was the sentiment which succeeded that vague sensation of happiness in his mind. But he understood that in a moment the minister whom he had been accompanying with so much friendliness on the way became intolerable, and that the very sound of his voice was irritating, and not to be borne. For the sake of appearances he went on with him to a cross-road which they were approaching, that led Lewis did not know whither; but anything was better than to go on with so heartless a companion. He broke off abruptly when he came to this unknown path, saying something about letters to write, and the necessity of getting back to his inn.
"You'll not get back to your inn that way," Mr. Seton said; but Lewis paid no attention, indeed scarcely heard him as he hurried on.
He sped along this lonely road in a totally different direction from that he was acquainted with, till he had entirely lost himself and worn himself out, which perhaps in the circumstances was as wise a thing as he could have done. For his mind was agitated with a wonderful variety of new thoughts. He became aware of what that lovely figure was which had glided across his vision, and in a moment swept everything else out of his thoughts. She was more than youth, more than mere beauty and brightness. She was love. The thoughts of last night, that sudden curious contrast which had struck him between the plans and purposes of his own life and those of Philip Stormont, flashed back again and made the situation clear to him in a moment. Here was nature, here was the secret of the world. The broken scenes and visions which had been passing before his eyes since ever he saw her took a different form; instead of only seeing her, he saw himself beside her. He saw the group of last night changed from Stormont and Katie to Lilias and himself. He walked by her side as he had walked by her sister's; but how differently! He talked to her as he had talked to Miss Jean, but oh! in how changed a tone.
All this went through his mind as he walked mile after mile, always trying a new direction, always failing to recover his ground, or come near any landmark he knew. The sun had been long set, and in any other but these northern skies night would have set in, when he found himself at last approaching the village. He could see that there was a little commotion in the street as he came along, sadly weary and dusty, and beginning to come down from those celestial circles of the imagination, and to remember that he was very hungry, and had not dined. A little group of children broke up and dashed down the road in front of him towards the 'Murkley Arms.'
"Eh, yonder he's coming!" they cried.
Janet, with a very anxious countenance, was standing in the doorway.
"Eh, sir," she said, "is this you? And what has keepit ye frae your dinner? We have had a maist anxious night looking out for ye, and wondering what could have happened. Adam's away doun to the water-side, and I've sent to the manse and the Castle, and every place I could think of, we were that alarmed."
"Why should you be alarmed?" said Lewis. "The fact is, I lost my way."
"I'm real glad to see it's nae waur," said Janet. "There's been ane here frae Kilmorley keen, keen to see ye. It was just the writer's clerk, and that gied us a fright; and he didna seem that sure about your name, and he said he had instructions just to bide and no to leave till he had seen ye. But I sent him away with a flea in his lug," said Janet. "I said you were just real respectable, as we've found you, sir, and one of the Murrays, kent folk, and taken a hantle notice of by the Murkley ladies, and how daured he come here to set your friends against ye? But for a' that I got a terrible fright, Mr. Murray. I thought maybe ye had got wit o' his coming, and had just slippit away, and we would never have heard tell of ye again."
"Why should I slip away?" cried Lewis, astonished, his conviction of innocence being too strong to permit him to entertain at the moment any alarm as to the consequences that might follow if he were found to have presented himself under a name which was not his own.
Janet gave him a confused, repentant, yet penetrating look.
"Deed, I canna tell," she said, somewhat abashed; "but how was I to ken that there mightna be reasons, and the man so awfu' curious about you, and him the writer's clerk? Gentlemen are whiles overtaken, just the same as poor folk. It might have been siller, or it might have been——But, dear bless me, what is the use of speakin', when here ye are, just your ain sel', and no put aboot at a'; and the dinner's spoilt, but nae mair harm done."
"My good Mrs. Janet," said Lewis, "I am much obliged to you, but you need not entertain any fears about me. I am not afraid of any writer's clerk. What is a writer, by the way?" he said, smiling, pausing as he was about to enter.
She gazed at him with round eyes of amazement.
"What is a writer? Well, I always said you were an innocent young man—I was aye sure there would be nothing in it—but you must ken very little indeed, sir, if you have never come across a writer. He's just a—well, maybe sometimes a terror to evil-doers, I would not say—but a great fyke and trouble mony a time to them that do well. He is one that will gather in the siller that's owin' ye, that ye canna get yoursel', and pretend it's a' for your gude, syne take his percentage and his profit, till there's more of it gangs into his pocket than yours. He is one that——"
"I see—a lawyer of some sort. You thought I was perhaps running away from my creditors," Lewis said, with a laugh.
Janet gave him a guilty glance. "Mony a grand gentleman has done that, and lived to pay them a' to the last farden, and never been a preen the waur."
Lewis laughed till all the attendant children, who had been looking on, waiting for the penny promised them for intimating his approach, laughed too in sympathy.
"I owe you more than I owe anybody else," he said; "but we'll talk of that after dinner, for I'm famishing now."
CHAPTER XV.
Lewis woke up next morning a different man. His light-hearted youth and easy views had gone from him. The musings of the night had only showed him the position in which he was, without showing him any way out of it. He had all but pledged himself to one woman, placed himself at her disposal; and his heart had gone out to another. He felt that life would not be worth living, nor the world have any charm for him, unless he could secure Lilias as the companion of his existence. Yet at the same time he recognized that it was the sister of Lilias to whom so lightly, thinking, as it now seemed, nothing of it, he had offered that life as he might have offered a flower. Was there ever a more terrible dilemma for a young man? And he had not found it out at first. It had not been till the terrible prose of the minister set the case fully before him that he had recognized the complication which was so novel, so strange, yet to him so overwhelming. Love! how could he love this creature whom he had seen but once, of whom he knew nothing. But even to ask that question seemed a sort of blasphemy against her, against the strange and potent sweetness of his own emotion. Knew nothing! he knew everything; he knew her, the wonder of creation! To see her was enough. What doubt, what hesitation was possible? "There is none like her, none;" he was as much convinced of that as if he had watched all her ways for years. And to think that he had not had the patience to wait, or any instinct to tell him that she was here! This was the strange, the incomprehensible thing. It was a fatality. So it had been ordained in Greek plays and uncompromising tragedy. That everything which was sweetest should come too late—that one should be on the very verge of the loveliest road to Paradise, and all unawares should choose another which led a different way.
Lewis awoke to a sense, no longer of a world enhanced, and made infinitely sweeter and fairer, by the presence in it of a creature more beautiful and delightful than he had ever before dreamt of, but of a universe which had gone suddenly out of joint, where the possibilities of blessedness were counteracted by malign influences, and fate took pleasure in turning happiness into trouble: one way and another the calmly smiling day, the happy commonplace, the matter-of-course existence had come to an end for him. It was very summary and very complete. He looked back for a few days, and thought how easily he had made up his mind about Miss Jean, how calmly he had determined to make her a present of his existence, with a kind of horror. In reality it had been a very small part of his existence which he had resolved to give up to her: but this he did not recollect in the excitement of his thoughts. He had meant to live as he pleased, always returning between whiles to the kind, elderly, indulgent wife who, he felt sure, would require no more of him; but this now seemed a sort of blasphemy to him, a travesty of the life which a man should wish to live with the true mate and companion who would share his every thought. He rejected his former thoughts with a self-disgust that was full of anger. It was odious to him to know that he had been capable of so thinking. All that had altered in a moment; not with the first sight of love, and what it was, in the person of Lilias, but with the first clear perception that this fair creature was some one's destined bride, but not his. In the irony of fate not his; revealed to him only after it was too late, after he had mortgaged his existence and bound himself to a world so much pettier and poorer than that of which she held the key.
Up to this moment there had been in the heart of Lewis very little questioning of fate; he had taken all that came in his way with, on the whole, a cheering composure. The loss of his parents had been made up to him in a wonderful way. The loss of Sir Patrick was so completely natural that there could be no repining in the sorrow, honest sorrow deeply felt, but without any bitterness, with which his young dependent mourned him. All this had been legitimate; he had accepted it as inevitable and necessary. Some natural tears he dropped, but wiped them soon. He had taken his life in the same unquestioning matter-of-fact way, almost unconscious of any deeper necessity for satisfaction in it than that which lay on the surface, the honest discharge of such duties as he knew, the honest enjoyment of such pleasures as were congenial to him. He did not know that he wanted anything more. It was not that Lewis had not heard the murmurings of bitter philosophy in many a tone, he had heard his old patron discourse upon the deceptions of life, he had heard Sir Patrick's friends talking, snarling over the lies and delusions with which, to them, the world was full; but the youth in him had rebelled, had laughed, had attributed all this to the ill-temper of age and disappointment, sometimes pitying, always certain that to him nothing of the kind would ever come. And there had been nothing in his existence to contradict this easy confidence. Nothing had gone amiss with him; there had been no occasion for him to rail at fortune, which had always been so good to him, or to find any delusions in the brightness of his life. It had been without complications, without mystery; nothing in it that was not straightforward, until he came to Murkley; and it seemed to him that the harshest moralist could not have objected to his innocent little artifice, his adoption of a name to which he had indeed a good title, even though it was taken up with intention to deceive. And even the deception had a good reason. It seemed hard to poor Lewis that coming thus innocently, with intention to do well, to right wrong, to atone for injury, he should have been made to suffer. It seemed to him cruel. His imagination did not blame Providence, which was too far-off and too solemn to be made responsible for such matters, but he found a little consolation in recalling to his mind the old snarlings he used to hear, the complaints against fate, whatever that was. Why, why should such a malign chance have fallen on him, whose wish was to be just, to be true to everybody? It seemed to Lewis that he had good reason to complain. To be sure, he did not very well know against whom his complaint could be directed, but he felt it all the same.
He was late of getting up; he was slow to go out; he did not care what he did with himself; sometimes his impulse was to hurry to the Castle, to take advantage as long as he could of the permission which certainly had been given him, on the mere chance of perhaps seeing her again. But what was the use of seeing her? It was to Miss Jean his visit would have to be made. It was she who had been the aim of his devotion; and at that thought Lewis laid down the hat which he had snatched up, and threw himself in despair upon his seat. No, better to hurry away, never to put himself within the reach of her influence again, to do nothing at least to deepen and increase it. And then he began to say to himself, what matter? no one but himself should ever know the strong temptation which had seized him, the enchantment she had exercised unawares. It would do no harm to any one but himself, if he did see her once more; and if he suffered for it, there would be compensation in the sweetness of her presence; he would have had the sunshine at least, even if the cloud were all the blacker afterwards.
Throughout the whole of this self-discussion it will be seen that the idea of being unfaithful to his first declared object never occurred to Lewis. He believed that he had made Miss Jean fully aware of the proposal he meant to make her. He had told Miss Margaret of it. He had no doubt that they must have communicated with each other on the subject, and that the mere fact of his reception at the house was a proof that he was viewed under the aspect of an accepted lover. And, this being the case, nothing in the world would have made Lewis flinch from the position he had assumed. It seemed to him now like going from the glory of the skies and free air into the dim and shadowed atmosphere indoors. Lilias would have meant the garden of Eden, the perennial, never-exhausted idyll of human blessedness. Miss Jean meant a domestic interior somewhat dull, grey, full of dimness and shadows. But all the glory and blessedness in the world could not make that possible which was impossible, as Lewis knew; and what was impossible was to leave in the lurch the woman he had wooed. That was the one thing he could not do, however hard the price he had to pay. It did not come even the length of a discussion in his mind. It was too certain, too self-evident, for anything of the kind. He made no question about it. Thus sometimes he jumped up, thinking he would go at once to the Castle, and linger there till it was time to see her again; sometimes sat down again, saying to himself why should he do it? why should he add to his pain? Better to keep that one vision as the only one, a sort of poem, a revelation for one moment, and no more. In the lives of the saints such things have been told; how they had seen a celestial vision, sometimes printing marks in their very flesh, and had seen no more. Lewis felt that it was perhaps profane to compare with that supreme sort of revelation his sudden view of the woman whom he could never forget, who might have made of his life a something glorious and noble, altogether different from its natural commonplace. It was profane, but he could not help it: only the highest images could express what he meant. That mere glimpse of her, attended by so little self-disclosure on her part, almost without the communication of words, had it not already made such an impression on his soul as could never wear out? It had revealed another world to him, it had shown him what life might be, what it never could be, and with what a strange, lamentable misconception he had chosen the lower place!
He was still in this uncertain condition, walking to the window now and then, looking out vaguely, pacing about the room, pausing to look at himself in the dingy mirror on the mantelpiece, taking up his hat and putting it down again, not able to decide what he should do, when his attention was caught by the sound of steps coming up the stairs, and the voice of Janet directing some one to come "This way, sir, this way."
"Our young gentleman took a walk yestreen, ower long, and lost his way, so he's no out this morning, which is just very lucky," Janet was saying.
Lewis threw down his hat with an impatient exclamation. It was Stormont, no doubt, he who could do what he pleased, who had taken his own way and satisfied himself, though not as Lewis would have done: or perhaps the minister who had laughed and spoken of the queen of beauty and love as a "poor little thing." There sprang up in his mind immediately a sort of hatred of them both as thus problematically preventing him from seeing her again: for he no sooner felt that he could not do it than it seemed to him he had made up his mind to do it, and was in the very act of sallying forth. But it was neither Stormont nor the minister who was shown in by Janet. She opened the door, and put her head in first with a certain caution.
"This'll be yon gentleman," she said, and made a sort of interrogative pause, as much as to say no one should enter did Lewis disapprove. Then she opened the door wider, and added, "A gentleman to see you, Mr. Murray," in a louder voice.
To say that Janet paused after this for a moment to satisfy herself what sort of greeting passed between them, and whether or not she had done well to introduce the stranger, is scarcely necessary. She stood with the door in her hand, and the most sympathetic curiosity in her mind: but when she saw the newcomer hurry forward with a sort of chuckling laugh, holding out his hand and exclaiming, in familiar accents, "So this is you! It was just borne in upon me that it must be you," Janet withdrew well pleased.
"It's a' just as it should be," she said to Adam, who had lingered to see the result. "I'll no say our young lad is pleased: but it's a friend, it's no a spy nor a sheriff's officer."
"It's a writer from Edinburgh," said Adam; "I've seen him in the Parliament house."
"Hoot awa' with your Parliament house!" cried Janet. "It's ten years since you were in Edinburgh, and how can ye mind if he's a writer or no? Besides, I told ye, he's no feared for ony writer; he asked me, bless the callant! what a writer was?"
Adam was more sceptical, having, as he thought, more knowledge of the world. "Ye may ken the thing and no ken the name," he said.
But even he shouldered his rood and stalked away with a relieved mind; for Lewis had so moved the household at the 'Murkley Arms,' and even the village itself, in his favour, that the writer would have fared badly who had meant mischief to the kind and friendly visitor who had conciliated everybody. Janet, considering all the circumstances, was of opinion that, after the greeting she had seen, it would be natural and desirable to put in hand certain preparations for luncheon of a more than usually elaborate kind.
But if his humble friends were consoled, Lewis was taken entirely by surprise. He said, "Mr. Allenerly!" in a tone between astonishment and dismay.
"It is just me," said the lawyer, "and I had a moral conviction it was you I should find, though no one knew the name of Grantley——"
"Hush!" cried Lewis in alarm, raising his hand.
"It is not a nice thing in any circumstances," said the newcomer, "for a man to disown his own name."