“Fetch me that writing-desk,” said Lady Dorothea, as she took several keys from her pockets; and noiselessly unlocking the box, she began to search amidst its contents. As she continued, her gestures grew more and more hurried; she threw papers recklessly here and there, and at last emptied the entire contents upon the table before her. “See, search if there be a key here,” cried she, in a broken voice; “I saw it here three days ago.”
“There is none here,” said he, wondering at her eagerness.
“Look carefully,—look well for it,” said she, her voice trembling at every word.
“Is it of such consequence—”
“It is of such consequence,” broke she in, “that he into whose hands it falls can leave you and me beggars on the world!” An effort at awaking by the sick man here made her hastily restore the papers to the desk, which she locked, and replaced upon the table.
“Was it the Henderson did this?” said she aloud, as if asking the question of herself. “Could she have known this secret?”
“Did what? What secret?” asked he, anxiously.
A low, long sigh announced that the sick man was awaking; and in a faint voice he said, “I feel better, Dora. I have had a sleep, and been dreaming of home and long ago. To-morrow, or next day, perhaps, I may be strong enough to leave this. I want to be back there again. Nay, don't refuse me,” said he, timidly.
“When you are equal to the journey—”
“I have a still longer one before me, Dora, and even less preparation for it. Harry, I have something to say to you, if I were strong enough to say it,—this evening, perhaps.” Wearied by the efforts he had made, he lay back again with a heavy sigh, and was silent.
“Is he worse—is he weaker?” asked his son.
A mournful nod of the head was her reply.
Young Martin arose and stole noiselessly from the room, he scarcely knew whither; he indeed cared not which way he turned. The future threw its darkest shadows before him. He had little to hope for, as little to love. His servant gave him a letter which Massingbred had left on his departure, but he never opened it; and in a listless vacuity he wandered out into the wood.
It was evening as he turned homeward. His first glance was towards the windows of his father's room. They were wont to be closely shuttered and fastened; now one of them lay partly open, and a slight breeze stirred the curtain within. A faint, sickly fear of he knew not what crept over him. He walked on quicker; but as he drew nigh the door, his servant met him. “Well!” cried he, as though expecting a message.
“Yes, sir, it is all over; he went off about an hour since.” The man added something; but Martin heard no more, but hurried to his room, and locked the door.
When Jack Massingbred found himself once more “in town,” and saw that the tide of the mighty world there rolled on the same full, boiling flood he had remembered it of yore, he began to wonder where and how he had latterly been spending his life. There were questions of politics—mighty interests of which every one was talking—of which he knew nothing; party changes and new social combinations had arisen of which he was utterly ignorant. But what he still more acutely deplored was that he himself had, so to say, dropped out of the memory of his friends, who accosted him with that half-embarrassed air that says, “Have you been ill?—or in India?—or how is it that we have n't met you about?” It was last session he had made a flash speech,—an effort that his own party extolled to the skies, and even the Opposition could only criticise the hardihood and presumption of so very young a member of the House,—and now already people had ceased to bear him in mind.
The least egotistical of men—and Massingbred did not enter into this category—find it occasionally very hard to bear the cool “go-by” the world gives them whenever a chance interval has withdrawn them from public view. The stern truth of how little each atom of the social scheme affects the working of the whole machinery is far from palatable in its personal application. Massingbred was probably sensitive enough on this score, but too consummate a tactician to let any one guess his feelings; and so he lounged down to the “House,” and lolled at his Club, and took his airings in the Park with all the seeming routine of one who had never abdicated these enjoyments for a day.
He had promised, and really meant, to have looked after Martin's affairs on his reaching London; but it was almost a week after his return that he bethought him of his pledge, his attention being then called to the subject by finding on his table the visiting-card of Mr. Maurice Scanlan. Perhaps he was not sorry to have something to do; perhaps he had some compunctions of conscience for his forgetfulness; at all events, he sent his servant at once to Scanlan's hotel, with a request that he would call upon him as early as might be. An answer was speedily returned that Mr. Scanlan was about to start for Ireland that same afternoon, but would wait upon him immediately. The message was scarcely delivered when Scanlan himself appeared.
Dressed in deep mourning, but with an easy complacency of manner that indicated very little of real grief, he threw himself into a chair, saying, “I pledge you my word of honor, it is only to yourself I 'd have come this morning, Mr. Massingbred, for I 'm actually killed with business. No man would believe the letters I've had to read and answer, the documents to examine, the deeds to compare, the papers to investigate—”
“Is the business settled, then—or in train of settlement?” broke in Jack.
“I suppose it is settled,” replied Scanlan, with a slight laugh. “Of course you know Mr. Martin is dead?”
“Dead! Good heavens! When did this occur?”
“We got the news—that is, Merl did—the day before yesterday. A friend of his who had remained at Baden to watch events started the moment he breathed his last, and reached town thirty hours before the mail; not, indeed, that the Captain has yet written a line on the subject to any one.”
“And what of the arrangement? Had you come to terms previously with Merl?”
“No; he kept negotiating and fencing with us from day to day, now asking for this, now insisting on that, till the evening of his friend's arrival, when, by special appointment, I had called to confer with him. Then, indeed, he showed no disposition for further delay, but frankly told me the news, and said, 'The Conferences are over, Scanlan. I 'm the Lord of Cro' Martin.'”
“And is this actually the case,—has he really established his claim in such a manner as will stand the test of law and the courts?”
“He owns every acre of it; there's not a flaw in his title; he has managed to make all Martin's debts assume the shape of advances in hard cash. There is no trace of play transactions throughout the whole. I must be off, Mr. Massing-bred; there 's the chaise now at the door.”
“Wait one moment, I entreat of you. Can nothing be done? Is it too late to attempt any compromise?”
“To be sure it is. He has sent off instructions already to serve the notice for ejectment. I 've got orders myself to warn the tenants not to pay the last half-year, except into court.”
“Why, are you in Mr. Merl's service, then?” asked Jack, with one of his quiet laughs.
“I am, and I am not,” said Scanlan, reddening. “You know the compact I made with Lady Dorothea at Baden. Well, of course there is no longer any question about that. Still, if Miss Mary agrees to accept me, I 'll stand by the old family! There 's no end of trouble and annoyance we could n't give Merl before he got possession. I know the estate well, and where the worst fellows on it are to be found! It's one thing to have the parchments of a property, and it is another to be able to go live on it, and draw the rents. But I can't stay another minute. Good-bye, air. Any chance of seeing you in the West soon?”
“I 'm not sure I 'll not go over to-morrow,” said Jack, musing.
“I suppose you are going to blarney the constituency?” said Maurice, laughing heartily at his coarse conceit. Then suddenly seeing that Massingbred did not seem to relish the freedom, he hurriedly repeated his leave-takings, and departed.
“Ye might ken the style of these epistles by this time, Dinah,” said Mr. Henderson, as he walked leisurely up and down a long low-ceilinged room, and addressed himself to a piece of very faded gentility, who sat at a writing-table. “She wants to hear naething but what she likes, and, as near as may be, in her ain words too.”
“I always feel as if I was copying out the same letter every time I write,” whined out a weak, sickly voice.
“The safest thing ye could do,” replied he, gravely. “She never tires o' reading that everybody on the estate is a fule or a scoundrel, and ye canna be far wrang when ye say the worst o' them all. Hae ye told her aboot the burnin' at Kyle-a-Noe?”
“Yes, I have said that you have little doubt it was malicious.”
“And hae ye said that there's not a sixpence to be had out of the whole townland of Kiltimmon?”
“I have. I have told her that, except Miss Mary herself, nobody would venture into the barony.”
“The greater fule yerself, then,” said he, angrily. “Couldna ye see that she'll score this as a praise o' the young leddy's courage? Ye maun just strike it out, ma'am, and say that the place is in open rebellion—”
“I thought you bade me say that Miss Mary had gone down there and spoken to the people—”
“I bade ye say,” broke he angrily in, “that Miss Mary declared no rent should be demanded o' them in their present distress; that she threw the warrants into the fire, and vowed that if we called a sale o' their chattels, she 'd do the same at the castle, and give the people the proceeds.”
“You only said that she was in such a passion that she declared she 'd be right in doing so.”
“I hae nae time for hair-splitting, ma'am. I suppose if she had a right she 'd exercise it! Put down the words as I gie them to ye! Ye hae no forgotten the conspeeracy?”
“I gave it exactly as you told me, and I copied out the two paragraphs in the papers about it, beginning, 'Great scandal,' and 'If our landed gentry expect—'”
“That's right; and ye hae added the private history of Joan? They 'll make a fine thing o' that on the trial, showing the chosen associate o' a young leddy to hae been naething better than—Ech! what are ye blubberin' aboot,—is it yer feelin's agen? Ech! ma'am, ye are too sentimental for a plain man like me!”
This rude speech was called up by a smothering effort to conceal emotion, which would not be repressed, but burst forth in a violent fit of sobbing.
“I know you didn't mean it. I know you were not thinking—”
“If ye canna keep your ain counsel, ye must just pay the cost o' it,” said he, savagely. “Finish the letter there, and let me send it to the post. I wanted ye to say a' about the Nelligans comin' up to visit Miss Mary, and she goin' ower the grounds wi' them, and sendin' them pineapples and grapes, and how that the doctor's girls are a'ways wi' her, and that she takes old Catty out to drive along wi' herself in the pony phaeton, which is condescendin' in a way her Leddyship will no approve o'. There was mony a thing beside I had in my head, but ye hae driven them a' clean awa' wi' your feelin's!” And he gave the last word with an almost savage severity.
“Bide a wee!” cried he, as she was folding up the letter. “Ye may add that Mister Scanlan has taken to shootin' over the preserves we were keepin' for the Captain, and if her Leddyship does not wish to banish the woodcocks a'the-gither, she 'd better gie an order to stop him. Young Nelli-gan had a special permission from Miss Mary hersel' and if it was na that he canna hit a haystack at twenty yards, there 'd no be a cock pheasant in the demesne! I think I 'm looking at her as she reads this,” said he, with a malicious grin. “Ech, sirs, won't her great black eyebrows meet on her forehead, and her mouth be drawn in till never a bit of a red lip be seen! Is na that a chaise I see comin' up the road?” cried he, suddenly. “Look yonder!”
“I thought I saw something pass,” said she, trying to strain her eyes through the tears that now rose to them.
“It's a post-chaise wi' twa trunks on the top. I wonder who's comin' in it?” said Henderson, as he opened the sash-door, and stood awaiting the arrival. The chaise swept rapidly round the beech copse, and drew up before the door; the postilion, dismounting, lowered the steps, and assisted a lady to alight. She threw back her veil as she stood on the ground, and Kate Henderson, somewhat jaded-looking and pale from her journey, was before her father. A slight flush—very slight—rose to his face as he beheld her, and without uttering a word he turned and re-entered the house.
“Ye are aboot to see a visitor, ma'am,” said he to his wife; and, taking his hat, passed out of the room. Meanwhile Kate watched the postboy as he untied the luggage and deposited it at her side.
“Did n't I rowl you along well, my Lady?—ten miles in little more than an hour,” said he, pointing to his smoking cattle.
“More speed than we needed,” said she, with a melancholy smile, while she placed some silver in his hand.
“What's this here, my Lady? It's like one of the owld tenpenny bits,” said he, turning over and over a coin as he spoke.
“It's French money,” said she, “and unfortunately I have got none other left me.”
“Sure they'll give you what you want inside,” said he, pointing towards the house.
“No, no; take this. It is a crown piece, and they'll surely change it for you in the town.” And so saying, she turned towards the door. When she made one step towards it, however, she stopped. A painful irresolution seemed to possess her; but, recovering it, she turned the handle and entered.
“We did not know you were coming; at least, he never told me,” said her stepmother, in a weak, broken voice, as she arose from her seat.
“There was no time to apprise you,” said Kate, as she walked towards the fire and leaned her arm on the chimney-piece.
“You came away suddenly, then? Had anything unpleasant—was there any reason—”
“I had been desirous of leaving for some time back. Lady Dorothea only gave her consent on Tuesday last,—I think it was Tuesday; but my head is not very clear, for I am somewhat tired.” There was an indescribable sadness in the way these simple words were uttered and in the sigh which followed them.
“I 'm afraid he 'll not be pleased at it!” said the other, timidly.
Another sigh, but still weaker than the former, was Kate's only reply.
“And how did you leave Mr. Martin? They tell us here that his case is hopeless,” said Mrs. Henderson.
“He is very ill, indeed; the doctors give no hope of saving him. Is Miss Martin fully aware of his state?”
“Who can tell? We scarcely ever see her. You know that she never was very partial to your father, and latterly there has been a greater distance than ever between them. They differ about everything; and with that independent way he has—”
A wide stare from Kate's full dark eyes, an expression of astonishment, mingled with raillery, in her features, here arrested the speaker, who blushed deeply in her embarrassment.
“Go on,” said Kate, gently. “Pray continue, and let me hear what it is that his independence accomplishes.”
“Oh, dear!” sighed the other. “I see well you are not changed, Kate. You have come back with your old haughty spirit, and sure you know well, dear, that he 'll not bear it.”
“I 'll not impose any burden on his forbearance. A few days' shelter—a week or two at furthest—will not be, perhaps, too much to ask.”
“So, then, you have a situation in view, Kate?” asked she, more eagerly.
“The world is a tolerably wide one, and I 'm sure there is room for me somewhere, even without displacing another. But let us talk of anything else. How are the Nelligans? and Joe, what is he doing?”
“The old people are just as you left them; but Mr. Joseph is a great man now,—dines with the Lord-Lieutenant, and goes into all the grand society of Dublin.”
“Is he spoiled by his elevation?”
“Your father thinks him haughtier than he used to be; but many say that he is exactly what he always was. Mrs. Nelligan comes up frequently to the cottage now, and dines with Miss Martin. I 'm sure I don't know how my Lady would like to see her there.”
“She is not very likely,” said Kate, dryly.
“Why not?”
“I mean, that nothing is less probable than Lady Dorothea's return here.”
“I suppose not!” half sighed Mrs. Henderson, for hers was one of those sorrowful temperaments that extract only the bitter from the cup of life. In reality, she had little reason to wish for Lady Dorothea's presence, but still she could make a “very good grievance” out of her absence, and find it a fitting theme for regret. “What reason do you mean to give for your coming home, Kate, if he should ask you?” inquired she, after a pause.
“That I felt dissatisfied with my place,” replied Kate, coldly.
“And we were always saying what a piece of good luck it was for you to be there! Miss Mary told Mrs. Nelligan—it was only the other day—that her uncle could n't live without you,—that you nursed him, and read to him, and what not; and as to her Ladyship, that she never took a drive in the carriage, or answered a note, without asking your advice first.”
“What a profound impression Miss Martin must have received of my talents for intrigue!” said Kate, sneeringly.
“I believe not. I think she said something very kind and good-natured, just as if it was only people who had really very great gifts that could condescend to make themselves subservient without humiliation. I know she said 'without humiliation,' because your father laughed when he heard of it, and remarked, 'If it's Kate's humility they like, they are assuredly thankful for small mercies!”
“I should like to go over and see Miss Martin. What distance is it from this to the cottage?”
“It's full three miles; but it's all through the demesne.”
“I'm a good walker, and I'll go,” said she, rising. “But first, might I ask for a little refreshment,—a cup of tea? Oh, I forgot,” added she, smiling, “tea is one of the forbidden luxuries here.”
“No; but your father doesn't like to see it in the daytime. If you'd take it in your own room—”
“Of course, and be most thankful. Am I to have the little room with the green paper, where I used to be, long ago?”
“Well, indeed, I can scarcely tell. The bed was taken down last autumn; and as we never thought of your coming home—”
“Home!” sighed Kate, involuntarily.
“But come into my room, and I 'll fetch you a cup of tea directly.”
“No, no; it is better not to risk offending him,” said Kate, calmly. “I remember, now, that this was one of his antipathies. Give me anything else, for I have not eaten to-day.”
While her stepmother went in search of something to offer her, Kate sat down beside the fire, deep in thought. She had removed her bonnet, and her long silky hair fell in rich masses over her neck and shoulders, giving a more fixed expression to her features, which were of deathlike paleness. And so she sat, gazing intently on the fire, as though she were reading her very destiny in the red embers before her. Her preoccupation of mind was such that she never noticed the opening of the door, nor remarked that her father had entered. The noise of a chair being moved suddenly startled her. She looked up, and there he stood, his hat on his head and his arms closely folded on his breast, at the opposite side of the fire.
“Well, lassie,” said he, after a long and steady stare at her, “ye hae left your place, or been turned oot o' it,—whilk is the case?”
“I came away of my own accord,” said she, calmly.
“And against my Leddy's wish?”
“No, with her full consent.”
“And how did ye do it? for in her last letter to my sel', she says, 'I desire ye, therefore, to bear in mind that any step she takes on this head'—meaning about going away—'shall have been adopted in direct opposition to my wishes.' What has ye done since that?”
“I have succeeded in convincing her Ladyship that I was right in leaving her!” said Kate.
“Was it the force of your poleetical convictions that impelled ye to this course?” said he, with a bitter grin, “for they tell me ye are a rare champion o' the rights o' the people, and scruple not to denounce the upper classes, while ye eat their bread.”
“I denounce no one; nor, so far as I know myself, is ingratitude amongst my faults.”
“Maybe, if one were to tak' your ain narrative for it, ye hae nae faults worse than mere failings! But this is na telling me why ye left my Leddy.”
Kate made no answer, but sat steadily watching the fire.
“Ye wad rayther, mayhap, that I asked hersel' aboot it! Well, be it so. And noo comes anither point. Do ye think that if your conduct has in any way given displeasure to your mistress, or offended those in whose service ye were,—do ye think, I say, that ye hae the right to involve me in your shame and disgrace?”
“Do you mean,” said she, calmly, “that I had no right to come here?”
“It 's just exactly what I mean; that if ye canna mak' friends for yoursel', ye ought not to turn away those whilk befriend your family.”
“But what was I to have done, then?” said she, gently. “There were circumstances that required—imperatively required me—to leave Lady Dorothea—”
“Let me hear them,” said he, breaking in, “It would lead me to speak of others than myself,—of events which are purely family matters,—were I to enter upon this theme. Besides,” said she, rising, “I am not, so far as I know, on my trial. There is not anything laid to my charge. I have no apologies to render.”
At this moment her stepmother appeared with a tray at the door, and seeing Henderson, endeavored to retire unobserved, but his quick eye had already detected her, and he cried out, “Come here,—ye canna do too much honor to a young leddy who has such a vara profound esteem for hersel'! Cake and wine! my faith! No but ye 'll deem it vara vulgar fare, after the dainties ye hae been used to! And yet, lassie, these are nae the habits here!”
“She has eaten nothing to-day!” meekly observed her stepmother.
“My fayther wad hae askit her hoo much has she earned the day?” said Henderson, severely.
“You are quite right, sir,” broke in Kate,—“I have earned nothing. Not just yet,” added she, as her stepmother pressed a glass of wine on her acceptance; “a little later, perhaps. I have no appetite now.”
“Are ye sae stupid, ma'am, that ye canna see ye are dealin' wi' a fine leddy, wha is no obleeged to hae the same mind twa minutes thegither? Ye 'll hae to train wee Janet to be a' ready for whate'er caprice is uppermost. But mine me, lassie,”—here he turned a look of stern meaning towards her,—“ye hae tried for mony a lang day to subdue me to your whims and fancies, as they tell me ye hae done wi' sae mony others, and ye are just as far fra it noo as the first time ye tried it. Ye canna cheat nor cajole me! I know ye!” And with these words, uttered in a tone of intense passion, he slowly walked out of the room.
“Had he been angry with you?—had anything occurred before I came in?” asked her stepmother.
“Very little,” sighed Kate, wearily. “He was asking me why I came here, I believe. I could scarcely tell him; perhaps I don't very well know, myself.”
“He can't get it out of his head,” said the other, in a low, stealthy whisper, “that, if you should leave Lady Dorothea, he will be turned away out of the stewardship. He is always saying it,—he repeats it even in his dreams. But for that, he 'd not have met you so—so—unkindly.”
Kate pressed her hand affectionately, and smiled a thankful acknowledgment of this speech. “And the cottage,” said she, rallying suddenly, “is about three miles off?”
“Not more. But you could scarcely walk there and back again. Besides, it is already growing late, and you have no chance of seeing Miss Mary if you 're not there by breakfast-time, since, when she comes home of an evening, she admits no one. She reads or studies, I believe, all the evening.”
“I think she'd see me,” said Kate; “I should have so much to tell her about her friends. I 'm sure she 'd see me,—at least, I'll try.”
“But you'll eat something,—you 'll at least drink a glass of wine before you set out?”
“I do not like to refuse you,” said Kate, smiling good-naturedly, “but I could n't swallow now. I have a choking feeling here in my throat, like a heavy cold, that seems as though it would suffocate me. Good-bye, for a while. I shall be quite well, once I 'm in the open air. Good-bye!” And, so saying, she wrapped her shawl around her, and motioning a farewell with her hand, set out on her errand.
It was one of those fresh and breezy days where brilliant flashes of sunlight alternate with deep shadow, making of every landscape a succession of pictures, that Kate Henderson set out on her way to the cottage. Her path led through the demesne, but it was as wild as any forest scene in Germany, now wending through dark woods, now issuing forth over swelling lawns, from which the view extended many a mile away,—at one moment displaying the great rugged mountains of Connemara, and at another, the broad blue sea, heaving heavily, and thundering in sullen roar against the rocks.
The fast-flitting clouds, the breezy grass, the wind-shaken foliage, and the white-crested waves, all were emblems of life; there was motion and sound and conflict! and yet to her heart, as she walked along, these influences imparted no sense of pleasure or relief. For a few seconds, perhaps, would she suddenly awake to the consciousness of the fair scene before her, and murmur to herself, perchance, the lines of some favorite poet; but in another moment her gloomy thoughtfulness was back again, and with bent-down head was she again moving onward. At times she walked rapidly forward, and then, relaxing her pace, she would stroll listlessly along, as though no object engaged her. And so was it in reality,—her main desire being to be free, in the open air; to be from beneath that roof whose shadow seemed to darken her very heart! Could that haughty spirit have humbled itself in sorrow, she might have found relief; but her proud nature had no such resource, and in her full heart injury and wrong had alone their place.
“And this,” burst she forth at length,—“and this is Home! this the dreamland of those far away over the seas,—the cherished spot of all affections,—the quiet nook wherein we breathe an atmosphere of love, blending our lives with all dearest to us. Is it, then, that all is hollow, false, and untrue; or is it that I alone have no part in the happiness that is diffused around me? I know not which would be the sadder!”
Thus, reasoning sadly, she went along, when suddenly, on the slope of a gentle hill in front of her, gracefully encircled with a young wood of larch and copper-beech, she caught sight of the cottage. It was a tasteful imitation of those seen in the Oberland, and with its wild background of lofty mountain, an appropriate ornament to the landscape.
A small stream running over a rocky, broken bed formed the boundary of the little grounds, and over this a bridge of a single plank conducted the way to the cottage. The whole was simple and unpretending; there was none of that smart trimness which gives to such scenes the air of an imitation. The lawn, it is true, was neatly shaven, and the flower-plots, which broke its uniformity, clean from weeds; but the flowers were of the simplest kind,—the crocus and the daffodil had to stand no dangerous rivalry, and the hyacinth had nothing to vie with.
Kate loitered for some time here, now gazing at the wild, stern landscape, now listening to the brawling rivulet, whose sounds were the only ones in the stillness. As she drew nigh the cottage, she found the windows of a little drawing-room open. She looked in: all was comfortable and neat-looking, but of the strictest simplicity. She next turned to the little porch, and pulled the bell; in a few seconds the sounds of feet were heard approaching, and a very old woman, whose appearance and dress were the perfection of neatness, appeared.
“Don't you know me, Mrs. Broon?” said Kate, gently.
“I do not, then, my Lady,” said she, respectfully, “for my eyes is gettin' dimmer every day.”
“I 'm Kate Henderson, Mrs. Broon. Do you forget me?”
“Indeed I do not,” said Catty, gravely. “You were here with the master and my Lady?”
“Yes. I went away with them to Germany; but I have come home for a while, and wish to pay my respects to Miss Mary.”
“She isn't at home to-day,” was the dry response.
“But she will return soon, I conclude. She'll be back some time in the evening, won't she?”
“If she plazes it, she will. There's nobody to control or make her do but what she likes herself,” said Catty.
“I ask,” said Kate, “because I'm a little tired. I've come off a long journey, and if you'd allow me to rest myself, and wait awhile in the hope of seeing Miss Martin, I'd be very thankful.”
“Come in, then,” said Catty; but the faint sigh with which the words were uttered, gave but a scant significance of welcome.
Kate followed her into the little drawing-room, and at a sign from the old woman, took a seat.
“Miss Mary is quite well, I'm glad to hear,” said Kate, endeavoring to introduce some conversation.
“Will they ever come back?” asked the old woman, in a stern, harsh voice, while she paid no attention whatever to Kate's remark.
“It is very unlikely,” said Kate. “Your poor master had not long to live when I came away. He was sinking rapidly.”
“So I heard,” muttered the other, dryly; “the last letter from Mr. Repton said 'he was n't expected.'”
“I fear it will be a great shock to Miss Mary,” said Kate.
The old woman nodded her head slowly several times without speaking.
“And, perhaps, cause great changes here?” continued Kate.
“There's changes enough, and too many already,” muttered Catty. “I remember the place upwards of eighty years. I was born in the little house to the right of the road as you come up from Kelly's mills. There was no mill there then, nor a school-house, no, nor a dispensary either! Musha, but the people was better off, and happier, when they had none of them.”
Kate smiled at the energy with which these words were uttered, surmising, rightfully, that Catty's condemnation of progress had a direct application to herself.
“Now it's all readin' and writin', teachin' honest people to be rogues, and givin' them new contrivances to cheat their masters. When I knew Cro' Martin first,” added she, almost fiercely, “there was n't a Scotch steward on the estate; but there was nobody turned out of his houldin', and there was n't a cabin unroofed to make the people seek shelter under a ditch.”
“The world would then seem growing worse every day,” remarked Kate, quietly.
“To be sure it is. Why would n't it? Money is in every one's heart. Nobody cares for his own flesh and blood. 'T is all money! What will I get if I take that farm over another man's head, or marry that girl that likes somebody better than me? 'Tis to be rich they're all strivin', and the devil never made people his own children so completely as by teachin' them to love goold!”
“Your young mistress has but little of this spirit in her heart?” said Kate.
“Signs on it! look at the life she leads: up before daybreak, and away many times before I 'm awake. She makes a cup of coffee herself, and saddles the pony, too, if Patsey is n't there to do it; and she 's off to Glentocher, or Knock-mullen, twelve, fourteen miles down the coast, with barley for one, and a bottle of wine for the other. Sometimes she has a basket with her, just a load to carry, with tay and shugar; ay, and—for she forgets nothing—toys for the children, too, and clothes, and even books. And then to see herself, she 's not as well dressed as her own maid used to be. There 's not a night she does n't sit up patchin' and piecin' her clothes. 'T is Billy at the cross-roads made her shoes last time for her, just because he was starvin' with nothing' to do. She ordered them, and she wears them, too; it makes him so proud, she says, to see them. And this is the niece of the Martins of Cro' Martin! without one of her kith or kin to welcome her home at nightfall,—without father or mother, brother or sister,—without a kind voice to say 'God bless her,' as she falls off to sleep many a time in that big chair there; and I take off her shoes without her knowin' it, she does be so weary and tired; and in her dhrames it 's always talking to the people, givin' them courage, and cheerin' them up, tellin' them there 's good times for every one; and once, the other evenin', she sang a bit of a song, thinkin' she was in Mat Leahy's cabin amusin' the children, and she woke up laughin', and said, 'Catty, I 've had such a pleasant dhrame. I thought I had little Nora, my godchild, on my knee, and was teachin' her “Why are the daisies in the grass?” I can't tell you how happy I felt!' There it was: the only thing like company to her poor heart was a dhrame!”
“I do not wonder that you love her, Catty,” said Kate; and the words fell tremulously from her lips.
“Love her! what's the use of such as me lovin' her?” cried the old woman, querulously. “Sure, it's not one of my kind knows how good she is! If you only seen her comin' in here, after dark, maybe, wet and weary and footsore, half famished with cold and hunger,—out the whole livelong day, over the mountains, where there was fever and shakin' ague, and starvin' people, ravin' mad between disease and destitution; and the first word out of her mouth will be, 'Oh, Catty, how grateful you and I ought to be with our warm roof over us, and our snug fire to sit at,' never thinkin' of who she is and what she has the right to, but just makin' herself the same as me. And then she 'd tell me where she was, and what she seen, and how well the people was bearin' up under their trials,—all the things they said to her, for they 'd tell her things they would n't tell the priest. 'Catty,' said she, t' other night, 'it looks like heartlessness in me to be in such high spirits in the midst of all this misery here; but I feel as if my courage was a well that others were drinking out of; and when I go into a cabin, the sick man, as he turns his head round, looks happier, and I feel as if it was my spirit that was warmin' and cheerin' him; and when a poor sick sufferin' child looks up at me and smiles, I 'm ready to drop on my knees and thank God in gratitude.'”
Kate covered her face with her hands, and never spoke; and now the old woman, warming with the theme she loved best, went on to tell various incidents and events of Mary's life,—the perilous accidents which befell her, the dangers she braved, the fatigues she encountered. Even recounted by her, there was a strange adventurous character that ran through these recitals, showing that Mary Martin, in all she thought and said and acted, was buoyed and sustained by a sort of native chivalry that made her actually court the incidents where she incurred the greatest hazard. It was plain to see what charm such traits possessed for her who recorded them, and how in her old Celtic blood ran the strong current of delight in all that pertained to the adventurous and the wild.
“'Tis her own father's nature is strong in her,” said Catty, with enthusiasm. “Show him the horse that nobody could back, tell him of a storm where no fisherman would launch his boat, point out a cliff that no man could climb, and let me see who 'd hould him! She 's so like him, that when there 's anything daring to be done you would n't know her voice from his own. There, now, I hear her without,” cried the old woman, as, rising suddenly, she approached the window. “Don't you hear something?”
“Nothing but the wind through the trees,” said Kate.
“Ay, but I did, and my ears are older than yours. She's riding through the river now; I hear the water splashin'.”
Kate tried to catch the sounds, but could not; she walked out upon the lawn to listen, but except the brawling of the stream among the rocks, there was nothing to be heard.
“D' ye see her comin'?” asked Catty, eagerly.
“No. Your ears must have deceived you. There is no one coming.”
“I heard her voice, as I hear yours now. I heard her spake to the mare, as she always does when she 's plungin' into the river. There, now, don't you hear that?”
“I hear nothing, I assure you, my dear Mrs. Broon. It is your own anxiety that is misleading you; but if you like, I 'll go down towards the river and see.” And without waiting for a reply Kate hastened down the slope. As she went, she could not help reflecting over the superstition which attaches so much importance to these delusions, giving them the character of actual warnings. It was doubtless from the mind dwelling so forcibly on Miss Martin's perilous life that the old woman's apprehensions had assumed this palpable form, and thus invented the very images which should react upon her with terror.
“Just as I thought,” cried Kate, as she stood on the bank of the stream; “all silent and deserted, no one within sight.” And slowly she retraced her steps towards the cottage. The old woman stood at the door, pale and trembling; an attempt to smile was on her features, but her heart denied the courage of the effort.
“Where is she now?” cried Catty, wildly. “She rang the bell this minute, and I heerd the mare trottin' round to the stable by herself, as she always does. But where 's Miss Mary?”
“My dear Mrs. Broon,” said Kate, in her kindest accents, “it is just as I told you. Your mind is anxious and uneasy about Miss Martin; you are unhappy at her absence, and you think at every stir you hear her coming; but I have been to the river-side, and there is no one there. I 'll go round to the stables, if you wish it.”
“There 's no tracks of a hoof on the gravel,” muttered the old woman, in a broken voice; “there was nobody here!”
“So I said,” replied Kate. “It was a mere delusion,—a fancy.”
“A delusion,—a fancy!” cried Catty, scornfully; “that's the way they always spake of whatever they don't understand. It's easier to say that than confess you don't see how to explain a thing; but I heerd the same sounds before you came to-day; ay, and I went down to see why she was n't comin', and at the pool there was bubbles and froth on the water, just as if a baste had passed through, but no livin' thing to be seen. Was n't that a delusion, too?”
“An accident, perchance. Only think, what lives of misery we should lead were we ever tracing our own fears, and connecting them with all the changes that go on around us!”
“It's two days she's away, now,” muttered the old woman, who only heeded her own thoughts; “she was to be back last night, or early this mornin'.”
“Where had she gone to?” asked Kate, who now saw that the other had lapsed into confidence.
“She's gone to the islands!—to Innishmore, and maybe, on to Brannock!”
“That's a long way out to sea,” said Kate, thoughtfully; “but still, the weather is fine, and the day favorable. Had she any other object than pleasure in this excursion?”
“Pleasure is it?” croaked Catty. “'Tis much pleasure she does be given herself! Her pleasure is to be where there 's fever and want,—in the lonely cabin, where the sick is lyin'! It 's to find a poor crayture that run away from home she 's gone now,—one Joan Landy. She's missin' this two months, and nobody knows where she 's gone to! and Miss Mary got so uneasy at last that she could n't sleep by night nor rest by day,—always talkin' about her, and say in' as much as it was all her fault; as if she could know why she went, or where?”
“Did she go alone on this errand, then?”
“To be sure she did. Who could she have with her? She towld Loony she 'd want the boat with four men in it, and maybe to stay out three days, for she 'd go to all the islands before she came back.”
“Loony 's the best sailor on the coast, I 've heard; and with such weather as this there is no cause for alarm.”
Catty did not seem to heed the remark; she felt that within her against which the words of consolation availed but little, and she sat brooding sorrowfully and in silence.
“The night will soon be fallin' now,” said she, at last. “I hope she's not at sea!”
In spite of herself, Kate Henderson caught the contagion of the old woman's terrors, and felt a dreamy, undefined dread of coming evil. As she looked out, however, at the calm and fair landscape, which, as day declined, grew each moment more still, she rallied from the gloomy thoughts, and said,—“I wish I knew how to be of any service to you, Mrs. Broon. If you could think of anything I could do—anywhere I could go—” She stopped suddenly at a gesture from the old woman, who, lifting her hand to impress silence, stood a perfect picture of eager anxiety to hear. Bending down her head, old Catty stood for several seconds motionless.
“Don't ye hear it now?” broke she in. “Listen! I thought I heerd something like a wailin' sound far off, but it is the wind. See how the tree-tops are bendin'!—That's three times I heerd it now,” said Catty. “If ye live to be as old as me, you 'll not think light of a warnin'. You think your hearin' better because you're younger; but I tell you that there 's sounds that only reach ears that are goin' to where the voices came from. When eyes grow dim to sights of this world, they are strainin' to catch a glimpse of them that's beyond it.” Although no tears rose to her eyes, the withered face trembled in her agony, and her clasped hands shook in the suffering of her sorrow.
Against impressions of this sort, Kate knew well enough how little reasoning availed, and she forbore to press arguments which she was aware would be unsuccessful. She tried, however, to turn the current of the old woman's thoughts, by leading her to speak of the condition of the country and the state of the people. Catty gave short, abrupt, and unwilling answers to all she asked, and Kate at length arose to take her leave.
“You're goin' away, are ye?” said Catty, half angrily.
“I have only just remembered that I have a long way to walk, and it is already growing late.”
“Ay, and ye 're impatient to be back again, at home, beside your own fire, with your own people. But she has no home, and her own has deserted her!”
“Mine has not many charms for me!” muttered Kate to herself.
“It's happy for you that has father and mother,” went on the old woman. “Them 's the only ones, after all!—the only ones that never loves the less, the less we desarve it! I don't wonder ye came back again!” And in a sort of envious bitterness Catty wished her a good-night.
If the distance she had to walk was not shortened by the tenor of her thoughts, as little did she feel impatient to press onward. Dreary and sad enough were her reveries. Of the wild visionary ambitions which once had stirred her heart, there remained nothing but disappointments. She had but passed the threshold of life to find all dreary and desolate; but perhaps the most painful feeling of the moment was the fact that now pressed conviction on her, and told that in the humble career of such a one as Mary Martin there lay a nobler heroism and a higher devotion than in the most soaring path of political ambition, and that all the theorizing as to popular rights made but a sorry figure beside the actual benefits conferred by one true-hearted lover of her kind. “She is right, and I am wrong!” muttered she to herself. “In declining to entertain questions of statecraft she showed herself above, and not beneath, the proud position she had taken. The very lowliness of this task is its glory. Oh, if I could but win her confidence and be associated in such a labor! and yet my very birth denies me the prestige that hers confers.” And then she thought of home, and all the coldness of that cheerless greeting smote upon her heart.
The moon was up ere Kate arrived at her father's door. She tapped at it gently, almost timidly. Her stepmother, as if expecting her, came quickly, and in a low, cautious whisper told her that she would find her supper ready in her bedroom.
“To-morrow, perhaps, he may be in better humor or better spirits. Good-night.” And so Kate silently stole along to her room, her proud heart swelling painfully, and her tearless eye burning with all the heat of a burning brain.