Project Gutenberg's Scottish sketches, by Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

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Title: Scottish sketches

Author: Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr

Release Date: December 28, 2004 [EBook #14494]

Language: English

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SHORT STORY

Scottish Sketches

By
AMELIA E. BARR


New York
Dodd, Mead and Company
1898



COPYRIGHT, 1883,
BY
AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY.




CONTENTS

CRAWFORD'S SAIR STRAIT           7

JAMES BLACKIE'S REVENGE        101

FACING HIS ENEMY               163

ANDREW CARGILL'S CONFESSION    241

ONE WRONG STEP                 267

LILE DAVIE                     309




Crawford's Sair Strait.




CRAWFORD'S SAIR STRAIT.


CHAPTER I.


Alexander Crawford sat reading a book which he studied frequently with
a profound interest. Not the Bible: that volume had indeed its place
of honor in the room, but the book Crawford read was a smaller one; it
was stoutly bound and secured by a brass lock, and it was all in
manuscript. It was his private ledger, and it contained his bank
account. Its contents seemed to give him much solid satisfaction; and
when at last he locked the volume and replaced it in his secretary, it
was with that careful respect which he considered due to the
representative of so many thousand pounds.

He was in a placid mood, and strangely inclined to retrospection.
Thoughtfully fingering the key which locked up the record of his
wealth, he walked to the window and looked out. It was a dreary
prospect of brown moor and gray sea, but Crawford loved it. The bare
land and the barren mountains was the country of the Crawfords. He had
a fixed idea that it always had been theirs, and whenever he told
himself--as he did this night--that so many acres of old Scotland were
actually his own, he was aggressively a Scotchman.

"It is a bonnie bit o' land," he murmured, "and I hae done as my
father Laird Archibald told me. If we should meet in another warld
I'll be able to gie a good account o' Crawford and Traquare. It is
thirty years to-night since he gave me the ring off his finger, and
said, 'Alexander, I am going the way o' all flesh; be a good man, and
_grip tight_.' I hae done as he bid me; there is L80,000 in the
Bank o' Scotland, and every mortgage lifted. I am vera weel pleased
wi' mysel' to-night. I hae been a good holder o' Crawford and
Traquare."

His self-complacent reflections were cut short by the entrance of his
daughter. She stood beside him, and laid her hand upon his arm with a
caressing gesture. No other living creature durst have taken that
liberty with him; but to Crawford his daughter Helen was a being apart
from common humanity. She was small, but very lovely, with something
almost Puritanical in her dainty, precise dress and carefully snooded
golden hair.

"Father!"

"Helen, my bird."

"Colin is coming home. I have just had a letter from him. He has taken
high honors in Glasgow. We'll both be proud of Colin, father."

"What has he done?"

"He has written a prize poem in Latin and Greek, and he is second in
mathematics."

"Latin and Greek! Poor ghostlike languages that hae put off flesh and
blood lang syne. Poetry! Warse than nonsense! David and Solomon hae
gien us such sacred poetry as is good and necessary; and for sinfu'
love verses and such vanities, if Scotland must hae them, Robert Burns
is mair than enough. As to mathematics, there's naething against them.
A study that is founded on figures is to be depended upon; it has nae
flights and fancies. You ken what you are doing wi' figures. When is
this clever fellow to be here?"

"He is coming by the afternoon packet to-morrow. We must send the
carriage to meet it, for Colin is bringing a stranger with him. I came
to ask you if I must have the best guest-room made ready."

"Wha for?"

"He is an English gentleman, from London, father."

"And you would put an Englishman in the room where the twa last
Stuarts slept? I'll not hear tell o' it. I'm not the man to lift a
quarrel my fathers dropped, but I'll hae no English body in Prince
Charlie's room. Mind that, noo! What is the man's name?"

"Mr. George Selwyn."

"George Selwyn! There's nae Scotch Selwyns that I ken o'. He'll be
Saxon altogether. Put him in the East room."

Crawford was not pleased at his son bringing any visitor. In the first
place, he had important plans to discuss and carry out, and he was
impatient of further delay. In the second, he was intensely jealous of
Helen. Every young man was a probable suitor, and he had quite decided
that Farquharson of Blair was the proper husband for her. Crawford and
Blair had stood shoulder to shoulder in every national quarrel, and a
marriage would put the two estates almost in a ring fence.

But he went the next day to meet the young men. He had not seen his
son for three years, and the lad was an object very near and dear to
his heart. He loved him tenderly as his son, he respected him highly
as the future heir of Crawford and Traquare. The Crawfords were a very
handsome race; he was anxious that this, their thirteenth
representative, should be worthy, even physically, of his ancestors.
He drew a long sigh of gratification as young Colin, with open hands,
came up to him. The future laird was a noble-looking fellow, a dark,
swarthy Highlandman, with glowing eyes, and a frame which promised in
a few years to fill up splendidly.

His companion was singularly unlike him. Old Crawford had judged
rightly. He was a pure Saxon, and showed it in his clear, fresh
complexion, pale brown hair, and clear, wide-open blue eyes. But there
was something about this young man which struck a deeper and wider
sympathy than race--he had a heart beating for all humanity. Crawford
looked at him physically only, and he decided at once, "There is no
fear of Helen." He told himself that young Farquharson was six inches
taller and every way a far "prettier man." Helen was not of this
opinion. No hero is so fascinating to a woman as the man mentally and
spiritually above her, and whom she must love from a distance; and if
Crawford could have known how dangerous were those walks over the
springy heather and through the still pine woods, Mr. Selwyn would
have taken them far more frequently alone than he did.

But Crawford had other things to employ his attention at that time,
and indeed the young English clergyman was far beyond his mental and
spiritual horizon; he could not judge him fairly. So these young
people walked and rode and sailed together, and Selwyn talked like an
apostle of the wrongs that were to be righted and the poor perishing
souls that were to be redeemed. The spiritual warfare in which he was
enlisted had taken possession of him, and he spoke with the martial
enthusiasm of a young soldier buckling on his armor.

Helen and Colin listened in glowing silence, Helen showing her
sympathy by her flushing cheeks and wet eyes, and Colin by the
impatient way in which he struck down with his stick the thistles by
the path side, as if they were the demons of sin and ignorance and
dirt Selwyn was warring against. But after three weeks of this
intercourse Crawford became sensible of some change in the atmosphere
of his home. When Selwyn first arrived, and Crawford learned that he
was a clergyman in orders, he had, out of respect to the office,
delegated to him the conduct of family worship. Gradually Selwyn had
begun to illustrate the gospel text with short, earnest remarks, which
were a revelation of Bible truth to the thoughtful men and women who
heard them.

The laird's "exercises" had often been slipped away from, excuses had
been frequent, absentees usual; but they came to listen to Selwyn with
an eagerness which irritated him. In our day, the gospel of Christ has
brought forth its last beautiful blossom--the gospel of humanity. Free
schools, free Bibles, Tract and City Missions, Hospitals and Clothing
Societies, loving helps of all kinds are a part of every church
organization. But in the time of which I am writing they were unknown
in country parishes, they struggled even in great cities for a feeble
life.

The laird and his servants heard some startling truths, and the laird
began to rebel against them. A religion of intellectual faith, and
which had certain well-recognized claims on his pocket, he was willing
to support, and to defend, if need were; but he considered one which
made him on every hand his brother's keeper a dangerously democratic
theology.

"I'll hae no socialism in my religion, any more than I'll hae it in my
politics, Colin," he said angrily. "And if yon Mr. Selwyn belongs to
what they call the Church o' England, I'm mair set up than ever wi'
the Kirk o' Scotland! God bless her!"

They were sitting in the room sacred to business and to the memory of
the late Laird Archibald. Colin was accustomed to receive his father's
opinions in silence, and he made no answer to this remark. This time,
however, the laird was not satisfied with the presumed assent of
silence; he asked sharply, "What say ye to that, son Colin?"

"I say God bless the Kirk of Scotland, father, and I say it the more
heartily because I would like to have a place among those who serve
her."

"What are ye saying now?"

"That I should like to be a minister. I suppose you have no
objections."

"I hae vera great objections. I'll no hear tell o' such a thing.
Ministers canna mak money, and they canna save it. If you should mak
it, that would be an offence to your congregation; if ye should save
it, they would say ye ought to hae gien it to the poor. There will be
nae Dominie Crawford o' my kin, Colin. Will naething but looking down
on the warld from a pulpit sarve you?"

"I like art, father. I can paint a little, and I love music."

"Art! Painting! Music! Is the lad gane daft? God has gien to some men
wisdom and understanding, to ithers the art o' playing on the fiddle
and painting pictures. There shall be no painting, fiddling Crawford
among my kin, Colin."

The young fellow bit his lip, and his eyes flashed dangerously beneath
their dropped lids. But he said calmly enough,

"What is your own idea, father? I am twenty-two, I ought to be doing a
man's work of some kind."

"Just sae. That is warld-like talk. Now I'll speak wi' you anent a
grand plan I hae had for a long time." With these words he rose, and
took from his secretary a piece of parchment containing the plan of
the estate. "Sit down, son Colin, and I'll show you your inheritance."
Then he went carefully over every acre of moor and wood, of moss and
water, growing enthusiastic as he pointed out how many sheep could be
grazed on the hills, what shooting and fishing privileges were worth,
etc. "And the best is to come, my lad. There is coal on the estate,
and I am going to open it up, for I hae the ready siller to do it."

Colin sat silent; his cold, dissenting air irritated the excited laird
very much.

"What hae ye got to say to a' this, Colin?" he asked proudly, "for
you'll hae the management o' everything with me. Why, my dear son, if
a' goes weel--and it's sure to--we'll be rich enough in a few years to
put in our claim for the old Earldom o' Crawford, and you may tak your
seat in the House o' Peers yet. The old chevalier promised us a
Dukedom," he said sadly, "but I'm feared that will be aboon our
thumb--"

"Father, what are you going to do with the clansmen? Do you think
Highlandmen who have lived on the mountains are going to dig coal? Do
you imagine that these men, who, until a generation or two ago, never
handled anything but a claymore, and who even now scorn to do aught
but stalk deer or spear salmon, will take a shovel and a pickaxe and
labor as coal-miners? There is not a Crawford among them who would do
it. I would despise him if he did."

"There is a glimmer o' good sense in what you say, Colin. I dinna
intend any Crawford to work in my coal mine. Little use they would be
there. I'll send to Glasgow for some Irish bodies."

"And then you will have more fighting than working on the place; and
you'll have to build a Roman-catholic chapel, and have a Roman priest
in Crawford, and you ken whether the Crawfords will thole _that_ or
not."

"As to the fighting, I'll gie them no chance. I'm going to send the
Crawfords to Canada. I hae thought it all out. The sheilings will do
for the others; the land I want for sheep grazing. They are doing
naething for themsel's, and they are just a burden to me. It will be
better for them to gang to Canada. I'll pay their passage, and I'll
gie them a few pounds each to start them. You must stand by me in this
matter, for they'll hae to go sooner or later."

"That is a thing I cannot do, father. There is not a Laird of Crawford
that was not nursed on some clanswoman's breast. We are all kin. Do
you think I would like to see Rory and Jean Crawford packed off to
Canada? And there is young Hector, my foster-brother! And old Ailsa,
your own foster-sister! Every Crawford has a right to a bite and a sup
from the Crawford land."

"That is a' bygane nonsense. Your great-grandfather, if he wanted
cattle or meal, could just take the clan and go and harry some
Southern body out o' them. That is beyond our power, and it's an unca
charge to hae every Crawford looking to you when hunting and fishing
fails. They'll do fine in Canada. There is grand hunting, and if they
want fighting, doubtless there will be Indians. They will hae to go,
and you will hae to stand by me in this matter."

"It is against my conscience, sir. I had also plans about these poor,
half-civilized, loving kinsmen of ours. You should hear Selwyn talk of
what we might do with them. There is land enough to give all who want
it a few acres, and the rest could be set up with boats and nets as
fishers. They would like that."

"Nae doubt. But I don't like it, and I wont hae it. Mr. Selwyn may hae
a big parish in London, but the Crawfords arena in his congregation. I
am king and bishop within my ain estate, Colin." Then he rose in a
decided passion and locked up again the precious parchment, and Colin
understood that, for the present, the subject was dismissed.



CHAPTER II.


At the very time this conversation was in progress, one strangely
dissimilar was being carried on between George Selwyn and Helen
Crawford. They were sitting in the sweet, old-fashioned garden and
Selwyn had been talking of the work so dear to his heart, but a
silence had fallen between them. Then softly and almost hesitatingly
Helen said "Mr. Selwyn, I cannot help in this grand evangel, except
with money and prayers. May I offer you L300? It is entirely my own,
and it lies useless in my desk. Will you take it?"

"I have no power to refuse it. 'You give it to God, durst I say no?'
But as I do not return at once, you had better send it in a check to
our treasurer." Then he gave her the necessary business directions,
and was writing the address of the treasurer when the laird stopped in
front of them.

"Helen, you are needed in the house," he said abruptly; and then
turning to Selwyn, he asked him to take a walk up the hill. The young
man complied. He was quite unconscious of the anger in the tone of the
request. For a few yards neither spoke; then the laird, with an
irritable glance at his placid companion, said, "Mr. Selwyn,
fore-speaking saves after-speaking. Helen Crawford is bespoke for
young Farquharson of Blair, and if you have any hopes o' wiving in my
house--"

"Crawford, thank you for your warning, but I have no thoughts of
marrying any one. Helen Crawford is a pearl among women; but even if I
wanted a wife, she is unfit for my helpmate. When I took my curacy in
the East End of London I counted the cost. Not for the fairest of the
daughters of men would I desert my first love--the Christ-work to
which I have solemnly dedicated my life."

His voice fell almost to a whisper, but the outward, upward glance of
the inspired eyes completely disconcerted the aggressive old
chieftain. His supposed enemy, in some intangible way, had escaped
him, and he felt keenly his own mistake. He was glad to see Colin
coming; it gave him an opportunity of escaping honorably from a
conversation which had been very humiliating to him. He had a habit
when annoyed of seeking the sea-beach. The chafing, complaining waves
suited his fretful mood, and leaving the young men, he turned to the
sea, taking the hillside with such mighty strides that Selwyn watched
him with admiration and astonishment.

"Four miles of that walking will bring him home in the most amiable of
moods," said Colin. And perhaps it would, if he had been left to the
sole companionship of nature. But when he was half way home he met
Dominie Tallisker, a man of as lofty a spirit as any Crawford who ever
lived. The two men were close friends, though they seldom met without
disagreeing on some point.

"Weel met, dominie! Are you going to the Keep?"

"Just so, I am for an hour's talk wi' that fine young English
clergyman you hae staying wi' you."

"Tallisker, let me tell you, man, you hae been seen o'er much wi' him
lately. Why, dominie! he is an Episcopal, and an Arminian o' the vera
warst kind."

"Hout, laird! Arminianism isna a contagious disease. I'll no mair tak
Arminianism from the Rev. George Selwyn than I'll tak Toryism fra
Laird Alexander Crawford. My theology and my politics are far beyond
inoculation. Let me tell you that, laird."

"Hae ye gotten an argument up wi' him, Tallisker? I would like weel to
hear ye twa at it."

"Na, na; he isna one o' them that argues. He maks downright
assertions; every one o' them hits a body's conscience like a
sledge-hammer. He said that to me as we walked the moor last night
that didna let me sleep a wink."

"He is a vera disagreeable young man. What could he say to you? You
have aye done your duty."

"I thought sae once, Crawford. I taught the bairns their catechism; I
looked weel to the spiritual life o' young and old; I had aye a word
in season for all. But maybe this I ought to hae done, and not left
the other undone."

"You are talking foolishness, Tallisker, and that's a thing no usual
wi' you."

"No oftener wi' me nor other folk. But, laird, I feel there must be a
change. I hae gotten my orders, and I am going to obey them. You may
be certain o' that."

"I didna think I would ever see Dominie Tallisker taking orders from a
disciple o' Arminius--and an Englishman forbye!"

"I'll tak my orders, Crawford, from any messenger the Lord chooses to
send them by. And I'll do this messenger justice; he laid down no law
to me, he only spak o' the duty laid on his own conscience; but my
conscience said 'Amen' to his--that's about it. There has been a
breath o' the Holy Ghost through the Church o' England lately, and the
dry bones o' its ceremonials are being clothed upon wi' a new and
wonderfu' life."

"Humff!" said the laird with a scornful laugh as he kicked a pebble
out of his way.

"There is a great outpouring at Oxford among the young men, and though
I dinna agree wi' them in a' things, I can see that they hae gotten a
revelation."

"Ou, ay, the young ken a' things. It is aye young men that are for
turning the warld upside down. Naething is good enough for them."

The dominie took no notice of the petulant interruption. "Laird," he
said excitedly, "it is like a fresh Epiphany, what this young Mr.
Selwyn says--the hungry are fed, the naked clothed, the prisoners
comforted, the puir wee, ragged, ignorant bairns gathered into homes
and schools, and it is the gospel wi' bread and meat and shelter and
schooling in its hand. That was Christ's ain way, you'll admit that.
And while he was talking, my heart burned, and I bethought me of a
night-school for the little herd laddies and lasses. They could study
their lessons on the hillside all day, and I'll gather them for an
hour at night, and gie them a basin o' porridge and milk after their
lessons. And we ought not to send the orphan weans o' the kirk to the
warkhouse; we ought to hae a hame for them, and our sick ought to be
better looked to. There is many another good thing to do, but we'll
begin wi' these, and the rest will follow."

The laird had listened thus far in speechless indignation. He now
stood still, and said,

"I'll hae you to understand, Dominie Tallisker, that I am laird o'
Crawford and Traquare, and I'll hae nae such pliskies played in either
o' my clachans."

"If you are laird, I am dominie. You ken me weel enough to be sure if
this thing is a matter o' conscience to me, neither king nor kaiser
can stop me. I'd snap my fingers in King George's face if he bid me
'stay,' when my conscience said 'go,'" and the dominie accompanied the
threat with that sharp, resonant fillip of the fingers that is a
Scotchman's natural expression of intense excitement of any kind.

"King George!" cried the laird, in an ungovernable temper, "there is
the whole trouble. If we had only a Charles Stuart on the throne there
would be nane o' this Whiggery."

"There would be in its place masses, and popish priests, and a few
private torture-chambers, and whiles a Presbyterian heretic or twa
burned at the Grass-market. Whiggery is a grand thing when it keeps
the Scarlet Woman on her ain seven hills. Scotland's hills and braes
can do weel, weel without her."

This speech gave the laird time to think. It would never do to quarrel
with Tallisker. If he should set himself positively against his scheme
of sending his clan to Canada it would be almost a hopeless one; and
then he loved and respected his friend. His tall, powerful frame and
his dark, handsome face, all aglow with a passionate conviction of
right, and an invincible determination to do it, commanded his
thorough admiration. He clasped his hands behind his back and said
calmly,

"Tallisker, you'll be sorry enough for your temper erelong. You hae
gien way mair than I did. Ye ken how you feel about it."

"I feel ashamed o' mysel', laird. You'll no lay the blame o' it to my
office, but to Dugald Tallisker his ain sel'. There's a deal o'
Dugald Tallisker in me yet, laird; and whiles he is o'er much for
Dominie Tallisker."

They were at the gate by this time, and Crawford held out his hand and
said,

"Come in, dominie."

"No; I'll go hame, laird, and gie mysel' a talking to. Tell Mr. Selwyn
I want to see him."



CHAPTER III.


Alas, how often do Christ's words, "I come not to bring peace, but a
sword," prove true. George Selwyn went away, but the seed he had
dropped in this far-off corner of Scotland did not bring forth
altogether the peaceable fruits of righteousness. In fact, as we have
seen, it had scarcely begun to germinate before the laird and the
dominie felt it to be a root of bitterness between them. For if
Crawford knew anything he knew that Tallisker would never relinquish
his new work, and perhaps if he yielded to any reasonable object
Tallisker would stand by him in his project.

He did not force the emigration plan upon his notice. The summer was
far advanced; it would be unjustifiable to send the clan to Canada at
the beginning of winter. And, as it happened, the subject was opened
with the dominie in a very favorable manner. They were returning from
the moors one day and met a party of six men. They were evidently
greatly depressed, but they lifted their bonnets readily to the chief.
There was a hopeless, unhappy look about them that was very painful.

"You have been unsuccessful on the hills, Archie, I fear."

"There's few red deer left," said the man gloomily. "It used to be
deer and men; it is sheep and dogs now."

After a painful silence the dominie said,

"Something ought to be done for those braw fellows. They canna ditch
and delve like an Irish peasant. It would be like harnessing stags in
a plough."

Then Crawford spoke cautiously of his intention, and to his delight
the dominie approved it.

"I'll send them out in Read & Murray's best ships. I'll gie each head
o' a family what you think right, Tallisker, and I'll put L100 in your
hands for special cases o' help. And you will speak to the men and
their wives for me, for it is a thing I canna bear to do."

But the men too listened eagerly to the proposition. They trusted the
dominie, and they were weary of picking up a precarious living in
hunting and fishing, and relying on the chief in emergencies. Their
old feudal love and reverence still remained in a large measure, but
they were quite sensible that everything had changed in their little
world, and that they were out of tune with it. Some few of their
number had made their way to India or Canada, and there was a vague
dissatisfaction which only required a prospect of change to develop.
As time went on, and the laird's plan for opening the coal beds on his
estate got known, the men became impatient to be gone.

In the early part of March two large ships lay off the coast waiting
for them, and they went in a body to Crawford Keep to bid the chief
"farewell." It was a hard hour, after all, to Crawford. The great
purpose that he had kept before his eyes for years was not at that
moment sufficient. He had dressed himself in his full chieftain's suit
to meet them. The eagle's feather in his Glengary gave to his great
stature the last grace. The tartan and philibeg, the garters at his
knee, the silver buckles at his shoulder, belt, and shoon, the
jewelled mull and dirk, had all to these poor fellows in this last
hour a proud and sad significance. As he stood on the steps to welcome
them, the wind colored his handsome face and blew out the long black
hair which fell curling on his shoulders.

Whatever they intended to say to him, when they thus saw him with
young Colin by his side they were unable to say. They could only lift
their bonnets in silence. The instincts and traditions of a thousand
years were over them; he was at this moment the father and the chief
of their deepest affection. One by one they advanced to him. He
pressed the hands of all. Some of the older men--companions of his
youth in play and sport--he kissed with a solemn tenderness. They went
away silently as they came, but every heart was full and every eye was
dim. There was a great feast for them in the clachan that night, but
it was a sombre meeting, and the dominie's cheerful words of advice
and comfort formed its gayest feature.

The next day was calm and clear. The women and children were safely on
board soon after noon, and about four o'clock the long boats left the
shore full of men. Tallisker was in the front one. As they pulled away
he pointed silently to a steep crag on the shingly beach. The chief
stood upon it. He waved his bonnet, and then the long-pent feelings of
the clan found vent in one long, pitiful Gallic lament, _O hon a rie!
O hon a rie!_ For a few moments the boats lay at rest, no man was able
to lift an oar. Suddenly Tallisker's clear, powerful voice touched the
right chord. To the grand, plaintive melody of St. Mary's he began the
125th Psalm,

  "They in the Lord that firmly trust
    shall be like Sion hill,
  Which at no time can be removed,
    but standeth ever still.

  As round about Jerusalem
    the mountains stand alway;
  The Lord his folk doth compass so
    from henceforth and for aye."

And thus singing together they passed from their old life into a new
one.

Colin had been indignant and sorrowful over the whole affair. He and
Helen were still young enough to regret the breaking of a tie which
bound them to a life whose romance cast something like a glamour over
the prosaic one of more modern times. Both would, in the
unreasonableness of youthful sympathy, have willingly shared land and
gold with their poor kinsmen; but in this respect Tallisker was with
the laird.

"It was better," he said, "that the old feudal tie should be severed
even by a thousand leagues of ocean. They were men and not bairns, and
they could feel their ain feet;" and then he smiled as he remembered
how naturally they had taken to self-dependence. For one night, in a
conversation with the oldest men, he said, "Crawfords, ye'll hae to
consider, as soon as you are gathered together in your new hame, the
matter o' a dominie. Your little flock in the wilderness will need a
shepherd, and the proper authorities maun be notified."

Then an old gray-headed man had answered firmly, "Dominie, we will
elect our ain minister. We hae been heart and soul, every man o' us,
with the Relief Kirk; but it is ill living in Rome and striving wi'
the pope, and sae for the chief's sake and your sake we hae withheld
our testimony. But we ken weel that even in Scotland the Kirk willna
hirple along much farther wi' the State on her back, and in the
wilderness, please God, we'll plant only a Free Kirk."

The dominie heard the resolve in silence, but to himself he said
softly, "_They'll do! They'll do!_ They'll be a bit upsetting at
first, maybe, but they are queer folk that have nae failings."

A long parting is a great strain; it was a great relief when the ships
had sailed quite out of sight. The laird with a light heart now turned
to his new plans. No reproachful eyes and unhappy faces were there to
damp his ardor. Everything promised well. The coal seam proved to be
far richer than had been anticipated, and those expert in such matters
said there were undoubted indications of the near presence of iron
ore. Great furnaces began to loom up in Crawford's mental vision, and
to cast splendid lustres across his future fortunes.

In a month after the departure of the clan, the little clachan of
Traquare had greatly changed. Long rows of brick cottages, ugly and
monotonous beyond description, had taken the place of the more
picturesque sheilings. Men who seemed to measure everything in life
with a two-foot rule were making roads and building jetties for
coal-smacks to lie at. There was constant influx of strange men and
women--men of stunted growth and white faces, and who had an insolent,
swaggering air, intolerably vulgar when contrasted with the Doric
simplicity and quiet gigantic manhood of the mountain shepherds.

The new workers were, however, mainly Lowland Scotchmen from the
mining districts of Ayrshire. The dominie had set himself positively
against the introduction of a popish element and an alien people; and
in this position he had been warmly upheld by Farquharson and the
neighboring proprietors. As it was, there was an antagonism likely to
give him full employment. The Gael of the mountains regarded these
Lowland "working bodies" with something of that disdain which a rich
and cultivated man feels for kin, not only poor, but of contemptible
nature and associations. The Gael was poor truly, but he held himself
as of gentle birth. He had lived by his sword, or by the care of
cattle, hunting, and fishing. Spades, hammers, and looms belonged to
people of another kind.

Besides this great social gulf, there were political and religious
ones still wider. That these differences were traditional, rather than
real, made no distinction. Man have always fought as passionately for
an idea as for a fact. But Dominie Tallisker was a man made for great
requirements and great trusts. He took in the position with the eye of
a general. He watched the two classes passing down the same streets as
far apart as if separated by a continent, and he said, with a very
positive look on his face, "These men are brethren and they ought to
dwell in unity; and, God helping Dugald Tallisker, they will do it,
yes, indeed, they will."



CHAPTER IV.


In a year after the departure of the clan, the clachans of Crawford
and Traquare had lost almost all traces of their old pastoral
character. The coal pit had been opened, and great iron furnaces built
almost at its mouth. Things had gone well with Crawford; the seam had
proved to be unusually rich; and, though the iron had been found, not
on his land, but on the extreme edge of Blair, he was quite satisfied.
Farquharson had struck hands with him over it, and the Blair iron ore
went to the Crawford furnaces to be smelted into pig iron.

Crawford had grown younger in the ardent life he had been leading. No
one would have taken him to be fifty-five years old. He hardly thought
of the past; he only told himself that he had never been as strong and
clear-headed and full of endurance, and that it was probable he had
yet nearly half a century before him. What could he not accomplish in
that time?

But in every earthly success there is a Mordecai sitting in its gate,
and Colin was the uncomfortable feature in the laird's splendid hopes.
He had lounged heartlessly to and from the works; the steady,
mechanical routine of the new life oppressed him, and he had a
thorough dislike for the new order of men with whom he had to come in
contact. The young Crawfords had followed him about the hills with an
almost canine affection and admiration. To them he was always "the
young laird." These sturdy Ayrshire and Galloway men had an old
covenanting rebelliousness about them. They disputed even with Dominie
Tallisker on church government; they sang Robert Burns' most
democratic songs in Crawford's very presence.

Then Colin contrasted them physically with the great fellows he had
been accustomed to see striding over the hills, and he despised the
forms stunted by working in low seams and unhealthy vapors and the
faces white for lack of sunshine and grimy with the all-pervading coal
dust. The giants who toiled in leather masks and leather suits before
the furnaces suited his taste better. When he watched them moving
about amid the din and flames and white-hot metal, he thought of
Vulcan and Mount AEtna, and thus threw over them the enchantments of
the old Roman age. But in their real life the men disappointed him.
They were vulgar and quarrelsome; the poorest Highland gillie had a
vein of poetry in his nature, but these iron-workers were painfully
matter of fact; they could not even understand a courtesy unless it
took the shape of a glass of whiskey.

It was evident to the laird that the new life was very distasteful to
his heir; it was evident to the dominie that it was developing the
worst sides of Colin's character. Something of this he pointed out to
Helen one morning. Helen and he had lately become great friends,
indeed, they were co-workers together in all the new labors which the
dominie's conscience had set him. The laird had been too busy and
anxious about other matters to interfere as yet with this alliance,
but he promised himself he would do so very soon. Helen Crawford was
not going to nurse sick babies and sew for all the old women in the
clachan much longer. And the night-school! This was particularly
offensive to him. Some of the new men had gone there, and Crawford was
sure he was in some way defrauded by it. He thought it impossible to
work in the day and study an hour at night. In some way he suffered by
it.

"If they werna in the schoolroom they would be in the Change House,"
Tallisker had argued.

But the laird thought in his heart that the whiskey would be more to
his advantage than the books. Yet he did not like to say so; there was
something in the dominie's face which restrained him. He had opened
the subject in that blustering way which always hides the white
feather somewhere beneath it, and Tallisker had answered with a solemn
severity,

"Crawford, it seems to be your wark to mak money; it is mine to save
souls. Our roads are sae far apart we arena likely to run against each
other, if we dinna try to."

"But I don't like the way you are doing your wark; that is all,
dominie."

"Mammon never did like God's ways. There is a vera old disagreement
between them. A man has a right to consider his ain welfare, Crawford,
but it shouldna be mair than the twa tables o' the law to him."

Now Tallisker was one of those ministers who bear their great
commission in their faces. There was something almost imperial about
the man when he took his stand by the humblest altar of his duty.
Crawford had intended at this very time to speak positively on the
subject of his own workers to Tallisker. But when he looked at the
dark face, set and solemn and full of an irresistible authority, he
was compelled to keep silence. A dim fear that Tallisker would say
something to him which would make him uncomfortable crept into his
heart. It was better that both the dominie and conscience should be
quiet at present.

Still he could not refrain from saying,

"You hae set yoursel' a task you'll ne'er win over, dominie. You could
as easy mak Ben-Cruchan cross the valley and sit down by Ben-Appin as
mak Gael and Lowlander call each other brothers."

"We are told, Crawford, that mountains may be moved by faith; why not,
then, by love? I am a servant o' God. I dinna think it any presumption
to expect impossibilities."

Still it must be acknowledged that Tallisker looked on the situation
as a difficult one. The new workers to a man disapproved of the
Established Church of Scotland. Perhaps of all classes of laborers
Scotch colliers are the most theoretically democratic and the most
practically indifferent in matters of religion. Every one of them had
relief and secession arguments ready for use, and they used them
chiefly as an excuse for not attending Tallisker's ministry. When
conscience is used as an excuse, or as a weapon for wounding, it is
amazing how tender it becomes. It pleased these Lowland workers to
assert a religious freedom beyond that of the dominie and the shepherd
Gael around them. And if men wish to quarrel, and can give their
quarrel a religious basis, they secure a tolerance and a respect which
their own characters would not give them. Tallisker might pooh-pooh
sectional or political differences, but he was himself far too
scrupulous to regard with indifference the smallest theological
hesitation.

One day as he was walking up the clachan pondering these things, he
noticed before him a Highland shepherd driving a flock to the hills.
There was a party of colliers sitting around the Change House; they
were the night-gang, and having had their sleep and their breakfast,
were now smoking and drinking away the few hours left of their rest.
Anything offering the chance of amusement was acceptable, and Jim
Armstrong, a saucy, bullying fellow from the Lonsdale mines, who had
great confidence in his Cumberland wrestling tricks, thought he saw in
the placid indifference of the shepherd a good opportunity for
bravado.

"Sawnie, ye needna pass the Change House because we are here. We'll no
hurt you, man."

The shepherd was as one who heard not.

Then followed an epithet that no Highlander can hear unmoved, and the
man paused and put his hand under his plaid. Tallisker saw the
movement and quickened his steps. The word was repeated, with the
scornful laugh of the group to enforce it. The shepherd called his
dog--

"Keeper, you tak the sheep to the Cruchan corrie, and dinna let are o'
them stray."

The dumb creature looked in his face assentingly, and with a sharp
bark took the flock charge. Then the shepherd walked up to the group,
and Jim Armstrong rose to meet him.

"Nae dirks," said an old man quietly; "tak your hands like men."

Before the speech was over they were clinched in a grasp which meant
gigantic strength on one side, and a good deal of practical bruising
science on the other. But before there was an opportunity of testing
the quality of either the dominie was between the men. He threw them
apart like children, and held each of them at arm's length, almost as
a father might separate two fighting schoolboys. The group watching
could not refrain a shout of enthusiasm, and old Tony Musgrave jumped
to his feet and threw his pipe and his cap in the air.

"Dugald," said the dominie to the shepherd, "go your ways to your
sheep. I'll hae nae fighting in my parish.

"Jim Armstrong, you thrawart bully you, dinna think you are the only
man that kens Cumberland cantrips. I could fling you mysel' before you
could tell your own name;" and as if to prove his words, he raised an
immense stone, that few men could have lifted, and with apparent ease
flung it over his right shoulder. A shout of astonishment greeted the
exploit, and Tony Musgrave--whose keen, satirical ill-will had
hitherto been Tallisker's greatest annoyance--came frankly forward and
said, "Dominie, you are a guid fellow! Will you tak some beer wi' me?"

Tallisker did not hesitate a moment.

"Thank you, Tony. If it be a drink o' good-will, I'll tak it gladly."

But he was not inclined to prolong the scene; the interference had
been forced upon him. It had been the only way to stop a quarrel which
there would have been no healing if blood had once been shed. Yet he
was keenly alive to the dignity of his office, and resumed it in the
next moment. Indeed, the drinking of the glass of good-will together
was rather a ceremonial than a convivial affair. Perhaps that also was
the best. The men were silent and respectful, and for the first time
lifted their caps with a hearty courtesy to Tallisker when he left
them.

"Weel! Wonders never cease!" said Jim Armstrong scornfully. "To see
Tony Musgrave hobnobbing wi' a black-coat! The deil must 'a' had a
spasm o' laughing."

"Let the deil laugh," said Tony, with a snap of his grimy fingers.
Then, after a moment's pause, he added, "Lads, I heard this morning
that the dominie's wheat was spoiling, because he couldna get help to
cut it. I laughed when I heard it; I didna ken the man then. I'm
going to-morrow to cut the dominie's wheat; which o' you will go wi'
me?"

"I!" and "I!" and "I!" was the hearty response; and so next day
Traquare saw a strange sight--a dozen colliers in a field of wheat,
making a real holiday of cutting the grain and binding the sheaves, so
that before the next Sabbath it had all been brought safely home.



CHAPTER V.


But during these very days, when the dominie and his parishioners were
drawing a step closer to each other, the laird and his son were
drifting farther apart. Crawford felt keenly that Colin took no
interest in the great enterprises which filled his own life. The fact
was, Colin inherited his mother's, and not his father's temperament.
The late Lady Crawford had been the daughter of a Zetland Udaller, a
pure Scandinavian, a descendant of the old Vikings, and she inherited
from them a poetic imagination and a nature dreamy and inert, though
capable of rousing itself into fits of courage that could dare the
impossible. Colin would have led a forlorn hope or stormed a battery;
but the bare ugliness and monotony of his life at the works fretted
and worried him.

Tallisker had repeatedly urged a year's foreign travel. But the laird
had been much averse to the plan. France, in his opinion, was a hotbed
of infidelity; Italy, of popery; Germany, of socialistic and
revolutionary doctrines. There was safety only in Scotland. Pondering
these things, he resolved that marriage was the proper means to
"settle" the lad. So he entered into communication with an old friend
respecting his daughter and his daughter's portion; and one night he
laid the result before Colin.

Colin was indignant. He wanted to marry no woman, and least of all
women, Isabel McLeod.

"She'll hae L50,000!" said the laird sententiously.

"I would not sell myself for L50,000."

"You'd be a vera dear bargain at half the price to any woman, Colin.
And you never saw Isabel. She was here when you were in Glasgow. She
has the bonniest black e'en in Scotland, and hair like a raven's
wing."

"When I marry, sir, I shall marry a woman like my mother: a woman with
eyes as blue as heaven, and a face like a rose. I'll go, as you did,
to Shetland for her."

"There isna a house there fit for you to take a wife from, Colin, save
and except the Earl's ain; and his daughter, the Lady Selina, is near
thirty years old."

"There are my second cousins, Helga and Saxa Vedder."

Then the laird was sure in his own heart that Tallisker's advice was
best. France and Italy were less to be feared than pretty, portionless
cousins. Colin had better travel a year, and he proposed it. It hurt
him to see how eagerly his heir accepted the offer. However, if the
thing was to be done, it was best done quickly. Letters of credit
suitable to the young laird's fortune were prepared, and in less than
a month he was ready to begin his travels. It had been agreed that he
should remain away one year, and if it seemed desirable, that his stay
might even be lengthened to two. But no one dreamed that advantage
would be taken of this permission.

"He'll be hamesick ere a twelvemonth, laird," said the dominie; and
the laird answered fretfully, "A twelvemonth is a big slice o' life to
fling awa in far countries."

The night before Colin left he was walking with his sister on the
moor. A sublime tranquillity was in the still September air. The
evening crimson hung over the hills like a royal mantle. The old
church stood framed in the deepest blue. At that distance the long
waves broke without a sound, and the few sails on the horizon looked
like white flowers at sea.

"How beautiful is this mansion of our father!" said Helen softly. "One
blushes to be caught worrying in it, and yet, Colin, I fear to have
you go away."

"Why, my dear?"

"I have a presentiment that we shall meet no more in this life. Nay,
do not smile; this strange intelligence of sorrow, this sudden
trembling in a soul at rest, is not all a delusion. We shall part
to-morrow, Colin. Oh, darling brother, where shall we meet again?"

He looked into the fair, tender face and the eager, questioning eyes,
and found himself unable to reply.

"Remember, Colin! I give you a rendezvous in heaven."

He clasped her hand tightly, and they walked on in a silence that
Colin remembered often afterwards. Sometimes, in dreams, to the very
end of his life, he took again with Helen that last evening walk, and
his soul leaned and hearkened after hers. "I give you a rendezvous in
heaven!"

In the morning they had a few more words alone. She was standing
looking out thoughtfully into the garden. "Are you going to London?"
she asked suddenly.

"Yes."

"You will call on Mr. Selwyn?"

"I think so."

"Tell him we remember him--and try to follow, though afar off, the
example he sets us."

"Well, you know, Helen, I may not see him. We never were chums. I have
often wondered why I asked him here. It was all done in a moment. I
had thought of asking Walter Napier, and then I asked Selwyn. I have
often thought it would have pleased me better if I had invited
Walter."

"Sometimes it is permitted to us to do things for the pleasure of
others, rather than our own. I have often thought that God--who
foresaw the changes to take place here--sent Mr. Selwyn with a message
to Dominie Tallisker. The dominie thinks so too. Then how glad you
ought to be that you asked him. He came to prepare for those poor
people who as yet were scattered over Ayrshire and Cumberland. And
this thought comforts me for you, Colin. God knows just where you are
going, dear, and the people you are going to meet, and all the events
that will happen to you."

The events and situations of life resemble ocean waves--every one is
alike and yet every one is different. It was just so at Crawford Keep
after Colin left it. The usual duties of the day were almost as
regular as the clock, but little things varied them. There were
letters or no letters from Colin; there were little events at the
works or in the village; the dominie called or he did not call.
Occasionally there were visitors connected with the mines or furnaces,
and sometimes there were social evening gatherings of the neighboring
young people, or formal state dinners for the magistrates and
proprietors who were on terms of intimacy with the laird.

For the first year of Colin's absence, if his letters were not quite
satisfactory, they were condoned. It did not please his father that
Colin seemed to have settled himself so completely in Rome, among
"artists and that kind o' folk," and he was still more angry when
Colin declared his intention of staying away another year. Poor
father! How he had toiled and planned to aggrandize this only son, who
seemed far more delighted with an old coin or an old picture than with
the great works which bore his name. In all manner of ways he had made
it clear to his family that in the dreamy, sensuous atmosphere of
Italian life he remembered the gray earnestness of Scottish life with
a kind of terror.

Tallisker said, "Give him his way a little longer, laird. To bring him
hame now is no use. People canna thole blue skies for ever; he'll be
wanting the moors and the misty corries and the gray clouds erelong."
So Colin had another year granted him, and his father added thousand
to thousand, and said to his heart wearily many and many a time, "It
is all vexation of spirit."

At the end of the second year Crawford wrote a most important letter
to his son. There was an opening for the family that might never come
again. All arrangements had been made for Colin to enter the coming
contest for a seat in Parliament. The Marquis of B---- had been spoken
to, and Crawford and he had come to an understanding Crawford did not
give the particulars of the "understanding," but he told Colin that
his "political career was assured." He himself would take care of the
works. Political life was open to his son, and if money and influence
could put him in the House of Peers, money should not be spared.

The offer was so stupendous, the future it looked forward to so great,
Crawford never doubted Colin's proud, acquiescence. That much he owed
to a long line of glorious ancestors; it was one of the obligations of
noble birth; he would not dare to, neglect it.

Impatiently he waited Colin's answer. Indeed, he felt sure Colin would
answer such a call in person. He was disappointed when a letter came;
he had not known, till then, how sure he had felt of seeing his son.
And the letter was a simple blow to him. Very respectfully, but very
firmly, the proposition was declined. Colin said he knew little of
parties and cabals, and was certain, at least, that nothing could
induce him to serve under the Marquis of B----. He could not see his
obligations to the dead Crawfords as his father did. He considered his
life his own. It had come to him with certain tastes, which he meant
to improve and gratify, for only in that way was life of any value to
him.

The laird laid the letter in Tallisker's hands without a word. He was
almost broken-hearted. He had not yet got to that point where
money-making for money's sake was enough. Family aggrandizement and
political ambition are not the loftiest motives of a man's life, but
still they lift money-making a little above the dirty drudgery of mere
accumulation. Hitherto Crawford had worked for an object, and the
object, at least in his own eyes, had dignified the labor.

In his secret heart he was angry at Colin's calm respectability. A
spendthrift prodigal, wasting his substance in riotous living, would
have been easier to manage than this young man of aesthetic tastes,
whose greatest extravagance was a statuette or a picture. Tallisker,
too, was more uneasy than he would confess. He had hoped that Colin
would answer his father's summons, because he believed now that the
life he was leading was unmanning him. The poetical element in his
character was usurping an undue mastery. He wrote to Colin very
sternly, and told him plainly that a poetic pantheism was not a whit
less sinful than the most vulgar infidelity.

Still he advised the laird to be patient, and by no means to answer
Colin's letter in a hurry. But only fixed more firmly the angry
father's determination. Colin must come home and fulfil his wish, or
he must time remain away until he returned as master. As his son, he
would know him no more; as the heir of Crawford, he would receive at
intervals such information as pertained to that position. For the old
man was just in his anger; it never seemed possible to him to deprive
Colin of the right of his heritage. To be the 13th Laird of Crawford
was Colin's birthright; he fully recognized his title to the honor,
and, as the future head of the house, rendered him a definite respect.

Of course a letter written in such a spirit did no good whatever.
Nothing after it could have induced Colin to come home. He wrote and
declined to receive even the allowance due to him as heir of Crawford.
The letter was perfectly respectful, but cruelly cold and polite, and
every word cut the old man like a sword.

For some weeks he really seemed to lose all interest in life. Then the
result Tallisker feared was arrived at. He let ambition go, and
settled down to the simple toil of accumulation.



CHAPTER VI.


But Crawford had not a miser's nature. His house, his name, his
children were dearer, after all, to him than gold. Hope springs
eternal in the breast; in a little while he had provided himself with
a new motive: he would marry Helen to young Farquharson, and endow her
so royally that Farquharson would gladly take her name. There should
be another house of Crawford of which Helen should be the root.

Helen had been long accustomed to consider Hugh Farquharson as her
future husband. The young people, if not very eager lovers, were at
least very warm and loyal friends. They had been in no hurry to finish
the arrangement. Farquharson was in the Scot's Greys; it was
understood that at his marriage he should resign his commission, so,
though he greatly admired Helen, he was in no hurry to leave the
delights of metropolitan and military life.

But suddenly Crawford became urgent for the fulfilment of the
contract, and Helen, seeing how anxious he was, and knowing how sorely
Colin had disappointed him, could no longer plead for a delay. And yet
a strange sadness fell over her; some inexplicable symptoms as to her
health led her to fear she would never be Farquharson's wife; the gay
wedding attire that came from Edinburgh filled her with a still
sorrow; she could not appropriate any part of it as her own.

One day when the preparations were nearly finished, Tallisker came up
to the Keep. Helen saw at once that he was moved by some intense
feeling, and there was a red spot on his cheeks which she had been
accustomed to associate with the dominie's anger. The laird was
sitting placidly smoking, and drinking toddy. He had been telling
Helen of the grand house he was going to build on the new estate he
had just bought; and he was now calmly considering how to carry out
his plans on the most magnificent scale, for he had firmly determined
there should be neither Keep nor Castle in the North Country as
splendid as the new Crawfords' Home.

He greeted Tallisker with a peculiar kindness, and held his hand
almost lovingly. His friendship for the dominie--if he had known
it--was a grain of salt in his fast deteriorating life. He did not
notice the dominie's stern preoccupation, he was so full of his own
new plans. He began at once to lay them before his old friend; he had
that very day got the estimates from the Edinburgh architect.

Tallisker looked at them a moment with a gathering anger. Then he
pushed them passionately away, saying in a voice that was almost a
sob, "I darena look at them, laird; I darena look at them! Do you ken
that there are fourteen cases o' typhus in them colliers' cottages you
built? Do you remember what Mr. Selwyn said about the right o'
laborers to pure air and pure water? I knew he was right then, and
yet, God forgive me! I let you tak your ain way. Six little bits o'
bairns, twa women, and six o' your pit men! You must awa to Athol
instanter for doctors and medicines and brandy and such things as are
needfu'. There isna a minute to lose, laird."

Helen had risen while he was speaking with a calm determination that
frightened her father. He did not answer Tallisker, he spoke to her:
"Where are you going, Helen?"

"Down to the village; I can do something till better help is got."

"Helen Crawford, you'll bide where you are! Sit still, and I'll do
whatever Tallisker bids me."

Then he turned angrily to the dominie.

"You are aye bringing me ill tidings. Am I to blame if death comes?"

"Am I my brother's keeper? It's an auld question, laird. The first
murderer of a' asked it. I'm bound to say you are to blame. When you
gie fever an invite to your cotters' homes, you darena lay the blame
on the Almighty. You should hae built as Mr. Selwyn advised."

"Dominie, be quiet. I'm no a bairn, to be hectored o'er in this way.
Say what I must do and I'll do it--anything in reason--only Helen.
I'll no hae her leave the Keep; that's as sure as deathe. Sit down,
Helen. Send a' the wine and dainties you like to, but don't you stir a
foot o'er the threshold."

His anger was, in its way, as authoritative as the dominie's. Helen
did as she was bid, more especially as Tallisker in this seconded the
laird.

"There is naething she could do in the village that some old crone
could not do better."

It was a bitterly annoying interruption to Crawford's pleasant dreams
and plans. He got up and went over to the works. He found things very
bad there. Three more of the men had left sick, and there was an
unusual depression in the village. The next day the tidings were
worse. He foresaw that he would have to work the men half time, and
there had never been so many large and peremptory orders on hand. It
was all very unfortunate to him.

Tallisker's self-reproaches were his own; he resented them, even while
he acknowledged their truth. He wished he had built as Selwyn advised;
he wished Tallisker had urged him more. It was not likely he would
have listened to any urging, but it soothed him to think he would. And
he greatly aggravated the dominie's trouble by saying,

"Why did ye na mak me do right, Tallisker? You should hae been mair
determined wi' me, dominie."

During the next six weeks the dominie's efforts were almost
superhuman. He saw every cottage whitewashed; he was nurse and doctor
and cook. The laird saw him carrying wailing babies and holding raving
men in his strong arms. He watched over the sick till the last ray of
hope fled; he buried them tenderly when all was over. The splendor of
the man's humanity had never shown itself until it stood erect and
feared not, while the pestilence that walked in darkness and the
destruction that wasted at noon-day dogged his every step.

The laird, too, tried to do his duty. Plenty of people are willing to
play the Samaritan without the oil and the twopence, but that was not
Crawford's way. Tallisker's outspoken blame had really made him
tremble at his new responsibilities; he had put his hand liberally in
his pocket to aid the sufferers. Perhaps at the foundation of all lay
one haunting thought--Helen! If he did what he could for others, Helen
would safer. He never audibly admitted that Helen was in any danger,
but--but--if there should be danger, he was, he hoped, paying a ransom
for her safety.

In six weeks the epidemic appeared to have spent itself. There was a
talk of resuming full hours at the works. Twenty new hands had been
sent for to fill vacant places. Still there was a shadow on the
dominie's face, and he knew himself there was a shadow on his heart.
Was it the still solemnity of death in which he had lately lived so
much? Or was it the shadow of a coming instead of a departing sorrow?

One afternoon he thought he would go and sit with Helen a little
while. During his close intimacy with the colliers he had learned many
things which would change his methods of working for their welfare;
and of these changes he wished to speak with Helen. She was just going
for a walk on the moor, and he went with her. It was on such a
September evening she had walked last with Colin. As they sauntered
slowly, almost solemnly home, she remembered it. Some impulse far
beyond her control or understanding urged her to say, "Dominie, when I
am gone I leave Colin to you."

He looked at her with a sudden enlightenment. Her face had for a
moment a far-away death-like predestination over it. His heart sank
like lead as he looked at her.

"Are you ill, Helen?"

"I have not been well for two weeks."

He felt her hands; they were burning with fever.

"Let us go home," she said, and then she turned and gave one long,
mournful look at the mountains and the sea and the great stretch of
moorland. Tallisker knew in his heart she was bidding farewell to
them. He had no word to say. There are moods of the soul beyond all
human intermeddling.

The silence was broken by Helen. She pointed to the mountains. "How
steadfast they are, how familiar with forgotten years! How small we
are beside them!"

"I don't think so," said Tallisker stoutly. "Mountains are naething to
men. How small is Sinai when the man Moses stands upon it!"

Then they were at the Keep garden. Helen pulled a handful of white and
golden asters, and the laird, who had seen them coming, opened the
door wide to welcome them. Alas! Alas! Though he saw it not, death
entered with them. At midnight there was the old, old cry of despair
and anguish, the hurrying for help, where no help was of avail, the
desolation of a terror creeping hour by hour closer to the
hearthstone.

The laird was stricken with a stony grief which was deaf to all
consolation. He wandered up and down wringing his hands, and crying
out at intervals like a man in mortal agony. Helen lay in a stupor
while the fever burned her young life away. She muttered constantly
the word "Colin;" and Tallisker, though he had no hope that Colin
would ever reach his sister, wrote for the young laird.

Just before the last she became clearly, almost radiantly conscious.
She would be alone with her father, and the old man, struggling
bravely with his grief, knelt down beside her. She whispered to him
that there was a paper in the jewel-box on her table. He went and got
it. It was a tiny scrap folded crosswise. "Read it, father, when I am
beyond all pain and grief. I shall trust you, dear." He could only bow
his head upon her hands and weep.

"Tallisker!" she whispered, and he rose softly and called him. The two
men stood together by her side.

"Is it well, my daughter?" said the dominie, with a tone of tender
triumph in his voice. "You fear not, Helen, the bonds of death?"

"I trust in those pierced hands which have broken the bonds of death.
Oh! the unspeakable riches!"

These were her last words. Tallisker prayed softly as the mystical
gray shadow stole over the fair, tranquil face. It was soon all over.

  "She had outsoared the shadow of our night,
  And that unrest which men misname delight."

The bridal robes were folded away, the bridegroom went back to his
regiment, the heartsore father tried to take up his life again. But it
seemed to him to have been broken in two by the blow; and besides
this, there was a little strip of paper which lay like a load upon his
heart. It was the paper he had taken from Helen's dying fingers, and
it contained her last request:

"Father, dear, dear father, whatever you intended to give me--I pray
you--give it to God's poor.

"HELEN."



CHAPTER VII.


The dominie had felt certain that Colin would answer his letter in
person, but after a long silence he received it back again. Colin had
left Rome, and left no trace behind him. The laird knew that Tallisker
had written, and he too had been hoping and expecting. But he received
the news of his son's disappearance without remark. Life for some time
was a dreary weight to him, he scarce felt as if he could lift it
again. Hope after hope had failed him. He had longed so to be a rich
man, had God in his anger granted him his wish? And was no other thing
to prosper with him? All the same he clung to his gold with a deeper
affection. When all other vices are old avarice is still young. As
ambition and other motives died out, avarice usurped their places, and
Tallisker saw with a feeling half angry, and half pitiful, the laird's
life dwindling down to this most contemptible of all aims. He kept his
duty as proprietor constantly before the laird, but he no longer
seemed to care that people should say, "Crawford's men have the best
laborers' cottages in Scotland."

"I hae made up my mind, Tallisker," said fretfully, "the warld thinks
more o' the who mak money than o' those who gie it awa." Certainly
this change was not a sudden one; for two years after Helen's death it
was coming slowly forward, yet there were often times when Tallisker
hoped that it was but a temptation, and would be finally conquered.
Men do not lose the noble savor of humanity in a moment. Even on the
downward road good angels wait anxiously, and whisper in every better
moment to the lapsing soul, "Return!"

But there was a seed of bitterness in Crawford's heart, that was
poisoning the man's spiritual life--a little bit of paper, yet it lay
like a great stone over his noblest feelings, and sealed them up as in
a sepulchre. Oh, if some angel would come and roll it away! He had
never told the dominie of Helen's bequest. He did not dare to destroy
the slip of paper, but he hid it in the most secret drawer of his
secretary. He told himself that it was only a dying sentiment in Helen
to wish it, and that it would be a foolish superstition in him to
regard it. Perhaps in those last moments she had not understood what
she was asking.

For a little while he found relief in this suggestion; then he
remembered that the request must have been dictated before the fever
had conquered her strength or judgment. The words were clearly written
in Helen's neat, precise manner; there was not a hesitating line in
the whole. She had evidently written it with care and consideration.
No one could tell how that slip of paper haunted him. Even in the
darkness of its secret hiding-place his spiritual eyes saw it clearly
day and night.

To give to the poor all he had intended to give to Helen! He could
not! He could not! He could not do it! Helen could not have known what
she was asking. He had meant, in one way or another, to give her, as
the founder of the new line of Crawfords, at least one hundred
thousand pounds. Was it reasonable to scatter hither and yon such a
large sum, earned, as he told himself pitifully, "by his ain wisdom
and enterprise!"

The dominie knew nothing of this terrible struggle going on ever in
the man's soul who sat by his side. He saw that Crawford was irritable
and moody, but he laid the blame of it on Colin. Oh, if the lad would
only write, he would go himself and bring him back to his father,
though he should have to seek him at the ends of the earth. But four
years passed away, and the prodigal sent no backward, homeward sign.
Every night, then, the laird looked a moment into the dominie's face,
and always the dominie shook his head. Ah, life has silences that are
far more pathetic than death's.

One night Crawford said, almost in a whisper,

"He'll be dead, Tallisker."

And Tallisker answered promptly,

"He'll come hame, laird."

No other words about Colin passed between the two men in four years.
But destiny loves surprises. One night Tallisker laid a letter on the
table.

"It is for you, laird; read it."

It was a singular letter to come after so long a silence, and the
laird's anger was almost excusable.

"Listen, Tallisker; did e'er you hear the like?

"'DEAR FATHER: I want, for a very laudable purpose, L4,000. It is not
for myself in any way. If you will let me have it, I will trouble you
with the proper explanations. If not, they will not be necessary. I
have heard that you are well. I pray God to continue his mercy to you.

"'Your dutiful son,

"'COLIN CRAWFORD.'

"'Laudable purpose!'" cried the unhappy father, in a passion. "The lad
is altogether too laudable. The letter is an insult, Tallisker. I'll
ne'er forgive him for it. Oh, what a miserable father I am!"

And the dominie was moved to tears at the sight of his old friend's
bitter anguish.

Still he asserted that Colin had meant it to be a kind letter.

"Dinna tak want o' sense for want o' affection laird. The lad is a
conceited prig. He's set up wi' himsel' about something he is going to
do. Let him hae the money. I would show him you can gie as grandly as
he can ask loftily."

And, somehow, the idea pleased the laird. It was something that Colin
had been obliged to ask him for money at all. He sat down and wrote
out a check for the amount. Then he enclosed it with these words:

"SON COLIN CRAWFORD: I send you what you desire. I am glad your
prospects are sae laudable; maybe it may enter your heart, some day,
to consider it laudable to keep the Fifth Command. Your sister is
dead. Life is lonely, but I thole it. I want nae explanations.

"Your father,

"ALEX. CRAWFORD."

"What's the address, Tallisker?"

"Regent's Place, London."

The answer arrived in due time. It was as proper as a letter could be.
Colin said he was just leaving for America, but did not expect to be
more than six months there. But he never said a word about coming to
Crawford. Tallisker was downright angry at the young man. It was true
his father had told him he did not wish to see him again, but that had
been said under a keen sense of family wrong and of bitter
disappointment. Colin ought to have taken his father's ready response
to his request as an overture of reconciliation. For a moment he was
provoked with both of them.

"You are a dour lot, you Crawfords; ane o' you is prouder than the
ither."

"The Crawfords are as God made them, dominie."

"And some o' them a little warse."

Yet, after all, it was Colin Tallisker was really angry at. For the
present he had to let his anger lie by. Colin had gone, and given him
no address in America.

"He is feared I will be telling him his duty, and when he comes back
that is what I shall do, if I go to London to mak him hear me."

For a moment the laird looked hopefully into the dominie's face, but
the hope was yet so far off he could not grasp it. Yet, in a dim,
unacknowledged way it influenced him. He returned to his money-making
with renewed vigor. It was evident he had let the hope of Colin's
return steal into his heart. And the giving of that L4,000 Tallisker
considered almost a sign of grace. It had not been given from any
particularly noble motive; but any motive, not sinful, roused in
opposition to simple avarice, was a gain. He was quite determined now
to find Colin as soon as he returned from America.

In rather less than six months there were a few lines from Colin,
saying that the money sent had been applied to the proper purpose, and
had nobly fulfilled it. The laird had said he wanted no explanations,
and Colin gave him none.

Tallisker read the letter with a half smile.

"He is just the maist contrary, conceited young man I e'er heard tell
o'. Laird, as he wont come to us, I am going to him."

The laird said nothing. Any grief is better than a grief not sure. It
would be a relief to know all, even if that "all" were painful.



CHAPTER VIII.


Tallisker was a man as quick in action as in resolve; the next night
he left for London, it was no light journey in those days for a man of
his years, and who had never in all his life been farther away from
Perthshire than Edinburgh. But he feared nothing. He was going into
the wilderness after his own stray sheep, and he had a conviction that
any path of duty is a safe path. He said little to any one. The people
looked strangely on him. He almost fancied himself to be Christian
going through Vanity Fair.

He went first to Colin's old address in Regent's Place. He did not
expect to find him there, but it might lead him to the right place.
Number 34 Regent's Place proved to be a very grand house. As he went
up to the door, an open carriage, containing a lady and a child, left
it. A man dressed in the Crawford tartan opened the door.

"Crawford?" inquired Tallisker, "is he at home?"

"Yes, he is at home;" and the servant ushered him into, a
carefully-shaded room, where marble statues gleamed in dusk corners
and great flowering plants made the air fresh and cool. It as the
first time Tallisker had ever seen a calla lily and he looked with
wonder and delight at the gleaming flowers. And somehow he thought of
Helen. Colin sat in a great leathern chair reading. He did not lift
his head until the door closed and he was sensible the servant had
left some one behind. Then for a moment he could hardly realize who it
was; but when he did, he came forward with a glad cry.

"Dominie! O Tallisker!"

"Just so, Colin, my dear lad. O Colin, you are the warst man I ever
kenned. You had a good share o' original sin to start wi', but what
wi' pride and self-will and ill-will, the old trouble is sairly
increased."

Colin smiled gravely. "I think you misjudge me, dominie." Then
refreshments were sent for, and the two men sat down for a long mutual
confidence.

Colin's life had not been uneventful. He told it frankly, without
reserve and without pride. When he quarrelled with his father about
entering Parliament, he left Rome at once, and went to Canada. He had
some idea of joining his lot with his own people there. But he found
them in a state of suffering destitution. They had been unfortunate in
their choice of location, and were enduring an existence barer than
the one they had left, without any of its redeeming features. Colin
gave them all he had, and left them with promises of future aid.

Then he went to New York. When he arrived, there was an intense
excitement over the struggle then going on in the little republic of
Texas. He found out something about the country; as for the struggle,
it was the old struggle of freedom against papal and priestly
dominion. That was a quarrel for which Scotchmen have always been
ready to draw the sword. It was Scotland's old quarrel in the New
World, and Colin went into it heart and soul. His reward had been an
immense tract of the noble rolling Colorado prairie. Then he
determined to bring the Crawfords down, and plant them in this garden
of the Lord. It was for this end he had written to his father for
L4,000. This sum had sufficed to transplant them to their new home,
and give them a start. He had left them happy and contented, and felt
now that in this matter he had absolved his conscience of all wrong.

"But you ought to hae told the laird. It was vera ill-considered. It
was his affair more than yours. I like the thing you did, Colin, but I
hate the way you did it. One shouldna be selfish even in a good wark."

"It was the laird's own fault; he would not let me explain."

"Colin, are you married?"

"Yes. I married a Boston lady. I have a son three years old. My wife
was in Texas with me. She had a large fortune of her own."

"You are a maist respectable man, Colin, but I dinna like it at all.
What are you doing wi' your time? This grand house costs something."

"I am an artist--a successful one, if that is not also against me."

"Your father would think sae. Oh, my dear lad, you hae gane far astray
from the old Crawford ways."

"I cannot help that, dominie. I must live according to my light. I am
sorry about father."

Then the dominie in the most forcible manner painted the old laird's
hopes and cruel disappointments. There were tears in Colin's eyes as
he reasoned with him. And at this point his own son came into the
room. Perhaps for the first time Colin looked at the lad as the future
heir of Crawford. A strange thrill of family and national pride
stirred his heart. He threw the little fellow shoulder high, and in
that moment regretted that he had flung away the child's chance of
being Earl of Crawford. He understood then something of the anger and
suffering his father had endured, and he put the boy down very
solemnly. For if Colin was anything, he was just; if his father had
been his bitterest enemy, he would, at this moment, have acknowledged
his own aggravation.

Then Mrs. Crawford came in. She had heard all about the dominie, and
she met him like a daughter. Colin had kept his word. This fair,
sunny-haired, blue-eyed woman was the wife he had dreamed about; and
Tallisker told him he had at any rate done right in that matter. "The
bonnie little Republican," as he called her, queened it over the
dominie from the first hour of their acquaintance.

He stayed a week in London, and during it visited Colin's studio. He
went there at Colin's urgent request, but with evident reluctance. A
studio to the simple dominie had almost the same worldly flavor as a
theatre. He had many misgivings as they went down Pall Mall, but he
was soon reassured. There was a singular air of repose and quiet in
the large, cool room. And the first picture he cast his eyes upon
reconciled him to Colin's most un-Crawford-like taste.

It was "The Farewell of the Emigrant Clan." The dominie's knees shook,
and he turned pale with emotion. How had Colin reproduced that scene,
and not only reproduced but idealized it! There were the gray sea and
the gray sky, and the gray granite boulder rocks on which the chief
stood, the waiting ships, and the loaded boats, and he himself in the
prow of the foremost one. He almost felt the dear old hymn thrilling
through the still room. In some way, too, Colin had grasped the
grandest points of his father's character. In this picture the man's
splendid physical beauty seemed in some mysterious way to give
assurance of an equally splendid spiritual nature.

"If this is making pictures, Colin, I'll no say but what you could
paint a sermon, my dear lad. I hae ne'er seen a picture before." Then
he turned to another, and his swarthy face glowed with an intense
emotion. There was a sudden sense of tightening in his throat, and he
put his hand up and slowly raised his hat. It was Prince Charlie
entering Edinburgh. The handsome, unfortunate youth rode bareheaded
amid the Gordons and the Murrays and a hundred Highland noblemen. The
women had their children shoulder high to see him, the citizens,
bonnets up, were pressing up to his bridle-rein. It stirred Tallisker
like a peal of trumpets. With the tears streaming down his glowing
face, he cried out,

"How daur ye, sir! You are just the warst rebel between the seas! King
George ought to hang you up at Carlisle-gate. And this is painting!
This is artist's wark! And you choose your subjects wisely, Colin: it
is a gift the angels might be proud o'." He lingered long in the room,
and when he left it, "Prince Charlie" and the "Clan's Farewell" were
his own. They were to go back with him to the manse at Crawford.



CHAPTER IX.


It was, upon the whole, a wonderful week to Tallisker; he returned
home with the determination that the laird must recall his banished.
He had tried to induce Colin to condone all past grievances, but Colin
had, perhaps wisely, said that he could not go back upon a momentary
impulse. The laird must know all, and accept him just as he was. He
had once been requested not to come home unless he came prepared to
enter into political life. He had refused the alternative then, and he
should refuse it again. The laird must understand these things, or the
quarrel would probably be renewed, perhaps aggravated.

And Tallisker thought that, in this respect, Colin was right. He would
at any rate hide nothing from the laird, he should know all; and
really he thought he ought to be very grateful that the "all" was so
much better than might have been.

The laird was not glad. A son brought down to eat the husk of evil
ways, poor, sick, suppliant, would have found a far readier welcome.
He would gladly have gone to meet Colin, even while he was yet a great
way off, only he wanted Colin to be weary and footsore and utterly
dependent on his love. He heard with a grim silence Tallisker's
description of the house in Regent's Place, with its flowers and
books, its statues, pictures, and conservatory. When Tallisker told
him of the condition of the Crawfords in Canada, he was greatly moved.
He was interested and pleased with the Texan struggle. He knew nothing
of Texas, had never heard of the country, but Mexicans, Spaniards, and
the Inquisition were one in his mind.

"That at least was Crawford-like," he said warmly, when told of
Colin's part in the struggle.

But the subsequent settlement of the clan there hurt him terribly. "He
should hae told me. He shouldna hae minded what I said in such a case.
I had a right to know. Colin has used me vera hardly about this. Has
he not, Tallisker?"

"Yes, laird, Colin was vera wrong there. He knows it now."

"What is he doing in such a grand house? How does he live?"

"He is an artist--a vera great one, I should say."

"He paints pictures for a living! He! A Crawford o' Traquare! I'll no
believe it, Tallisker."

"There's naught to fret about, laird. You'll ken that some day. Then
his wife had money."

"His wife! Sae he is married. That is o' a piece wi' the rest. Wha is
she?"

"He married an American--a Boston lady."

Then the laird's passion was no longer controllable, and he said some
things the dominie was very angry at.

"Laird," he answered, "Mrs. Colin Crawford is my friend. You'll no
daur to speak any way but respectful o' her in my presence. She is as
good as any Crawford that ever trod the heather. She came o' the
English Hampdens. Whar will ye get better blood than that?"

"No Hampdens that ever lived--"

"Whist! Whist, laird! The Crawfords are like a' ither folk; they have
twa legs and twa hands."

"He should hae married a Scots lass, though she had carried a
milking-pail."

"Laird, let me tell you there will be nae special heaven for the Gael.
They that want to go to heaven by themsel's arena likely to win there
at a'. You may as well learn to live with ither folk here; you'll hae
to do it to a' eternity."

"If I get to heaven, Dominie Tallisker, I'll hae special graces for
the place. I'm no going to put mysel' in a blazing passion for you
to-night. Yon London woman has bewitched you. She's wanting to come to
the Keep, I'll warrant."

"If ye saw the hame she has you wouldna warrant your ain word a minute
longer, laird. And I'm sure I dinna see what she would want to hae twa
Crawfords to guide for. One is mair than enough whiles. It's a wonder
to me how good women put up wi' us at all!"

"_Humff!_" said the laird scornfully. "Too many words on a spoiled
subject."

"I must say one mair, though. There is a little lad, a bonnie, brave,
bit fellow, your ain grandson, Crawford."

"An American Crawford!" And the laird laughed bitterly. "A foreigner!
an alien! a Crawford born in England! Guid-night, Tallisker! We'll
drop the subject, an it please you."

Tallisker let it drop. He had never expected the laird to give in at
the first cry of "Surrender." But he reflected that the winter was
coming, and that its long nights would give plenty of time for thought
and plenty of opportunities for further advocacy. He wrote constantly
to Colin and his wife, perhaps oftener to Mrs. Crawford than to the
young laird, for she was a woman of great tact and many resources, and
Tallisker believed in her.

Crawford had said a bitter word about her coming to the Keep, and
Tallisker could not help thinking what a blessing she would be there;
for one of Crawford's great troubles now was the wretchedness of his
household arrangements. The dainty cleanliness and order which had
ruled it during Helen's life were quite departed. The garden was
neglected, and all was disorder and discomfort. Now it is really
wonderful how much of the solid comfort of life depends upon a
well-arranged home, and the home must depend upon some woman. Men may
mar the happiness of a household, but they cannot make it. Women are
the happiness makers. The laird never thought of it in this light, but
he did know that he was very uncomfortable.

"I canna even get my porridge made right," he said fretfully to the
dominie.

"You should hae a proper person o'er them ne'er-do-weel servants o'
yours, laird. I ken one that will do you."

"Wha is she?"

"A Mrs. Hope."

"A widow?"

"No, not a widow, but she is not living with her husband."

"Then she'll ne'er win into my house, dominie."

"She has good and sufficient reasons. I uphold her. Do you think I
would sanction aught wrong, laird?"

No more was said at that time, but a month afterwards Mrs. Hope had
walked into the Keep and taken everything in her clever little hands.
Drunken, thieving, idle servants had been replaced by men and women
thoroughly capable and efficient. The laird's tastes were studied, his
wants anticipated, his home became bright, restful, and quiet. The
woman was young and wonderfully pretty, and Crawford soon began to
watch her with a genuine interest.

"She'll be ane o' the Hopes o' Beaton," he thought; "she is vera like
them."

At any rate he improved under her sway, for being thoroughly
comfortable himself, he was inclined to have consideration for others.

One afternoon, as he came from the works, it began to snow. He turned
aside to the manse to borrow a plaid of Tallisker. He very seldom went
to the manse, but in the keen, driving snow the cheerful fire gleaming
through the window looked very inviting. He thought he would go in and
take a cup of tea with Tallisker.

"Come awa in, laird," cried old Janet, "come awa in. You are a sight
good for sair e'en. The dominie will be back anon, and I'll gie ye a
drap o' hot tay till he comes."

So the laird went in, and the first thing he saw was Colin's picture
of "The Clan's Farewell." It moved him to his very heart. He divined
at once whose work it was, and he felt that it was wonderful. It must
be acknowledged, too, that he was greatly pleased with Colin's
conception of himself.

"I'm no a bad-looking Crawford," he thought complacently; "the lad has
had a vera clear notion o' what he was doing."

Personal flattery is very subtle and agreeable. Colin rose in his
father's opinion that hour.

Then he turned to Prince Charlie. How strange is that vein of romantic
loyalty marbling the granite of Scotch character! The common-place man
of coal and iron became in the presence of his ideal prince a feudal
chieftain again. His heart swelled to that pictured face as the great
sea swells to the bending moon. He understood in that moment how his
fathers felt it easy to pin on the white cockade and give up
everything for an impossible loyalty.

The dominie found him in this mood. He turned back to every-day life
with a sigh.

"Weel, dominie, you are a man o' taste. When did you begin buying
pictures?"

"I hae no money for pictures, laird. The artist gave me them."

"You mean Colin Crawford gave you them."

"That is what I mean."

"Weel, I'm free to say Colin kens how to choose grand subjects. I
didna think there was so much in a picture. I wouldna dare to keep
that poor dear prince in my house. I shouldna be worth a bawbee at the
works. It was a wonderfu' wise step, that forbidding o' pictures in
the kirks. I can vera weel see how they would lead to a sinfu'
idolatry."

"Yes, John Knox kent well the temper o' the metal he had to work.
There's nae greater hero-worshippers than Scots folk. They are aye
making idols for themsel's. Whiles it's Wallace, then it's Bruce or
Prince Charlie; nay, there are decent, pious folk that gie Knox
himsel' a honoring he wouldna thank them for. But, laird, there is a
mair degraded idolatry still--that o' gold. We are just as ready as
ever the Jews were to fall down before a calf, an' it only be a golden
one."

"Let that subject alane, dominie. It will tak a jury o' rich men to
judge rich men. A poor man isna competent. The rich hae straits the
poor canna fathom."

And then he saw in light as clear as crystal a slip of paper hid away
in a secret drawer.

Just at this moment a little lad bairn entered the room; a child with
bright, daring eyes, and a comically haughty, confident manner. He
attracted Crawford's attention at once.

"What's your name, my wee man?"

"Alexander is my name."

"That is my name."

"It is not," he answered positively; "don't say that any more."

"Will you hae a sixpence?"

"Yes, I will. Money is good. It buys sweeties."

"Whose boy is that, dominie?"

"Mrs. Hope's. I thought he would annoy you. He is a great pleasure to
me."

"Let him come up to the Keep whiles. I'll no mind him."

When he rose to go he stood a moment before each picture, and then
suddenly asked,

"Whar is young Crawford?"

"In Rome."

"A nice place for him to be! He'd be in Babylon, doubtless, if it was
on the face o' the earth."

When he went home he shut himself in his room and almost stealthily
took out that slip of paper. It had begun to look yellow and faded,
and Crawford had a strange fancy that it had a sad, pitiful
appearance. He held it in his hand a few moments and then put it back
again. It would be the new year soon, and he would decide then. He had
made similar promises often; they always gave him temporary comfort.

Then gradually another element of pleasure crept into his life--Mrs.
Hope's child. The boy amused him; he never resented his pretty,
authoritative ways; a queer kind of companionship sprang up between
them. It was one of perfect equality every way; an old man easily
becomes a little child. And those who only knew Crawford among coals
and pig iron would have been amazed to see him keeping up a mock
dispute with this baby.



CHAPTER X.


One day, getting towards the end of December, the laird awoke in a
singular mood. He had no mind to go to the works, and the weather
promised to give him a good excuse. Over the dreary hills there was a
mournful floating veil of mist. Clouds were flying rapidly in great
masses, and showers streaming through the air in disordered ranks,
driven furiously before a mad wind--a wind that before noon shook the
doors and windows, and drove the bravest birds into hiding.

The laird wandered restlessly up and down.

"There is the dominie," cried Mrs. Hope, about one o'clock. "What
brings him here through such a storm?"

Crawford walked to the door to meet him. He came striding over the
soaking moor with his plaid folded tightly around him and his head
bent before the blast. He was greatly excited.

"Crawford, come wi' me. The Athol passenger packet is driving before
this wind, and there is a fishing smack in her wake."

"Gie us some brandy wi' us, Mrs. Hope, and you'll hae fires and
blankets and a' things needfu' in case O' accident, ma'am." He was
putting on his bonnet and plaid as he spoke, and in five minutes the
men were hastening to the seaside.

It was a deadly coast to be on in a storm with a gale blowing to land.
A long reef of sharp rocks lay all along it, and now the line of
foaming breakers was to any ship a terrible omen of death and
destruction. The packet was almost helpless, and the laird and
Tallisker found a crowd of men waiting the catastrophe that was every
moment imminent.

"She ought to hae gien hersel' plenty o' sea room," said the laird. He
was half angry to see all the interest centred on the packet. The
little fishing cobble was making, in his opinion, a far more sensible
struggle for existence. She was managing her small resources with
desperate skill.

"Tallisker," said the laird, "you stay here with these men. Rory and I
are going half a mile up the coast. If the cobble drives on shore, the
current will take a boat as light as she is over the Bogie Rock and
into the surf yonder. There are doubtless three or four honest men in
her, quite as weel worth the saving as those stranger merchant bodies
that will be in the packet."

So Crawford and Rory hastened to the point they had decided on, and
just as they reached it the boat became unmanageable. The wind took
her in its teeth, shook her a moment or two like a thing of straw and
rags, and then flung her, keel upwards, on the Bogie Rock. Two of the
men were evidently good swimmers; the others were a boy and an old
man. Crawford plunged boldly in after the latter. The waves buffeted
him, and flung him down, and lifted him up, but he was a fine surf
swimmer, and he knew every rock on that dangerous coast. After a hard
struggle, all were brought safe to land.

Then they walked back to where the packet had been last seen. She had
gone to pieces. A few men waited on the beach, picking up the dead,
and such boxes and packages as were dashed on shore. Only three of all
on board had been rescued, and they had been taken to the Keep for
succor and rest.

The laird hastened home. He had not felt as young for many years. The
struggle, though one of life and death, had not wearied him like a
day's toil at the works, for it had been a struggle to which the soul
had girded itself gladly, and helped and borne with it the mortal
body. He came in all glowing and glad; a form lay on his own couch
before the fire. The dominie and Mrs. Hope were bending over it. As he
entered, Mrs. Hope sprang forward--

"Father!"

"Eh? Father? What is this?"

"Father, it is Colin."

Then he knew it all. Colin stretched out a feeble hand towards him. He
was sorely bruised and hurt, he was white and helpless and death-like.

"Father!"

And the father knelt down beside him. Wife and friend walked softly
away. In the solemn moment when these two long-parted souls met again
there was no other love that could inter-meddle.

"My dear father--forgive me!"

Then the laird kissed his recovered son, and said tenderly,

"Son Colin, you are all I have, and all I have is yours."

"Father, my wife and son."

Then the old man proudly and fondly kissed Hope Crawford too, and he
clasped the little lad in his arms. He was well pleased that Hope had
thought it worth while to minister to his comfort, and let him learn
how to know her fairly.

"But it was your doing, Tallisker, I ken it was; it has your mark on
it." And he grasped his old friend's hand with a very hearty grip.

"Not altogether, laird. Colin had gone to Rome on business, and you
were in sair discomfort, and I just named it to Mrs. Hope. After a' it
was her proposal. Naebody but a woman would hae thought o' such a way
to win round you."

Perhaps it was well that Colin was sick and very helpless for some
weeks. During them the two men learned to understand and to respect
each other's peculiarities. Crawford himself was wonderfully happy; he
would not let any thought of the past darken his heart. He looked
forward as hopefully as if he were yet on the threshold of life.

O mystery of life! from what depths proceed thy comforts and thy
lessons! One morning at very early dawn Crawford awoke from a deep
sleep in an indescribable awe. In some vision of the night he had
visited that piteous home which memory builds, and where only in sleep
we walk. Whom had he seen there? What message had he received? This he
never told. He had been "spoken to."

Tallisker was not the man to smile at any such confidence. He saw no
reason why God's messengers should not meet his children in the
border-land of dreams. Thus he had counselled and visited the
patriarchs and prophets of old. He was a God who changeth not; and if
he had chosen to send Crawford a message in this way, it was doubtless
some special word, for some special duty or sorrow. But he had really
no idea of what Crawford had come to confess to him.

"Tallisker, I hae been a man in a sair strait for many a year. I hae
not indeed hid the Lord's talent in a napkin, but I hae done a warse
thing; I hae been trading wi' it for my ain proper advantage. O
dominie, I hae been a wretched man through it all. Nane ken better
than I what a hard master the deil is."

Then he told the dominie of Helen's bequest. He went over all the
arguments with which he had hitherto quieted his conscience, and he
anxiously watched their effect upon Tallisker. He had a hope even yet
that the dominie might think them reasonable. But the table at which
they sat was not less demonstrative than Tallisker's face; for once he
absolutely controlled himself till the story was told. Then he said to
Crawford,

"I'll no tak any responsibility in a matter between you and your
conscience. If you gie it, gie it without regret and without holding
back. Gie it cheerfully; God loves a cheerful giver. But it isna wi'
me you'll find the wisdom to guide you in this matter. Shut yoursel'
in your ain room, and sit down at the foot o' the cross and think it
out. It is a big sum to gie away, but maybe, in the face o' that
stupendous Sacrifice it willna seem so big. I'll walk up in the
evening, laird; perhaps you will then hae decided what to do."

Crawford was partly disappointed. He had hoped that Tallisker would in
some way take the burden from him--he had instead sent him to the foot
of the cross. He did not feel as if he dared to neglect the advice; so
he went thoughtfully to his own room and locked the door. Then he took
out his private ledger. Many a page had been written the last ten
years. It was the book of a very rich man. He thought of all his
engagements and plans and hopes, and of how the withdrawal of so large
a sum would affect them.

Then he took out Helen's last message, and sat down humbly with it
where Tallisker had told him to sit. Suddenly Helen's last words came
back to him, "Oh! the unspeakable riches!" What of? The cross of
Christ--the redemption from eternal death--the promise of eternal
life! Sin is like a nightmare; when we stir under it, we awake.
Crawford sat thinking until his heart burned and softened, and great
tears rolled slowly down his cheeks and dropped upon the paper in his
hands. Then he thought of the richness of his own life--Colin and
Hope, and the already beloved child Alexander--of his happy home, of
the prosperity of his enterprises, of his loyal and loving friend
Tallisker. What a contrast to the Life he had been told to remember!
that pathetic Life that had not where to lay its head, that mysterious
agony in Gethsemane, that sublime death on Calvary, and he cried out,
"O Christ! O Saviour of my soul! all that I have is too little!"

When Tallisker came in the evening, Hope noticed a strange solemnity
about the man. He, too, had been in the presence of God all day. He
had been praying for his friend. But as soon as he saw Crawford he
knew how the struggle had ended. Quietly they grasped each other's
hand, and the evening meal was taken by Colin's side in pleasant
cheerfulness. After it, when all were still, the laird spoke:

"Colin and Hope, I hae something I ought to tell you. When your sister
Helen died she asked me to gie her share o' the estate to the poor
children of our Father. I had intended giving Helen L100,000. It is a
big sum, and I hae been in a sair strait about it. What say you,
Colin?"

"My dear father, I say there is only one way out of that strait. The
money must be given as Helen wished it. Helen was a noble girl. It was
just like her."

"Ah, Colin, if you could only tell what a burden this bit o' paper has
been to me! I left the great weight at the foot o' the cross this
morning." As he spoke the paper dropped from his fingers and fell upon
the table. Colin lifted it reverently and kissed it. "Father," he
said, "may I keep it now? The day will come when the Crawfords will
think with more pride of it than of any parchment they possess."

Then there was an appeal to Tallisker about its disposal. "Laird," he
answered, "such a sum must be handled wi' great care. It is not enough
to gie money, it must be gien wisely." But he promised to take on
himself the labor of inquiry into different charities, and the
consideration of what places and objects needed help most. "But,
Crawford," he said, "if you hae any special desire, I think it should
be regarded."

Then Crawford said he had indeed one. When he was himself young he had
desired greatly to enter the ministry, but his father had laid upon
him a duty to the family and estate which he had accepted instead.

"Now, dominie," he said, "canna I keep aye a young man in my place?"

"It is a worthy thought, Crawford."

So the first portion of Helen's bequest went to Aberdeen University.
This endowment has sent out in Crawford's place many a noble young man
into the harvest-field of the world, and who shall say for how many
centuries it will keep his name green in earth and heaven! The
distribution of the rest does not concern our story. It may safely be
left in Dominie Tallisker's hands.

Of course, in some measure it altered Crawford's plans. The new house
was abandoned and a wing built to the Keep for Colin's special use. In
this portion the young man indulged freely his poetic, artistic
tastes. And the laird got to like it. He used to tread softly as soon
as his feet entered the large shaded rooms, full of skilful lights and
white gleaming statues. He got to enjoy the hot, scented atmosphere
and rare blossoms of the conservatory, and it became a daily delight
to him to sit an hour in Colin's studio and watch the progress of some
favorite picture.

But above all his life was made rich by his grandson. Nature, as she
often does, reproduced in the second generation what she had totally
omitted in the first. The boy was his grandfather over again. They
agreed upon every point. It was the laird who taught Alexander to
spear a salmon, and throw a trout-line, and stalk a deer. They had
constant confidences about tackle and guns and snares. They were all
day together on the hills. The works pleased the boy better than his
father's studio. He trotted away with his grandfather gladly to them.
The fires and molten metal, the wheels and hammers and tumult, were
all enchantments to him. He never feared to leap into a collier's
basket and swing down the deep, black shaft. He had also an
appreciative love of money; he knew just how many sixpences he owned,
and though he could give if asked to do so, he always wanted the
dominie to give him a good reason for giving. The child gave him back
again his youth, and a fuller and nobler one than he himself had
known.

And God was very gracious to him, and lengthened out this second youth
to a green old age. These men of old Gaul had iron constitutions; they
did not begin to think themselves old men until they had turned
fourscore. It was thirty years after Helen's death when Tallisker one
night sent this word to his life-long friend,

"I hae been called, Crawford; come and see me once more."

They all went together to the manse. The dominie was in his
ninety-first year, and he was going home. No one could call it dying.
He had no pain. He was going to his last sleep

          "As sweetly as a child,
  Whom neither thought disturbs nor care encumbers,
  Tired with long play, at close of summer's day
      Lies down and slumbers."

"Good-by, Crawford--for a little while. We'll hae nae tears. I hae
lived joyfully before my God these ninety years; I am going out o' the
sunshine into the sunshine. Crawford, through that sair strait o'
yours you hae set a grand, wide-open door for a weight o' happiness. I
am glad ye didna wait. A good will is a good thing, but a good life is
far better. It is a grand thing to sow your ain good seed. Nae ither
hand could hae done it sae well and sae wisely. Far and wide there are
lads and lasses growing up to call you blessed. This is a thought to
mak death easy, Crawford. Good-night, dears."

And then "God's finger touched him and he slept."

Crawford lived but a few weeks longer. After the dominie's death he
simply sat waiting. His darling Alexander came home specially to
brighten these last hours, and in his company he showed almost to the
last hour the true Crawford spirit.

"Alexander," he would say, "you'll ding for your ain side and the
Crawfords always, but you'll be a good man; there is nae happiness
else, dear. Never rest, my lad, till ye sit where your fathers sat in
the House o' Peers. Stand by the State and the Kirk, and fear God,
Alexander. The lease o' the Cowden Knowes is near out; don't renew it.
Grip tight what ye hae got, but pay every debt as if God wrote the
bill. Remember the poor, dear lad. Charity gies itsel' rich. Riches
mak to themselves wings, but charity clips the wings. The love o' God,
dear, the love o' God--that is the best o' all."

Yes, he had a sair struggle with his lower nature to the very last,
but he was constantly strengthened by the conviction of a "Power
closer to him than breathing, nearer than hands or feet." Nine weeks
after the dominie's death they found him sitting in his chair, fallen
on that sleep whose waking is eternal day. His death was like
Tallisker's--a perfectly natural one. He had been reading. The Bible
lay open at that grand peroration of St. Paul's on faith, in the
twelfth of Hebrews. The "great cloud of witnesses," "the sin which
doth so easily beset us," "Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our
faith"--these were probably his last earthly thoughts, and with them
he passed into

  "That perfect presence of His face
  Which we, for want of words, call heaven."




James Blackie's Revenge.




JAMES BLACKIE'S REVENGE.


CHAPTER I.


Few people who have travelled will deny that of all cities Glasgow is
apparently the least romantic. Steeped in wet, white mist, or wrapped
in yellow fog vapor, all gray stone and gray sky, dirty streets, and
sloppy people, it presents none of the features of a show town. Yet it
has great merits; it is enterprising, persevering, intensely national,
and practically religious; and people who do not mind being damp have
every chance to make a good living there. Even the sombre appearance
of the dark gray granite of which it is built is not unsuitable to the
sterling character of its people; for though this stone may be dull
and ugly, there is a natural nobility about it, and it never can be
mean.

I have said that, as a city, Glasgow is practically religious, and
certainly this was the case something less than half a century ago.
The number of its churches was not more remarkable than the piety and
learning of its clergy; and the "skailing" of their congregations on a
Sabbath afternoon was one of the most impressive sights, of its kind,
in the world.

My true little story opens with the skailing of the Ramshorn Kirk, a
very favorite place of worship with the well-to-do burghers of the
east end of the city, and it was a peculiarly douce, decent,
solemn-looking crowd that slowly and reverently passed out of its
gates into the absolutely silent streets. For no vehicles of any kind
disturbed the Sabbath stillness, and not until the people had gone
some distance from the house of God did they begin to think their own
thoughts, and with a certain grave reserve put them into words.

Among the groups who proceeded still farther east, towards the
pleasant houses facing the "Green," one alone was remarkable enough to
have elicited special notice from an observing stranger. It consisted
of an old man and a young girl, evidently his daughter. Both were
strikingly handsome, and the girl was much better dressed than the
majority of women who took the same road. Long before they reached the
Green they were joined by a younger man, whom the elder at once
addressed in a reproving voice.

"Ye didna pay as much attention to the sermon as it behooved ye to do,
James Blackie; and what for did ye speak to Robert Laird a'most within
'the Gates'?"

"I only asked if he had heard of the 'Bonnie Bess;' she is overdue
five days, and eight good men in her, not to speak of the cargo."

"It's no cannie to be aye asking questions. Sit still and the news
will come to ye: forbye, I'm no sure if yon was a lawfu' question; the
Sabbath sun hasna set yet."

James Blackie mechanically turned to the west, and then slowly let his
glance fall on the lovely face at his side.

"Christine," he asked softly, "how is all with you?"

"All is well, James."

Not another word was spoken until they reached David Cameron's home.
He was carefully reconsidering the sermon--going over every point on
his finger ends, lest he should drop any link of the argument; and
James and Christine were listening to his criticisms and remarks. They
all stopped before a shop over the windows of which was painted,
"David Cameron, Dealer in Fine Teas;" and David, taking a large key
from his pocket, opened the door, and said,

"Come in and eat wi' us, James; ye ken ye're welcome."

"Our friendship, Mr. Cameron, is a kind of Montgomery division--all on
one side, nothing on the other; but I am 'so by myself' that I thank
you heartily."

So David, followed by Christine and James, passed slowly through the
darkened store, with its faint smells of Eastern spices and fragrant
teas, into the little parlor beyond. The early winter night had now
fallen, and the room, having only an outlet into a small court, would
have been dark also but for the red glow of the "covered" fire. David
took the poker and struck the great block of coal, and instantly the
cheerful blaze threw an air of cosey and almost picturesque comfort
over the homelike room.

The two men sat down beside the fire, spreading their hands to its
warmth, and apparently finding their own thoughts excellent company,
for neither of them spoke or moved until Christine reappeared. She had
divested herself of the handsome black satin and velvet which formed
her kirk suit; but in her long, plain dress of gray winsey, with a
snowy lawn kerchief and cuffs, she looked still more fair and lovable.

James watched her as she spread the cloth and produced from various
cupboards cold meats and pastries, bread and cakes, and many kinds of
delicate preserves and sweetmeats. Her large, shapely hands among the
gold-and-white china fascinated him, while her calm, noiseless,
unhurried movements induced a feeling of passive repose that it
required an effort to dispel, when she said in a low, even voice,

"Father, the food is waiting for the blessing."

It was a silent but by no means an unhappy meal. David was a good man,
and he ate his food graciously and gratefully, dropping now and then a
word of praise or thanks; and James felt it delightful enough to watch
Christine. For James, though he had not yet admitted the fact to his
own heart, loved Christine Cameron as men love only once, with that
deep, pure affection that has perchance a nearer kindred than this
life has hinted of.

He thought her also exquisitely beautiful, though this opinion would
not have been indorsed by a majority of men. For Christine had one of
those pale, statuesque faces apt to be solemn in repose; its beauty
was tender and twilight, its expression serious and steadfast, and her
clear, spiritual eyes held in them no light of earthly passion. She
had grown up in that little back parlor amid the din and tumult of the
city, under the gray, rainy skies, and surrounded by care and sin, as
a white lily grows out of the dark, damp soil, drawing from the
elements around only sweetness and purity.

She was very silent this afternoon, but apparently very happy. Indeed,
there was an expression on her face which attracted her father's
attention, and he said,

"The sermon has pleased thee well, I see, Christine."

"The sermon was good, but the text was enough, father. I think it over
in my heart, and it leaves a light on all the common things of life."
And she repeated it softly, "O Thou preserver of men, unto Thee shall
all flesh come."

David lifted his bonnet reverently, and James, who was learned in what
the Scotch pleasantly call "the humanities," added slowly,

  "'But I, the mortal,
  Planted so lowly, with death to bless me,
  I sorrow no longer.'"

When people have such subjects of conversation, they talk
moderately--for words are but poor interpreters of emotions whose
sources lie in the depths of eternity. But they were none the less
happy, and James felt as if he had been sitting at one of those tables
which the Lord "prepareth in the wilderness," where the "cup runneth
over" with joy and content.

Such moments rarely last long; and it is doubtful if we could bear to
keep the soul always to its highest bent. When Christine had sided
away the dishes and put in order the little room, David laid down his
pipe, and said, "The Lord's day being now over, I may speak anent my
ain matters. I had a letter, Christine, on Saturday, from my
brother-in-law, McFarlane. He says young Donald will be in Glasgow
next week."

"Will he stay here, father?"

"Na, na; he'll bide wi' the McFarlanes. They are rich folk; but siller
is nae sin--an' it be clean-won siller."

"Then why did Uncle McFarlane write to you, father?"

"He wrote concerning the lad's pecuniary matters, Christine. Young
Donald will need gude guiding; and he is my sister Jessie's only
bairn--blood is thicker than water, ye'll allow that--and Donald is o'
gentle blood. I'm no saying that's everything; but it is gude to come
o' a gude kind."

"The McFarlanes have aye been for the pope and the Stuarts," said
James, a little scornfully. "They were 'out' in the '79'; and they
would pin the white cockade on to-morrow, if there was ever a Stuart
to bid them do it."

"Maybe they would, James. Hielandmen hae a way o' sticking to auld
friends. There's Camerons I wadna go bail for, if Prince Charlie could
come again; but let that flea stick to the wa'. And the McFarlanes
arena exactly papist noo; the twa last generations hae been
'Piscopals--that's ane step ony way towards the truth. Luther mayna be
John Knox, but they'll win up to him some time, dootless they will."

"How old is young McFarlane?" asked James.

"He is turned twenty--a braw lad, his father says. I hae ne'er seen
him, but he's Jessie's bairn, and my heart gaes out to meet him."

"Why did you not tell me on Saturday, father? I could have spoken for
Maggie Maclean to help me put the house in order."

"I didna get the letter till the evening post. It was most as good as
Sabbath then. Housecleaning is an unco temptation to women-folk, so I
keepit the news till the Sabbath sun was weel set."

During this conversation James Blackie's heart had become heavy with
some sad presentiment of trouble, such as arise very naturally in
similar circumstances. As a poet says,

  "Ah, no! it is not all delusion,
    That strange intelligence of sorrow
  Searching the tranquil heart's seclusion,
    Making us quail before the morrow.
  'Tis the farewell of happiness departing,
    The sudden tremor of a soul at rest;
  The wraith of coming grief upstarting
    Within the watchful breast."

He listened to David Cameron's reminiscences of his bonnie sister
Jessie, and of the love match she had made with the great Highland
chieftain, with an ill-disguised impatience. He had a Lowlander's
scorn for the thriftless, fighting, freebooting traditions of the
Northern clans and a Calvinist's dislike to the Stuarts and the
Stuarts' faith; so that David's unusual emotion was exceedingly and,
perhaps, unreasonably irritating to him. He could not bear to hear him
speak with trembling voice and gleaming eyes of the grand mountains
and the silent corries around Ben-Nevis, the red deer trooping over
the misty steeps, and the brown hinds lying among the green plumes of
fern, and the wren and the thrush lilting in song together.

"Oh, the bonnie, bonnie Hielands!" cried David with a passionate
affection; "it is always Sabbath up i' the mountains, Christine. I
maun see them once again ere I lay by my pilgrim-staff and shoon for
ever."

"Then you are not Glasgow born, Mr. Cameron," said James, with the air
of one who finds out something to another's disadvantage.

"Me! Glasgo' born! Na, na, man! I was born among the mountains o'
Argyle. It was a sair downcome fra them to the Glasgo' pavements. But
I'm saying naething against Glasgo'. I was but thinking o' the days
when I wore the tartan and climbed the hills in the white dawns, and,
kneeling on the top o' Ben Na Keen, saw the sun sink down wi' a smile.
It's little ane sees o' sunrising or sunsetting here, James," and
David sighed heavily and wiped away the tender mist from his sight.

James looked at the old man with some contempt; he himself had been
born and reared in one or other of the closest and darkest streets of
the city. The memories of his loveless, hard-worked childhood were
bitter to him, and he knew nothing of the joy of a boyhood spent in
the hills and woods.

"Life is the same everywhere, Mr. Cameron. I dare say there is as much
sin and as much worry and care among the mountains as on the Glasgow
pavements."

"You may 'daur say' it, James, but that winna mak it true. Even in
this warld our Father's house has many mansions. Gang your way up and
up through thae grand solitudes and ye'll blush to be caught worrying
among them."

And then in a clear, jubilant voice he broke into the old Scotch
version of the 121st Psalm:

  "I to the hills will lift mine eyes
    from whence doth come mine aid;
  My safety cometh from the Lord,
    who heaven and earth hath made."

And he sang it to that loveliest of all psalm tunes, Rathiel's "St.
Mary's." It was impossible to resist the faith, the enthusiasm, the
melody. At the second bar Christine's clear, sweet voice joined in,
and at the second line James was making a happy third.

  "Henceforth thy goings out and in
    God keep for ever will."

"Thae twa lines will do for a 'Gude-night,'" said David in the pause
at the end of the psalm, and James rose with a sigh and wrapped his
plaid around him.



CHAPTER II.


James had gone into the house so happy and hopeful, he left it so
anxious and angry--yes, angry. He knew well that he had no just cause
for anger, but that knowledge only irritated him the more. Souls, as
well as bodies, are subject to malignant diseases, and to-night envy
and jealousy were causing James Blackie more acute suffering than any
attack of fever or contagion. A feeling of dislike towards young
Donald McFarlane had taken possession of his heart; he lay awake to
make a mental picture of the youth, and then he hated the picture he
had made.

Feverish and miserable, he went next morning to the bank in which he
was employed, and endeavored amid the perplexities of compound
interest to forget the anxieties he had invented for himself. But it
was beyond his power, and he did not pray about them; for the burdens
we bind on our own shoulders we rarely dare to go to God with, and
James might have known from this circumstance alone that his trouble
was no lawful one. He nursed it carefully all day and took it to bed
with him again at night. The next day he had begun to understand how
envy grew to hatred, and hatred to murder. Still he did not go to God
for help, and still he kept ever before his eyes the image of the
youth that he had determined was to be his enemy.

On Thursday night he could no longer bear his uncertainties. He
dressed himself carefully and went to David Cameron's. David was in
his shop tasting and buying teas, and apparently absorbed in business.
He merely nodded to James, and bid him "walk through." He had no
intention of being less kindly than usual, but James was in such a
suspicious temper that he took his preoccupation for coolness, and so
it was almost with a resentful feeling he opened the half-glass door
dividing the shop from the parlor.

As his heart had foretold him, there sat the youth whom he had
determined to hate, but his imagination had greatly deceived him with
regard to his appearance. He had thought of Donald only as a "fair,
false Highlander" in tartan, kilt, and philibeg. He found him a tall,
dark youth, richly dressed in the prevailing Southern fashion, and
retaining no badge of his country's costume but the little Glengary
cap with its chieftain's token of an eagle's feather. His manners were
not rude and haughty, as James had decided they would be; they were
singularly frank and pleasant. Gracious and graceful, exceedingly
handsome and light-hearted, he was likely to prove a far more
dangerous rival than even James' jealous heart had anticipated.

He rose at Christine's introduction, and offered his hand with a
pleasant smile to James. The latter received the courtesy with such
marked aversion that Donald slightly raised his eyebrows ere he
resumed his interrupted conversation with Christine. And now that
James sat down with a determination to look for offences he found
plenty. Christine was sewing, and Donald sat beside her winding and
unwinding her threads, playing with her housewife, or teasingly hiding
her scissors. Christine, half pleased and half annoyed, gradually fell
into Donald's mood, and her still face dimpled into smiles. James very
quickly decided that Donald presumed in a very offensive manner on his
relationship to Christine.

A little after nine o'clock David, having closed his shop, joined them
in the parlor. He immediately began to question James about the loss
of the "Bonnie Bess," and from that subject they drifted easily into
others of a local business interest. It was very natural that Donald,
being a stranger both to the city and its business, should take no
part in this discourse, and that he should, in consequence, devote
himself to Christine. But James felt it an offence, and rose much
earlier than was his wont to depart. David stayed him, almost
authoritatively:

"Ye maun stop, baith o' ye lads, and join in my meat and worship. They
are ill visitors that canna sit at ane board and kneel at ane altar."

For David had seen, through all their drifting talk of ships and
cargoes, the tumult in James' heart, and he did not wish him to go
away in an ungenerous and unjust temper. So both Donald and James
partook of the homely supper of pease brose and butter, oatmeal cakes
and fresh milk, and then read aloud with David and Christine the
verses of the evening Psalm that came to each in turn. James was much
softened by the exercise; so much so that when Donald asked permission
to walk with him as far as their way lay together, he very pleasantly
acceded to the request. And Donald was so bright and unpretentious it
was almost impossible to resist the infectious good temper which
seemed to be his characteristic.

Still James was very little happier or more restful. He lay awake
again, but this night it was not to fret and fume, but to calmly think
over his position and determine what was best and right to do. For
James still thought of "right," and would have been shocked indeed if
any angel of conscience had revealed to him the lowest depths of his
desires and intentions. In the first place, he saw that David would
tolerate no element of quarrelling and bitterness in his peaceful
home, and that if he would continue to visit there he must preserve
the semblance of friendship for Donald McFarlane. In the second, he
saw that Donald had already made so good his lien upon his uncle's and
cousin's affections that it would be very hard to make them believe
wrong of the lad, even if he should do wrong, though of this James
told himself there would soon be abundance.

"For the things David will think sinful beyond all measure," he
argued, "will seem but Puritanical severity to him; forbye, he is
rich, gay, handsome, and has little to do with his time, he'll get
well on to Satan's ground before he knows it;" and then some whisper
dim and low in his soul made him blush and pause and defer the
following out of a course which was to begin in such a way.

So Donald and he fell into the habit of meeting at David's two or
three nights every week, and an apparent friendship sprang up between
them. It was only apparent, however. On Donald's side was that
good-natured indifference that finds it easy enough to say smooth
words, and is not ready to think evil or to take offence; on James'
part a wary watchfulness, assuming the role of superior wisdom, half
admiring and half condemning Donald's youthful spirits and ways.

David was quite deceived; he dropped at once the authoritative manner
which had marked his displeasure when he perceived James' disposition
to envy and anger; he fell again into his usual pleasant familiar
talks with the young man, for David thought highly of James as of one
likely to do his duty to God and himself.

In these conversations Donald soon began to take a little share, and
when he chose to do so, evinced a thought and shrewdness which greatly
pleased his uncle; more generally, however, he was at Christine's
side, reading her some poem he had copied, or telling her about some
grand party he had been at. Sometimes James could catch a few words of
reproof addressed in a gentle voice to Donald by Christine; more often
he heard only the murmur of an earnest conversation, or Christine's
low laugh at some amusing incident.

The little room meanwhile had gradually become a far brighter place.
Donald kept it sweet and bright with his daily offerings of fresh
flowers; the pet canary he had given Christine twittered and sang to
her all the day through. Over Christine herself had come the same
bright change; her still, calm face often dimpled into smiles, her
pale-gold hair was snooded with a pretty ribbon, and her dress a
little richer. Yet, after all, the change was so slight that none but
a lover would have noticed it. But there was not a smile or a shade of
brighter color that James did not see; and he bore it with an
equanimity which used often to astonish himself, though it would not
have done so if he had dared just once to look down into his heart; he
bore it because he knew that Donald was living two lives--one that
Christine saw, and one that she could not even have imagined.

It was, alas, too true that this gay, good-natured young man, who had
entered the fashionable world without one bad habit, was fast becoming
proficient in all its follies and vices. That kind of negative
goodness which belonged naturally to him, unfortified by strict habits
and strong principles, had not been able to repel the seductions and
temptations that assail young men, rich, handsome, and well-born.
There was an evil triumph in James' heart one night when Donald said
to him, as they walked home after an evening at David's,

"Mr. Blackie, I wish you could lend me L20. I am in a little trouble,
and I cannot ask Uncle David for more, as I have already overdrawn my
father's allowance."

James loaned it with an eager willingness, though he was usually very
cautious and careful of every bawbee of his hard-earned money. He knew
it was but the beginning of confidence, and so it proved; in a very
little while Donald had fallen into the habit of going to James in
every emergency, and of making him the confidant of all his youthful
hopes and follies.

James even schooled himself to listen patiently to Donald's praises of
his cousin Christine. "She is just the wife I shall need when I settle
down in three or four years," Donald would say complacently, "and I
think she loves me. Of course no man is worthy of such a woman, but
when I have seen life a little I mean to try and be so."

"Umph!" answered James scornfully, "do you suppose, Mr. McFarlane,
that ye'll be fit for a pure lassie like Christine Cameron when you
have played the prodigal and consorted with foolish women, and wasted
your substance in riotous living?"

And Donald said with an honest blush, "By the memory of my mother, no,
I do not, James. And I am ashamed when I think of Christine's white
soul and the stained love I have to offer it. But women forgive! Oh,
what mothers and wives and sisters there are in this world!"

"Well, don't try Christine too far, Donald. She is of an old
Covenanting stock; her conscience feels sin afar off. I do not believe
she would marry a bad, worldly man, though it broke her heart to say
'No.' I have known her far longer than you have."

"Tut, man, I love her! I know her better in an hour than you could do
in a lifetime;" and Donald looked rather contemptuously on the plain
man who was watching him with eyes that might have warned any one more
suspicious or less confident and self-satisfied.



CHAPTER III.


The summer brought some changes. Christine went to