A Noble Life Part 3

"And may I have a boat on that beautiful loch, and be rowed about just where I please? Malcolm says it would not shake me nearly so much as the carriage. May I go to the kirk every Sunday, and see every thing and every body, and read as many books as ever I choose? Oh, How happy I shall be!--as happy as a king!"

"G.o.d help thee, my lamb!" muttered Mrs. Campbell to herself, while even Mr. Menteith turned his face sedulously toward the loch and took snuff violently.

By this time, they had reached the church door, where the congregation were already gathering and hanging about, as Scotch congregations do, till service begins. But of this service and this Sunday, which was so strangely momentous a day in more lives than one, the next chapter must tell.

Chapter 3

The carriage of the Earl of Cairnforth, with its familiar and yet long unfamiliar liveries, produced a keen sensation among the simple folk who formed the congregation of Cairnforth. But they had too much habitual respect for the great house and great folk of the place, mingled with their national shyness and independence, to stare very much. A few moved aside to make way for the two grand Edinburg footmen who leaped down from their perch in order to render customary a.s.sistance to the occupants of the carriage.

Mrs. Campbell and Mr. Menteith descended first, and then the two footmen looked puzzled as to what they should do next.

But Malcolm was before them--Malcolm, who never suffered mortal man but himself to render the least a.s.sistance to his young master; who watched and tended him; waited on and fed him in the day, and slept in his room at night; who, in truth, had now, for a year past, slipped into all the offices of a nurse as well as servant, and performed them with a woman's tenderness, care, and skill. Lord Cairnforth's eyes brightened when he saw him; and, carried in Malcolm's arms--a few stragglers of the congregation standing aside to let them pa.s.s--the young earl was brought to the door of the kirk where his family had worshiped for generations.

Two elders stood there beside the plate--white-headed farmers, who remembered both the late lord and the one before him.

"You's the earl," whispered they, and came forward respectfully; then, startled by the unexpected and pitiful sight, they shrank back; but either the boy did not notice this, or was so used to it that he showed no surprise.

"My purse, Malcolm," the small, soft voice was heard to say.

"Ay, my lord. What will ye put into the plate?"

"A guinea, I think, today, because I am so very happy."

This answer, which the two elders overheard, was told by them next day to every body, and remembered along the loch-side for years.

Cairnforth Kirk, like most other Scotch churches of ancient date, is very plain within and without, and the congregation then consisted almost entirely of hillside farmers, shepherds, and the like, who arrived in families--dogs, and all, for the dogs always came to church, and behaved there as decorously as their masters. Many the people walked eight, ten, and even twelve miles, from the extreme boundary of the parish, and waited about in the kirk or kirk-yard on fine Sundays, and in the Manse kitchen on wet ones--which were much the most frequent--during the two hours' interval between sermons.

In the whole congregation there was hardly a person above the laboring cla.s.s except in the minister's pew and that belonging to the Castle, which had been newly lined and cushioned, and in a corner of which, safely deposited by Malcolm, the little earl now sat--sat always, even during the prayer, at which some of the congregation looked reprovingly round, but only saw the little figure wrapped in a plaid, and the sweet, wan, childish, and yet unchild-like face, with the curly dark hair, and large dark eyes.

Whatever in the earl was "no a'richt," it certainly could not be his mind, for a brighter, more intelligent countenance was never seen. It quite startled the minister with the intentness of its gaze from the moment he ascended the pulpit; and though he tried not to look that way, and was very nervous, he could not get over the impression it made. It was to him almost like a face from the grave--this strange, eerie child's face, so strongly resembling that of the dead countess, who, despite the difference in rank, had, during the brief year she lived and reigned at Cairnforth, been almost like an equal friend and companion to his own dead wife. Their two faces--Lady Cairnforth's as she looked the last time he saw her in her coffin, and his wife's as she lay in hers--mingled together, and affected him powerfully.

The good minister was not remarkable for the brilliance of his sermons, which he wrote and "committed"--that is, learned by heart, to deliver in pseudo-extempore fashion, as was the weary custom of most Scotch ministers of his time. But this Sunday, all that he had committed slipped clean out of his memory. He preached as he had never been known to preach before, and never preached again--with originality, power, eloquence; speaking from his deepest heart, as if the words thence pouring out had been supernaturally put into it; which, with a superst.i.tion that approached to sublimest faith, he afterward solemnly believe they had been.

The text was that verse about "all things working together for good to them that love G.o.d;" but, whatever the original discourse had been, it wandered off into a subject which all who knew the minister recognized as one perpetually close to his heart--submission to the will of G.o.d, whatever that will might be, and however incomprehensible it seemed to mortal eyes.

"Not, my friends," said he, after speaking for a long time on this head --speaking rather than sermonizing, which, like many cultivated but not very original minds, he was too p.r.o.ne to do--"not that I would encourage or excuse that weak yielding to calamity which looks like submission, but is, in fact, only cowardice; submitting to all things as to a sort of fatality, without struggling against them, or trying to distinguish how much of them is the will of G.o.d, and how much our own weak will; daunted by the first shadow of misfortune, especially misfortunes in our worldly affairs, wherein so much often happens for which we have ourselves only to blame. Submission to man is one thing, submission to G.o.d another. The latter is divine, the former is often merely contemptible. But even to the Almighty Father we should yield not a blind, crushed resignation, but an open-eyed obedience, like that we would fain win from our own children, desiring to make of them children, not slaves.

"My children--for I speak to the very youngest of you here, and do try to understand me if you can, or as much as you can--it is right --it is G.o.d's will--that you should resist, to the very last, any trial which is not inevitable. There are in this world countless sorrows, which, so far appears, we actually bring on ourselves and others by our own folly, wickedness, or weakness--which is often as fatal as wickedness; and then we blame providence for it, and sink into total despair. But when, as sometimes happens, His heavy hand is laid upon us in a visible, inevitable misfortune which we can not struggle against, and from which no human aid can save us, then we ought to learn His hardest lesson--to submit. To submit--yet still, while saying 'Thy will be done,' to strive, so far as we can, to do it. If He have taken from us all but one talent, even that, my children, let us not bury in a napkin. Let us rather put it out a usury, leaving to Him to determine how much we shall receive again; for it is according to our use of what we have, and not of what we have not, that He will call us 'good and faithful servants,' and at last, when the long struggle of living shall be over, will bid us 'enter into the joy of our Lord.'"

When the minister sat down, he saw, as he had seen consciously or unconsciously, all through the service, and above the entire congregation, those two large intent eyes fixed upon him from the Cairnforth pew.

Children of ten years old do not usually listen much to sermons, but the little earl had heard very few, for it was difficult to take him to church without so many people staring at him. Nevertheless, he listened to this sermon, so plain and clear, suited to the capacity of ignorant shepherds and little children, and seemed as if he understood it all.

If he did not then, he did afterward.

When service was over, he sat watching the congregation pa.s.s out, especially noticing a family of boys who occupied the adjoining pew.

They had neither father nor mother with them, but an elder sister, as she appeared to be--a tall girl of about fifteen. She marshaled them out before her, not allowing them once to turn, as many of the other people did, to look with curiosity at the poor little earl. But in quitting the kirk she stopped at the vestry door, apparently to say a word to the minister; after which Mr. Cardross came forward, his gown over his arm, and spoke to Mr. Menteith--

"Where is Lord Cairnforth? I was so glad to see him here."

"Thank you, Mr. Cardross," replied a weak but cheerful voice from Malcolm's shoulder, which so startled the good minister that he found not another word for a whole minute. At last he said, hesitating,

"Helen has just been reminding me that the earl and countess used always to come and rest at the Manse between sermons. Would Lord Cairnforth like to do the same? It is a good way to the Castle--or perhaps he is too fatigued for the afternoon service?"

"Oh no, I should like it very much. And, nurse, I do so want to see Mr.

Cardross's children; and Helen--who is Helen?"

"My daughter. Come here, Helen, and speak to the earl."

She came forward--the tall girl who had sat at the end of the pew, in charge of the six boys--came forward in her serious, gentle, motherly way--alas! She was the only mother at the Manse now--and put out her hand, but instinctively drew it back again; for oh! what poor, helpless, unnatural-looking fingers were feebly advanced an inch or so to meet hers! They actually shocked her--gave her a sick sense of physical repulsion; but she conquered it. Then, by a sudden impulse of conscience, quite forgetting the rank of the earl, and only thinking of the poor, crippled, orphaned baby--for he seemed no more than a baby --Helen did what her warm, loving heart was in the habit of doing, as silent consolation for every thing, to her own tribe of "motherless bairns"--she stooped forward and kissed him.

The little earl was so astonished that he blushed up to the very brow.

But from that minute he loved Helen Cardross, and never ceased loving her to the end of his days.

She led the way to the Manse, which was so close behind the kirk that the back windows of it looked on the grave-yard. But in front there was a beautiful lawn and garden--the prettiest Manse garden that ever was seen. Helen stepped through it with her light, quick step, a child clinging to each hand, often turning round to speak to Malcolm or to the earl. He followed her with his eyes and thought she was like a picture he had once seen of a guardian angel leading two children along, though there was not a bit of the angel about Helen Cardross--externally at least, she being one of those large, rosy, round-face, flaxen-haired Scotch girls who are far from pretty even in youth, and in middle age sometimes grow quite coa.r.s.e and plain. She would not do so, and did not; for any body so good, so sweet, so bright, must always carry about with her, even to old age, something which, if not beauty's self, is beauty's atmosphere, and which often creates, even around unlovely people, a light and glory as perfect as the atmosphere round the sun.

She took her seat--her poor mother's that used to be--at the head of the Manse table--which was a little quieter on Sundays than week-days, and especially this Sunday, when the children were all awed and shy before their new visitor. Helen had previously taken them all aside, and explained to them that they were not to notice any thing in the earl that was different from other people--that he was a poor little crippled boy who had neither father, mother, brother, nor sister, that they were to be very kind to him, but not to look at him much, and to make no remarks upon him on any account whatever.

And so, even though he was placed on baby's high chair, and fed by Malcolm almost as if he were a baby--he who, though no bigger than a baby, was in reality a boy of ten years old, whom papa talked to, and who talked with papa almost as cleverly as Helen herself--still the Manse children were so well behaved that nothing occurred to make any body uncomfortable.

For the little earl, he seemed to enjoy himself amazingly. He sat in his high chair, and looked round the well-filled table with mingled curiosity and amus.e.m.e.nt; inquired the children's names, and was greatly interested in the dog, the cat, a rabbit, and two kittens, which after dinner they successively brought to amuse him. And then he invited them all to the Castle next day, and promised to take them over his garden there.

"But how can you take us?" said the youngest, in spite of Helen's frown.

"We can run about, but you--"

"I can't run about, that is true; but I have a little carriage, and Malcolm draws it, or Malcolm carries me, and then I can see such a deal.

I used to see nothing--only lie on a sofa all day, and have doctors coming about me and hurting me," added the poor little earl, growing confidential, as one by one the boys slipped away, leaving him alone with Helen.

"Did they hurt you very much:" asked she.

"Oh, terribly; but I never told. You see, there was no use in telling; it could not be helped, and it would only have made nurse cry--she always cries over me. I think that is why I like Malcolm; he always helps me, and he never cries. And I am getting a great boy now; I was ten years old last week."

Ten years old, though he seemed scarcely more than five, except by the old look of his face. But Helen took no notice, only saying "that she hoped the doctors did not hurt him now."

"No, that is all over. Dr Hamilton says I am to be left to Nature, whatever that is; I overheard him say it one day. And I begged of Mr.

Menteith not to shut me up any longer, or take me out only in my carriage, but to let me go about as I like, Malcolm carrying me-- isn't he a big, strong fellow? You can't think how nice it is to be carried about, and see every thing--oh, it makes me so happy!"

The tone in which he said "so happy" made the tears start to Helen's eyes. She turned away to the window, where she saw her own big brothers, homely-featured, and coa.r.s.ely clad, but full of health, and strength, and activity, and then looked at this poor boy, who had every thing that fortune could give, and yet--nothing! She thought how they grumbled and squabbled, those rough lads of hers; how she herself often felt the burden of the large narrow household more than she could bear, and lost heart and temper; then she thought of him--poor, helpless soul!--you could hardly say body--who could neither move hand nor foot--who was dependent as an infant on the kindness or compa.s.sion of those about him. Yet he talked of being "so happy!" And there entered into Helen Cardross's good heart toward the Earl of Cairn forth a deep tenderness, which from that hour nothing ever altered or estranged.

It was not pity--something far deeper. Had he been fretful, fractious, disagreeable, she would still have been very sorry for him and very kind to him. But now, to see him as he was--cheerful, patient; so ready with his interest in others, so utterly without envying and complaining regarding himself--changed what would otherwise have been mere compa.s.sion into actual reverence. As she sat beside him in his little chair, not looking at him much, for she still found it difficult to overcome the painful impression of the sight of that crippled and deformed body, she felt a choking in her throat and a dimness in her eyes--a longing to do any thing in the wide world that would help or comfort the poor little earl.

"Do you learn any lessons?" asked she, thinking he seemed to enjoy talking with her. "I thought at dinner today that you seemed to know a great many things."

"Did I? That is very odd, for I fancied I knew nothing; and I want to learn every thing--if Mr. Cardross will teach me. I should like to sit and read all day long. I could do it by myself, now that I have found out a way of holding the book and turning over the leaves without nurse's helping me. Malcolm invented it--Malcolm is so clever and so kind."