Guy Mannering Or the Astrologer Part 41

But while the farmer stopped to make his bow, Bertram, dizzied with the sudden glare of light, and bewildered with the circ.u.mstances of his situation, almost unconsciously entered the open door of the parlour, and confronted the Colonel, who was just advancing towards it. The strong light of the apartment left no doubt of his ident.i.ty, and he himself was as much confounded with the appearance of those to whom he so unexpectedly presented himself as they were by the sight of so utterly unlooked-for an object. It must be remembered that each individual present had their own peculiar reasons for looking with terror upon what seemed at first sight a spectral apparition. Mannering saw before him the man whom he supposed he had killed in India; Julia beheld her lover in a most peculiar and hazardous situation; and Lucy Bertram at once knew the person who had fired upon young Hazlewood. Bertram, who interpreted the fixed and motionless astonishment of the Colonel into displeasure at his intrusion, hastened to say that it was involuntary, since he had been hurried hither without even knowing whither he was to be transported.

'Mr. Brown, I believe!' said Colonel Mannering.

'Yes, sir,' replied the young man, modestly, but with firmness, 'the same you knew in India; and who ventures to hope, that what you did then know of him is not such as should prevent his requesting you would favour him with your attestation to his character as a gentleman and man of honour.'

'Mr. Brown, I have been seldom-never-so much surprised; certainly, sir, in whatever pa.s.sed between us you have a right to command my favourable testimony.'

At this critical moment entered the Counsellor and Dinmont. The former beheld to his astonishment the Colonel but just recovering from his first surprise, Lucy Bertram ready to faint with terror, and Miss Mannering in an agony of doubt and apprehension, which she in vain endeavoured to disguise or suppress. 'What is the meaning of all this?' said he; 'has this young fellow brought the Gorgon's head in his hand? let me look at him. By Heaven!' he muttered to himself, 'the very image of old Ellangowan! Yes, the same manly form and handsome features, but with a world of more intelligence in the face. Yes! the witch has kept her word.' Then instantly pa.s.sing to Lucy, 'Look at that man, Miss Bertram, my dear; have you never seen any one like him?'

Lucy had only ventured one glance at this object of terror, by which, however, from his remarkable height and appearance, she at once recognised the supposed a.s.sa.s.sin of young Hazlewood, a conviction which excluded, of course, the more favourable a.s.sociation of ideas which might have occurred on a closer view. 'Don't ask me about him, sir,' said she, turning away her eyes; 'send him away, for Heaven's sake! we shall all be murdered!'

'Murdered! where's the poker?' said the Advocate in some alarm; 'but nonsense! we are three men besides the servants, and there is honest Liddesdale, worth half-a-dozen, to boot; we have the major vis upon our side. However, here, my friend Dandie-Davie-what do they call you? keep between that fellow and us for the protection of the ladies.'

'Lord! Mr. Pleydell,' said the astonished farmer, 'that's Captain Brown; d 'ye no ken the Captain?'

'Nay, if he's a friend of yours we may be safe enough,' answered Pleydell; 'but keep near him.'

All this pa.s.sed with such rapidity that it was over before the Dominie had recovered himself from a fit of absence, shut the book which he had been studying in a corner, and, advancing to obtain a sight of the strangers, exclaimed at once upon beholding Bertram, 'If the grave can give up the dead, that is my dear and honoured master!'

'We're right after all, by Heaven! I was sure I was right,' said the Lawyer; 'he is the very image of his father. Come, Colonel, what do you think of, that you do not bid your guest welcome? I think-I believe-I trust we're right; never saw such a likeness! But patience; Dominie, say not a word. Sit down, young gentleman.'

'I beg pardon, sir; if I am, as I understand, in Colonel Mannering's house, I should wish first to know if my accidental appearance here gives offence, or if I am welcome?'

Mannering instantly made an effort. 'Welcome? most certainly, especially if you can point out how I can serve you. I believe I may have some wrongs to repair towards you, I have often suspected so; but your sudden and unexpected appearance, connected with painful recollections, prevented my saying at first, as I now say, that whatever has procured me the honour of this visit, it is an acceptable one.'

Bertram bowed with an air of distant yet civil acknowledgment to the grave courtesy of Mannering.

'Julia, my love, you had better retire. Mr. Brown, you will excuse my daughter; there are circ.u.mstances which I perceive rush upon her recollection.'

Miss Mannering rose and retired accordingly; yet, as she pa.s.sed Bertram, could not suppress the words, 'Infatuated! a second time!' but so p.r.o.nounced as to be heard by him alone. Miss Bertram accompanied her friend, much surprised, but without venturing a second glance at the object of her terror. Some mistake she saw there was, and was unwilling to increase it by denouncing the stranger as an a.s.sa.s.sin. He was known, she saw, to the Colonel, and received as a gentleman; certainly he either was not the person she suspected or Hazlewood was right in supposing the shot accidental.

The remaining part of the company would have formed no bad group for a skilful painter. Each was too much embarra.s.sed with his own sensations to observe those of the others. Bertram most unexpectedly found himself in the house of one whom he was alternately disposed to dislike as his personal enemy and to respect as the father of Julia. Mannering was struggling between his high sense of courtesy and hospitality, his joy at finding himself relieved from the guilt of having shed life in a private quarrel, and the former feelings of dislike and prejudice, which revived in his haughty mind at the sight of the object against whom he had entertained them. Sampson, supporting his shaking limbs by leaning on the back of a chair, fixed his eyes upon Bertram with a staring expression of nervous anxiety which convulsed his whole visage. Dinmont, enveloped in his loose s.h.a.ggy great-coat, and resembling a huge bear erect upon his hinder legs, stared on the whole scene with great round eyes that witnessed his amazement.

The Counsellor alone was in his element: shrewd, prompt, and active, he already calculated the prospect of brilliant success in a strange, eventful, and mysterious lawsuit, and no young monarch, flushed with hopes, and at the head of a gallant army, could experience more glee when taking the field on his first campaign. He bustled about with great energy, and took the arrangement of the whole explanation upon himself.

'Come, come, gentlemen, sit down; this is all in my province; you must let me arrange it for you. Sit down, my dear Colonel, and let me manage; sit down, Mr. Brown, aut quocunque alio nomine vocaris; Dominie, take your seat; draw in your chair, honest Liddesdale.'

'I dinna ken, Mr. Pleydell,' said Dinmont, looking at his dreadnought coat, then at the handsome furniture of the room; 'I had maybe better gang some gate else, and leave ye till your cracks, I'm no just that weel put on.'

The Colonel, who by this time recognised Dandie, immediately went up and bid him heartily welcome; a.s.suring him that, from what he had seen of him in Edinburgh, he was sure his rough coat and thick-soled boots would honour a royal drawing-room.

'Na, na, Colonel, we're just plain up-the-country folk; but nae doubt I would fain hear o' ony pleasure that was gaun to happen the Captain, and I'm sure a' will gae right if Mr. Pleydell will take his bit job in hand.'

'You're right, Dandie; spoke like a Hieland [Footnote: It may not be unnecessary to tell southern readers that the mountainous country in the south western borders of Scotland is called Hieland, though totally different from the much more mountainous and more extensive districts of the north, usually called Hielands.] oracle; and now be silent. Well, you are all seated at last; take a gla.s.s of wine till I begin my catechism methodically. And now,' turning to Bertram, 'my dear boy, do you know who or what you are?'

In spite of his perplexity the catechumen could not help laughing at this commencement, and answered, 'Indeed, sir, I formerly thought I did; but I own late circ.u.mstances have made me somewhat uncertain.'

'Then tell us what you formerly thought yourself.'

'Why, I was in the habit of thinking and calling myself Vanbeest Brown, who served as a cadet or volunteer under Colonel Mannering, when he commanded the-regiment, in which capacity I was not unknown to him.'

'There,' said the Colonel, 'I can a.s.sure Mr. Brown of his ident.i.ty; and add, what his modesty may have forgotten, that he was distinguished as a young man of talent and spirit.'

'So much the better, my dear sir,' said Mr. Pleydell; 'but that is to general character. Mr. Brown must tell us where he was born.'

'In Scotland, I believe, but the place uncertain.'

'Where educated?'

'In Holland, certainly.'

'Do you remember nothing of your early life before you left Scotland?'

'Very imperfectly; yet I have a strong idea, perhaps more deeply impressed upon me by subsequent hard usage, that I was during my childhood the object of much solicitude and affection. I have an indistinct remembrance of a good-looking man whom I used to call papa, and of a lady who was infirm in health, and who, I think, must have been my mother; but it is an imperfect and confused recollection. I remember too a tall, thin, kind-tempered man in black, who used to teach me my letters and walk out with me; and I think the very last time-'

Here the Dominie could contain no longer. While every succeeding word served to prove that the child of his benefactor stood before him, he had struggled with the utmost difficulty to suppress his emotions; but when the juvenile recollections of Bertram turned towards his tutor and his precepts he was compelled to give way to his feelings. He rose hastily from his chair, and with clasped hands, trembling limbs, and streaming eyes, called out aloud, 'Harry Bertram! look at me; was I not the man?'

'Yes!' said Bertram, starting from his seat as if a sudden light had burst in upon his mind; 'yes; that was my name! And that is the voice and the figure of my kind old master!'

The Dominie threw himself into his arms, pressed him a thousand times to his bosom in convulsions of transport which shook his whole frame, sobbed hysterically, and at length, in the emphatic language of Scripture, lifted up his voice and wept aloud. Colonel Mannering had recourse to his handkerchief; Pleydell made wry faces, and wiped the gla.s.ses of his spectacles; and honest Dinmont, after two loud blubbering explosions, exclaimed, 'Deil's in the man! he's garr'd me do that I haena done since my auld mither died.'

'Come, come,' said the Counsellor at last, 'silence in the court. We have a clever party to contend with; we must lose no time in gathering our information; for anything I know there may be something to be done before daybreak.'

'I will order a horse to be saddled if you please,' said the Colonel.

'No, no, time enough, time enough. But come, Dominie, I have allowed you a competent s.p.a.ce to express your feelings. I must circ.u.mduce the term; you must let me proceed in my examination.'

The Dominie was habitually obedient to any one who chose to impose commands upon him: he sunk back into his chair, spread his chequered handkerchief over his face, to serve, as I suppose, for the Grecian painter's veil, and, from the action of his folded hands, appeared for a time engaged in the act of mental thanksgiving. He then raised his eyes over the screen, as if to be a.s.sured that the pleasing apparition had not melted into air; then again sunk them to resume his internal act of devotion, until he felt himself compelled to give attention to the Counsellor, from the interest which his questions excited.

'And now,' said Mr. Pleydell, after several minute inquiries concerning his recollection of early events-'and now, Mr. Bertram,-for I think we ought in future to call you by your own proper name-will you have the goodness to let us know every particular which you can recollect concerning the mode of your leaving Scotland?'

'Indeed, sir, to say the truth, though the terrible outlines of that day are strongly impressed upon my memory, yet somehow the very terror which fixed them there has in a great measure confounded and confused the details. I recollect, however, that I was walking somewhere or other, in a wood, I think-'

'O yes, it was in Warroch wood, my dear,' said the Dominie.

'Hush, Mr. Sampson,' said the Lawyer.

'Yes, it was in a wood,' continued Bertram, as long past and confused ideas arranged themselves in his reviving recollection; 'and some one was with me; this worthy and affectionate gentleman, I think.'

'O, ay, ay, Harry, Lord bless thee; it was even I myself.'

'Be silent, Dominie, and don't interrupt the evidence,' said Pleydell. 'And so, sir?' to Bertram.

'And so, sir,' continued Bertram, 'like one of the changes of a dream, I thought I was on horseback before my guide.'

'No, no,' exclaimed Sampson, 'never did I put my own limbs, not to say thine, into such peril.'

'On my word, this is intolerable! Look ye, Dominie, if you speak another word till I give you leave, I will read three sentences out of the Black Acts, whisk my cane round my head three times, undo all the magic of this night's work, and conjure Harry Bertram back again into Vanbeest Brown.'

'Honoured and worthy sir,' groaned out the Dominie, 'I humbly crave pardon; it was but verb.u.m volans.'

'Well, nolens volens, you must hold your tongue,' said Pleydell.