Olive Part 16

"Ay, ay, measter," was the answer, in rather unintelligible Doric; "thot bees Harbury Church, as sure as moy name's John Dent; and thot red house--conna ye see't?--thot's our parson's."

Prompted by curiosity, Rothesay observed, "Oh, Mr. Gwynne's. He is quite a young man, I believe? Do you like him, you good folks hereabout?"

"Some on us dun, and some on us dunna. He's not much of parson though; he wunna send yer to sleep wi' his long preachings. But oi say the mon's a good mon: he'll coom and see yer when you're bad, an' talk t' ye by th' hour; though he dunna talk oot o' th' Bible. But oi'm a lad o' t'

forest, and 'll be a keeper some toime. That's better nor book-larning."

Captain Rothesay had no will to listen to more personal revelations from honest John Dent; so he said, quickly, "Perhaps so, my good fellow."

Then added, "Mr. Gwynne has a mother living with him, I believe. What sort of person is she?"

"Her's a good-enough lady, oi reckon: only a bit too proud. Many's the blanket her's gen to poor folk; and my owd mother sees her every week--but her's never shook hands wi' her yet. Eh, measter, won ye go?"

This last remark was bellowed after Captain Rothesay, whose horse had commenced a sudden canter, which ceased not until its owner dismounted at the parsonage-gate.

This gate formed the boundary of the garden, and a most lovely spot it was. It extended to the churchyard, with which it communicated by a little wicket-door. You pa.s.sed through beautiful parterres and alleys, formed of fragrant shrubs, to the spot

Where grew the turf in many a mouldering heap.

It seemed as though the path of death were indeed through flowers.

Garden and churchyard covered the hill's summit; and from both might be discerned a view such as is rarely seen in level England. It was a panorama, extending some twenty or thirty miles across the country, where, through woodlands and meadow-lands, flowed the silver windings of a small river. Here and there was an old ruined castle--a manor-house rising among its ancestral trees--or the faint, misty smoke-cloud, that indicated some hamlet or small town. Save these, the landscape swept on unbroken, until it ended at the horizon in the high range of the D--shire hills.

Even to Captain Rothesay, this scene seemed strangely beautiful. He contemplated it for some time, his hand still on the unopened gate; and then he became aware that a lady, whose gardening dress and gardening implements showed she was occupied in her favourite evening employment, was looking at him with some curiosity.

The traces of life's downward path are easier to recognise than those of its ascent. Though the mature womanhood of Alison Balfour had glided into age, Rothesay had no difficulty in discovering that he was in the presence of his former friend. Not so with her. He advanced, addressed her by name, and even took her hand, before she had the slightest idea that her guest was Angus Rothesay.

"Have you, then, so entirely forgotten me--forgotten the days in our native Perthshire, when I was a bit laddie, and you, our guest, were Miss Alison Balfour?"

There came a trembling over her features--ay, aged woman as she was!

But at her years, all the past, whether of joy or grief, becomes faint; else, how would age be borne? She extended both her hands, with a warm friendliness.

"Welcome, Angus Rothesay! No wonder I did not know you. These thirty years--is it not thus much?--have changed you from a boy into a middle-aged man, and made of me an old woman."

She really was an elderly lady now. It seemed almost ridiculous to think of her as his youth's idol. Neither was she beautiful--how could he ever have imagined her so? Her irregular features--unnoticed when the white and red tints of youth adorned them--were now, in age, positively plain.

Her strong-built frame had, in losing elasticity, lost much of grace, though dignity remained. Looking on Mrs. Gwynne for the first time, she appeared a large, rather plain woman. Looking again, it would be to observe the n.o.ble candour that dwelt in the eyes, and the sweetness--at times even playfulness--that hovered round the mouth. Regarding her for the third time, you would see a woman whom you felt sure you must perforce respect, and might, in time, love very much, if she would let you. Of that gracious permission you would long have considerable doubt; but once granted, you would never unlove her to the end of your days.

As for her loving _you_, you would not be quite clear that it did not spring from the generous benevolence of her nature, rather than from any individual warmth toward yourself; and such was the reserve of her character, that, were her affection, ever so deep, she might possibly never let you know it until the day of your death.

Yet she was capable of attachments, strong as her own nature. All her feelings, pa.s.sions, energies, were on a grand scale: in her were no petty feminine follies--no weak, narrow illiberalities of judgment. She had the soul of a man and the heart of a woman.

"You were gardening, I see?" said Captain Rothesay, making the first ordinary remark that came to his mind to break the awkward pause.

"Yes; I do so every fine evening. Harold is very fond of flowers.

That reminds me I must call him to you at once, as it is Wednesday,--service-night, and he will be engaged in his duties soon."

"Pray, let us enter the house; I should much like to see your son," said Angus Rothesay. He gave her his arm; and they walked together, through the green alleys of holly, to the front-door. Then Mrs. Gwynne stopped, put her hand oyer her eyes for a moment, removed it, and looked earnestly at her guest.

"Angus Rothesay! how strange this seems!--like a dream--a dream of thirty years. Well, let us go in."

Mechanically, and yet in a subdued, absent manner, she laid her bonnet and shawl on the hall-table, and took off her gardening gloves, thereby discovering hands, which, though large, were white and well formed, and in their round, taper delicacy, exhibited no sign of age. Captain Rothesay, without pausing to think, took the right hand.

"Ah! you wear still the ring I used to play with when a boy. I thought"---- and recollecting himself, he stopped, ashamed of his discourtesy in alluding to what must have been a painful past.

But she said, quietly, sadly, "You have a good memory. Yes, I wear it again now. It was left to me, ten years since, on the death of Archibald Maclean."

Strange that she could thus speak that name! But over how many a buried grief does the gra.s.s grow green in thirty years!

In the hall they encountered a young man.

"Harold," said Mrs. Gwynne, "give welcome to an old--a very old friend of mine--Captain Angus Rothesay. Angus, this is my son--my only son, Harold."

And she looked upon him as a mother, widowed for twenty years, looks upon an only son; yet the pride was tempered with dignity, the affection was veiled under reserve. She, who doubtless would have sustained his life with her own heart's blood, had probably never since his boyhood suffered him to know a mother's pa.s.sionate tenderness, or to behold a mother's tear.

Perhaps that was the reason that Harold's whole manner was the reflection of her own. Not that he was like her in person; for nature had to him been far more bountiful. But there was a certain rigidness and harshness in his mien, and a slightly repellant atmosphere around him. Probably not one of the young lambs of his flock had ever dreamed of climbing the knee of the Reverend Harold Gwynne. Though he wore the clerical garb, he did not look at all apostle-like; he was neither a St.

Paul nor a St. John. Yet a grand, n.o.ble head it was. It might have been sketched for that of a young philosopher--a Galileo or a Priestley, with the heavy, strongly-marked brows. The eyes--hackneyed as the description is, no one can paint a man without mentioning his eyes: those of Harold Gwynne were not unlike his mother's, in their open, steadfast look; yet they were not soft, like hers, but of steel-grey, diamond-clear.

He carried his head very erect; and these eyes of his seemed as though unable to rest on the ground; they were always turned upwards, with a gaze--not reverent or dreamy--but eager, inquiring, and piercing as truth itself.

Such was the young man with whom Captain Rothesay shook hands, congratulating his old friend on having such a son.

"You are more fortunate than I," he said; "my marriage has only bestowed on me a daughter."

"Daughters are a great comfort sometimes," answered Mrs. Gwynne; "though, for my part, I never wished for one."

The quick, reproachful glance of Harold sought his mother's face; and shortly afterwards he re-entered his study.

"My son thinks I meant to include a daughter-in-law," was Mrs. Gwynne's remark, while the concealed playfulness about her mouth appeared. "He is soon to bring me one."

"I know it--and know her too; by this means I found you out. I should scarcely have imagined Sara Derwent the girl for you to choose."

"_He_ chooses, not I. A mother, whose dutiful son has been her sole stay through life, has no right to interfere with what he deems his happiness," said Alison, gravely. And, at that moment, the young curate reappeared, ready for the duties to which he was summoned by the sharp sound of the "church-going bell."

"I will stay at home with Captain Rothesay," observed Mrs. Gwynne.

Her guest made a courteous disclaimer, which ended in something about "religious duties."

"Hospitality is a duty too--at least we thought so in the north," she answered. "And old friendship is ever somewhat of a religion with me.

Therefore I will stay, Harold."

"You are right, mother," said Harold. But he would not that his mother had seen the smile which curled his lip as he pa.s.sed along the hall and through the garden towards the churchyard. There it faded into a look, dark and yet mournful; which, as it turned from the dust beneath his feet to the stars overhead, and then back again to the graves, seemed to ask despairingly, at once of heaven and earth, for the solution of some inward mystery.

While Harold preached, his mother and Captain Rothesay sat in the parsonage and talked of their olden days, now faint as a dream. The rising wind, which, sweeping over the wide champaign, came to moan in the hill-side trees, seemed to sing the dirge of that long-past life.

Yet the heart of both, even of Angus Rothesay, throbbed to its memory, as a Scottish heart ever does to that of home and the mountain-land.

Among other long unspoken names came that of Miss Flora Rothesay. "She is an old woman now--a few years older than I; Harold visits her not infrequently; and she and I correspond now and then, but we have not met for many years."

"Yet you have not forgotten her?"

"Do I ever forget?" said Alison, as she turned her face towards him. And looking thereon, he felt that such a woman never could.

Their conversation, pa.s.sing down the stream of time, touched on all that was memorable in the life of both. She mentioned her husband--but merely the two events, not long distant each from each, of their marriage and his death.

"Your son is not like yourself--does he resemble Mr. Gwynne?" observed Rothesay.