St. Ives, Being the Adventures of a French Prisoner in England Part 30

These were sentiments to be encouraged; and, on the way home from church-if church it could be called-I adopted a most insidious device to magnify her interest. I took her into the confidence, that is, of my love affair, and I had no sooner mentioned a young lady with whom my affections were engaged than she turned upon me a face of awful gravity.

'Is she bonny?' she inquired.

I gave her full a.s.surances upon that.

'To what denoamination does she beloang?' came next, and was so unexpected as almost to deprive me of breath.

'Upon my word, ma'am, I have never inquired,' cried I; 'I only know that she is a heartfelt Christian, and that is enough.'

'Ay!' she sighed, 'if she has the root of the maitter! There's a remnant practically in most of the denoaminations. There's some in the McGlashanites, and some in the Gla.s.sites, and mony in the McMillanites, and there's a leeven even in the Estayblishment.'

'I have known some very good Papists even, if you go to that,' said I.

'Mr. Ducie, think shame to yoursel'!' she cried.

'Why, my dear madam! I only-' I began.

'You shouldnae jest in sairious maitters,' she interrupted.

On the whole, she entered into what I chose to tell her of our idyll with avidity, like a cat licking her whiskers over a dish of cream; and, strange to say-and so expansive a pa.s.sion is that of love!-that I derived a perhaps equal satisfaction from confiding in that breast of iron. It made an immediate bond: from that hour we seemed to be welded into a family-party; and I had little difficulty in persuading her to join us and to preside over our tea-table. Surely there was never so ill-matched a trio as Rowley, Mrs. McRankine, and the Viscount Anne! But I am of the Apostle's way, with a difference: all things to all women! When I cannot please a woman, hang me in my cravat!

CHAPTER XXVIII-EVENTS OF MONDAY: THE LAWYER'S PARTY

By half-past eight o'clock on the next morning, I was ringing the bell of the lawyer's office in Castle Street, where I found him ensconced at a business table, in a room surrounded by several tiers of green tin cases. He greeted me like an old friend.

'Come away, sir, come away!' said he. 'Here is the dentist ready for you, and I think I can promise you that the operation will be practically painless.'

'I am not so sure of that, Mr. Robbie,' I replied, as I shook hands with him. 'But at least there shall be no time lost with me.'

I had to confess to having gone a-roving with a pair of drovers and their cattle, to having used a false name, to having murdered or half-murdered a fellow-creature in a scuffle on the moors, and to having suffered a couple of quite innocent men to lie some time in prison on a charge from which I could have immediately freed them. All this I gave him first of all, to be done with the worst of it; and all this he took with gravity, but without the least appearance of surprise.

'Now, sir,' I continued, 'I expect to have to pay for my unhappy frolic, but I would like very well if it could be managed without my personal appearance or even the mention of my real name. I had so much wisdom as to sail under false colours in this foolish jaunt of mine; my family would be extremely concerned if they had wind of it; but at the same time, if the case of this Faa has terminated fatally, and there are proceedings against Todd and Candlish, I am not going to stand by and see them vexed, far less punished; and I authorise you to give me up for trial if you think that best-or, if you think it unnecessary, in the meanwhile to make preparations for their defence. I hope, sir, that I am as little anxious to be Quixotic, as I am determined to be just.'

'Very fairly spoken,' said Mr. Robbie. 'It is not much in my line, as doubtless your friend, Mr. Romaine, will have told you. I rarely mix myself up with anything on the criminal side, or approaching it. However, for a young gentleman like you, I may stretch a point, and I dare say I may be able to accomplish more than perhaps another. I will go at once to the Procurator Fiscal's office and inquire.'

'Wait a moment, Mr. Robbie,' said I. 'You forget the chapter of expenses. I had thought, for a beginning, of placing a thousand pounds in your hands.'

'My dear sir, you will kindly wait until I render you my bill,' said Mr. Robbie severely.'

'It seemed to me,' I protested, 'that coming to you almost as a stranger, and placing in your hands a piece of business so contrary to your habits, some substantial guarantee of my good faith-'

'Not the way that we do business in Scotland, sir,' he interrupted, with an air of closing the dispute.

'And yet, Mr. Robbie,' I continued, 'I must ask you to allow me to proceed. I do not merely refer to the expenses of the case. I have my eye besides on Todd and Candlish. They are thoroughly deserving fellows; they have been subjected through me to a considerable term of imprisonment; and I suggest, sir, that you should not spare money for their indemnification. This will explain,' I added smiling, 'my offer of the thousand pounds. It was in the nature of a measure by which you should judge the scale on which I can afford to have this business carried through.'

'I take you perfectly, Mr. Ducie,' said he. 'But the sooner I am off, the better this affair is like to be guided. My clerk will show you into the waiting-room and give you the day's Caledonian Mercury and the last Register to amuse yourself with in the interval.'

I believe Mr. Robbie was at least three hours gone. I saw him descend from a cab at the door, and almost immediately after I was shown again into his study, where the solemnity of his manner led me to augur the worst. For some time he had the inhumanity to read me a lecture as to the incredible silliness, 'not to say immorality,' of my behaviour. 'I have the satisfaction in telling you my opinion, because it appears that you are going to get off scot free,' he continued, where, indeed, I thought he might have begun.

'The man, Faa, has been discharged cured; and the two men, Todd and Candlish, would have been leeberated lone ago if it had not been for their extraordinary loyalty to yourself, Mr. Ducie-or Mr. St. Ivey, as I believe I should now call you. Never a word would either of the two old fools volunteer that in any manner pointed at the existence of such a person; and when they were confronted with Faa's version of the affair, they gave accounts so entirely discrepant with their own former declarations, as well as with each other, that the Fiscal was quite nonplussed, and imaigined there was something behind it. You may believe I soon laughed him out of that! And I had the satisfaction of seeing your two friends set free, and very glad to be on the causeway again.'

'Oh, sir,' I cried, 'you should have brought them here.'

'No instructions, Mr. Ducie!' said he. 'How did I know you wished to renew an acquaintance which you had just terminated so fortunately? And, indeed, to be frank with you, I should have set my face against it, if you had! Let them go! They are paid and contented, and have the highest possible opinion of Mr. St. Ivey! When I gave them fifty pounds apiece-which was rather more than enough, Mr. Ducie, whatever you may think-the man Todd, who has the only tongue of the party, struck his staff on the ground. "Weel," says he, "I aye said he was a gentleman!" "Man, Todd," said I, "that was just what Mr St. Ivey said of yourself!"'

'So it was a case of "Compliments fly when gentlefolk meet."'

'No, no, Mr. Ducie, man Todd and man Candlish are gone out of your life, and a good riddance! They are fine fellows in their way, but no proper a.s.sociates for the like of yourself; and do you finally agree to be done with all eccentricity-take up with no more drovers, or tinkers, but enjoy the naitural pleesures for which your age, your wealth, your intelligence, and (if I may be allowed to say it) your appearance so completely fit you. And the first of these,' quoth he, looking at his watch, 'will be to step through to my dining-room and share a bachelor's luncheon.'

Over the meal, which was good, Mr. Robbie continued to develop the same theme. 'You're, no doubt, what they call a dancing-man?' said he. 'Well, on Thursday night there is the a.s.sembly Ball. You must certainly go there, and you must permit me besides to do the honours of the ceety and send you a ticket. I am a thorough believer in a young man being a young man-but no more drovers or rovers, if you love me! Talking of which puts me in mind that you may be short of partners at the a.s.sembly-oh, I have been young myself!-and if ye care to come to anything so portentiously tedious as a tea-party at the house of a bachelor lawyer, consisting mainly of his nieces and nephews, and his grand-nieces and grand-nephews, and his wards, and generally the whole clan of the descendants of his clients, you might drop in to-night towards seven o'clock. I think I can show you one or two that are worth looking at, and you can dance with them later on at the a.s.sembly.'

He proceeded to give me a sketch of one or two eligible young ladies' whom I might expect to meet. 'And then there's my parteecular friend, Miss Flora,' said he. 'But I'll make no attempt of a description. You shall see her for yourself.'

It will be readily supposed that I accepted his invitation; and returned home to make a toilette worthy of her I was to meet and the good news of which I was the bearer. The toilette, I have reason to believe, was a success. Mr. Rowley dismissed me with a farewell: 'Crikey! Mr. Anne, but you do look prime!' Even the stony Bethiah was-how shall I say?-dazzled, but scandalised, by my appearance; and while, of course, she deplored the vanity that led to it, she could not wholly prevent herself from admiring the result.

'Ay, Mr. Ducie, this is a poor employment for a wayfaring Christian man!' she said. 'Wi' Christ despised and reject.i.t in all pairts of the world and the flag of the Covenant flung doon, you will be muckle better on your knees! However, I'll have to confess that it sets you weel. And if it's the la.s.sie ye're gaun to see the nicht, I suppose I'll just have to excuse ye! Bairns maun be bairns!' she said, with a sigh. 'I mind when Mr. McRankine came courtin', and that's lang by-gane-I mind I had a green gown, pa.s.s.e.m.e.nt.i.t, that was thocht to become me to admiration. I was nae just exactly what ye would ca' bonny; but I was pale, penetratin', and interestin'.' And she leaned over the stair-rail with a candle to watch my descent as long as it should be possible.

It was but a little party at Mr. Robbie's-by which, I do not so much mean that there were few people, for the rooms were crowded, as that there was very little attempted to entertain them. In one apartment there were tables set out, where the elders were solemnly engaged upon whist; in the other and larger one, a great number of youth of both s.e.xes entertained themselves languidly, the ladies sitting upon chairs to be courted, the gentlemen standing about in various att.i.tudes of insinuation or indifference. Conversation appeared the sole resource, except in so far as it was modified by a number of keepsakes and annuals which lay dispersed upon the tables, and of which the young beaux displayed the ill.u.s.trations to the ladies. Mr. Robbie himself was customarily in the card-room; only now and again, when he cut out, he made an incursion among the young folks, and rolled about jovially from one to another, the very picture of the general uncle.

It chanced that Flora had met Mr. Robbie in the course of the afternoon. 'Now, Miss Flora,' he had said, 'come early, for I have a Phoenix to show you-one Mr. Ducie, a new client of mine that, I vow, I have fallen in love with'; and he was so good as to add a word or two on my appearance, from which Flora conceived a suspicion of the truth. She had come to the party, in consequence, on the knife-edge of antic.i.p.ation and alarm; had chosen a place by the door, where I found her, on my arrival, surrounded by a posse of vapid youths; and, when I drew near, sprang up to meet me in the most natural manner in the world, and, obviously, with a prepared form of words.

'How do you do, Mr. Ducie?' she said. 'It is quite an age since I have seen you!'

'I have much to tell you, Miss Gilchrist,' I replied. 'May I sit down?'

For the artful girl, by sitting near the door, and the judicious use of her shawl, had contrived to keep a chair empty by her side.

She made room for me, as a matter of course, and the youths had the discretion to melt before us. As soon as I was once seated her fan flew out, and she whispered behind it:

'Are you mad?'

'Madly in love,' I replied; 'but in no other sense.'

'I have no patience! You cannot understand what I am suffering!' she said. 'What are you to say to Ronald, to Major Chevenix, to my aunt?'

Your aunt?' I cried, with a start. 'Peccavi! is she here?'

'She is in the card-room at whist,' said Flora.

'Where she will probably stay all the evening?' I suggested.

'She may,' she admitted; 'she generally does!'

'Well, then, I must avoid the card-room,' said I, 'which is very much what I had counted upon doing. I did not come here to play cards, but to contemplate a certain young lady to my heart's content-if it can ever be contented!-and to tell her some good news.'

'But there are still Ronald and the Major!' she persisted. 'They are not card-room fixtures! Ronald will be coming and going. And as for Mr. Chevenix, he-'