The Antiquary Part 57

"To be sure," said Sir Arthur; "but it was so good that I should not know the horse I have ridden these five years--ha! ha! ha!"

"Sir Arthur," said the Antiquary, "don't let us waste time which is precious; we shall have, I hope, many better seasons for jesting-- desipere in loco is the maxim of Horace. I more than suspect this has been brought on by the villany of Dousterswivel."

"Don't mention his name, sir!" said Sir Arthur; and his manner entirely changed from a fluttered affectation of gaiety to all the agitation of fury; his eyes sparkled, his mouth foamed, his hands were clenched-- "don't mention his name, sir," he vociferated, "unless you would see me go mad in your presence! That I should have been such a miserable dolt-- such an infatuated idiot--such a beast endowed with thrice a beast's stupidity, to be led and driven and spur-galled by such a rascal, and under such ridiculous pretences!--Mr. Oldbuck, I could tear myself when I think of it."

"I only meant to say," answered the Antiquary, "that this fellow is like to meet his reward; and I cannot but think we shall frighten something out of him that may be of service to you. He has certainly had some unlawful correspondence on the other side of the water."

"Has he?--has he?--has he indeed?--then d--n the house-hold goods, horses, and so forth--I will go to prison a happy man, Mr. Oldbuck. I hope in heaven there's a reasonable chance of his being hanged?"

"Why, pretty fair," said Oldbuck, willing to encourage this diversion, in hopes it might mitigate the feelings which seemed like to overset the poor man's understanding; "honester men have stretched a rope, or the law has been sadly cheated--But this unhappy business of yours--can nothing be done? Let me see the charge."

He took the papers; and, as he read them, his countenance grew hopelessly dark and disconsolate. Miss Wardour had by this time entered the apartment, and fixing her eyes on Mr. Oldbuck, as if she meant to read her fate in his looks, easily perceived, from the change in his eye, and the dropping of his nether-jaw, how little was to be hoped.

"We are then irremediably ruined, Mr. Oldbuck?" said the young lady.

"Irremediably?--I hope not--but the instant demand is very large, and others will, doubtless, pour in."

"Ay, never doubt that, Monkbarns," said Sir Arthur; "where the slaughter is, the eagles will be gathered together. I am like a sheep which I have seen fall down a precipice, or drop down from sickness--if you had not seen a single raven or hooded crow for a fortnight before, he will not lie on the heather ten minutes before half-a-dozen will be picking out his eyes (and he drew his hand over his own), and tearing at his heartstrings before the poor devil has time to die. But that d--d long-scented vulture that dogged me so long--you have got him fast, I hope?"

"Fast enough," said the Antiquary; "the gentleman wished to take the wings of the morning, and bolt in the what d'ye call it,--the coach and four there. But he would have found twigs limed for him at Edinburgh. As it is, he never got so far, for the coach being overturned--as how could it go safe with such a Jonah?--he has had an infernal tumble, is carried into a cottage near Kittlebrig, and to prevent all possibility of escape, I have sent your friend Sweepclean to bring him back to Fairport in nomine regis, or to act as his sick-nurse at Kittlebrig, as is most fitting. And now, Sir Arthur, permit me to have some conversation with you on the present unpleasant state of your affairs, that we may see what can be done for their extrication;" and the Antiquary led the way into the library, followed by the unfortunate gentleman.

They had been shut up together for about two hours, when Miss Wardour interrupted them with her cloak on as if prepared for a journey.

Her countenance was very pale, yet expressive of the composure which characterized her disposition.

"The messenger is returned, Mr. Oldbuck."

"Returned?--What the devil! he has not let the fellow go?"

"No--I understand he has carried him to confinement; and now he is returned to attend my father, and says he can wait no longer."

A loud wrangling was now heard on the staircase, in which the voice of Hector predominated. "You an officer, sir, and these ragam.u.f.fins a party! a parcel of beggarly tailor fellows--tell yourselves off by nine, and we shall know your effective strength."

The grumbling voice of the man of law was then heard indistinctly muttering a reply, to which Hector retorted--"Come, come, sir, this won't do;--march your party, as you call them, out of this house directly, or I'll send you and them to the right about presently."

"The devil take Hector," said the Antiquary, hastening to the scene of action; "his Highland blood is up again, and we shall have him fighting a duel with the bailiff. Come, Mr. Sweepclean, you must give us a little time--I know you would not wish to hurry Sir Arthur."

"By no means, sir," said the messenger, putting his hat off, which he had thrown on to testify defiance of Captain M'Intyre's threats; "but your nephew, sir, holds very uncivil language, and I have borne too much of it already; and I am not justified in leaving my prisoner any longer after the instructions I received, unless I am to get payment of the sums contained in my diligence." And he held out the caption, pointing with the awful truncheon, which he held in his right hand, to the formidable line of figures jotted upon the back thereof.

Hector, on the other hand, though silent from respect to his uncle, answered this gesture by shaking his clenched fist at the messenger with a frown of Highland wrath.

"Foolish boy, be quiet," said Oldbuck, "and come with me into the room-- the man is doing his miserable duty, and you will only make matters worse by opposing him.--I fear, Sir Arthur, you must accompany this man to Fairport; there is no help for it in the first instance--I will accompany you, to consult what further can be done--My nephew will escort Miss Wardour to Monkbarns, which I hope she will make her residence until these unpleasant matters are settled."

"I go with my father, Mr. Oldbuck," said Miss Wardour firmly--"I have prepared his clothes and my own--I suppose we shall have the use of the carriage?"

"Anything in reason, madam," said the messenger; "I have ordered it out, and it's at the door--I will go on the box with the coachman--I have no desire to intrude--but two of the concurrents must attend on horseback."

"I will attend too," said Hector, and he ran down to secure a horse for himself.

"We must go then," said the Antiquary.

"To jail," said the Baronet, sighing involuntarily. "And what of that?"

he resumed, in a tone affectedly cheerful--"it is only a house we can't get out of, after all--Suppose a fit of the gout, and Knockwinnock would be the same--Ay, ay, Monkbarns--we'll call it a fit of the gout without the d--d pain."

But his eyes swelled with tears as he spoke, and his faltering accent marked how much this a.s.sumed gaiety cost him. The Antiquary wrung his hand, and, like the Indian Banians, who drive the real terms of an important bargain by signs, while they are apparently talking of indifferent matters, the hand of Sir Arthur, by its convulsive return of the grasp, expressed his sense of grat.i.tude to his friend, and the real state of his internal agony.--They stepped slowly down the magnificent staircase--every well-known object seeming to the unfortunate father and daughter to a.s.sume a more prominent and distinct appearance than usual, as if to press themselves on their notice for the last time.

At the first landing-place, Sir Arthur made an agonized pause; and as he observed the Antiquary look at him anxiously, he said with a.s.sumed dignity--"Yes, Mr. Oldbuck, the descendant of an ancient line--the representative of Richard Redhand and Gamelyn de Guardover, may be pardoned a sigh when he leaves the castle of his fathers thus poorly escorted. When I was sent to the Tower with my late father, in the year 1745, it was upon a charge becoming our birth--upon an accusation of high treason, Mr. Oldbuck;--we were escorted from Highgate by a troop of life-guards, and committed upon a secretary of state's warrant; and now, here I am, in my old age, dragged from my household by a miserable creature like that" (pointing to the messenger), "and for a paltry concern of pounds, shillings, and pence."

"At least," said Oldbuck, "you have now the company of a dutiful daughter, and a sincere friend, if you will permit me to say so, and that may be some consolation, even without the certainty that there can be no hanging, drawing, or quartering, on the present occasion. But I hear that choleric boy as loud as ever. I hope to G.o.d he has got into no new broil!--it was an accursed chance that brought him here at all."

In fact, a sudden clamour, in which the loud voice and somewhat northern accent of Hector was again preeminently distinguished, broke off this conversation. The cause we must refer to the next CHAPTER.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SECOND.

Fortune, you say, flies from us--She but circles, Like the fleet sea-bird round the fowler's skiff,-- Lost in the mist one moment, and the next Brushing the white sail with her whiter wing, As if to court the aim.--Experience watches, And has her on the wheel-- Old Play.

The shout of triumph in Hector's warlike tones was not easily distinguished from that of battle. But as he rushed up stairs with a packet in his hand, exclaiming, "Long life to an old soldier! here comes Edie with a whole budget of good news!" it became obvious that his present cause of clamour was of an agreeable nature. He delivered the letter to Oldbuck, shook Sir Arthur heartily by the hand, and wished Miss Wardour joy, with all the frankness of Highland congratulation. The messenger, who had a kind of instinctive terror for Captain M'Intyre, drew towards his prisoner, keeping an eye of caution on the soldier's motions.

"Don't suppose I shall trouble myself about you, you dirty fellow," said the soldier; "there's a guinea for the fright I have given you; and here comes an old forty-two man, who is a fitter match for you than I am."

The messenger (one of those dogs who are not too scornful to eat dirty puddings) caught in his hand the guinea which Hector chucked at his face; and abode warily and carefully the turn which matters were now to take. All voices meanwhile were loud in inquiries, which no one was in a hurry to answer.

"What is the matter, Captain M'Intyre?" said Sir Arthur.

"Ask old Edie," said Hector;--"I only know all's safe and well."

"What is all this, Edie?" said Miss Wardour to the mendicant.

"Your leddyship maun ask Monkbarns, for he has gotten the yepistolary correspondensh."

"G.o.d save the king!" exclaimed the Antiquary at the first glance at the contents of his packet, and, surprised at once out of decorum, philosophy, and phlegm, he skimmed his c.o.c.ked hat in the air, from which it descended not again, being caught in its fall by a branch of the chandelier. He next, looking joyously round, laid a grasp on his wig, which he perhaps would have sent after the beaver, had not Edie stopped his hand, exclaiming "Lordsake! he's gaun gyte!--mind Caxon's no here to repair the damage."

Every person now a.s.sailed the Antiquary, clamouring to know the cause of so sudden a transport, when, somewhat ashamed of his rapture, he fairly turned tail, like a fox at the cry of a pack of hounds, and ascending the stair by two steps at a time, gained the upper landing-place, where, turning round, he addressed the astonished audience as follows:--

[Ill.u.s.tration: My Good Friends, 'favete Linguis']

"My good friends, _favete linguis_--To give you information, I must first, according to logicians, be possessed of it myself; and, therefore, with your leaves, I will retire into the library to examine these papers--Sir Arthur and Miss Wardour will have the goodness to step into the parlour--Mr. Sweepclean, secede paulisper, or, in your own language, grant us a supersedere of diligence for five minutes--Hector, draw off your forces, and make your bear-garden flourish elsewhere--and, finally, be all of good cheer till my return, which will be instanter."

The contents of the packet were indeed so little expected, that the Antiquary might be pardoned, first his ecstasy, and next his desire of delaying to communicate the intelligence they conveyed, until it was arranged and digested in his own mind.

Within the envelope was a letter addressed to Jonathan Oldbuck, Esq. of Monkbarns, of the following purport:--

"Dear Sir,--To you, as my father's proved and valued friend, I venture to address myself, being detained here by military duty of a very pressing nature. You must by this time be acquainted with the entangled state of our affairs; and I know it will give you great pleasure to learn, that I am as fortunately as unexpectedly placed in a situation to give effectual a.s.sistance for extricating them. I understand Sir Arthur is threatened with severe measures by persons who acted formerly as his agents; and, by advice of a creditable man of business here, I have procured the enclosed writing, which I understand will stop their proceedings until their claim shall be legally discussed, and brought down to its proper amount. I also enclose bills to the amount of one thousand pounds to pay any other pressing demands, and request of your friendship to apply them according to your discretion. You will be surprised I give you this trouble, when it would seem more natural to address my father directly in his own affairs. But I have yet had no a.s.surance that his eyes are opened to the character of a person against whom you have often, I know, warned him, and whose baneful influence has been the occasion of these distresses. And as I owe the means of relieving Sir Arthur to the generosity of a matchless friend, it is my duty to take the most certain measures for the supplies being devoted to the purpose for which they were destined,--and I know your wisdom and kindness will see that it is done. My friend, as he claims an interest in your regard, will explain some views of his own in the enclosed letter. The state of the post-office at Fairport being rather notorious, I must send this letter to Tannonburgh; but the old man Ochiltree, whom particular circ.u.mstances have recommended as trustworthy, has information when the packet is likely to reach that place, and will take care to forward it. I expect to have soon an opportunity to apologize in person for the trouble I now give, and have the honour to be your very faithful servant,

"Reginald Gamelyn Wardour." "Edinburgh, 6th August, 179-."

The Antiquary hastily broke the seal of the enclosure, the contents of which gave him equal surprise and pleasure. When he had in some measure composed himself after such unexpected tidings, he inspected the other papers carefully, which all related to business--put the bills into his pocket-book, and wrote a short acknowledgment to be despatched by that day's post, for he was extremely methodical in money matters--and lastly, fraught with all the importance of disclosure, he descended to the parlour.