The Marquis of Lossie Part 31

Out of the dim wood came two lovely forms into the moonlight, and softly approached him--so softly that he knew nothing of their nearness until Florimel spoke.

"Is that MacPhail?" she said.

"Yes, my lady," answered Malcolm, and bounded to his feet

"What were you singing?"

"You could hardly call it singing, my lady. We should call it crooning in Scotland."

"Croon it again then."

"I couldn't, my lady. It's gone."

"You don't mean to pretend that you were extemporising?"

"I was crooning what came--like the birds, my lady. I couldn't have done it if I had thought anyone was near."

Then, half ashamed, and anxious to turn the talk from the threshold of his secret chamber, he said, "Did you ever see a lovelier night, ladies?"

"Not often, certainly," answered Clementina.

She was not quite pleased and not altogether offended at his addressing them dually. A curious sense of impropriety in the state of things bewildered her--she and her friend talking thus, in the moonlight, on the seash.o.r.e, doing nothing, with her friend's groom--and such a groom, his mistress asking him to sing again, and he addressing them both with a remark on the beauty of the night! She had braved the world a good deal, but she did not choose to brave it where nothing was to be had, and she was too honest to say to herself that the world would never know--that there was nothing to brave: she was not one to do that in secret to which she would not hold her face. Yet all the time she had a doubt whether this young man, whom it would certainly be improper to encourage by addressing from any level but one of lofty superiority, did not belong to a higher sphere than theirs; while certainly no man could be more unpresuming, or less forward even when opposing his opinion to theirs. Still--if an angel were to come down and take charge of their horses, would ladies be justified in treating him as other than a servant?

"This is just the sort of night," Malcolm resumed, "when I could almost persuade myself I was not quite sure I wasn't dreaming. It makes a kind of border land betwixt waking and sleeping, knowing and dreaming, in our brain. In a night like this I fancy we feel something like the colour of what G.o.d feels when he is making the lovely chaos of a new world, a new kind of world, such as has never been before."

"I think we had better go in," said Clementina to Florimel, and turned away.

Florimel made no objection, and they walked towards the wood.

"You really must get rid of him as soon as you can," said Clementina, when again the moonless night of the pines had received them: "he is certainly more than half a lunatic. It is almost full moon now,"

she added, looking up. "I have never seen him so bad."

Florimel's clear laugh rang through the wood.

"Don't be alarmed, Clementina," she said. "He has talked like that ever since I knew him; and if he is mad, at least he is no worse than he has always been. It is nothing but poetry--yeast on the brain, my father used to say. We should have a fish poet of him-- a new thing in the world, he said. He would never be cured till he broke out in a book of poetry. I should be afraid my father would break the catechism and not rest in his grave till the resurrection, if I were to send Malcolm away."

For Malcolm, he was at first not a little mazed at the utter blankness of the wall against which his words had dashed themselves. Then he smiled queerly to himself, and said:

"I used to think ilka bonny la.s.sie bude to be a poetess--for hoo sud she be bonnie but by the informin' hermony o' her bein'?--an'

what's that but the poetry o' the Poet, the Makar, as they ca'd a poet i' the auld Scots tongue?--but haith! I ken better an' waur noo! There's gane the twa bonniest I ever saw, an' I s' lay my heid there's mair poetry in auld man faced Miss Horn nor in a dizzin like them. Ech! but it's some sair to bide. It's sair upon a man to see a bonny wuman 'at has nae poetry, nae inward lichtsome hermony in her. But it's dooms sairer yet to come upo' ane wantin' cowmon sense! Saw onybody ever sic a gran' sicht as my Leddy Clementina!

--an' wha can say but she's weel named frae the hert oot?--as guid at the hert, I'll sweir, as at the een! but eh me! to hear the blether o' nonsense 'at comes oot atween thae twa bonny yetts o' music--an' a' cause she winna gi'e her hert rist an' time eneuch to grow bigger, but maun aye be settin' at things richt afore their time, an' her ain fitness for the job! It's sic a faithless kin' o' a w'y that! I could jist fancy I saw her gaein' a' roon'

the trees o' a simmer nicht, pittin' hiney upo' the peers an' the peaches, 'cause she cudna lippen to natur' to ripe them sweet eneuch --only 'at she wad never tak the hiney frae the bees. She's jist the pictur' o' Natur' hersel' turnt some dement.i.t. I cud jist fancy I saw her gaein' aboot amo' the ripe corn, on sic a nicht as this o' the mune, happin' 't frae the frost. An' I s' warran' no ae mesh in oor nets wad she lea' ohn clippit open gien the twine had a herrin' by the gills. She's e'en sae pitifu' owre the sinner 'at she winna gi'e him a chance o' growin' better. I won'er gien she believes 'at there's ae great thoucht abune a', an' aneth a', an'

roon' a', an' in a'thing. She cudna be in sic a mist o' benevolence and parritch hert.i.tness gien she cud lippen till a wiser. It's na'e won'er she kens naething aboot poetry but the meeserable sids an'

sawdist an' leavin's the gran' leddies sing an' ca' sangs! Nae mair is 't ony won'er she sud tak' me for dement.i.t, gien she h'ard what I was singin'! only I canna think she did that, for I was but croonin'

till mysel'."--Malcolm was wrong there, for he was singing out loud and clear.--"That was but a kin' o' an unknown tongue atween Him an' me an' no anither."

CHAPTER XLI: THE SWIFT

Florimel succeeded so far in rea.s.suring her friend as to the safety if not sanity of her groom, that she made no objection to yet another reading from "St Ronan's Well"--upon which occasion an incident occurred that did far more to rea.s.sure her than all the attestations of his mistress.

Clementina, in consenting, had proposed, it being a warm sunny afternoon, that they should that time go down to the lake, and sit with their work on the bank, while Malcolm read. This lake, like the whole place, and some of the people in it, was rather strange --not resembling any piece of water that Malcolm at least had ever seen. More than a mile in length, but quite narrow, it lay on the seash.o.r.e--a lake of deep fresh water, with nothing between it and the sea but a bank of sand, up which the great waves came rolling in southwesterly winds, one now and then toppling over--to the disconcerting no doubt of the pikey mult.i.tude within.

The head only of the mere came into Clementina's property, and they sat on the landward side of it, on a sandy bank, among the half exposed roots of a few ancient firs, where a little stream that fed the lake had made a small gully, and was now trotting over a bed of pebbles in the bottom of it. Clementina was describing to Florimel the peculiarities of the place, how there was no outlet to the lake, how the water went filtering through the sand into the sea, how in some parts it was very deep, and what large pike there were in it. Malcolm sat a little aside as usual, with his face towards the ladies, and the book open in his hand, waiting a sign to begin, but looking at the lake, which here was some fifty yards broad, reedy at the edge, dark and deep in the centre. All at once he sprang to his feet, dropping the book, ran down to the brink of the water, undoing his buckled belt and pulling off his coat as he ran, threw himself over the bordering reeds into the pool, and disappeared with a great plash.

Clementina gave a scream, and started up with distraction in her face: she made no doubt that in the sudden ripeness of his insanity he had committed suicide. But Florimel, though startled by her friend's cry, laughed, and crowded out a.s.surances that Malcolm knew well enough what he was about. It was longer, however, than she found pleasant, before a black head appeared--yards away, for he had risen at a great slope, swimming towards the other side.

What could he be after? Near the middle he swam more softly, and almost stopped. Then first they spied a small dark object on the surface. Almost the same moment it rose into the air. They thought Malcolm had flung it up. Instantly they perceived that it was a bird--a swift. Somehow it had dropped into the water, but a lift from Malcolm's hand had restored it to the air of its bliss.

But instead of turning and swimming back, Malcolm held on, and getting out on the farther side, ran down the beach and rushed into the sea, rousing once more the apprehensions of Clementina.

The sh.o.r.e sloped rapidly, and in a moment he was in deep water. He swam a few yards out, swam ash.o.r.e again, ran round the end of the lake, found his coat, and got from it his pocket handkerchief.

Having therewith dried his hands and face, he wrang out the sleeves of his shirt a little, put on his coat, returned to his place, and said, as he took up the book and sat down,

"I beg your pardon, my ladies; but just as I heard my Lady Clementina say pikes, I saw the little swift in the water. There was no time to lose. Swiftie had but a poor chance."

As he spoke he proceeded to find the place in the book.

"You don't imagine we are going to have you read in such a plight as that!" cried Clementina.

"I will take good care, my lady. I have books of my own, and I handle them like babies."

"You foolish man! It is of you in your wet clothes, not of the book I am thinking," said Clementina indignantly.

"I'm much obliged to you, my lady, but there's no fear of me. You saw me wash the fresh water out. Salt water never hurts."

"You must go and change nevertheless," said Clementina.

Malcolm looked to his mistress. She gave him a sign to obey, and he rose. He had taken three steps towards the house when Clementina recalled him.

"One word, if you please," she said. "How is it that a man who risks his life for that of a little bird, can be so heartless to a great n.o.ble creature like that horse of yours? I cannot understand it!"

"My lady," returned Malcolm with a smile, "I was no more risking my life than you would be in taking a fly out of the milk jug. And for your question, if your ladyship will only think, you cannot fail to see the difference. Indeed I explained my treatment of Kelpie to your ladyship that first morning in the park, when you so kindly rebuked me for it, but I don't think your ladyship listened to a word I said."

Clementina's face flushed, and she turned to her friend with a "Well!"

in her eyes. But Florimel kept her head bent over her embroidery; and Malcolm, no further notice being taken of him walked away.

CHAPTER XLII: ST RONAN'S WELL

The next day the reading was resumed, and for several days was regularly continued. Each day, as their interest grew, longer time was devoted to it. They were all simple enough to accept what the author gave them, nor, had a critic of the time been present to instruct them that in this last he had fallen off, would they have heeded him much: for Malcolm, it was the first story by the Great Unknown he had seen. A question however occurring, not of art but of morals, he was at once on the alert. It arose when they reached that portion of the tale in which the true heir to an earldom and its wealth offers to leave all in the possession of the usurper, on the one condition of his ceasing to annoy a certain lady, whom, by villainy of the worst, he had gained the power of rendering unspeakably miserable. Naturally enough, at this point Malcolm's personal interest was suddenly excited: here were elements strangely correspondent with the circ.u.mstances of his present position. Tyrrel's offer of acquiescence in things as they were, and abandonment of his rights, which, in the story, is so amazing to the man of the world to whom it is first propounded, drew an exclamation of delight from both ladies--from Clementina because of its unselfishness, from Florimel because of its devotion: neither of them was at any time ready to raise a moral question, and least of all where the heart approved. But Malcolm was interested after a different fashion from theirs. Often during the reading he had made remarks and given explanations--not so much to the annoyance of Lady Clementina as she had feared, for since his rescue of the swift, she had been more favourably disposed towards him, and had judged him a little more justly--not that she understood him, but that the gulf between them had contracted. He paused a moment, then said:

"Do you think it was right, my ladies? Ought Mr Tyrrel to have made such an offer?"

"It was most generous of him," said Clementina, not without indignation --and with the tone of one whose answer should decide the question.

"Splendidly generous," replied Malcolm; "--but--I so well remember when Mr Graham first made me see that the question of duty does not always lie between a good thing and a bad thing: there would be no room for casuistry then, he said. A man has very often to decide between one good thing and another. But indeed I can hardly tell without more time to think, whether that comes in here. If a man wants to be generous, it must at least be at his own expense."