CHAPTER XIIIA MEETINGWe two will stand beside that shrine,Occult, withheld, untrod,Whose lamps are stirred continuallyWith prayer sent up to God;And see our old prayers, granted, meltEach like a little cloud.D. G. ROSSETTI.When Edmund was five years old Mr. Wycherly expressed his readiness to teach him all he was teaching Montagu. He took infinite pains to do so, but Edmund's presence was found to be so provocative of dispeace in the quiet study upstairs, and so effectually hindered his brother's progress, while his own was of the slowest, that Miss Esperance took the matter into her own hands and sent her younger nephew to be instructed by the Reverend Peter Gloag, who seasoned his instruction with the tawse, and was altogether more fitted to cope with the average boy's vagaries than the gentle, dreamy Mr. Wycherly. Edmund was rather afraid of the minister. His hand was heavy, and he was singularly awake to the devices by means of which small boys seek to evade their scholastic duties. Nevertheless, the child liked him, for he could unbend on occasion and was an excellent hand at marbles. Moreover, he had a sense of humour, and like so many of the Scottish Calvinists of that time, managed to keep his denunciations of abstract sins quite separate from his judgment of the sinner. In the pulpit he was a terror to evil-doers. When tackled upon questions of doctrine, he laid down the law with a vigour and determination that left his opponent with the impression that never was there such a hard and inflexible man: but when it came to deeds, when it was a question of giving another chance to a ne'er-do-weel, or the punishment to be meted out to some young ragamuffin caught stealing apples or breaking windows, the sinner had far rather fall into the hands of the minister than those of many a gentler spoken man.In spite of the minister's endeavours, however, Edmund was still laboriously writing sentences to the effect that "'Tis education forms the mind" at an age when Montagu had begun to write Latin verses and to read Xenophon."I hate sitting on a chair and hearing things," Edmund would say. "I want to be doing them. I want more room than there is in Auntie's house, or the Manse. Ihatethings over my head 'cept the sky."One day Miss Esperance drove both boys to Leith, and left them to play on the beach while she went to see an old friend. In a minute Edmund had off his shoes and socks, and in spite of the jagged pebbles, that hurt his unaccustomed feet so cruelly, went down to the water's edge and in up to his knees, then turning to the more timid Montagu, who still stood dubiously upon the brink, cried joyously, "Thisis what I've always been wanting: there'splentyof room out there."The same evening he climbed on to Mr. Wycherly's knee demanding, "How can I get to be a sailor like my daddie was?""You go into the Navy.""How do I go? What way? Where's the Navy? Is it a town?"No, it's an institution, a service——""Like the poorhouse?" Edmund interrupted, in less enthusiastic tones."Oh, dear, no.""Tell me all about it," the little boy commanded, whereupon Mr. Wycherly obediently and at considerable length explained the constitution of His Majesty's Navy, and Edmund never once interrupted.When Mr. Wycherly had finished, the little boy was silent for a minute, then asked earnestly, "How soon can I go?""Let me see, you're nearly eight now; it might be managed in about three years. You will need to read well, and write well, and be able to do many kinds of sums, and be very obedient.""I could do all that," Edmund said decidedly, and in the end, to the surprise of every one concerned, he did.At first it grieved Mr. Wycherly that any one should teach either of the little boys except himself. He grudged Edmund to the minister, even while he knew that the minister was far more fitted to teach him than he was himself. His only consolation was that, as Edmund disliked lessons so much, there would have been some danger of his extending his dislike to the giver of them, and that Mr. Wycherly could not have borne.It happened that soon after Edmund first went for lessons to the Manse whooping-cough broke out among the village children. It was a bad kind, and Miss Esperance was very anxious that neither Montagu nor Edmund should take it. Thus it came about that one Sunday, one particularly fine Sunday at the beginning of June, she decided that she would not take them to church with her for fear of infection. The doctor himself had suggested this only the day before, and after a sleepless night, in which she had prayed for guidance, Miss Esperance decided that the doctor was probably right and that she should run no risks for them, whatever she might do for herself. Mr. Wycherly offered to look after them both during her absence, and it was characteristic of Miss Esperance that, although she had her misgivings, she made no suggestions as to how their time should be spent in her absence. That would have been to reflect upon Mr. Wycherly.The little boys will always remember that Sunday, not only because they did not go to church, and did play in a field near the Manse, but because of something that happened.When the church bells had stopped and the village street was deserted, Mr. Wycherly, the two little boys and Mause went to play in a field that adjoined the Manse. To get to this field, which was rich in buttercups and hedge parsley, and was bordered by ash trees giving a pleasant shade, you turned down a lane, which was also a short cut to the station, lying a mile or so south of the village. The Manse was at one end of the lane, the main street of the village at the other: the gate leading into the field about half-way down. As the little boys neared it they saw a stranger coming from the opposite direction.It was unusual to meet anybody in that lane, especially at this time of day on the Sabbath, and the children waited at the gate to see the stranger pass. Mr. Wycherly, whose long-distance sight was failing a little, put up his eye-glasses lest he might know the stranger and pass him by without greeting, as he was rather prone to do. Hardly had he placed the glasses on his nose than they dropped off again, and with an exclamation of surprise he hurried forward, holding out both his hands, which the stranger grasped and warmly shook.He was a tall young man, with very large bright eyes and an abundance of curly black hair, worn rather longer than was usual at that time.He seized Mr. Wycherly by the arm and bore him up the lane again, talking eagerly the while."I must see her," the little boys heard him say. "I must see her somehow, and I daren't go into the house, for he has forbidden me. Could you tell her? Could you fetch her? I'll stay with the youngsters. Oh, dear old friend, for God's sake don't frighten her, but bring her to me somehow. She isn't in church, I know, for I watched every one go in from behind the hedge in the churchyard. I was coming to you in any case...."Mr. Wycherly and the young man had passed out of earshot. Montagu and Edmund looked at one another with large, round eyes, and Mause looked after Mr. Wycherly and sniffed the air inquiringly."Do you think he's a relation?" Edmund asked. "Do you think he's come to stay with us?""He can't stay with us," Montagu answered decidedly; "there isn't any room. I wish he could, though," he added; "he looks rather nice."A sound of quick footsteps in the lane, and the stranger was back again, but without Mr. Wycherly."Now," he said, "what shall we play at?"He said it in a business-like way, and Edmund did the stranger the honour to take him at his word."Can you be a tiger?" he demanded excitedly, "and we'll hunt you. You must crawl in the grass, and crouch in the ditch—it's quite dry—and bounce out at us and growl, not too loud, because it's the Sabbath."Never was such a tiger; so fierce, so elusive, so dashing, so unexpected. This man threw himself into his part at once and required no tedious explanations. The intrepid hunters had a quarter of an hour's blissful excitement, and the tiger had rolled over dead for the fifth time when he suddenly rose to his feet, went to the gate, and looked up the lane toward the Manse.Mr. Wycherly was coming slowly down the lane, and a lady leant upon his arm. The quondam tiger brushed some grass from off his clothes and turned to the little boys, who were following him eagerly. "Boys," he said, "we've had a good play, we'll have another some day, but now I must go and speak—to my mother——"He went down the lane very quickly toward Mr. Wycherly and the lady."Come," said Montagu, catching Edmund by the hand, "let's come away," and the two little boys trotted off up the lane in the opposite direction; and they never looked back.Mrs. Gloag, tremulous and very pale, leant heavily on Mr. Wycherly's arm as the tall young man came out of the field toward her. Then she steadied herself. "Dear friend," she said very softly, "I am quite strong. Will you leave me to wait for my boy? I would like to be with him alone—once more, together—he and I." She drew her hand from Mr. Wycherly's arm, and he raised his hat and left her. He passed the stranger and hurried after the little boys. They heard him coming and slackened their pace: but they never looked round.They had turned the corner when Mr. Wycherly joined them, and separated that he might walk between them as was his custom. He laid a hand on each soft little shoulder and stopped. "Boys," he said, and his voice sounded husky and broken. "You are gentlemen—and good fellows—and I'm proud of you."The little boys were silent. This that had happened, coming so close upon the heels of the uproarious tiger game, was very puzzling.Presently, as though following some train of thought, Edmund said: "She knew him, I suppose. Will our mothers know us, do you think, when we get up there? Because, you see, we shall look rather different from when they saw us last. Now you, Guardie, dear, you hadn't white hair when you saw your mother last, had you? You were quite a little boy.""I think," said Mr. Wycherly, "in fact, I may say I am sure, that our mothers will know us, even if we all three should have white hair.""I expect," Montagu said thoughtfully, "that they're waiting just like we waited for you round the corner; they've just gone on first.""Just gone on," Edmund echoed. "I wonder if it seems long to them till we come?"After morning service when the minister turned down the lane, which was a short cut to the Manse, he found Mr. Wycherly waiting for him outside his own gate.As a rule Mr. Wycherly was rather shy and nervous in the presence of the minister, but there was no sign of this usual mental perturbation as he stopped him with a courteous gesture. "Mr. Gloag," said Mr. Wycherly, and he looked the minister straight in the eyes, "I have done something which you will probably disapprove and condemn. Curly has been here, and I went to the Manse and told Mrs. Gloag that he was here.""Did he dare to enter my house?" asked the minister, and he glowered at Mr. Wycherly from under his heavy brows."I think," that gentleman replied, and he met the minister's keen glance with one that was quite equally combative, "that he would have dared anything to see his mother. As it happened she came to him. And I want to spare her the exertion of telling you that she did so.""Since when," asked the minister, looking as though he would greatly like to annihilate Mr. Wycherly; "since when has my wife needed a go-between to spare her the necessity of telling me anything?""Good heavens, sir!" Mr. Wycherly exclaimed, "can't you see that what I want you to realise is that Mrs. Gloag is very ill—that whatever you may feel on the subject of Curly's coming, it would have been inhuman to prevent her seeing her son—once more, whatever he had done."Even as Mr. Wycherly spoke the eyes of the two men that a moment before had been bright with mutual antagonism changed. The minister's to a dumb agony, Mr. Wycherly's to an awe-struck pity. He turned and walked hastily away.Blindly the minister opened the gate and went through the garden into his own house.His wife met him in the hall, and her face, he thought, was as the face of an angel, full of a soft radiance not of earth."Peter," she said in her soft "Englishey" voice, "God has been good to me. I have seen Curly, and he is not changed. I know it; we may not like what he has done, but he is not changed. He is good, Peter; he is our own dear good boy all the same. He didn't come in because he thought you wouldn't like it, but I had a long, beautiful talk with him in the lane. I felt somehow that I should see him—once more."Again the ominous phrase, "Once more.""Felicity," said the minister, "you have stood much longer than is good for you," and he picked her up in his arms and carried her to the sofa in the parlour.She caught him round the neck and rubbed her soft cheek against his hair. "Why are you not surprised—and angry?" she asked with a little nervous laugh, and he felt how her whole body was trembling in his arms."Because I knew already," said the minister; and not one other word did he say on the subject that day, but he noticed that her pretty eyes had lost their look of strained expectancy and watchfulness, and in its place there was an expression of beautiful serenity and almost joyous content.Although Edmund went to the Manse for his lessons, he was faithful always to the matutinal service of biscuits in Mr. Wycherly's room. He wouldn't have missed it on any account. Two mornings after their encounter with the "tiger-man," as they always called him, they sought Mr. Wycherly after breakfast to find him looking very grave and sad. He gave them their biscuits as usual, and turning to Edmund said: "You must not go to the Manse this morning, my dear boy. There is great trouble there. We have all lost a very dear friend—Mrs. Gloag." Mr. Wycherly paused, for he could not speak. The little boys looked very solemn, then Edmund said softly, "I suppose she has gone on."CHAPTER XIVA PARTINGO Royal and radiant soul,Thou dost return, thine influences returnUpon thy children as in life, and deathTurns stingless!W. E. HENLEY.Whooping-cough was still bad in the village on the Sabbath following their famous tiger-game, and again Miss Esperance did not take her great-nephews to church.Again, moreover, the Sunday was memorable, not so much because they did not attend church, as because Mr. Wycherly did.The little boys knew there had been a funeral the day before. Mr. Wycherly had gone to it, and their aunt had sewn a black band upon the sleeve of each little white blouse. They felt solemn and important; and for once they would even have been glad to go to church in order to show this unusual adornment. When they discovered that not only were they to be left at home, but left at home without Mr. Wycherly, such immunity was shorn of all its more pleasing attributes.They were sorry about Mrs. Gloag, with the curious, impersonal sorrow that children experience in considering the troubles of others. She was a kind lady, and they liked her. She knew many rhymes and funny stories, and was almost as good a playmate as that unequalled tiger-man. But they had not seen her often lately, and at present their chief concern was with the unusual and uncomfortable sense of depression that seemed in some subtle, indefinable fashion to separate them from their aunt and Mr. Wycherly.And now, having gone to a funeral on Saturday, Mr. Wycherly was going to church on Sunday. Why was Mr. Wycherly going to church?That was the question that grievously exercised the little boys, and perhaps Mr. Wycherly himself would have been hard put to it to explain his reasons.There was the protective instinct, the feeling that he could not let Miss Esperance go alone, so small and sad and solitary: the desire to do something comforting: an equally strong desire to show his affectionate respect for Mrs. Gloag, and the hope that perhaps by this means he might to some small extent show his sympathy with the minister. And at the back of all these mixed motives and through every one of them there sounded the voices of habit and tradition; voices which every day of late had called more and more imperatively to Mr. Wycherly. In the old days it had been a matter of course that he should take part in any public ceremony; now, in spite of his long aloofness from any part or lot in the lives of his neighbours, he felt it incumbent upon him to make some open and public demonstration of his share in this common sorrow.When he first came to live with Miss Esperance, Mrs. Gloag had always been kind and friendly, stopped him in the road when he would fain have passed her by, and yet always left him unconsciously cheered by her greeting. Few others had been kind and friendly then, and Mr. Wycherly did not forget.It was surprising how many people remembered such things of her now. It seemed that every man, woman, and child in the village could and did tell of something kind Mrs. Gloag had done, of something merry and heartening she had said. People forgot now that she had sometimes laughed when it would have been more fitting to look grave. They only remembered that she had cheered the despondent, strengthened the weak-hearted, made peace where there were quarrels, and brought gaiety and good humour into homes where before there were gloom and discontent.Not for years had the church been so full as on that Sabbath morning, that sunny Sabbath morning when Mr. Wycherly went to church with Miss Esperance.The minister looked much as usual. His face was stern and set, though his eyes under the bushy, overhanging gray eyebrows were the eyes of a man who had slept but little. Yet his voice was strong and full, and he prayed and read the Bible with his customary earnestness and vigour.The congregation were a little fluttered to notice that in the Manse pew there were three tall young men, and that the white-haired, Oxfordy gentleman who lived with Miss Esperance was in her seat, but otherwise the service was much as usual.It was not until the time came for the sermon that there was throughout the congregation that little thrill of excited expectation which proclaims deep interest."What would be the minister's text?"To most people it was a surprise: it was not even a whole text. The minister preached upon the four words, "Be pitiful, be courteous." His sermon was the shortest he had ever given in that church, lasting only half an hour.Mr. Wycherly sat with his elbow on the desk in front of him, his white, slender hand shading his eyes.Miss Esperance was visibly affected; and of the three young men in the Manse seat, one laid his head down on his crossed arms, but he assuredly was not sleeping.When the service was over and Mr. Wycherly and Miss Esperance were walking home, she said timidly: "It was a beautiful discourse, don't you think?""I think," said Mr. Wycherly, "that he preached that sermon for his wife; and that it will be remembered when all his other sermons are forgotten. I am glad to have been there."That afternoon the little boys took their Sunday picture-books into the garden and sat on the grass under the alder tree; Mr. Wycherly, too, sat in a garden chair reading a sober-looking calf-bound book.Miss Esperance had returned from afternoon church, but she was so tired and upset that Elsa persuaded her for once to go and lie down in her room, and the children were warned not to disturb their aunt.Edmund's book was a large Bible Alphabet with gaily-coloured pictures, which Miss Maggie Moffat had given him at the New Year. Montagu had brought out "Peep of Day," a work he detested, but choice on the Sabbath was limited in the house of Miss Esperance, so he looked at the "Child's Bible Alphabet" with Edmund, and so often had they pored over the volume that they were familiar with all the characters from Abraham to Zacchaeus.Presently Edmund shut the book with a bang. "I shall know all these folks when I meet 'em, anyway," he said decidedly. "I've looked at 'em and looked: I've had enough of seeing them, Isaac and Noah and Jacob and Mrs. Potiphar and that dancing woman, Miriam—none of them very handsome, either," Edmund continued discontentedly. "Oh, I do wish the Sabbath was over, it's such a long, long day.""I wonder," said Montagu musingly, "why the Bible people are always so ugly in pictures; so red and blue: real people aren't as ugly as that even if they are a bit plain. Can you tell how it is, Guardie, dear? D'you suppose they're really like the people in Edmund's book?""I expect," Mr. Wycherly said cautiously, laying down his "Alcestis" and smiling at Montagu's earnest upturned face, "that they were very like the people we see every day, some neither very handsome nor very plain. Some beautiful and delightful.""I shall be disappointed," Edmund remarked, "if, after all, they turn out to be different from what they are in my book, after I've taken so much trouble to know them when Aunt Esperance covers the little poem at the bottom and the letter. You do think they'll be like they are here, don't you?" he asked anxiously."I fear not," Mr. Wycherly said, shaking his head. "We can't tell what they were like. You see, the artists who made the pictures in your book could only give their idea of the people they wished to represent——""Then they aren't kind of fortygraphs!" Edmund exclaimed aghast. "I sha'n't really know them when I meet them, after all—they may be quite different! What a shame!""I wish we might have the Theogony out on Sunday," Montagu grumbled. "The people there are pretty enough. Do you think we could, Guardie, dear?""I fear not. I don't think Miss Esperance would like it.""Is your book a Sunday book?" Edmund asked severely."Well, no, perhaps not exactly; it is a very beautiful play.""What's a play?""Something that can be acted.""Is it wicked to act?""No, I don't think so—but there are people——""Why, then, did Elsa say the tiger-man was wicked?" Edmund interposed. "He's an actor, isn't he?"Mr. Wycherly was spared an answer to this question, as at that very moment some one was seen coming through the garden toward them—a tall young man in black, who proved to be none other than the tiger-man himself.The boys rushed at him, shouting joyfully. "Oh, tiger-man, have you come to play with us? You promised you would, you know.""I've come to say good-bye," he said, as each child seized a hand and hung on to him. "I have to go to-night.""But you'll have a little play with us first; just one? It's been such a long Sabbath, and it isn't nearly tea-time yet."Edmund's voice was very piteous."Poor mites," said the tiger-man. "I'll tell you what we'll do. You go down to the bottom of the garden under the trees and wait for me for five minutes. Then I'll come to you and we'll do something—it mustn't be noisy—but we'll make some sort of a play. Just let me have five minutes with Mr. Wycherly here—see, there's my watch—when the five minutes are up you give me a call."As he spoke he took off his watch and chain and gave it to Montagu. The little boys ran to the end of the garden and waited by the wall."He must have climbed over," Edmund said. "I suppose it isn't very high when your legs are so long.""Edmund," said Montagu very seriously, "I don't think we ought to bother him to play. He looks very sorry. You see, his mother's just dead—perhaps he doesn't feel at all like playing. You see, before, when we had that lovely game, he was just going to see her—now——"Edmund's face fell. The tiger-man's advent had seemed a direct interposition of Providence on his behalf. Now, it appeared that he was not to avail himself of it after all."Sha'n't you call him when it's the five minutes?" he asked."No," said Montagu, "it would be kinder not, don't you think?"Edmund's mouth went down at the corners. "It's been so mizzable all day," he sighed. "Aunt Esperance is sorry, and Guardie is sorry, and now you're sorry, and say he mustn't play wiv me. How long must people keep on being sorry? He said he'd play his own self."Montagu was puzzled. He sympathised with his small brother—it had been a long, dull day for him, too—but yet he felt that the tiger-man ought not to be bothered. Montagu was sensitive and sympathetic, and even as he had caught sight of the tiger-man walking up the path he realised that it was a different tiger-man from the one of a week ago who had rolled over and over in the grass so joyously.He looked at the watch in his hand. "It's more'n five minutes now," he said. "You can call if you like, I sha'n't."But Edmund did not call. Montagu moved nearer his little brother and put his arm round him. "We ought to be sorry for the tiger-man, you know," he said softly. "He's like Guardie and us now."Edmund leaned against Montagu and sighed. It really was a very sad and puzzling day."Surely, it's more than five minutes," said a voice behind them, and there was the tiger-man, pale certainly, with red rims round his eyes, but evidently ready to play."Do you mind? Are you sure you don't mind?" Edmund asked eagerly. "If you'd rather not—we'd rather not, too."The tiger-man sat down on the rough grass near the wall—it was one of his agreeable qualities that he was ready to sit down anywhere at any moment. He held out his hand to each of the little boys, and they sat down one on each side and cuddled up against him."You're jolly, decent little chaps," he said, "and I know just what you mean, but I'd like to keep my promise because—well, most of all, because she'd like me to. So now I'll try and be amusing."And he was amusing. Edmund forgot his low spirits and rolled over and over on the grass in paroxysms of stifled laughter at the things the tiger-man did and said.All too soon the game ended. The tiger-man put on his watch, and kissed both the little boys in farewell. "Good-bye," he said, "I'm afraid it will be some time before we meet again, but I sha'n't forget you.""We sha'n't forgetyou. Good-bye, good-bye," called the little boys, watching the tiger-man as he vaulted lightly over the wall. Montagu ran after him. "I'd like to whisper," he said breathlessly.The tiger-man leant over the wall, and Montagu caught him round the neck:"Although we laughed and enjoyed it so," he whispered, "wearesorry, we really are."The tiger-man kissed Montagu once more, but this time he said nothing at all.CHAPTER XVTHE BETHUNE TEMPERAMENTFor courage mounteth with occasion.—KING JOHN."It is curious, is it not," Miss Esperance said to Mr. Wycherly, "how entirely those two dear boys differ in character. Sometimes I think that Montagu must be like his mother's family. He is certainly not like ours.""I am not sure that fundamentally Montagu is so very unlike you, Miss Esperance. In some ways, too, he strikes me as resembling Edmund, though not on the surface. I don't think that you need feel disturbed. Montagu is a Bethuneau fond, although he may seem milder and perhaps—er—less strenuous than Edmund."Miss Esperance shook her head, unconvinced."No," she said, "from all I remember of my brothers and myself and from what I know of my dear father, I don't think Montagu is one of us. Edmund is, absolutely, a Bethune for good and ill—and there's a great deal of ill, mind, in our characters. But Montagu is too reflective, too slow to act. He is not impulsive, like the rest of us, and look how serene he is! He is hardly ever in a temper, and the Bethunes have always been so hot-tempered and high-spirited."They were sitting at table in the evening while Mr. Wycherly drank his wine, and he smiled as he looked at the pretty old lady opposite with the soft lamplight shining on her white hair: the old lady who laid claim to such violent characteristics with such calm assurance. He did not point out to her that it was her beautiful serenity that set so wide a gulf between her and more easily ruffled ordinary mortals: he said nothing, but he smiled, and Miss Esperance saw the smile."You must not think," she continued, "that I in any way regret Montagu's dissimilarity. He is a most kind and unselfish boy; a dear, dear boy. And I wouldn't have him different if I could. But he is not like my people. He has the scholar's temperament. He weighs and considers. He would never act upon impulse, and sometimes I wonder whether he is not lacking in the dash and courage that have always marked our race: those qualities that Edmund possesses in so marked a degree—together with so many others that are quite undesirable."Mr. Wycherly ceased to smile. "Do you know," he said, "it is a most curious thing, and, I suppose, the result of association, but sometimes Montagu reminds me a little of myself when I was a boy. Of course it is extremely unlikely that he should resemble me in any way: yet our minds do tend to run in the same groove. But it's only our minds. Montagu has far more strength and tenacity of purpose than I ever had, and I believe that, should the necessity arise, he would show both dash and courage. The Bethune temperament is there, Miss Esperance, but in his case it is not roused to activity by little things."Mr. Wycherly remembered this conversation next day when he was out walking with Montagu. Their way lay through the village, past some of the poorer cottages, and from one of these came Jamie Brown, a barefooted laddie, about Montagu's own age, but rather bigger.As usual Montagu had hold of Mr. Wycherly's hand, and there was something in the sight of the two figures walking along so primly together that annoyed Jamie excessively.Neither Edmund nor Montagu were allowed to play with the village boys: about this Miss Esperance was most firm and particular. But all the same Edmund knew and was hail-fellow-well-met with them all, and contrived many a sly game of "tippenny-nippenny" or "papes," and many a secret confab on his way to and from the Manse. They all liked Edmund, and Edmund liked them. He could talk broad Scotch, and did whenever he got the chance, although if his aunt heard him she severely discouraged his efforts, even going so far as to forbid the use of certain somewhat lurid, if expressive, adjectives. But Montagu, who spent so much of his time with Mr. Wycherly, was not drawn toward the village boys. Their loud voices and rough manners repelled him: he was naturally shy and held himself aloof. Hence he was despised and disliked as "Englishey" and stuck up.Jamie Brown danced out into the middle of the road on his noiseless bare feet, and walked mincingly in front of Mr. Wycherly and Montagu, looking back over his shoulder from time to time to remark tauntingly: "This is you, mim's milk, like a puggie, a wee Englishey puggie in a red coatie jimp an' sma'—whaur's yer organ? Wull yon auld gentleman no gies a chune? Puggie! Puggie! wha's a wee puggie!"Montagu turned very red, but said nothing. Mr. Wycherly had never in the smallest degree mastered the dialect of Burnhead, and was quite unconscious that Jamie's remarks were other than of the most friendly description. He regarded his gyrations with some surprise, but did not realise any offensive intention. Presently, however, Jamie began to stagger about the road like a drunken man, at the same time chanting raucously:"Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Sumph!What'll ye get from a soo but a grumph?"Then it was that Montagu felt a little tremor in his guardian's hand, and looking up, saw that his face was lined and drawn as with pain.Now Mr. Wycherly was well aware that Jamie Brown could not by any possibility know of his past weakness through personal knowledge; for his "foible" had ceased to be a foible long before Jamie was born. Yet it was pain inexpressible that his old frailty could be made an instrument of persecution for Montagu. The love and admiration of the two little boys, who had come so unexpectedly and beneficently into his life, were very precious to him, and that anything could be done or said to lower him in their estimation or hurt them through his past infirmity, was little short of torture.Montagu, who couldn't imagine why Jamie was reeling about the road in that idiotic fashion, understood well enough the insulting couplet, and saw that Mr. Wycherly was pained."I can't stand this any more," he said, dragging his hand from his guardian's; "he's got to stop it."He ran forward, and with a bound leapt upon Jamie from behind, who, taken by surprise, went down with Montagu on the top of him. Over and over in the mud the boys rolled, kicking, scratching, thumping, doing everything, in fact, of a combative nature except bite.Mr. Wycherly remained where he was, watching them. Mause would fain have hurled herself into the press, too, but he caught the old dog by the collar just in time, and had hard work to hold her, as she bounced and barked and choked in her efforts to get free. He did not feel called upon to interfere between the boys, for they were not ill-matched, and Jamie had assuredly been the aggressor. Presently, however, he saw that Montagu was uppermost, that he had got his adversary by the throat, and was deliberately bumping the boy's head on the ground, while he never relaxed his hold for an instant, and that Jamie was rapidly getting black in the face.Still holding Mause, Mr. Wycherly ran forward, shouting, "Loose him, Montagu; let him go, I say. Don't you see you're throttling the boy? You'll choke him; let go, I say.""I want to choke him," Montagu gasped, as Mr. Wycherly, still holding the struggling Mause with one hand, attempted to drag his ward off the prostrate Jamie with the other. "I want to kill him. I'd have done it, too, if you hadn't interfered.""Nonsense," Mr. Wycherly said sharply. "Don't you know yet that you mustn't keep on hitting a man when he's down? Here, catch hold of Mause for me. Get up, boy!"And he half lifted the recumbent Jamie, who, though somewhat limp, was beginning to assume a normal complexion.Montagu glared at his foe like an angry terrier. "We haven't finished," he cried. "Let me get at him to box him some more. You hold Mause again. Come on!"And Montagu, whose nose was bleeding, while one eye was rapidly disappearing in a tremendous bruise, danced up and down impatiently, in concert with the excited Mause.But Jamie was holding his neck and gasping."I'll no' fecht nae mair wi' yon wee teeger," he said slowly. "He's gey an' spunkie," he added, "for all he's sae genty and mim. Ma certie! his hauns can tak a grup although they're sae wee.""There, you see," said Mr. Wycherly. "He says that he has had enough, so, of course, you can't go on any more. Now you must shake hands with each other, for it's all over."Frankly, and with no sort of grudge, Jamie held out his square, brown fist. "I'll no' ca' ye a puggie onny mair," he said handsomely.Montagu was still eyeing his late foe with some hostility: but as his guardian had bidden him to shake hands he felt it must be the proper thing to do, so he held out his hand. "Perhaps," he said hopefully, "you'll fight with me again some day.""Ah'm no' sae shure," Jamie replied cautiously, and in another minute was speeding on his swift, bare feet toward his mother's cottage.Montagu, still standing in the middle of the road, was indeed a deplorable figure: covered from head to foot with mud and blood, with a singing in his ears, and an extremely sore eye, he looked about as disreputable an object as could be imagined. Mr. Wycherly stood back and regarded him curiously. "We must go home," he said, "and it is to be hoped that we shall not meet many people on the way. Here's a handkerchief; just try and mop that unfortunate nose of yours. What Miss Esperance will say, my dear Montagu, I really cannot imagine."They turned homeward, and had not gone many yards when they met the Misses Moffat, who stopped, holding up their hands in horror at Montagu's appearance.Mr. Wycherly had never yet spoken to them and would fain have passed them now with a courteous salutation. But it was not to be. They closed in upon him and Montagu, both asking at once what dreadful mishap had occurred.Mr. Wycherly again lifted his hat. "The fact is," he said, "Montagu has been engaged in the rough and tumble. There has been a great deal of tumble and a fair amount of rough. But no serious damage has been done. I think, however, that the sooner he gets home and changes the better." And yet again lifting his hat and holding out his hand to Montagu, he prepared to go on his way.But the Misses Moffat were not satisfied. "And you let him fight?" Miss Maggie exclaimed reproachfully. "Oh, sir! do you think it was right?""Yes, madam," Mr. Wycherly answered boldly. "I think it would have been wrong to interfere.""But you did interfere," Montagu exclaimed in injured tones. "I'd have killed him if you hadn't.""Killed who?" shrieked Miss Jeanie. "But this is dreadful——""I really think," Mr. Wycherly interposed, "that we must get back at once. Good-day to you—good-day."And seizing Montagu's hand, he fairly ran from the Misses Moffat in the direction of Remote.Miss Esperance met them at the gate. When she caught sight of Montagu, she, too, gazed in wonder and consternation, and ran out to them, crying, "What has happened? Has he been run over? Is he badly hurt?""This," said Mr. Wycherly, pointing to Montagu, "is the result, my dear Miss Esperance, of a sudden manifestation of—the Bethune temperament."Miss Esperance flushed a most beautiful pink. She stooped and kissed her great-nephew's most uninviting-looking countenance."He has been fighting," she said quietly, "and I fear he has had the worst of it.""That I didn't," the belligerent one exclaimed joyously. "I'd have killed him quite dead if Guardie hadn't stopped me. He wouldn't let me.""Who was it?" Miss Esperance asked with breathless interest."Jamie Broun; he was rude. His father makes wheels and things, you know.""Come and get cleaned, my dear, dear boy. It's very wrong to fight, but sometimes—in a good cause, it maybe necessary. Come away in."And Miss Esperance walked up the garden path with her arm round Montagu's neck.Presently she tapped at Mr. Wycherly's door. When she came in her gentle face was wreathed with smiles."I've just come to confess to you," she said, "that I feel you were right and I was wrong last night. There is no doubt whatever that Montagu is a real Bethune. In 1657 Archibald Bethune did with his own hands choke to death an Irish wrestler who had set upon him in a lonely inn in Forfarshire. The man was seven feet high, so the old chronicle says. I've just been looking.""Won't you sit down, Miss Esperance?""No, I thank you, not now. I have several things to see to; but, dear friend, I felt that I must tell you that I recognise that your insight is deeper than mine. Montagu is a true Bethune: he will be a man of his hands even as the rest of our house.""For my part," Mr. Wycherly said dryly, "I would rather fall into the hands of Edmund than those of Montagu when he is roused. Especially as it would appear to be an agreeable characteristic of the Bethunes to throttle their adversaries.""We have always been a fighting race," Miss Esperance remarked complacently, and departed with pride in her port and satisfaction writ large upon her face.Mr. Wycherly looked thoughtful. "And she the gentlest and tenderest of women!" he murmured. "How strange they are!"That afternoon the Misses Moffat called to ask after Montagu.They found him resting, with a bandaged eye, upon the sofa in his aunt's parlour, with Flaxman's "Theogony" open on his knees for his amusement. His head ached badly, but he was quite happy. He knew that in some way this exploit, although it entailed much destruction to garments and was altogether of an unlawful and unusual order, had not really grieved his aunt. She had lectured him gently, it is true, but she had been very kind as well, and had given him a whole bunch of raisins to console him when he was left at home—his appearance being unsuited just then to polite society—and she and Edmund drove over to see Lady Alicia.Miss Maggie came and sat down beside his sofa, and after sundry searching inquiries after his various wounds, she divulged the real reason of her visit."I felt, my dear," said kind Miss Maggie, "that I must come and tell you a story, a wee story, I read just the other day in 'Wise Words.'""Thank you very much," Montagu said politely."It was told by a Quaker gentleman——""What's a Quaker, please?" Montagu interrupted."A very good man——""Are there many of them or only one?""I think there must be a good many, but that doesn't matter," Miss Maggie said hastily, rather flurried by these interruptions."I like to understand things as I go along. Guardie says you must never pass a word you don't understand. Yes, a Quaker gentleman, a very good man—what next?""Well, this Quaker gentleman had a class for boys, a Sunday class——""Was he a minister as well as a Quaker?" asked the incorrigible Montagu."No, no, he just taught them for kindness, and he was much pleased, because one day he asked his class whether they would rather kill a man or be killed themselves, and all of them, with one accord, every single boy, said he'd rather be killed himself than take the life of a fellow-creature."Miss Maggie paused and looked at Montagu for admiration of these noble sentiments.He shook his head vigorously. "I'm not like that," he said decidedly. "Why, I'd rather kill ten men than be killed myself—and I'd try to do it too, first."
CHAPTER XIII
A MEETING
We two will stand beside that shrine,Occult, withheld, untrod,Whose lamps are stirred continuallyWith prayer sent up to God;And see our old prayers, granted, meltEach like a little cloud.D. G. ROSSETTI.
We two will stand beside that shrine,Occult, withheld, untrod,Whose lamps are stirred continuallyWith prayer sent up to God;And see our old prayers, granted, meltEach like a little cloud.D. G. ROSSETTI.
We two will stand beside that shrine,
Occult, withheld, untrod,
Occult, withheld, untrod,
Whose lamps are stirred continually
With prayer sent up to God;
With prayer sent up to God;
And see our old prayers, granted, melt
Each like a little cloud.D. G. ROSSETTI.
Each like a little cloud.
D. G. ROSSETTI.
D. G. ROSSETTI.
When Edmund was five years old Mr. Wycherly expressed his readiness to teach him all he was teaching Montagu. He took infinite pains to do so, but Edmund's presence was found to be so provocative of dispeace in the quiet study upstairs, and so effectually hindered his brother's progress, while his own was of the slowest, that Miss Esperance took the matter into her own hands and sent her younger nephew to be instructed by the Reverend Peter Gloag, who seasoned his instruction with the tawse, and was altogether more fitted to cope with the average boy's vagaries than the gentle, dreamy Mr. Wycherly. Edmund was rather afraid of the minister. His hand was heavy, and he was singularly awake to the devices by means of which small boys seek to evade their scholastic duties. Nevertheless, the child liked him, for he could unbend on occasion and was an excellent hand at marbles. Moreover, he had a sense of humour, and like so many of the Scottish Calvinists of that time, managed to keep his denunciations of abstract sins quite separate from his judgment of the sinner. In the pulpit he was a terror to evil-doers. When tackled upon questions of doctrine, he laid down the law with a vigour and determination that left his opponent with the impression that never was there such a hard and inflexible man: but when it came to deeds, when it was a question of giving another chance to a ne'er-do-weel, or the punishment to be meted out to some young ragamuffin caught stealing apples or breaking windows, the sinner had far rather fall into the hands of the minister than those of many a gentler spoken man.
In spite of the minister's endeavours, however, Edmund was still laboriously writing sentences to the effect that "'Tis education forms the mind" at an age when Montagu had begun to write Latin verses and to read Xenophon.
"I hate sitting on a chair and hearing things," Edmund would say. "I want to be doing them. I want more room than there is in Auntie's house, or the Manse. Ihatethings over my head 'cept the sky."
One day Miss Esperance drove both boys to Leith, and left them to play on the beach while she went to see an old friend. In a minute Edmund had off his shoes and socks, and in spite of the jagged pebbles, that hurt his unaccustomed feet so cruelly, went down to the water's edge and in up to his knees, then turning to the more timid Montagu, who still stood dubiously upon the brink, cried joyously, "Thisis what I've always been wanting: there'splentyof room out there."
The same evening he climbed on to Mr. Wycherly's knee demanding, "How can I get to be a sailor like my daddie was?"
"You go into the Navy."
"How do I go? What way? Where's the Navy? Is it a town?"
No, it's an institution, a service——"
"Like the poorhouse?" Edmund interrupted, in less enthusiastic tones.
"Oh, dear, no."
"Tell me all about it," the little boy commanded, whereupon Mr. Wycherly obediently and at considerable length explained the constitution of His Majesty's Navy, and Edmund never once interrupted.
When Mr. Wycherly had finished, the little boy was silent for a minute, then asked earnestly, "How soon can I go?"
"Let me see, you're nearly eight now; it might be managed in about three years. You will need to read well, and write well, and be able to do many kinds of sums, and be very obedient."
"I could do all that," Edmund said decidedly, and in the end, to the surprise of every one concerned, he did.
At first it grieved Mr. Wycherly that any one should teach either of the little boys except himself. He grudged Edmund to the minister, even while he knew that the minister was far more fitted to teach him than he was himself. His only consolation was that, as Edmund disliked lessons so much, there would have been some danger of his extending his dislike to the giver of them, and that Mr. Wycherly could not have borne.
It happened that soon after Edmund first went for lessons to the Manse whooping-cough broke out among the village children. It was a bad kind, and Miss Esperance was very anxious that neither Montagu nor Edmund should take it. Thus it came about that one Sunday, one particularly fine Sunday at the beginning of June, she decided that she would not take them to church with her for fear of infection. The doctor himself had suggested this only the day before, and after a sleepless night, in which she had prayed for guidance, Miss Esperance decided that the doctor was probably right and that she should run no risks for them, whatever she might do for herself. Mr. Wycherly offered to look after them both during her absence, and it was characteristic of Miss Esperance that, although she had her misgivings, she made no suggestions as to how their time should be spent in her absence. That would have been to reflect upon Mr. Wycherly.
The little boys will always remember that Sunday, not only because they did not go to church, and did play in a field near the Manse, but because of something that happened.
When the church bells had stopped and the village street was deserted, Mr. Wycherly, the two little boys and Mause went to play in a field that adjoined the Manse. To get to this field, which was rich in buttercups and hedge parsley, and was bordered by ash trees giving a pleasant shade, you turned down a lane, which was also a short cut to the station, lying a mile or so south of the village. The Manse was at one end of the lane, the main street of the village at the other: the gate leading into the field about half-way down. As the little boys neared it they saw a stranger coming from the opposite direction.
It was unusual to meet anybody in that lane, especially at this time of day on the Sabbath, and the children waited at the gate to see the stranger pass. Mr. Wycherly, whose long-distance sight was failing a little, put up his eye-glasses lest he might know the stranger and pass him by without greeting, as he was rather prone to do. Hardly had he placed the glasses on his nose than they dropped off again, and with an exclamation of surprise he hurried forward, holding out both his hands, which the stranger grasped and warmly shook.
He was a tall young man, with very large bright eyes and an abundance of curly black hair, worn rather longer than was usual at that time.
He seized Mr. Wycherly by the arm and bore him up the lane again, talking eagerly the while.
"I must see her," the little boys heard him say. "I must see her somehow, and I daren't go into the house, for he has forbidden me. Could you tell her? Could you fetch her? I'll stay with the youngsters. Oh, dear old friend, for God's sake don't frighten her, but bring her to me somehow. She isn't in church, I know, for I watched every one go in from behind the hedge in the churchyard. I was coming to you in any case...."
Mr. Wycherly and the young man had passed out of earshot. Montagu and Edmund looked at one another with large, round eyes, and Mause looked after Mr. Wycherly and sniffed the air inquiringly.
"Do you think he's a relation?" Edmund asked. "Do you think he's come to stay with us?"
"He can't stay with us," Montagu answered decidedly; "there isn't any room. I wish he could, though," he added; "he looks rather nice."
A sound of quick footsteps in the lane, and the stranger was back again, but without Mr. Wycherly.
"Now," he said, "what shall we play at?"
He said it in a business-like way, and Edmund did the stranger the honour to take him at his word.
"Can you be a tiger?" he demanded excitedly, "and we'll hunt you. You must crawl in the grass, and crouch in the ditch—it's quite dry—and bounce out at us and growl, not too loud, because it's the Sabbath."
Never was such a tiger; so fierce, so elusive, so dashing, so unexpected. This man threw himself into his part at once and required no tedious explanations. The intrepid hunters had a quarter of an hour's blissful excitement, and the tiger had rolled over dead for the fifth time when he suddenly rose to his feet, went to the gate, and looked up the lane toward the Manse.
Mr. Wycherly was coming slowly down the lane, and a lady leant upon his arm. The quondam tiger brushed some grass from off his clothes and turned to the little boys, who were following him eagerly. "Boys," he said, "we've had a good play, we'll have another some day, but now I must go and speak—to my mother——"
He went down the lane very quickly toward Mr. Wycherly and the lady.
"Come," said Montagu, catching Edmund by the hand, "let's come away," and the two little boys trotted off up the lane in the opposite direction; and they never looked back.
Mrs. Gloag, tremulous and very pale, leant heavily on Mr. Wycherly's arm as the tall young man came out of the field toward her. Then she steadied herself. "Dear friend," she said very softly, "I am quite strong. Will you leave me to wait for my boy? I would like to be with him alone—once more, together—he and I." She drew her hand from Mr. Wycherly's arm, and he raised his hat and left her. He passed the stranger and hurried after the little boys. They heard him coming and slackened their pace: but they never looked round.
They had turned the corner when Mr. Wycherly joined them, and separated that he might walk between them as was his custom. He laid a hand on each soft little shoulder and stopped. "Boys," he said, and his voice sounded husky and broken. "You are gentlemen—and good fellows—and I'm proud of you."
The little boys were silent. This that had happened, coming so close upon the heels of the uproarious tiger game, was very puzzling.
Presently, as though following some train of thought, Edmund said: "She knew him, I suppose. Will our mothers know us, do you think, when we get up there? Because, you see, we shall look rather different from when they saw us last. Now you, Guardie, dear, you hadn't white hair when you saw your mother last, had you? You were quite a little boy."
"I think," said Mr. Wycherly, "in fact, I may say I am sure, that our mothers will know us, even if we all three should have white hair."
"I expect," Montagu said thoughtfully, "that they're waiting just like we waited for you round the corner; they've just gone on first."
"Just gone on," Edmund echoed. "I wonder if it seems long to them till we come?"
After morning service when the minister turned down the lane, which was a short cut to the Manse, he found Mr. Wycherly waiting for him outside his own gate.
As a rule Mr. Wycherly was rather shy and nervous in the presence of the minister, but there was no sign of this usual mental perturbation as he stopped him with a courteous gesture. "Mr. Gloag," said Mr. Wycherly, and he looked the minister straight in the eyes, "I have done something which you will probably disapprove and condemn. Curly has been here, and I went to the Manse and told Mrs. Gloag that he was here."
"Did he dare to enter my house?" asked the minister, and he glowered at Mr. Wycherly from under his heavy brows.
"I think," that gentleman replied, and he met the minister's keen glance with one that was quite equally combative, "that he would have dared anything to see his mother. As it happened she came to him. And I want to spare her the exertion of telling you that she did so."
"Since when," asked the minister, looking as though he would greatly like to annihilate Mr. Wycherly; "since when has my wife needed a go-between to spare her the necessity of telling me anything?"
"Good heavens, sir!" Mr. Wycherly exclaimed, "can't you see that what I want you to realise is that Mrs. Gloag is very ill—that whatever you may feel on the subject of Curly's coming, it would have been inhuman to prevent her seeing her son—once more, whatever he had done."
Even as Mr. Wycherly spoke the eyes of the two men that a moment before had been bright with mutual antagonism changed. The minister's to a dumb agony, Mr. Wycherly's to an awe-struck pity. He turned and walked hastily away.
Blindly the minister opened the gate and went through the garden into his own house.
His wife met him in the hall, and her face, he thought, was as the face of an angel, full of a soft radiance not of earth.
"Peter," she said in her soft "Englishey" voice, "God has been good to me. I have seen Curly, and he is not changed. I know it; we may not like what he has done, but he is not changed. He is good, Peter; he is our own dear good boy all the same. He didn't come in because he thought you wouldn't like it, but I had a long, beautiful talk with him in the lane. I felt somehow that I should see him—once more."
Again the ominous phrase, "Once more."
"Felicity," said the minister, "you have stood much longer than is good for you," and he picked her up in his arms and carried her to the sofa in the parlour.
She caught him round the neck and rubbed her soft cheek against his hair. "Why are you not surprised—and angry?" she asked with a little nervous laugh, and he felt how her whole body was trembling in his arms.
"Because I knew already," said the minister; and not one other word did he say on the subject that day, but he noticed that her pretty eyes had lost their look of strained expectancy and watchfulness, and in its place there was an expression of beautiful serenity and almost joyous content.
Although Edmund went to the Manse for his lessons, he was faithful always to the matutinal service of biscuits in Mr. Wycherly's room. He wouldn't have missed it on any account. Two mornings after their encounter with the "tiger-man," as they always called him, they sought Mr. Wycherly after breakfast to find him looking very grave and sad. He gave them their biscuits as usual, and turning to Edmund said: "You must not go to the Manse this morning, my dear boy. There is great trouble there. We have all lost a very dear friend—Mrs. Gloag." Mr. Wycherly paused, for he could not speak. The little boys looked very solemn, then Edmund said softly, "I suppose she has gone on."
CHAPTER XIV
A PARTING
O Royal and radiant soul,Thou dost return, thine influences returnUpon thy children as in life, and deathTurns stingless!W. E. HENLEY.
O Royal and radiant soul,Thou dost return, thine influences returnUpon thy children as in life, and deathTurns stingless!W. E. HENLEY.
O Royal and radiant soul,
Thou dost return, thine influences return
Upon thy children as in life, and death
Turns stingless!
W. E. HENLEY.
W. E. HENLEY.
Whooping-cough was still bad in the village on the Sabbath following their famous tiger-game, and again Miss Esperance did not take her great-nephews to church.
Again, moreover, the Sunday was memorable, not so much because they did not attend church, as because Mr. Wycherly did.
The little boys knew there had been a funeral the day before. Mr. Wycherly had gone to it, and their aunt had sewn a black band upon the sleeve of each little white blouse. They felt solemn and important; and for once they would even have been glad to go to church in order to show this unusual adornment. When they discovered that not only were they to be left at home, but left at home without Mr. Wycherly, such immunity was shorn of all its more pleasing attributes.
They were sorry about Mrs. Gloag, with the curious, impersonal sorrow that children experience in considering the troubles of others. She was a kind lady, and they liked her. She knew many rhymes and funny stories, and was almost as good a playmate as that unequalled tiger-man. But they had not seen her often lately, and at present their chief concern was with the unusual and uncomfortable sense of depression that seemed in some subtle, indefinable fashion to separate them from their aunt and Mr. Wycherly.
And now, having gone to a funeral on Saturday, Mr. Wycherly was going to church on Sunday. Why was Mr. Wycherly going to church?
That was the question that grievously exercised the little boys, and perhaps Mr. Wycherly himself would have been hard put to it to explain his reasons.
There was the protective instinct, the feeling that he could not let Miss Esperance go alone, so small and sad and solitary: the desire to do something comforting: an equally strong desire to show his affectionate respect for Mrs. Gloag, and the hope that perhaps by this means he might to some small extent show his sympathy with the minister. And at the back of all these mixed motives and through every one of them there sounded the voices of habit and tradition; voices which every day of late had called more and more imperatively to Mr. Wycherly. In the old days it had been a matter of course that he should take part in any public ceremony; now, in spite of his long aloofness from any part or lot in the lives of his neighbours, he felt it incumbent upon him to make some open and public demonstration of his share in this common sorrow.
When he first came to live with Miss Esperance, Mrs. Gloag had always been kind and friendly, stopped him in the road when he would fain have passed her by, and yet always left him unconsciously cheered by her greeting. Few others had been kind and friendly then, and Mr. Wycherly did not forget.
It was surprising how many people remembered such things of her now. It seemed that every man, woman, and child in the village could and did tell of something kind Mrs. Gloag had done, of something merry and heartening she had said. People forgot now that she had sometimes laughed when it would have been more fitting to look grave. They only remembered that she had cheered the despondent, strengthened the weak-hearted, made peace where there were quarrels, and brought gaiety and good humour into homes where before there were gloom and discontent.
Not for years had the church been so full as on that Sabbath morning, that sunny Sabbath morning when Mr. Wycherly went to church with Miss Esperance.
The minister looked much as usual. His face was stern and set, though his eyes under the bushy, overhanging gray eyebrows were the eyes of a man who had slept but little. Yet his voice was strong and full, and he prayed and read the Bible with his customary earnestness and vigour.
The congregation were a little fluttered to notice that in the Manse pew there were three tall young men, and that the white-haired, Oxfordy gentleman who lived with Miss Esperance was in her seat, but otherwise the service was much as usual.
It was not until the time came for the sermon that there was throughout the congregation that little thrill of excited expectation which proclaims deep interest.
"What would be the minister's text?"
To most people it was a surprise: it was not even a whole text. The minister preached upon the four words, "Be pitiful, be courteous." His sermon was the shortest he had ever given in that church, lasting only half an hour.
Mr. Wycherly sat with his elbow on the desk in front of him, his white, slender hand shading his eyes.
Miss Esperance was visibly affected; and of the three young men in the Manse seat, one laid his head down on his crossed arms, but he assuredly was not sleeping.
When the service was over and Mr. Wycherly and Miss Esperance were walking home, she said timidly: "It was a beautiful discourse, don't you think?"
"I think," said Mr. Wycherly, "that he preached that sermon for his wife; and that it will be remembered when all his other sermons are forgotten. I am glad to have been there."
That afternoon the little boys took their Sunday picture-books into the garden and sat on the grass under the alder tree; Mr. Wycherly, too, sat in a garden chair reading a sober-looking calf-bound book.
Miss Esperance had returned from afternoon church, but she was so tired and upset that Elsa persuaded her for once to go and lie down in her room, and the children were warned not to disturb their aunt.
Edmund's book was a large Bible Alphabet with gaily-coloured pictures, which Miss Maggie Moffat had given him at the New Year. Montagu had brought out "Peep of Day," a work he detested, but choice on the Sabbath was limited in the house of Miss Esperance, so he looked at the "Child's Bible Alphabet" with Edmund, and so often had they pored over the volume that they were familiar with all the characters from Abraham to Zacchaeus.
Presently Edmund shut the book with a bang. "I shall know all these folks when I meet 'em, anyway," he said decidedly. "I've looked at 'em and looked: I've had enough of seeing them, Isaac and Noah and Jacob and Mrs. Potiphar and that dancing woman, Miriam—none of them very handsome, either," Edmund continued discontentedly. "Oh, I do wish the Sabbath was over, it's such a long, long day."
"I wonder," said Montagu musingly, "why the Bible people are always so ugly in pictures; so red and blue: real people aren't as ugly as that even if they are a bit plain. Can you tell how it is, Guardie, dear? D'you suppose they're really like the people in Edmund's book?"
"I expect," Mr. Wycherly said cautiously, laying down his "Alcestis" and smiling at Montagu's earnest upturned face, "that they were very like the people we see every day, some neither very handsome nor very plain. Some beautiful and delightful."
"I shall be disappointed," Edmund remarked, "if, after all, they turn out to be different from what they are in my book, after I've taken so much trouble to know them when Aunt Esperance covers the little poem at the bottom and the letter. You do think they'll be like they are here, don't you?" he asked anxiously.
"I fear not," Mr. Wycherly said, shaking his head. "We can't tell what they were like. You see, the artists who made the pictures in your book could only give their idea of the people they wished to represent——"
"Then they aren't kind of fortygraphs!" Edmund exclaimed aghast. "I sha'n't really know them when I meet them, after all—they may be quite different! What a shame!"
"I wish we might have the Theogony out on Sunday," Montagu grumbled. "The people there are pretty enough. Do you think we could, Guardie, dear?"
"I fear not. I don't think Miss Esperance would like it."
"Is your book a Sunday book?" Edmund asked severely.
"Well, no, perhaps not exactly; it is a very beautiful play."
"What's a play?"
"Something that can be acted."
"Is it wicked to act?"
"No, I don't think so—but there are people——"
"Why, then, did Elsa say the tiger-man was wicked?" Edmund interposed. "He's an actor, isn't he?"
Mr. Wycherly was spared an answer to this question, as at that very moment some one was seen coming through the garden toward them—a tall young man in black, who proved to be none other than the tiger-man himself.
The boys rushed at him, shouting joyfully. "Oh, tiger-man, have you come to play with us? You promised you would, you know."
"I've come to say good-bye," he said, as each child seized a hand and hung on to him. "I have to go to-night."
"But you'll have a little play with us first; just one? It's been such a long Sabbath, and it isn't nearly tea-time yet."
Edmund's voice was very piteous.
"Poor mites," said the tiger-man. "I'll tell you what we'll do. You go down to the bottom of the garden under the trees and wait for me for five minutes. Then I'll come to you and we'll do something—it mustn't be noisy—but we'll make some sort of a play. Just let me have five minutes with Mr. Wycherly here—see, there's my watch—when the five minutes are up you give me a call."
As he spoke he took off his watch and chain and gave it to Montagu. The little boys ran to the end of the garden and waited by the wall.
"He must have climbed over," Edmund said. "I suppose it isn't very high when your legs are so long."
"Edmund," said Montagu very seriously, "I don't think we ought to bother him to play. He looks very sorry. You see, his mother's just dead—perhaps he doesn't feel at all like playing. You see, before, when we had that lovely game, he was just going to see her—now——"
Edmund's face fell. The tiger-man's advent had seemed a direct interposition of Providence on his behalf. Now, it appeared that he was not to avail himself of it after all.
"Sha'n't you call him when it's the five minutes?" he asked.
"No," said Montagu, "it would be kinder not, don't you think?"
Edmund's mouth went down at the corners. "It's been so mizzable all day," he sighed. "Aunt Esperance is sorry, and Guardie is sorry, and now you're sorry, and say he mustn't play wiv me. How long must people keep on being sorry? He said he'd play his own self."
Montagu was puzzled. He sympathised with his small brother—it had been a long, dull day for him, too—but yet he felt that the tiger-man ought not to be bothered. Montagu was sensitive and sympathetic, and even as he had caught sight of the tiger-man walking up the path he realised that it was a different tiger-man from the one of a week ago who had rolled over and over in the grass so joyously.
He looked at the watch in his hand. "It's more'n five minutes now," he said. "You can call if you like, I sha'n't."
But Edmund did not call. Montagu moved nearer his little brother and put his arm round him. "We ought to be sorry for the tiger-man, you know," he said softly. "He's like Guardie and us now."
Edmund leaned against Montagu and sighed. It really was a very sad and puzzling day.
"Surely, it's more than five minutes," said a voice behind them, and there was the tiger-man, pale certainly, with red rims round his eyes, but evidently ready to play.
"Do you mind? Are you sure you don't mind?" Edmund asked eagerly. "If you'd rather not—we'd rather not, too."
The tiger-man sat down on the rough grass near the wall—it was one of his agreeable qualities that he was ready to sit down anywhere at any moment. He held out his hand to each of the little boys, and they sat down one on each side and cuddled up against him.
"You're jolly, decent little chaps," he said, "and I know just what you mean, but I'd like to keep my promise because—well, most of all, because she'd like me to. So now I'll try and be amusing."
And he was amusing. Edmund forgot his low spirits and rolled over and over on the grass in paroxysms of stifled laughter at the things the tiger-man did and said.
All too soon the game ended. The tiger-man put on his watch, and kissed both the little boys in farewell. "Good-bye," he said, "I'm afraid it will be some time before we meet again, but I sha'n't forget you."
"We sha'n't forgetyou. Good-bye, good-bye," called the little boys, watching the tiger-man as he vaulted lightly over the wall. Montagu ran after him. "I'd like to whisper," he said breathlessly.
The tiger-man leant over the wall, and Montagu caught him round the neck:
"Although we laughed and enjoyed it so," he whispered, "wearesorry, we really are."
The tiger-man kissed Montagu once more, but this time he said nothing at all.
CHAPTER XV
THE BETHUNE TEMPERAMENT
For courage mounteth with occasion.—KING JOHN.
"It is curious, is it not," Miss Esperance said to Mr. Wycherly, "how entirely those two dear boys differ in character. Sometimes I think that Montagu must be like his mother's family. He is certainly not like ours."
"I am not sure that fundamentally Montagu is so very unlike you, Miss Esperance. In some ways, too, he strikes me as resembling Edmund, though not on the surface. I don't think that you need feel disturbed. Montagu is a Bethuneau fond, although he may seem milder and perhaps—er—less strenuous than Edmund."
Miss Esperance shook her head, unconvinced.
"No," she said, "from all I remember of my brothers and myself and from what I know of my dear father, I don't think Montagu is one of us. Edmund is, absolutely, a Bethune for good and ill—and there's a great deal of ill, mind, in our characters. But Montagu is too reflective, too slow to act. He is not impulsive, like the rest of us, and look how serene he is! He is hardly ever in a temper, and the Bethunes have always been so hot-tempered and high-spirited."
They were sitting at table in the evening while Mr. Wycherly drank his wine, and he smiled as he looked at the pretty old lady opposite with the soft lamplight shining on her white hair: the old lady who laid claim to such violent characteristics with such calm assurance. He did not point out to her that it was her beautiful serenity that set so wide a gulf between her and more easily ruffled ordinary mortals: he said nothing, but he smiled, and Miss Esperance saw the smile.
"You must not think," she continued, "that I in any way regret Montagu's dissimilarity. He is a most kind and unselfish boy; a dear, dear boy. And I wouldn't have him different if I could. But he is not like my people. He has the scholar's temperament. He weighs and considers. He would never act upon impulse, and sometimes I wonder whether he is not lacking in the dash and courage that have always marked our race: those qualities that Edmund possesses in so marked a degree—together with so many others that are quite undesirable."
Mr. Wycherly ceased to smile. "Do you know," he said, "it is a most curious thing, and, I suppose, the result of association, but sometimes Montagu reminds me a little of myself when I was a boy. Of course it is extremely unlikely that he should resemble me in any way: yet our minds do tend to run in the same groove. But it's only our minds. Montagu has far more strength and tenacity of purpose than I ever had, and I believe that, should the necessity arise, he would show both dash and courage. The Bethune temperament is there, Miss Esperance, but in his case it is not roused to activity by little things."
Mr. Wycherly remembered this conversation next day when he was out walking with Montagu. Their way lay through the village, past some of the poorer cottages, and from one of these came Jamie Brown, a barefooted laddie, about Montagu's own age, but rather bigger.
As usual Montagu had hold of Mr. Wycherly's hand, and there was something in the sight of the two figures walking along so primly together that annoyed Jamie excessively.
Neither Edmund nor Montagu were allowed to play with the village boys: about this Miss Esperance was most firm and particular. But all the same Edmund knew and was hail-fellow-well-met with them all, and contrived many a sly game of "tippenny-nippenny" or "papes," and many a secret confab on his way to and from the Manse. They all liked Edmund, and Edmund liked them. He could talk broad Scotch, and did whenever he got the chance, although if his aunt heard him she severely discouraged his efforts, even going so far as to forbid the use of certain somewhat lurid, if expressive, adjectives. But Montagu, who spent so much of his time with Mr. Wycherly, was not drawn toward the village boys. Their loud voices and rough manners repelled him: he was naturally shy and held himself aloof. Hence he was despised and disliked as "Englishey" and stuck up.
Jamie Brown danced out into the middle of the road on his noiseless bare feet, and walked mincingly in front of Mr. Wycherly and Montagu, looking back over his shoulder from time to time to remark tauntingly: "This is you, mim's milk, like a puggie, a wee Englishey puggie in a red coatie jimp an' sma'—whaur's yer organ? Wull yon auld gentleman no gies a chune? Puggie! Puggie! wha's a wee puggie!"
Montagu turned very red, but said nothing. Mr. Wycherly had never in the smallest degree mastered the dialect of Burnhead, and was quite unconscious that Jamie's remarks were other than of the most friendly description. He regarded his gyrations with some surprise, but did not realise any offensive intention. Presently, however, Jamie began to stagger about the road like a drunken man, at the same time chanting raucously:
"Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Sumph!What'll ye get from a soo but a grumph?"
"Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Sumph!What'll ye get from a soo but a grumph?"
"Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Oxfordy, Sumph!
What'll ye get from a soo but a grumph?"
Then it was that Montagu felt a little tremor in his guardian's hand, and looking up, saw that his face was lined and drawn as with pain.
Now Mr. Wycherly was well aware that Jamie Brown could not by any possibility know of his past weakness through personal knowledge; for his "foible" had ceased to be a foible long before Jamie was born. Yet it was pain inexpressible that his old frailty could be made an instrument of persecution for Montagu. The love and admiration of the two little boys, who had come so unexpectedly and beneficently into his life, were very precious to him, and that anything could be done or said to lower him in their estimation or hurt them through his past infirmity, was little short of torture.
Montagu, who couldn't imagine why Jamie was reeling about the road in that idiotic fashion, understood well enough the insulting couplet, and saw that Mr. Wycherly was pained.
"I can't stand this any more," he said, dragging his hand from his guardian's; "he's got to stop it."
He ran forward, and with a bound leapt upon Jamie from behind, who, taken by surprise, went down with Montagu on the top of him. Over and over in the mud the boys rolled, kicking, scratching, thumping, doing everything, in fact, of a combative nature except bite.
Mr. Wycherly remained where he was, watching them. Mause would fain have hurled herself into the press, too, but he caught the old dog by the collar just in time, and had hard work to hold her, as she bounced and barked and choked in her efforts to get free. He did not feel called upon to interfere between the boys, for they were not ill-matched, and Jamie had assuredly been the aggressor. Presently, however, he saw that Montagu was uppermost, that he had got his adversary by the throat, and was deliberately bumping the boy's head on the ground, while he never relaxed his hold for an instant, and that Jamie was rapidly getting black in the face.
Still holding Mause, Mr. Wycherly ran forward, shouting, "Loose him, Montagu; let him go, I say. Don't you see you're throttling the boy? You'll choke him; let go, I say."
"I want to choke him," Montagu gasped, as Mr. Wycherly, still holding the struggling Mause with one hand, attempted to drag his ward off the prostrate Jamie with the other. "I want to kill him. I'd have done it, too, if you hadn't interfered."
"Nonsense," Mr. Wycherly said sharply. "Don't you know yet that you mustn't keep on hitting a man when he's down? Here, catch hold of Mause for me. Get up, boy!"
And he half lifted the recumbent Jamie, who, though somewhat limp, was beginning to assume a normal complexion.
Montagu glared at his foe like an angry terrier. "We haven't finished," he cried. "Let me get at him to box him some more. You hold Mause again. Come on!"
And Montagu, whose nose was bleeding, while one eye was rapidly disappearing in a tremendous bruise, danced up and down impatiently, in concert with the excited Mause.
But Jamie was holding his neck and gasping.
"I'll no' fecht nae mair wi' yon wee teeger," he said slowly. "He's gey an' spunkie," he added, "for all he's sae genty and mim. Ma certie! his hauns can tak a grup although they're sae wee."
"There, you see," said Mr. Wycherly. "He says that he has had enough, so, of course, you can't go on any more. Now you must shake hands with each other, for it's all over."
Frankly, and with no sort of grudge, Jamie held out his square, brown fist. "I'll no' ca' ye a puggie onny mair," he said handsomely.
Montagu was still eyeing his late foe with some hostility: but as his guardian had bidden him to shake hands he felt it must be the proper thing to do, so he held out his hand. "Perhaps," he said hopefully, "you'll fight with me again some day."
"Ah'm no' sae shure," Jamie replied cautiously, and in another minute was speeding on his swift, bare feet toward his mother's cottage.
Montagu, still standing in the middle of the road, was indeed a deplorable figure: covered from head to foot with mud and blood, with a singing in his ears, and an extremely sore eye, he looked about as disreputable an object as could be imagined. Mr. Wycherly stood back and regarded him curiously. "We must go home," he said, "and it is to be hoped that we shall not meet many people on the way. Here's a handkerchief; just try and mop that unfortunate nose of yours. What Miss Esperance will say, my dear Montagu, I really cannot imagine."
They turned homeward, and had not gone many yards when they met the Misses Moffat, who stopped, holding up their hands in horror at Montagu's appearance.
Mr. Wycherly had never yet spoken to them and would fain have passed them now with a courteous salutation. But it was not to be. They closed in upon him and Montagu, both asking at once what dreadful mishap had occurred.
Mr. Wycherly again lifted his hat. "The fact is," he said, "Montagu has been engaged in the rough and tumble. There has been a great deal of tumble and a fair amount of rough. But no serious damage has been done. I think, however, that the sooner he gets home and changes the better." And yet again lifting his hat and holding out his hand to Montagu, he prepared to go on his way.
But the Misses Moffat were not satisfied. "And you let him fight?" Miss Maggie exclaimed reproachfully. "Oh, sir! do you think it was right?"
"Yes, madam," Mr. Wycherly answered boldly. "I think it would have been wrong to interfere."
"But you did interfere," Montagu exclaimed in injured tones. "I'd have killed him if you hadn't."
"Killed who?" shrieked Miss Jeanie. "But this is dreadful——"
"I really think," Mr. Wycherly interposed, "that we must get back at once. Good-day to you—good-day."
And seizing Montagu's hand, he fairly ran from the Misses Moffat in the direction of Remote.
Miss Esperance met them at the gate. When she caught sight of Montagu, she, too, gazed in wonder and consternation, and ran out to them, crying, "What has happened? Has he been run over? Is he badly hurt?"
"This," said Mr. Wycherly, pointing to Montagu, "is the result, my dear Miss Esperance, of a sudden manifestation of—the Bethune temperament."
Miss Esperance flushed a most beautiful pink. She stooped and kissed her great-nephew's most uninviting-looking countenance.
"He has been fighting," she said quietly, "and I fear he has had the worst of it."
"That I didn't," the belligerent one exclaimed joyously. "I'd have killed him quite dead if Guardie hadn't stopped me. He wouldn't let me."
"Who was it?" Miss Esperance asked with breathless interest.
"Jamie Broun; he was rude. His father makes wheels and things, you know."
"Come and get cleaned, my dear, dear boy. It's very wrong to fight, but sometimes—in a good cause, it maybe necessary. Come away in."
And Miss Esperance walked up the garden path with her arm round Montagu's neck.
Presently she tapped at Mr. Wycherly's door. When she came in her gentle face was wreathed with smiles.
"I've just come to confess to you," she said, "that I feel you were right and I was wrong last night. There is no doubt whatever that Montagu is a real Bethune. In 1657 Archibald Bethune did with his own hands choke to death an Irish wrestler who had set upon him in a lonely inn in Forfarshire. The man was seven feet high, so the old chronicle says. I've just been looking."
"Won't you sit down, Miss Esperance?"
"No, I thank you, not now. I have several things to see to; but, dear friend, I felt that I must tell you that I recognise that your insight is deeper than mine. Montagu is a true Bethune: he will be a man of his hands even as the rest of our house."
"For my part," Mr. Wycherly said dryly, "I would rather fall into the hands of Edmund than those of Montagu when he is roused. Especially as it would appear to be an agreeable characteristic of the Bethunes to throttle their adversaries."
"We have always been a fighting race," Miss Esperance remarked complacently, and departed with pride in her port and satisfaction writ large upon her face.
Mr. Wycherly looked thoughtful. "And she the gentlest and tenderest of women!" he murmured. "How strange they are!"
That afternoon the Misses Moffat called to ask after Montagu.
They found him resting, with a bandaged eye, upon the sofa in his aunt's parlour, with Flaxman's "Theogony" open on his knees for his amusement. His head ached badly, but he was quite happy. He knew that in some way this exploit, although it entailed much destruction to garments and was altogether of an unlawful and unusual order, had not really grieved his aunt. She had lectured him gently, it is true, but she had been very kind as well, and had given him a whole bunch of raisins to console him when he was left at home—his appearance being unsuited just then to polite society—and she and Edmund drove over to see Lady Alicia.
Miss Maggie came and sat down beside his sofa, and after sundry searching inquiries after his various wounds, she divulged the real reason of her visit.
"I felt, my dear," said kind Miss Maggie, "that I must come and tell you a story, a wee story, I read just the other day in 'Wise Words.'"
"Thank you very much," Montagu said politely.
"It was told by a Quaker gentleman——"
"What's a Quaker, please?" Montagu interrupted.
"A very good man——"
"Are there many of them or only one?"
"I think there must be a good many, but that doesn't matter," Miss Maggie said hastily, rather flurried by these interruptions.
"I like to understand things as I go along. Guardie says you must never pass a word you don't understand. Yes, a Quaker gentleman, a very good man—what next?"
"Well, this Quaker gentleman had a class for boys, a Sunday class——"
"Was he a minister as well as a Quaker?" asked the incorrigible Montagu.
"No, no, he just taught them for kindness, and he was much pleased, because one day he asked his class whether they would rather kill a man or be killed themselves, and all of them, with one accord, every single boy, said he'd rather be killed himself than take the life of a fellow-creature."
Miss Maggie paused and looked at Montagu for admiration of these noble sentiments.
He shook his head vigorously. "I'm not like that," he said decidedly. "Why, I'd rather kill ten men than be killed myself—and I'd try to do it too, first."