Rain! Rain! Rain! One drop chasing the other down the window-pane like boys upon a slide. Beyond them a swaying network of branches rising out of the grey mist-curtain veiling the landscape, and every now and again a wild whirl of wind from the southwest, bringing with it a fiercer patter on the pane. Those who know the West coast of Scotland in the mood with which in nine cases out of ten it welcomes the Sassenach, will need no further description of the general depression and discomfort in Gleneira House a week after Paul had said good-bye to Marjory at the short cut. For he had been right, the deluge had come; and even Mrs. Cameron, going her rounds through byre and barn in pattens, with petticoats high kilted to her knees, shook her head, declaring that if it were not for the promise she would misdoubt that the long-prophesied judgment had overtaken this evil generation. And she had lived in the Glen for fifty years.
Poor Lady George, who had arrived at Gleneira wet, chilled, uncomfortable, yet still prepared to play her rôle of hostess to perfection, fell a victim to a cold, which, as she complained, put it out of her power to give a good rendering to the part. Since it was manifestly impossible to receive her visitors, arriving in their turn wet, chilled, uncomfortable, with anything like the optimism required, for protestations that Highland rain did no harm, and hot whiskey-and-water did good, were valueless, when you sneezed three times during your remark. If she could only have gone to bed for one day, there would have been some chance for her; but that was impossible, since nowadays one couldn't have a good old-fashioned cold in one's head without the risk of breaking up one's party from fear of influenza! So she went about in a very smart, short, tweed costume, with gaiters, and affected a sort of forced indifference even when the cook, imported at fabulous wages, gave up her place on the third day, saying she could not live in a shower bath, and was not accustomed to a Zoölogical Gardens in the larder; when the upper housemaid gave warning because hot water was not laid on to the top of the house, and the kitchenmaid refused to make the porridge for the half-dozen Highland lassies, who did all the work, on the ground that no self-respecting girl would encourage others in such barbarous habits. But all this, thank heaven! was on the other side of the swing door; still, though the guests could scarcely give warning, matters were not much brighter in, what servants call, collectively, the dining-room. Breakfast was a godsend, for a judicious admixture of scones and jams, and a little dexterous manipulation of the time at which people were expected to come down, made it last till eleven at the earliest. And then the hall was a providence. Large, and low, and comfortable, with a blazing fire, and two doors, where the ladies could linger and talk bravely of going out. Looking like it, also, in tweeds even shorter and nattier than Lady George's, yet for all that succumbing after a time to the impossibility of holding up an umbrella in such a gale of wind, joined to gentle doubts as to whether a waterproof was waterproof. Then there was lunch. But it was after lunch, when people had manifestly over-eaten themselves, that the real strain of the day began. So that the Reverend James Gillespie, coming to call, despite the pouring rain, as in duty bound, was delighted with the warmth of his reception, and Lady George, making the most of the pleasing novelty, reverted unconsciously to a part suitable to the occasion.
"Dear me!" she said plaintively; "this is very distressing! Imagine, my dear Mrs. Woodward! Mr. Gillespie assures me that there is no church in the Glen, only a schoolhouse. Paul, dear, how came you never to mention this, you bad boy?"
Paul, who, after sending the most enthusiastic men forth on what he knew must be a fruitless quest after grouse, was devoting himself to the ladies, and in consequence felt unutterably bored, as he always did when on duty, turned on his sister captiously:
"I thought you would have remembered the fact. I did, and you are older than I am. Why, you used always to cry--just like Blazes does--if my mother wouldn't let you open the picture papers during service."
Lady George bridled up. It was so thoughtless of Paul, bringing all the disagreeables in life into one sentence; and reminiscences of that sort were so unnecessary, for everyone knew that even the best childhood could not stand the light of adult memory.
"But surely there was a talk, even then, of a more suitable building. I suppose it fell through. High time, is it not, dear Mrs. Woodward, for our absentee landlord to repair his neglect?"
"The farm-steadings have first claim to repair, I'm afraid, Blanche," returned Paul, refusing his part. "The church will have to stand over as a luxury."
Lady George, even in her indignation, hastened to cover the imprudence, for the Woodwards were distinctly high.
"Not a bit of it, Paul! We will all set to work at once, Mr. Gillespie, and see what can be done--won't we, dear Mrs. Woodward?"
"I would suggest writing to the Bishop as the first step," said the Reverend James, modestly.
"And then a fancy fair," continued Lady George.
"Delightful! a fancy fair, by all means," echoed an elderly schoolfellow of Blanche's, who had been invited on the express understanding that she was to do the flowers and second all suggestions.
"I trust you will have nothing of the kind, Blanche," put in Paul, with unusual irritation. "I hate charitable pocket-picking. I beg your pardon for the crude expression, Miss Woodward, but I have some excuse. On one occasion in India I was set on by every lady in the station, with the result that I found twenty-five penwipers of sorts in my pocket when I got home."
"Twenty-five, that was a large number," said Alice, stifling a yawn. "What did you do with them?"
"Put them away in lavender as keepsakes, of course."
"My dear Paul," put in his sister, hurriedly, recognising his unsafe mood. "We do things differently in England. We do not set on young men; we do not have----"
"A superfluity of penwipers," interrupted her brother, becoming utterly exasperated; but as he looked out of the window he saw something which made him sit down again beside Alice Woodward, and devote himself to her amusement. Yet it was a sight which with most men would have had exactly the opposite effect, for it was a glimpse of a well-known figure battling with the wind and the rain along the ferry road. But Paul Macleod had made up his mind; besides, rather to his own surprise, the past few days had brought him very little of the restless desire to be with Marjory, which he had expected from his previous experiences in love. It was evidently a sentimental attack, unreal, fanciful, Arcadian, like the episode in which it had arisen. And yet a remark of his sister's at afternoon tea set him suddenly in arms.
"Mr. Gillespie told me there was a girl staying at the Camerons', Paul, who was a sort of governess, or going to be one. And I thought--if she hadn't a dreadful accent, or anything of that sort, you know, of having her in the mornings for the children."
"Miss Carmichael, Blanche," he broke in, at a white heat, "is a very charming girl, and I was going to ask you to call upon her, as soon as the weather allowed of it. I have seen a good deal of her during the last few weeks, and should like you to know her."
Really, in his present mood, Paul was almost as bad as a dynamite bomb, or a high-pressure boiler in the back kitchen! Still, mindful of her sisterly devotion, Lady George covered his indiscretion gracefully.
"Oh, she is that sort of person, is she? I must have misunderstood Mr. Gillespie, and I will call at once, for it is so pleasant, isn't it, Alice dear, for girls to have companions."
And yet, as she spoke, she told herself that this was an explanation of her brother's patience in solitude, and that it would be far safer, considering what Paul was, to keep an eye on this possible flirtation. Meanwhile, the offender felt a kind of shock at the possibilities her easy acquiescence opened up. He had been telling himself, with a certain satisfaction, that the idyll was over, leaving both him and her little the worse for it; and now, apparently, he was to have an opportunity of comparing the girl he fancied, and the girl he meant to marry, side by side. It was scarcely a pleasing prospect, and the knowledge of this made him once more return to his set purpose of fostering some kind of sentiment towards Alice Woodward. But the fates were against him. Lord George, coming in wet, but lively, from a constitutional, began enthusiastically, between his drainings of the teapot, in search of something to drink, on the charms of a girl he had met on the road. "A real Highland girl," continued the amiable idiot, regardless of his wife's storm signals, "with a lot of jolly curly hair: not exactly pretty, you know, but fresh as a daisy, bright as a bee. I couldn't help thinking, you know, how much better you would all feel, Blanche, if you went out for a blow instead of sticking at home."
"We should not come into the drawing-room with dirty boots if we did, should we, Alice dear? Just look at him, Mrs. Woodward! He isn't fit for ladies' society, is he?"
Lord George gave a hasty glance at his boots, swallowed his tepid washings of the teapot with a muttered apology, and retired, leaving his wife to breathe freely.
"That must be Miss Carmichael, I suppose," she remarked easily. "I am beginning to be quite anxious to see this paragon, Paul."
"Nothing easier," replied her brother, shortly; "if you will be ready at three to-morrow afternoon, I'll take you over and introduce you."
Positively she felt relieved when, with some excuse about seeing whether the sportsmen had returned, he left the drawing-room. It was like being on the brink of a volcano when he was there, and yet, poor, dear old fellow, he behaved very sweetly.
She said as much to him, being clever enough to take his real affection for her into consideration, during a brief quarter of an hour's respite from duty which she managed in his business-room before dinner.
"I wishIhad a snuggery like this, Paul," she said, plaintively shaking her head over his long length spread out on one side of the fire, and Lord George's on the other, "but women always bear the brunt of everything. If the barometer would go up I could manage; but itwillgo down, and though I've taken away the one from the hall, Major Tombs has an aneroid in his room, andwillspeak about it. And Ricketts--I have had her for five years, George, you remember--gave me warning to-day. It seems Jessie took advantage of the fire in Ricketts's room to dry one of Paul's wet suits, and Ricketts thought it was a burglar. She went into hysterics first, and now says she never was so insulted in her life."
Paul laughed. "Would it do any good if I apologised?"
"Wish it had been mine," grumbled Lord George. "This is my last coat but one, and the sleeves of it are damp. I can't think why the dickens the women can't turn 'em inside out."
"Oh! of course, it's the women again, George, but the footman wants to know if he is expected to grease boots, and I don't know what to say. Someone used to grease them, I remember----"
"Oh! if it comes to that," said Paul, hotly, "I'll grease 'em myself. Why should you bother, Blanche?"
"Now that issolike a man! Someone must bother; and really servants are so troublesome about boots, though I must own one would think you men were centipedes; there are fifty pairs in the laundry at present. And Mrs. Woodward says her husband has smoked too many cigars and drunk too much whiskey and soda. As if it were my fault." Poor Lady George spoke quite tearfully.
"Well, I offered to take him out, but he said his waterproof wasn't waterproof. What the dickens does a man mean by coming to the West Highlands without a waterproof? One doesn't expect anything else in a woman, of course, but a man!"
Lady George dried her eyes disconsolately. "Oh! it is no use, George, importing the antagonism of sex into the matter. It is bad enough without that. If we only had a billiard-room I could manage. Do you know I think it quite criminal to build a house in the country without one."
"There are the Kindergarten toys, my dear," suggested her husband; "the children seem to have tired of them."
"Oh, don't try to be funny, please!" retorted his wife; "that would be the last straw. And nurse says it is because they cannot get out that they are so cross. Just when I was counting on them, too, as a distraction."
"Well, Blazes was that effectually this morning," replied her husband, with an air of conviction; "he howled straight on end for two hours, and when I went into the nursery to see what was up, I found the poor little beggar sobbing over some grievance or another."
Lady George flushed up. "It was only because he couldn't come down with the others--I really can't have him; he is so unreasonable, and Mrs. Woodward doesn't believe in my system."
"Never mind, my dear Blanche," said her brother, consolingly. "It seems to answer nicely with good children, and children ought to be good, you know. And the barometer is going up, it really is."
"For wind, I suppose," replied his sister, tragically. Apparently it was for wind; at any rate, Will Cameron coming up to see the laird on business next day observed casually that this must be about the end of it; an optimistic remark which has a certain definite significance in a land of gales. Even the sportsmen were driven to the cold comfort of examining the action of each other's weapons with veiled contempt, discussing the respective merits of each other's accoutrements, from cartridge cases to leggings, and trying to forget that the wild weather was making the birds still wilder than they had been already. It appeared to have the same effect upon humanity. Sam Woodward, who had been a thorn in poor Lady George's side from the beginning, fell out with the only man who could tolerate him, and thereafter told his sister it was a beastly hole, and that he meant to make thematergive him some oof, when he would cut and run to some place where they weren't so beastly stuck up. Mr. Woodward, senior, after roaming about disconsolately waiting for the post, was only appeased by Lady George's suggestion that he would be doing yeoman's service to the cause of civilisation if he composed a letter to the Postmaster-General, calling attention to the disgraceful irregularity in her Majesty's mails to Gleneira; whereupon he retired into the library and wasted several sheets of foolscap.
It was on the children, however, that the weather had the most disastrous effect; so much so that Lord George, returning in the afternoon from a blow with Paul--whose patience had given way over a point-blank refusal on the under footman's part to stop another hour if he was not allowed a fire in his room before dinner--found his wife in the nursery standing helplessly before Blazes, who, in his flannel nightgown, was seated stolidly on the floor. Adam and Eve, meanwhile, were eyeing the scene from their beds, where, however, they had a liberal supply of toys.
"Oh, George!" she cried appealingly, "he has such a hard, hard heart; and I am sure he must get it from your side of the family, sodoyou think you could do anything with him?"
"Put him to bed like the others," suggested his father, weakly, showing signs, at the same time, of beating a retreat, but pausing at the sight of his wife's face, which, to tell the truth, was not far from tears.
"So I have, but he gets out again, and nurse can't hold him in all the time. Besides, it was Mrs. Woodward's fault for being so disagreeable about my system; but the children were naughty, poor dears; only, of course, Adam and Eve went to bed when they were told--you see, they arereasonable, and knew that if theydidthey would be allowed to come down again to dessert--and then they didn't really mind going to bed to please me, the little dears. But Blasius actually slapped Mrs. Woodward's face, and then she said he ought to be whipped. So we had quite a discussion about it, and, in the heat of the moment, I told Blasius he must stop in bed till he said he was sorry. And now I can't make him stop in bed or say a word. He just sits and smiles."
Here their mother's tone became so unlike smiles that Adam and Eve, from their little beds, begged their ducksom mummie not to cry, even though Blazes was the baddest little boytheyhad ever seen.
"If he won't say it, you can't make him," remarked Lord George aside, with conviction. "If I were you I'd chance it."
"But I can't. You see, I told Mrs. Woodward I could manage my own children, and so I've made quite a point of it with Blasius. I can't give in."
Lord George, who was in the Foreign Office, and great on diplomatic relations, whistled softly. "Always a mistake to claim when you can't coerce--or retaliate." Then he added, as if a thought had struck him, "Look here! has he had his tea? No! then hand him over to me; I'll put him in the little room by the business room. Nobody will hear him there even if he does howl, and as he gets hungry he will cave in, I expect. At any rate, he can't get out of bed there, and I don't think he can like it."
But for some unexplained reason, possibly original sin, Blasius elected to be quite cheerful over the transfer. He informed the nurse, as she put on his dressing-gown, that he was going to "'moke with daddy," and when he reached the little bare room, which was almost a closet, he tucked the same dressing-gown round his little legs very carefully as he plumped down on the floor.
"Blazeth's goin' to stay here a long, long time," he said, confidently. "Dood-night, daddy dear."
In fact, he was so quiet that more than once his father, smoking in the next room, got up to open the door softly and peer in to see if by chance any evil could have befallen the small rebel; only to retire finally, quite discomforted by the superior remark that "when Blazeth's horry Blazeth's 'll let daddy know." To retire and meditate upon the mysterious problem of fatherhood, and that duty to the soul which, somehow or another, you have beckoned out of the unknown. In nine times out of ten, thoughtlessly, to suit your own pleasure; in ninety-nine times out of a hundred to bring it up to suit your own convenience, to minister to your amusement, to justify your theories.
Lady George, coming in with the falling twilight, when the duties of afternoon tea were over in the drawing-room, found her husband, minus a cigar, brooding over the fire.
"I've done it, Blanche," he said defiantly.
"Done what?"
"Beaten him. I knew I should some day."
His wife gave quite a sharp little cry. "Oh, George! and I trusted you. I trusted you so entirely, because you knew it was wrong. And now it can never be undone--never! You have ruined everything--all the confidence, and the love--Oh! George, how could you?"
The man's face was a study, but it was one which few women could understand, for there is something in a righteous disregard of weakness which seems brutal to most of them; for to them justice, like everything else, is an emotion.
"The little beggar bit me," he began, rather sheepishly, and then suddenly he laughed. "He was awfully quiet, you know, and I thought he was really getting hungry; so I went in, and by Jove! Blanche, he had eaten nearly a whole dog biscuit! Paul keeps them there, you know, for the puppy. Well, I felt he had me on the hip as it were, and if it hadn't been for your face, I'd have given in--like a fool. So I sate down and talked to him--like--like a father. And then he suddenly slipped off my knee like an eel, and bit me on the calf. Got tired, I suppose, and upon my soul, I don't wonder--we had been at it for hours, remember. And then--I don't think I lost my temper, Blanche--I don't, indeed; but it seemed to come home to me that it was he or I--a sort of good fight, you know. So I told him that I wasn't going to be bothered by him any more. He had had his fun, and must pay for it, as he would have to do till the day of his death. And then I gave him a regular spanking--yes! I did--and he deserved it."
There was the oddest mixture of remorse, defiance, pain, and pride in her husband's honest face, but Lady George could see nothing, think of nothing, save the overthrow of her system, her belief.
"I wonder you aren't ashamed of yourself!" she cried, quite passionately. "It isn't as if he could reason about it as you can--it isn't as if he understood--it is brute force to him, nothing more----"
"That's just it, you see," protested the culprit, feebly, "if hecouldreason."
"And now the memory must be between you two always, and it isn't as it used to be in the old barbarous days. Parents nowadays care for something more than the old tyranny. We have a respect for our children as for human beings like ourselves. And now you will never be--or at least yououghtnever to be able to look him in the face again! Just think what it means, George!" Blanche, as she stood there with disclaiming hands and eloquent voice, felt herself no mean exponent of the new order of things, and rose to the occasion. "If he had been a man, you dared not have beaten him, so it was mean, brutal, unworthy. How can you expect the child to forget it? Would you, if you were in his place? No! He will never forget it, and the memory must come between you----"
"Blazeth's horry."
A round, full, almost manly voice, and a round, broad face, seamed with tears, yet strangely cheerful withal, as if, the bolt having fallen, the sky was clear once more.
Blanche dropped to her knees, and, secure in her own conscience, held out her arms to the little advancing figure, but the child steered past them. It was fact, and fact alone, which impressed the sturdy brain, which day by day was gathering up its store of experience against the hand-to-hand fight with life, which, please God, would come by and bye--the life which was no Kindergarten game, the life of strange, unknown dangers, against which the only weapon is the sheer steel of self-control. And this was a little foretaste of the fight in which daddy had won; daddy, who could do nothing but clasp the little figure close to his heart as it climbed to his knee, and then walk away with it to the window to hide his own tears.
His wife, standing where Blasius had passed her by, could see those two round, red heads, so strangely like each other, though the one had a shock of rough hair and the other was beginning to grow bald. And she could hear that round full voice with a ring of concern in it.
"Blazeth's horry he hurt daddy such a lot. And daddy hurt Blazeths awful; but he's a dood boy now. And oh, daddy! I don't fink them bickeys is half as nice as daddy's--and Blazeths would like one, becauth he's a dood boy."
The storm was over. The sky was clear, and Lord George, as he carried his youngest born pick-a-back upstairs to the nursery, felt that there was a stronger tie between them than there had ever been before; a strange new tie between him and the little soul he had beckoned out of the unknown--the little soul to whom in future "Daddy says not" would represent that whole concentrated force of law and order from which it was at present sheltered, but which by and bye would be its only teacher. And yet, when brought face to face with his wife's arguments, he, being of the dumb kind, could only say:
"You see, my dear, Blazes isnota Kindergarten child, now is he?"
And still it rained!
"Paul, this is awful," mourned poor Lady George, on the eighth morning. "The post hasn't come at all for two days, and it is positively heartrending to see poor Mr. Woodward trying to read Monday's share-list for the third time. Then the beef hasn't come either, and their maid won't eat any other meat. Hot roast twice a day, and cold for lunch. All the servants have given warning, and I don't believe the Woodwards will stand it."
"Let them give warning, too," broke in her brother, hotly; then seeing his sister's face, went on after his wont, consolingly. "Don't bother, please, I'm not worth it. Besides, if Miss Woodward is going to do me the honour of marrying Gleneira, it is as well that she should learn to stand a little damp."
"A little damp! Besides, she will have time to learn afterwards--women always do after they are married--till then, they really have a right to be amused. Can't you suggest something to cheer us up? I'm at my wits' end. Even the book-box has gone astray, and it is so hard to make conversation when you don't see the society papers."
"Shall I black my face or stand on my head and sing a comic song? I've done both in my salad days."
"Oh, don't be unkind, Paul, when I have taken so much trouble!"
"You have, indeed," he echoed, walking to the window moodily, feeling at once irritated and annoyed. Personally he would have found no difficulty in amusing himself with Marjory, whom he had not seen for a week, so close at hand. And suddenly the thought of someone else who had had the knack of making time pass pleasantly occurred to him. "I'll tell you what I'll do, Blanche, I'll wire to Mrs. Vane to come at once. I expected to hear two days ago if she was to be with us this week or next; but she would come anywhere to do a kindness, and she would keep us alive--rain or no rain."
"It would be too late," returned his sister, dejectedly. "To do any good she should be here to-day. I will not be responsible for another hour--another minute of this detestable climate." She spoke quite tragically, but her brother was staring out of the window with all his eyes.
"By all that's impossible! Yes, it is. Hooray, Blanche! There she is."
"Who! What!"
"Violet! Violet Vane in Macniven's machine. How on earth----" He was out of the door full of excitement, followed by his sister, who was heard giving tragic orders for hot baths and blankets.
"She must be half drowned," said Mrs. Woodward, hastening from her room at the sound of wheels to join the little circle crowding round the window to watch the arrival. "She will go to bed at once, of course."
"And have something warm," said one voice.
"More likely inflammation of the lungs. I remember----" suggested another.
"Bronchitis, at least--poor thing--poor thing----" put in a third.
To which Cassandra chorus came the sound of a musical laugh and a perfect ripple of chatter, as Paul, with a new cheerfulness in his face, ushered in the daintiest little figure, which, as he held the door open, looked back at him to finish the recital of her adventures with words, "It was such fun."
"My dear Mrs. Vane," cried Lady George, "you must be dead!"
"Only with laughing, I assure you. I am not a bit wet, thanks. I got them to lend me a tarpaulin jacket and a sou'-wester. But Captain Macleod tells me I was not expected--I am so sorry, but really I did write."
"The post is shamefully irregular," put in Mr. Woodward, majestically; "it did not come yesterday, and I have no doubt it will not come to-day."
"But it has! I brought it. Peter Macniven--that was my driver--proposed I should give it a lift, and Donald Post said it would save time if I took out the Gleneira letters myself. So I did. They are in my bag downstairs, Paul--quite a large bundle for Mr. Woodward; and all the picture papers, and a packet of chocolates from Fuller's. And, oh! by the way, Lady George, there was a basket of beef and a box of books lying for you at the Oban pier, so I took the liberty of bringing them along."
"My dear--my dear Mrs. Vane!"
Lady George positively could say no more. Here was a guest, indeed. It was as if a glint of sunshine had come into the house; so that after a time the young man with a big head, whom Lady George had invited because he could recite poetry to the young ladies, and who had for the last few days been elaborating a sonnet on suicide, went hurriedly out of the room to commit to paper the opening lines of a lyric, "To a sea breeze sweeping away a storm." It was the same with everyone in the house, and even the maids bustled to get her room in order, and the butler, after laying an extra place at the dinner-table, remarked in the housekeeper's room that now, perhaps, the dining-room would have conversation that was worth listening to.
Only Paul, remembering her ways of old, and that, spirits or no spirits, the long journey must have fatigued one who was past the first untiringness of youth, urged her to rest; but with a little familiar nod of comprehension she set the very idea aside with scorn. Thereby, to say sooth, starting fair with him by arousing once more that tender admiration for pluck which, despite asseverations to the contrary, most men have for courage and fire in a woman. Paul Macleod, at any rate, felt it keenly when she came, plumaged like some delicate butterfly, into the drawing-room before dinner, causing Mr. Woodward to put down the share-list without a sigh, and Sam, who had been laying down the law loudly, to become bashfully silent. And then when, in consequence of her being the Honourable Mrs. Vane by virtue of a most dishonourable husband, Paul took her down to dinner, how different that dinner was! He recognised it gratefully; recognised the readiness of her smile, the art which her bright eyes had of making people believe in themselves and feel that they, too, had something to say worth the saying. The art, in short, of the hostess, which Lady George, with all her cleverness, had not; for the simple reason that she thought too much about the effect she was producing. And Violet Vane's worst enemies might call her artificial, but they could never have called her self-conscious or selfish. While, as for the artificiality, a woman must needs be that who is deadly weary, and who has given herself bright eyes and a ready tongue by means of chloric ether. Violet had to slip away for another dose ere she could face what to her was the dreariest, deadliest hour of the day--the time when the ladies wait patiently for the men to come up from the wine and the cigars; for she was frankly, unblushingly, a man's woman, and would confess as much to anyone with a smile. And wherefore not? She had lived among them all her life. She had no babies to discuss, had no experience of English housekeeping, and felt no sympathy with woman's rights or wrongs; for the simple reason that she herself had never felt the least disqualification of sex. She wasbonne camaradein every fibre of her mind and body; yet withal a thorough little lady.
"Paul, my friend," she said, as he made his way straight to her sofa, where, with wide, bright eyes, she had been taking sights for future steering, "you can have five minutes by the clock, and then monsieur will be on duty again. Will he not? Yes! no doubt five minutes is short; it will not suffice to tell me all you have to tell, will it? But I would rather leave it for to-morrow. For I am tired, Paul, so tired, and I don't want to be cross."
Something in her voice touched him. "Of course, you are tired. I know that. But when was our dear lady ever cross?"
The old familiar title, given in the remote Indian station to the dainty little woman who had made life so pleasant to so many, came to his lips naturally, and the scent of the jasmine she wore carried him back to the days when it had seemed an integral part of consciousness; since life was divided into delirium-haunted forgetfulness and confused awakenings to the familiar perfume. And those are things a man never forgets. She laughed, though the words sent a throb to her heart.
"Cross?" she echoed; "I am always cross when people are dull. And you are dull to-night, Paul. Why?"
Those bright eyes were full of meaning, and he hesitated over the remark that he had been waiting for the sunshine of her presence. She laughed again, this time with an odd little ring in it. "My dear Paul, you should not need sunshine nowadays." There was no mistaking her intent, and he winced visibly.
"I always said you had antennae, Violet," he replied, with a flush; "but how on earth have you found that out already?"
She paused for a moment, and a mad desire to quote a proverb about thieves came over her. So it was true, then! True, and she--she was too late! She set her teeth firmly over her own pain. "Does it generally need such great acumen to discover when Paul Macleod is in love,mon ami?"
The sarcasm struck home, and he rose, feeling the position untenable. "Come and sing," he said; "it is years since I heard you."
She shook her head. "It will not do, Paul; not even though it is five years six months seventeen days and a few hours or so since we sang 'La ci darem' together. The five minutes is not up yet, so sit down, please, and tell me who these people are whom you want to amuse. Or, stay! I will catalogue them, and then you can correct my mistakes. Your sister? How handsome she is, yet not in the least like you. Lord George? A perfect angel, with a twinkle in his eye. He is to be my best friend. Your Miss Woodward? Alice is a pretty name, Paul; and her hair shall be of what colour it shall please God. Am I right, Benedict? Papa Woodward? Have a care, Paul! he studies the share-list too much; so have it in Government securities. Mamma Woodward? What her daughter will be at that age; it is such an advantage to a man, Paul, to see exactly what his future will be. Master Woodward? No! I will leave you to describe him."
Paul winced again. "You are very clever, Violet--suppose you pass on to the others----"
"I told you I was evil-tempered. Then there is the young man who wrote a sonnet to somebody's eyebrow--probably mine--between the soup and fish. Two young ladies colourless--your sister is clever, too, Paul--and a couple of men to match. Finally the Moth."
"Who?"
"Miss Jones, or is she Miss Smith? I met her in Devonshire with another school friend. She was Watteau then--cream and roses. I met her, too, on a yacht--anchors and lanyards. And here, like Lady George, she ismoyen-âge."
"But why the Moth?"
"Because she takes her colour from what she preys upon; and she frets my garment! That is all, except the lady who bicycles and thinks Gleneira too hilly, and the man who takes photographs."
"My dear Violet!" laughed Paul; "you are a witch."
"Pardon me! I am an ass--all ears. And Bertie, Palmer, and Gordon come next week. I'm glad of that; one can't make bricks without mud. Straw requires the baser clay."
"Straw! that is hardly complimentary to your sex!"
"Pardon me again! the highest duty of a woman is to please man, and he is proverbially tickled by a straw. So now for the neighbours."
"None."
Violet Vane's eyebrows went up in derision. "There is no Sahara in Lorneshire, and you have been here for three weeks--or is it a month?"
"To be accurate, a month and four days."
"Dear me! what a long time it takes to put up curtains."
"Very. I am sure those five minutes are over, Violet. Won't you come and sing for us?"
"How--how dreadfully dull you must have been, Paul!"
"Dreadfully. Blanche! will you try and persuade Mrs. Vane to sing to us--she is obdurate with me."
Lady George, delighted at her brother's virtue in seeking to break up atête-a-tête, was urgent in her appeals, and Mrs. Vane passed to the piano, airily.
"There is music here," cried Lord George, officiously producing a book from the canterbury. Mrs. Vane took it with a gracious smile.
"Bach! Corelli! This is yours, I suppose, Miss Woodward?"
"No! I don't play," replied Alice, and Mrs. Vane turned instantly to the flyleaf.
"There are no songs in that book," remarked Paul, black as thunder, laying his hands on the volume. "Not that it matters--for Mrs. Vane used not to need music----"
"Nor does she now," retorted the little lady, laughing, as she sate down, saying as she did so, in an undertone, "Does Marjory Carmichael play Bach well, Paul? I hope so; he is dreadful when murdered."
The reply, if reply there came, was lost in her sudden burst into one of those Frenchchansonsin which laughter and tears are so closely interwoven that the mixture is apt to confuse the insular understanding. Her singing was, like herself, bright, gracious, fluent, with the rare perfection of training which conceals art.
"She reminds me of Piccolomini," said Mr. Woodward, in pompous delight, feeling himself the better for the remark, after the fashion of men who are no longer afraid of being considered old. "A most charming little person altogether. Who is she?"
"The widow of an Honourable--a Colonel--one of the Wentworths, I suppose," replied Lady George, yielding to the reflected glory of a successful guest. "She was very kind to Paul when he was ill in India, and we are all very fond of her. A most desirable friend for him to have."
"Most desirable!" echoed Mr. Woodward; and Blanche felt that she had been wise, since no one could tell how Paul would behave with a woman of that sort. She might have felt still more doubtful if she had seen the desirable friend after she reached the seclusion of her own room, sitting dry-eyed and haggard before the looking-glass, as if to read the ravages of time in each faintly-growing wrinkle.
"I have been a fool!" she said, half aloud, as she rose; "but it may not be too late. I thought at first he was in love with that girl; but it is not she. Oh, why! Why didn't I tell him I was rich now, instead of waiting like a romantic idiot to see if he could still care for me? Care for me! As if any man wouldn't care for a woman such as I, if she chose to let him care. Well! I must sleep now; I can't afford to look older than I am." So she opened her dressing-case, took out a bottle of chloral, measured herself out a full dose, and half an hour afterwards was sleeping peacefully, like a child.
When she woke the sun was streaming in at the open window--for she was one of those to whom the close atmosphere of English houses is unendurable--and she curled herself round comfortably in her bed to consider the new aspect of affairs before rising to face them. In a way she was to be pitied, for in sending Paul Macleod to Kashmir, in order to buy a silk carpet, she had really touched the highest point of self-abnegation of which she was capable. She had done it to save him; for what? For this colourless girl who would never understand his odd mixture of sentimentality and worldliness? No! not for that. Even as a friend she could not stand by and see him ruin his prospects of happiness in that fashion. Had she not hesitated herself in those old days, when, by simply leaving a man who disgraced her every hour and moment of his life, she could, after a brief period, no doubt of horrible humiliation, have married Paul herself? She had hesitated because of his future, for nothing else; and was she to stand by and see him ruin it for no just cause, since she was wealthy enough now for all his wants? There was a sufficiency of high moral tone in this view of the question to serve her purpose, which she strengthened by telling herself that if she had found Paul properly devoted to his heiress, she would once more have sacrificed herself. All is fair, says the proverb, in love and war; but Mrs. Vane felt much was fair because it was not love, and came down to breakfast determined to see what could be done. For Paul's sake first, of course, and then?--for the present Mrs. Vane decided to leave that alone.
Despite the sunshine, the menkind came down slackly, grumbling at a real shooting day being just "nippet awa by the Sawbath." Obedient, nevertheless, to the order for church parade at the schoolhouse, which, being of modest dimensions, overflowed after a time into the road, where the latest comers contented themselves with sitting on the turf-capped dyke beneath the chestnut tree, where they could just hear the swell of the responses, and join in the hymns if they chose. Mrs. Vane, standing during theVenitebeside Paul, could see these outdoor worshippers, and rather envied them, being at heart a thorough little Bohemian. Yet the interior interested her quick brain also, and she watched Lady George with furtive amusement, as the course of service brought to that lady a dim suspicion that she had lost her place. For, despite Mr. Gillespie's suggestion of a second and English "diet" for the visitors, Blanche had preferred to bring them to the Gaelic; moved thereto by a vague feeling that it gave, as it were, acachetto the laird of Gleneira, with whose importance she was anxious to impress the Woodwards. The effect, however, was somewhat disastrous, since Alice looked shocked and surprised, Sam laughed, and Mrs. Woodward, after a frantic effort to follow the Psalms, gave up the struggle. Mr. Woodward had--Blanche felt fortunately--remained at home, for he was of the stern, uncompromising section of British laymen who only attend service on high days, and have, in consequence, strong opinions as to the necessity of the Athanasian Creed to the stability of the English Church. Paul, tall and listless, looked so persistently towards one dark corner, that at last Mrs. Vane's watchful eyes, following his, discovered an attraction in the girl playing the harmonium. And then it struck her that the voluntary had been a bit of Corelli! Yet that was not the sort of face to make Paul stare, as he undoubtedly was staring. She looked up at him quickly, and with a real shock recognised something in his expression which she had not expected, something which roused her to a sudden flame. It was almost a relief when Donald Post, stealing in on tiptoe noisily, caused a general stir, followed by an all-pervading smell of sealing-wax from the other dark corner, which showed that Mr. McColl was sealing up the bag; Lady George's face the while being an unsuccessful attempt to combine horror and unconsciousness, while her husband's, much to her annoyance, openly reflected the children's unabashed interest. It was a greater relief still, when the sermon came to an end, the letters were handed round, and, with joyful barks, the collies rushed out, followed by the quality. All but Mrs. Vane, who stood listening to a fugue of Bach's with a little fine smile on her face. Inaction was over, and she must survey this new difficulty without delay.
"Don't wait," she said to Paul, lightly; "I love Bach, and Miss Carmichael plays charmingly."
He said a bad word under his breath as he passed out, and yet for the life of him he could not be angry with her. She saw through him, of course; right through to the very worst part of him, and yet she was his friend. When he joined the gathering outside Lady George was already shaking hands benignly with all and sundry, whispering between whiles to Mrs. Woodward that it was a Highland custom, and so much more conducive to proper relations between landlord and tenant than the English standoffishness. In fact, she was in her element, in a new part of great capabilities. Paul, on the other hand, merely nodded and smiled; but his great personal beauty, his reputation as a soldier and a sportsman, went further towards popularity among both the men and the women than all his sister's condescension. And still the Bach fugue went on, being, in truth, susceptible of many repeats andda capos, while Marjory, over the music desk, gave annoyed glances at the dainty little figure at the door. During the past week of Paul's absence, the charm of his personality had faded, leaving behind it the memory that he was hardly of her world; that even if he had been, he was hardly the sort of man with whom she could have sympathy. And yet, with the sight of him, had come back the old excuses, the old conviction that he slandered himself. It did not make her feel any the more kindly towards the world which held him back from his better self; towards women, for instance, like this one at the door.
"Are you not coming, Violet? The others have gone on."
Paul's voice had a note of warning in it, but she never heeded his thunderings like others did, and in that lay the secret of her power over him.
"I am waiting for you to introduce me to Miss Carmichael," she said calmly; "then we can walk home together. I want to ask her where she learned to play Bach."
A transparent prevarication, but one it was impossible to set aside; nor, to tell truth, did Paul wish to set it aside. The temptation presented to him by this little Eve in a Paris costume, was far too welcome for that; so welcome that the very excess of his own fierce desire to yield to it made him silent, while Mrs. Vane set herself deliberately to pierce through the girl's shield of stiff politeness. Not a difficult task with one so quick to respond to the least touch of sympathy; besides, Mrs. Vane in her girlhood had lived in the great world of music, among people who were to Marjory as prophets and kings. So she was soon deep in eager inquiry, and positively felt impatient as, when they were passing old Peggy's cottage, little Paul started up from the brackens with a quick message that his grannie would like to see Miss Marjory, if she could spare time.
"What a pretty little fellow," remarked Mrs. Vane. "Is Paul a common name about here? or is it a compliment to the laird?" She asked the question carelessly, and was genuinely surprised at the look it brought to the elder Paul's face.
"It is certainly not out of compliment to me, so I presume it is a common name--since you gave no other alternative." This was a manifest loss of temper on his part, not to be justified so far as she could see; therefore, in her opinion, a thing to be decently covered at the time, however much it might mean when considered. So she remarked that, common or not, it was a name she liked. And then she said good-bye charmingly, warning Miss Carmichael that she must expect to be disturbed for more Bach; and so drifted on daintily.
"She is quite delightful, your Miss Carmichael," she began, negligently, after a pause.
Paul, who, after a handshake with Marjory, had rejoined her, looking better pleased with himself, decided on adopting her mood.
"Very; though I fail to see why you should use the possessive pronoun. She would not thank you, believe me."
"Because you discovered her, that is all. She is charming. Like Brynhild, brave and bold."
"Cruel and cold."
"Nonsense. Men like you, my friend, of the earth earthy, are alarmed by the glistening circle of fire. Few have the courage to leap it and wake the heart within. Gudrun, duly decked in diamonds and given away by her father in St. George's, Hanover-square, is more in your line. Better so, for Sigurd is a double-faced scoundrel, and Brynhild's heart is too good to break." Her voice grew serious, a little bitter smile came to her face; for Violet had a heart of her own.
"I quite agree with you."
The jest was gone both from his mind and hers, and she changed the subject adroitly, certain of one thing, that here was a weapon ready to her hand. LoveversusGreed-of-Gold! Really, that method of putting it sounded quite pretty. And then suddenly a fierce pang of jealousy shot through her as she thought of the look she had caught unawares on Paul's face. Alice Woodward would never rouse such a look as that--never! Would it not be better to leave things as they were? But, then, why should they not be turned to something better? If, somehow, they could be manipulated so as to disgust him both with mere money and mere affection, it would be better for all concerned. For him, above all, since he could neither live without love or money; and she could give him both.
As they talked commonplaces during the remainder of the walk, Paul felt more contented than he had done for a week, even while he was asking himself captiously why this should be so. To see the girl you like, and say not a single word to her ear alone, to shake hands with her and feel no desire to prolong the touch, to look in her face and see nothing that was not clear and cold in her eyes, was not, could not, be comforting. Clearly his feeling for her was not to be classed as a passion. And yet how glad he had been to see her. How contented he had been to walk beside her, and what a sense ofbien-êtreher presence gave him. And it was distinctly satisfactory to find it so little disturbing. Then, recognising the fact that he was becoming absent in the effort to remember the exact look on her face as she shook hands with him, he set the thought of her from him angrily. He would not be the sport of a mere sentimental fancy, unworthy of a man who had the courage to face his own manhood.