Chapter Sixteen.The “John Seaton.”Mrs Calderwood stood waiting outside Mrs Horne’s door, when her son came there.“Is it you, mother?”“Is it you, Willie? Thank God?”“Amen. Mother, I bring heavy news to this house.”“Ah! poor soul! I dared not go in till I knew the worst. Is it long since it happened?”“Three months and more. He was long ill, and glad to go.”“And must I tell her? Oh, if Miss Jean were here!”“I will tell her, but I wanted you here. Does she ken that the ship is in?”“She must ken, I think. But it is no’ like her to go out among the throng. She’s just waiting. God help her, poor woman!”“Ay, mother,yeken.”“But, Willie—I must say one word. George Dawson? He sailed with you?”“Yes, mother, but—”A voice from within bade them enter, and there was time for no more. We shall not enter with them. The first tears of a childless widow suddenly bereaved, must not be looked upon by eyes indifferent. There was much to be told—much that must have made her thankful even in her bitter sorrow. But it was a painful hour to the returned sailor, and there were tears on his cheeks when at last he came out to clasp his joyful only sister at the door.But he could not linger long. He had more to do before he returned to the ship.“I must go to Saughleas,” said he, as they paused at the corner where his sister must turn towards home.“To Saughleas? Oh! Willie let me go with you,” she cried clinging to him. “Mother will maybe bide with Mrs Horne a’ nicht. Oh, Willie, let me go! I’ll keep out o’ sicht, and naebody will ken. If ye maun go, let me go with you.”“I maun go. I promised Geordie.”“Geordie? Have ye seen him? Did he sail in the ‘John Seaton’? And has he come home?”“Ye dinna mean that ye never heard that he sailed with us?”“I never heard. Did Miss Dawson ken? It must have been that that made her e’en grow like my mother’s when she looked out over the sea.”They were on their way to Saughleas by this time. They had much to say to one another. Or rather Marion had much to say, and her brother had much to hear. A few words were enough to tell all that he needed to tell until his mother should hear him also.But Marion had to give him the news of a year and more,—the ups and downs, the comings and goings of all their friends and acquaintance; the sickness of one, the health of another; the births and deaths; the marriages past and in prospect. With the last the name of May Dawson was mentioned, and being herself intensely interested in the matter, Marion went into particulars.“He is an Englishman; but they all like him. I like his lace. Yes, I saw him once, and Jean made me sing a song to him—‘The bonny House o’ Airlie.’ And auld Miss Jean likes him, she told my mother. He is no’ a rich man, and folk wonder at Mr Dawson being so well pleased. But what seems strange to me is, that May should be married before her sister. And I whiles think, that maybe if he had seen Jean first—but love goes where it is sent, they say,” added Marion gravely.“And her sister’s turn will come next,” said Willie.“Oh! as to that—” said Marion, and then she was silent, adding after a little, “andhewas an Englishman too. May is nice, ye ken, but there’s no’ another in all Scotland like Jean.”They were approaching Saughleas by this time. They went slowly round the drive to the open hall door. The summer gloaming was not at its darkest yet, and there were no lights visible. As they stood for a moment at the door, they heard enough to make them aware that a messenger had preceded them.“It’s Robbie Saugster, Miss Dawson. He says he has news for you—or for Mr Dawson, I canna say which. Will you come but the house and see him? or will I send him ben to you?”But Jean did not need to answer. Robbie had followed his message.“Miss Dawson, it’s the ‘John Seaton.’ She’s won safe hame. But there’s ill news. It’s the Captain. But I saw Willie Calderwood, and he said—”It was hard on Robbie that after all his trouble, the telling of the news should fall to another. A heavy hand was laid on his shoulder, and a voice said,—“That’ll do, Robbie, lad. I’ll say my ain say.”And then Jean stood face to face with Willie Calderwood. For one wonderful moment they clasped hands and gazed into each other’s eyes. Not a word, not even the name, of George was spoken. And then came a joyful cry from May,—“It is Willie Calderwood. Oh, Willie! Willie! Papa, the ‘John Seaton’ has come.”Then there was a minute or two of confusion in the hall, hand shaking and congratulations, and then Mr Dawson ordered lights, and they went into the parlour where auld Miss Jean was sitting, for she had not moved with the rest. She drew down the young man’s handsome head and kissed him.“Oh, your happy mother!” said she softly.But the mate of the “John Seaton” did not sit down. He stood erect beside Miss Jean’s chair, with his eyes cast down upon the floor. He must go back to the ship at once. He would report himself at Mr Dawson’s office to-morrow; he had come to-night because of a promise—“Did I hear something about ill news?” said Mr Dawson. “Jean, what was it the laddie said about Captain Horne.”“Yes,” said the sailor, “it is bad news. It is three months and more since we lost him; a heavy loss. A better sailor never sailed—nor a better man.”There was silence for a minute.“His wife! Puir body!” said Miss Jean.“My mother is with her,” said the sailor. “They were wishing for you, Miss Jean, to tell her. I almost think she kenned what was coming.”The young man seemed to forget where he was for the moment.There were more questions asked, and more particulars given, and all the while the mate stood beside Miss Jean’s chair, making his answers clear and brief, and suffering no sympathetic friendliness to soften voice or manner, except when he spoke to Miss Jean.“And are there any more sorrowful hearts in Portie the nicht?” asked she gravely. “Did a’ the lave win hame?”“Saugster, the second mate, did not, nor two others. But nobody need grieve for Saugster. There was never less occasion. He’ll be home all right, I hope soon.”And then he told how they had met in with an American fishing vessel partially disabled from encountering a heavy storm, and far out of her course. She had lost four of her men, one of them the mate, from the capsizing of a boat. The captain was down with fever, and the ship was at the mercy of the winds and waves as there was no one on board who had the knowledge or skill to sail her.“We might have taken the rest of the men on board, but it would not have been right to abandon their ship, and as Tam Saugster and—two others were willing to go, there was nothing to be said. I dare say they are safe in Portland harbour by this time.”Mr Dawson asked some questions as to the cargo and value of the vessel taken in charge, and the mate answered them briefly, and then he said, “And now I must go. I came to-night, because of a promise I made—”Jean had been sitting all this time in the shadow of her lather’s high-backed chair, a little out of sight. She rose now and stood gazing at the mate with dilated eyes and a face on which not a trace of colour lingered. He did not look at her, but at her father, who had risen also, ready to give his hand at parting.“It is a letter,” said the sailor. “I must give it into your own hand, as I promised George.”“George!” repeated Mr Dawson suddenly falling back into his chair again, with a face as white as Jean’s.“Yes. He sailed with us. You surely must have heard of that.”“I heard nothing of it.”“Well, that is queer?”He hesitated and remained silent, as he might not have done if he had seen the agony of the father’s face. Jean had stretched out her hand and touched him. She was trying to say something, but her lips uttered no sound.“My son! my son! Oh, dinna tell me that he didna come home?”It was an exceeding bitter cry.“He didna come home—”“Oh, Willie, tell him?” cried an eager voice, and his sister sprang forward and a hand was laid on the old man’s arm. “He hasna come home, but he’s safe and well and he is coming home. And he is—good now. He was ay good, but now he is sorry, and he’s coming home. And—Oh, sir, I beg your pardon—” added Marion, coming to herself, and she would have darted away again, but Jean held her fast.Willie’s heart softened as he met the old man’s look.“George was one of the two that went with Saugster. There is no better sailor than Tam, as ye ken; but he’s open to the temptation o’ strong drink. If there is any one that can keep Tam straight, it’s George. I dare say they are in port by this time.”“Willie,” said Miss Jean, “tell us how it happened that he sailed with you. Surely you should have told us before you let him go?”“I did my best, Miss Jean. He came on board that last morning with some of the men who had been making a night of it on shore, but I did not know it till we were nearly ready to set sail. I did my best to persuade him to stay at home. I sent three different messages to his father, but he couldna be found; and I wrote a line to—”Mr Dawson groaned.“I had heard that he had been seen in the town, in company with Niel Cochrane of the How. I went there to seek him, and the ship had sailed before I came back again.”“It was to be,” said the sailor. “And though I was sorry at the time, I was glad afterwards, and ye’ll be glad too, sir. It has done him no ill, but good. He has gathered himself up again. He is a man now—a man among a thousand. And ye havena read your letter.”A curious change had come over the young man’s manner, though there was no one calm enough to notice it but Mr Manners. He had for the greater part of the time not been looking at Mr Dawson, but over his head, or at any one else rather than the master of the house when he spoke. But now he sat down near him, his voice softening wonderfully, and his face looking like the one that was leaning on Miss Dawson’s shoulder on the other side of the old man’s chair.It was a very handsome face, but for that Mr Manners would have cared little. It was a noble face, strong and true; a face to trust, “a face to love,” said he to himself. He had heard of Willie Calderwood before, as he had by this time heard of the most of May’s friends, and he had gathered more from the story than May had meant to tell. And now he noticed that the handsome face had hardly turned towards Jean, and that Jean had not spoken since he came into the room.Mr Dawson opened his letter with fingers that trembled. There was only a line or two, and when he had read it, he laid it on the table, and laid his face down upon it without a word; and when he lifted it again there were tears upon it.“Oh, Willie, man! if ye had brought him home! There is nothing of mine but ye might have had for the asking, if ye had but brought him home!”The young man rose and walked up and down the room once or twice, and then sat down again, saying gently,—“I had no right to prevent his going. He was in his lather’s ship of his own will, and though he submitted to command through all the voyage, that was of his own will too. And I am no’ sure that I would have kept him, even if I could have done it. It was to save life that he went. Danger? Well, it turned out that there was really less danger than was supposed when he offered to go. I went on board with him and we overhauled the ship and did what was needed to make all safe. As to its being his duty—he had no doubts o’ that. It was to save life.”“Dinna go yet, Willie, man,” said Mr Dawson, putting out his hand as the mate rose. “We are a’ friends here. This is Hugh Corbett, his father was your father’s friend. And this is Mr Manners who has come seeking our May. It is no secret now, my lassie.”The two shook hands heartily—each “kenning a man when he saw him.” And then the sailor offered his hand to May. And if Jean had had any doubts remaining as to the nature of the mutual interest of these two they were set at rest now. May blushed, but met his look frankly, and for the first time since he came Willie smiled brightly—a smile that “minded” Jean of the days before trouble of any kind had fallen upon them.The rest of the story might have kept till another day, as Willie said, but he yielded to entreaty and sat down again. He had nothing to tell of George’s story before he found him on board ship. He had come home meaning to see his father, but had fallen into bad hands, and, discouraged and ashamed, had changed his mind, not caring whether he lived or died. If he had not been allowed to go in the “John Seaton,” there were other vessels leaving Portie in which he could have sailed.“I could only have kept him at home by using force, or by betraying him, as he called it. I thought he was better at sea with a friend than on shore with those who did him no good—for home he would not go. So I risked the captain’s anger and said nothing. But I never supposed but you would hear about his sailing, as there must have been more than one who knew it.”No one made any reply to this. Captain Horne, a good and just, but stern man, was sorely displeased when he found that his owner’s son had sailed secretly with them; and he showed his displeasure by ignoring his presence on board after the very first, and leaving him to suffer all the hardships of the lot he had chosen. George accepted the situation, asked no favours, and shirked no duty, but lived in the forecastle, and fared as the rest fared there.After a time he grew strong and cheerful and did his part for the general entertainment, chatting and chaffing—singing songs and spinning yarns, and winning the good-will of every man and boy on board. Nor did he lose his time altogether, as far as self-improvement was concerned. He read every book on board, and at leisure times gave himself to the reading of mathematics and the study of navigation with his friend, and had done it to some purpose, his friend declared.They reached the Arctic seas in good time, and had there met with more than the usual success, so that they had good hope of getting home to Portie before the year was over. But after that heavy storms had overtaken them, and they had driven before the wind many days and nights without a glimpse of sun or star, and so had drifted far out of their course. They had taken shelter at last in an unknown bay and had lain ice bound for many months.Here sore sickness fell on Captain Horne, against which—being a man strong and brave and patient—he struggled long, only to yield at last, and take to his berth helpless, and for a time, hopeless. A good man, a true Christian—(“ane o’ your kind, Miss Jean,” said the sailor),—he had yet fallen into utter despondency, out of which, strangely enough, the foolish lad who had wandered so far from home, and from the right way, had helped him.When he came to this part of the story, the mate rose and took two or three turns up and down the room again; then he came and stood beside Miss Jean’s chair, saying softly,—“Sometime, Miss Jean, when Geordie comes home, ye must ask him about it. I could never tell you all he was to the sick man in those days. No son ever served a father more faithfully. No mother ever nursed, cared for, and comforted a sick child with more entire forgetfulness of self. Whiles he read to him out of the Bible, and out of other books, and whiles he talked to him and told him things that he had heard—from his mother, I dare say, and from you, Miss Jean, and whiles—once at least in my hearing—he prayed with him, because in the darkness that had fallen on him the old man couldna pray for himself I mind that night well.”There was a long pause after this, and then he went on; “Geordie will tell you all about it better than I could do. A good while before the end, light came back to the captain—and, oh! the brightness of it! and the peace that fell on him! The good book says ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive,’ and that was the way with Geordie. For as much good as came to our captain through him, there came more to himself; and it came to him first.“You are one of those, Miss Jean, who believe in a change of nature,—coming from darkness to light—from ‘the power of Satan onto God.’ Well, I would have said that Geordie needed that change less than most folk, but it was like that with him. Even I, who saw few faults in him before, could see the difference afterward. But it canna be spoken about, and it is more than time that I were away.”However he sat down again for a moment on the other side of the table where he had been sitting before, and went on to tell, how after a few bright days, the captain died, and they buried him in the sea.At last they got away from the ice, and were beginning to count the days, before they might hope to see the harbour of Portie, when they fell in with the ship in distress, and this ended in Tam Saugster being sent to take her to her port, and in George going also, to help Tam to withstand his foe. For the “John Seaton” was a temperance ship, and Tam had tasted nothing stronger than tea or coffee since he lost sight of Portie harbour.“He had sailed with us, just to give himself another chance, he said, and, poor lad, he had gone far the wrong gait—and he was another man; a fine fellow truly, when he was out of the way of temptation. And whiles I have thought it was for Tam’s sake, more even than for the sake of the Yankee ship and its crew, that George was so fain to go. It cost him much no’ to come home with us, for he had come to a clearer sight of—two or three things,—he told me. But I think he made a sort of thank-offering of himself for the time, and even if I could have hindered him, I could hardly have found it in my heart to do it. And he is sure to come soon.”“He is in safe keeping,” said Miss Jean.“Yes, he is that, and we may hear from him any day.” There was not much more said. Mr Manners had some questions, and so had Miss Jean, and May asked if her brother had changed much as to looks; and Mr Dawson looked from one to the other as each spoke, but he did not say another word, nor did Jean till Willie rose to go. “Now, Marion, it is late and we must make haste.” Then Jean said softly—it was the first word she had uttered since he came into the house—“No, Marion. It is too late to go. Willie will tell your mother that you are going to bide with me to-night.”Of course that was the wisest thing for the girl to do, as Mrs Calderwood might remain all night with poor Mrs Horne, and it was necessary that her brother should go back to the ship. And so the mate went away alone.
Mrs Calderwood stood waiting outside Mrs Horne’s door, when her son came there.
“Is it you, mother?”
“Is it you, Willie? Thank God?”
“Amen. Mother, I bring heavy news to this house.”
“Ah! poor soul! I dared not go in till I knew the worst. Is it long since it happened?”
“Three months and more. He was long ill, and glad to go.”
“And must I tell her? Oh, if Miss Jean were here!”
“I will tell her, but I wanted you here. Does she ken that the ship is in?”
“She must ken, I think. But it is no’ like her to go out among the throng. She’s just waiting. God help her, poor woman!”
“Ay, mother,yeken.”
“But, Willie—I must say one word. George Dawson? He sailed with you?”
“Yes, mother, but—”
A voice from within bade them enter, and there was time for no more. We shall not enter with them. The first tears of a childless widow suddenly bereaved, must not be looked upon by eyes indifferent. There was much to be told—much that must have made her thankful even in her bitter sorrow. But it was a painful hour to the returned sailor, and there were tears on his cheeks when at last he came out to clasp his joyful only sister at the door.
But he could not linger long. He had more to do before he returned to the ship.
“I must go to Saughleas,” said he, as they paused at the corner where his sister must turn towards home.
“To Saughleas? Oh! Willie let me go with you,” she cried clinging to him. “Mother will maybe bide with Mrs Horne a’ nicht. Oh, Willie, let me go! I’ll keep out o’ sicht, and naebody will ken. If ye maun go, let me go with you.”
“I maun go. I promised Geordie.”
“Geordie? Have ye seen him? Did he sail in the ‘John Seaton’? And has he come home?”
“Ye dinna mean that ye never heard that he sailed with us?”
“I never heard. Did Miss Dawson ken? It must have been that that made her e’en grow like my mother’s when she looked out over the sea.”
They were on their way to Saughleas by this time. They had much to say to one another. Or rather Marion had much to say, and her brother had much to hear. A few words were enough to tell all that he needed to tell until his mother should hear him also.
But Marion had to give him the news of a year and more,—the ups and downs, the comings and goings of all their friends and acquaintance; the sickness of one, the health of another; the births and deaths; the marriages past and in prospect. With the last the name of May Dawson was mentioned, and being herself intensely interested in the matter, Marion went into particulars.
“He is an Englishman; but they all like him. I like his lace. Yes, I saw him once, and Jean made me sing a song to him—‘The bonny House o’ Airlie.’ And auld Miss Jean likes him, she told my mother. He is no’ a rich man, and folk wonder at Mr Dawson being so well pleased. But what seems strange to me is, that May should be married before her sister. And I whiles think, that maybe if he had seen Jean first—but love goes where it is sent, they say,” added Marion gravely.
“And her sister’s turn will come next,” said Willie.
“Oh! as to that—” said Marion, and then she was silent, adding after a little, “andhewas an Englishman too. May is nice, ye ken, but there’s no’ another in all Scotland like Jean.”
They were approaching Saughleas by this time. They went slowly round the drive to the open hall door. The summer gloaming was not at its darkest yet, and there were no lights visible. As they stood for a moment at the door, they heard enough to make them aware that a messenger had preceded them.
“It’s Robbie Saugster, Miss Dawson. He says he has news for you—or for Mr Dawson, I canna say which. Will you come but the house and see him? or will I send him ben to you?”
But Jean did not need to answer. Robbie had followed his message.
“Miss Dawson, it’s the ‘John Seaton.’ She’s won safe hame. But there’s ill news. It’s the Captain. But I saw Willie Calderwood, and he said—”
It was hard on Robbie that after all his trouble, the telling of the news should fall to another. A heavy hand was laid on his shoulder, and a voice said,—
“That’ll do, Robbie, lad. I’ll say my ain say.”
And then Jean stood face to face with Willie Calderwood. For one wonderful moment they clasped hands and gazed into each other’s eyes. Not a word, not even the name, of George was spoken. And then came a joyful cry from May,—
“It is Willie Calderwood. Oh, Willie! Willie! Papa, the ‘John Seaton’ has come.”
Then there was a minute or two of confusion in the hall, hand shaking and congratulations, and then Mr Dawson ordered lights, and they went into the parlour where auld Miss Jean was sitting, for she had not moved with the rest. She drew down the young man’s handsome head and kissed him.
“Oh, your happy mother!” said she softly.
But the mate of the “John Seaton” did not sit down. He stood erect beside Miss Jean’s chair, with his eyes cast down upon the floor. He must go back to the ship at once. He would report himself at Mr Dawson’s office to-morrow; he had come to-night because of a promise—
“Did I hear something about ill news?” said Mr Dawson. “Jean, what was it the laddie said about Captain Horne.”
“Yes,” said the sailor, “it is bad news. It is three months and more since we lost him; a heavy loss. A better sailor never sailed—nor a better man.”
There was silence for a minute.
“His wife! Puir body!” said Miss Jean.
“My mother is with her,” said the sailor. “They were wishing for you, Miss Jean, to tell her. I almost think she kenned what was coming.”
The young man seemed to forget where he was for the moment.
There were more questions asked, and more particulars given, and all the while the mate stood beside Miss Jean’s chair, making his answers clear and brief, and suffering no sympathetic friendliness to soften voice or manner, except when he spoke to Miss Jean.
“And are there any more sorrowful hearts in Portie the nicht?” asked she gravely. “Did a’ the lave win hame?”
“Saugster, the second mate, did not, nor two others. But nobody need grieve for Saugster. There was never less occasion. He’ll be home all right, I hope soon.”
And then he told how they had met in with an American fishing vessel partially disabled from encountering a heavy storm, and far out of her course. She had lost four of her men, one of them the mate, from the capsizing of a boat. The captain was down with fever, and the ship was at the mercy of the winds and waves as there was no one on board who had the knowledge or skill to sail her.
“We might have taken the rest of the men on board, but it would not have been right to abandon their ship, and as Tam Saugster and—two others were willing to go, there was nothing to be said. I dare say they are safe in Portland harbour by this time.”
Mr Dawson asked some questions as to the cargo and value of the vessel taken in charge, and the mate answered them briefly, and then he said, “And now I must go. I came to-night, because of a promise I made—”
Jean had been sitting all this time in the shadow of her lather’s high-backed chair, a little out of sight. She rose now and stood gazing at the mate with dilated eyes and a face on which not a trace of colour lingered. He did not look at her, but at her father, who had risen also, ready to give his hand at parting.
“It is a letter,” said the sailor. “I must give it into your own hand, as I promised George.”
“George!” repeated Mr Dawson suddenly falling back into his chair again, with a face as white as Jean’s.
“Yes. He sailed with us. You surely must have heard of that.”
“I heard nothing of it.”
“Well, that is queer?”
He hesitated and remained silent, as he might not have done if he had seen the agony of the father’s face. Jean had stretched out her hand and touched him. She was trying to say something, but her lips uttered no sound.
“My son! my son! Oh, dinna tell me that he didna come home?”
It was an exceeding bitter cry.
“He didna come home—”
“Oh, Willie, tell him?” cried an eager voice, and his sister sprang forward and a hand was laid on the old man’s arm. “He hasna come home, but he’s safe and well and he is coming home. And he is—good now. He was ay good, but now he is sorry, and he’s coming home. And—Oh, sir, I beg your pardon—” added Marion, coming to herself, and she would have darted away again, but Jean held her fast.
Willie’s heart softened as he met the old man’s look.
“George was one of the two that went with Saugster. There is no better sailor than Tam, as ye ken; but he’s open to the temptation o’ strong drink. If there is any one that can keep Tam straight, it’s George. I dare say they are in port by this time.”
“Willie,” said Miss Jean, “tell us how it happened that he sailed with you. Surely you should have told us before you let him go?”
“I did my best, Miss Jean. He came on board that last morning with some of the men who had been making a night of it on shore, but I did not know it till we were nearly ready to set sail. I did my best to persuade him to stay at home. I sent three different messages to his father, but he couldna be found; and I wrote a line to—”
Mr Dawson groaned.
“I had heard that he had been seen in the town, in company with Niel Cochrane of the How. I went there to seek him, and the ship had sailed before I came back again.”
“It was to be,” said the sailor. “And though I was sorry at the time, I was glad afterwards, and ye’ll be glad too, sir. It has done him no ill, but good. He has gathered himself up again. He is a man now—a man among a thousand. And ye havena read your letter.”
A curious change had come over the young man’s manner, though there was no one calm enough to notice it but Mr Manners. He had for the greater part of the time not been looking at Mr Dawson, but over his head, or at any one else rather than the master of the house when he spoke. But now he sat down near him, his voice softening wonderfully, and his face looking like the one that was leaning on Miss Dawson’s shoulder on the other side of the old man’s chair.
It was a very handsome face, but for that Mr Manners would have cared little. It was a noble face, strong and true; a face to trust, “a face to love,” said he to himself. He had heard of Willie Calderwood before, as he had by this time heard of the most of May’s friends, and he had gathered more from the story than May had meant to tell. And now he noticed that the handsome face had hardly turned towards Jean, and that Jean had not spoken since he came into the room.
Mr Dawson opened his letter with fingers that trembled. There was only a line or two, and when he had read it, he laid it on the table, and laid his face down upon it without a word; and when he lifted it again there were tears upon it.
“Oh, Willie, man! if ye had brought him home! There is nothing of mine but ye might have had for the asking, if ye had but brought him home!”
The young man rose and walked up and down the room once or twice, and then sat down again, saying gently,—
“I had no right to prevent his going. He was in his lather’s ship of his own will, and though he submitted to command through all the voyage, that was of his own will too. And I am no’ sure that I would have kept him, even if I could have done it. It was to save life that he went. Danger? Well, it turned out that there was really less danger than was supposed when he offered to go. I went on board with him and we overhauled the ship and did what was needed to make all safe. As to its being his duty—he had no doubts o’ that. It was to save life.”
“Dinna go yet, Willie, man,” said Mr Dawson, putting out his hand as the mate rose. “We are a’ friends here. This is Hugh Corbett, his father was your father’s friend. And this is Mr Manners who has come seeking our May. It is no secret now, my lassie.”
The two shook hands heartily—each “kenning a man when he saw him.” And then the sailor offered his hand to May. And if Jean had had any doubts remaining as to the nature of the mutual interest of these two they were set at rest now. May blushed, but met his look frankly, and for the first time since he came Willie smiled brightly—a smile that “minded” Jean of the days before trouble of any kind had fallen upon them.
The rest of the story might have kept till another day, as Willie said, but he yielded to entreaty and sat down again. He had nothing to tell of George’s story before he found him on board ship. He had come home meaning to see his father, but had fallen into bad hands, and, discouraged and ashamed, had changed his mind, not caring whether he lived or died. If he had not been allowed to go in the “John Seaton,” there were other vessels leaving Portie in which he could have sailed.
“I could only have kept him at home by using force, or by betraying him, as he called it. I thought he was better at sea with a friend than on shore with those who did him no good—for home he would not go. So I risked the captain’s anger and said nothing. But I never supposed but you would hear about his sailing, as there must have been more than one who knew it.”
No one made any reply to this. Captain Horne, a good and just, but stern man, was sorely displeased when he found that his owner’s son had sailed secretly with them; and he showed his displeasure by ignoring his presence on board after the very first, and leaving him to suffer all the hardships of the lot he had chosen. George accepted the situation, asked no favours, and shirked no duty, but lived in the forecastle, and fared as the rest fared there.
After a time he grew strong and cheerful and did his part for the general entertainment, chatting and chaffing—singing songs and spinning yarns, and winning the good-will of every man and boy on board. Nor did he lose his time altogether, as far as self-improvement was concerned. He read every book on board, and at leisure times gave himself to the reading of mathematics and the study of navigation with his friend, and had done it to some purpose, his friend declared.
They reached the Arctic seas in good time, and had there met with more than the usual success, so that they had good hope of getting home to Portie before the year was over. But after that heavy storms had overtaken them, and they had driven before the wind many days and nights without a glimpse of sun or star, and so had drifted far out of their course. They had taken shelter at last in an unknown bay and had lain ice bound for many months.
Here sore sickness fell on Captain Horne, against which—being a man strong and brave and patient—he struggled long, only to yield at last, and take to his berth helpless, and for a time, hopeless. A good man, a true Christian—(“ane o’ your kind, Miss Jean,” said the sailor),—he had yet fallen into utter despondency, out of which, strangely enough, the foolish lad who had wandered so far from home, and from the right way, had helped him.
When he came to this part of the story, the mate rose and took two or three turns up and down the room again; then he came and stood beside Miss Jean’s chair, saying softly,—
“Sometime, Miss Jean, when Geordie comes home, ye must ask him about it. I could never tell you all he was to the sick man in those days. No son ever served a father more faithfully. No mother ever nursed, cared for, and comforted a sick child with more entire forgetfulness of self. Whiles he read to him out of the Bible, and out of other books, and whiles he talked to him and told him things that he had heard—from his mother, I dare say, and from you, Miss Jean, and whiles—once at least in my hearing—he prayed with him, because in the darkness that had fallen on him the old man couldna pray for himself I mind that night well.”
There was a long pause after this, and then he went on; “Geordie will tell you all about it better than I could do. A good while before the end, light came back to the captain—and, oh! the brightness of it! and the peace that fell on him! The good book says ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive,’ and that was the way with Geordie. For as much good as came to our captain through him, there came more to himself; and it came to him first.
“You are one of those, Miss Jean, who believe in a change of nature,—coming from darkness to light—from ‘the power of Satan onto God.’ Well, I would have said that Geordie needed that change less than most folk, but it was like that with him. Even I, who saw few faults in him before, could see the difference afterward. But it canna be spoken about, and it is more than time that I were away.”
However he sat down again for a moment on the other side of the table where he had been sitting before, and went on to tell, how after a few bright days, the captain died, and they buried him in the sea.
At last they got away from the ice, and were beginning to count the days, before they might hope to see the harbour of Portie, when they fell in with the ship in distress, and this ended in Tam Saugster being sent to take her to her port, and in George going also, to help Tam to withstand his foe. For the “John Seaton” was a temperance ship, and Tam had tasted nothing stronger than tea or coffee since he lost sight of Portie harbour.
“He had sailed with us, just to give himself another chance, he said, and, poor lad, he had gone far the wrong gait—and he was another man; a fine fellow truly, when he was out of the way of temptation. And whiles I have thought it was for Tam’s sake, more even than for the sake of the Yankee ship and its crew, that George was so fain to go. It cost him much no’ to come home with us, for he had come to a clearer sight of—two or three things,—he told me. But I think he made a sort of thank-offering of himself for the time, and even if I could have hindered him, I could hardly have found it in my heart to do it. And he is sure to come soon.”
“He is in safe keeping,” said Miss Jean.
“Yes, he is that, and we may hear from him any day.” There was not much more said. Mr Manners had some questions, and so had Miss Jean, and May asked if her brother had changed much as to looks; and Mr Dawson looked from one to the other as each spoke, but he did not say another word, nor did Jean till Willie rose to go. “Now, Marion, it is late and we must make haste.” Then Jean said softly—it was the first word she had uttered since he came into the house—
“No, Marion. It is too late to go. Willie will tell your mother that you are going to bide with me to-night.”
Of course that was the wisest thing for the girl to do, as Mrs Calderwood might remain all night with poor Mrs Horne, and it was necessary that her brother should go back to the ship. And so the mate went away alone.
Chapter Seventeen.Home Coming.That night Mr Dawson and Miss Jean sat long together, when the others had gone away, and for the most part they sat in silence. Mr Dawson had some thoughts which he would not have liked to tell his sister,—thoughts which he knew she would call wrong and thankless—which he would gladly have put away.The good things of this life, the glad surprises, the unhoped for reprieves from sorrow, rarely come without some drawback of regret or pain. That he should have got tidings of his son; that he should be coming home, and glad to come; that he should be well and worthy, a man to honour and to trust,—how utterly beyond his hopes had this been yesterday!His son was coming home; but, alas! he could never have his light-hearted, bonny laddie back again. George was a man now, “knowing good and evil.” It could never be again between them as it had been before their trouble came.“Ane o’ your kind, Miss Jean,” the mate had said; “a changed man.”Mr Dawson’s thoughts went back to the time of his sister’s trouble, when she had become “a changed woman.” All the anger and vexation, that had then seemed natural and right, because of her new ways, had passed out of his heart, a score of years and more. It was as though it had never been. He glanced up at her placid face, and said to himself, as he had said before many times, “A woman among a thousand.” But he remembered the old pain, though it was gone, and he shrank from the thought that he might have to suffer again through his son.“He is a man now, and must go his ain way,” he said to himself, moving uneasily on his chair and sighing. “We canna begin again where we left off. Ungrateful? Yes, I dare say it would be so called; but, oh! Geordie, my lad! I doubt your way and mine must lie asunder now.”Miss Jean too had some thoughts which she would not have cared to tell, but they were not about George; for him she was altogether joyful. If Willie Calderwood’s words about him were true, and he were indeed “a changed man,” nothing else mattered much in Miss Jean’s esteem. The “good,” for which he had God’s promise as security would be wrought out in him whether by health or sickness, by joy or sorrow, by possession or loss, and through him might be brought help and healing, higher hopes, and better lives to many. The Master who had chosen him would use him for His own work, and that implied all that was to be desired for any one to Miss Jean.But in the midst of her joy for him, she could not forget Jean’s silence, and Willie Calderwood’s averted eyes. And though she told herself that possible pain and disappointment could work good to her niece as well as to her nephew, she could not but shrink beforehand from the suffering that might be before her. But it was not a trouble to be spoken about.Neither had spoken for a long time, when the door opened and Jean came in. She was wrapped in her dressing-gown, over which her long hair hung, and her face looked pale and troubled.“Are you here still, Auntie Jean? No, don’t go, papa,” said she as he rose. “I have something to tell you.”“It maun be late. I thought you had been in your bed this hour and more,” said her father.“Yes, papa, I was in bed, but I couldna sleep.”“For joy, I suppose?” said he smiling.“Yes, for joy and—because—papa, I knew that my brother had sailed in the John Seaton.”“You knew! And never spoke?”“Would it have been better if I had spoken? Would you have suffered less? But I did not know it till after the ship had sailed, and I thought it would break your heart to know that he could have been here and gone away again, without a word. I tried to tell you afterwards, and you, Auntie Jean, as well. I longed to tell you. I could hardly bear the doubt and fear of the last few weeks. But I thought if it was so terrible to me, what would it be to you!”Mr Dawson did not answer for a moment. He was thinking of the stormy nights of last winter, and the dread in her eyes as they looked out over the angry sea.“No wonder that you were anxious often, and afraid.”“Ought I to have told you? But you are not angry now, papa?”“There is no good being angry—and you did it for the best.”And then Jean told them about the note that Robbie Saugster had brought too late to let her see her brother before the ship sailed. Miss Jean said it had doubtless been wisely and kindly ordered, that the lad would come home and be a better son, and a better man for the discipline of the time. And then when they went upstairs together, she added a few joyful words to Jean, about the change that had come to her brother, and about the peace that would henceforth be between his father and him. But she would not let her linger beside her for any more talk.“Ye need your rest, my dear, and we’ll baith ha’e quieter hearts, and be better able to measure the greatness of the mercy that has come to us. And other things will take a mair natural look as well.”Though Mr Manners had only one more day at Saughleas at this time, he accepted Mr Dawson’s invitation to walk with him to Portie in the morning. Mr Dawson wished to show him the “John Seaton,” and Mr Manners wished to see again the fine young fellow, who might, if he chose, henceforth have the command of the ship. Mr Dawson had something to say to him on the way.“You will get a scanter portion with your wife than you would have gotten if—we had heard no news.”“Oh! My wife! My bonny May,” said Mr Manners with smiling eyes. “But then I shall have a brother—I who never had one—and I shall have a right to my share of the family joy.”Mr Dawson did not speak for a moment.“There will be something at once,” and he named a sum, “and there will be something more at my death.”Then he went on to mention certain arrangements that were to be made, and Mr Manners, of course, seemed to listen with interest; but when he ceased speaking, he said gravely,—“I have only one fear, lest the joyful expectation of having her brother home again, may make May wish to delay her marriage.”“As to that—if he come at once he will be here long before the first. And if he should delay—no, I do not think that that ought to be allowed to interfere with your plans.”“Thank you,” said Mr Manners. “Oh, he will be sure to be here in time.”“Wha kens?” said Mr Dawson. “It seems beyond belief that I should ever have my son back again. I never can in one sense. He is a man now, and changed. I wouldna seem unthankful; but, oh, man! if ye had ever seen my George, ye would ken what I mean.”He was greatly moved. If he had tried to say more, daylight as it was, and on the open road, his voice must have failed him. They walked on in silence for a while—for what could Mr Manners say?—and before they reached the High-street, he was himself again.There were many eyes upon him as they went down the street, for by this time it was known through all the town that George had sailed in the “John Seaton.” But “the old man took it quietly enough,” some said, and others, who saw him in the way of business through the day, said the same. The sailors in the “John Seaton,” when later he and Mr Manners went down to the pier, saw nothing unusual in his rough, but kindly, greetings. There was not one of them but would have liked to say a kindly and admiring word of “Geordie”; for “Geordie” he had been to them all, through the long year; and doubtless it would have pleased the father to hear it. But he heard nothing of it there.It did not surprise these men to see that he took it quietly. Their own fathers and mothers took quietly the comings and goings of their sons. But it would have surprised them to know that the old man kept silence because he was not sure whether his voice would serve him if he should try to speak. He turned back again for a minute when Mr Manners and the mate came on deck, when all had been said that was necessary on that occasion, and it would have surprised them to know that it was to shut himself into the little cabin where George had so long served and comforted the dying captain, and that he there knelt down and thanked God for His goodness to his son.He seemed to take it quietly as far as people generally saw during the next ten days; but Jean put away all remorseful thoughts as to the silence she had kept during the last long year.“He never could have borne the long suspense,” she said to herself, as she watched him through the days and heard his restless movements through nights of sleepless waiting. He never spoke of his son, or his anxiety with regard to him; but Jean took pains to speak of her brother to others in his hearing; and sometimes she spoke to himself, and he listened, but he never made reply.“He will grow morbid and ill if this continues long,” she said one day to her aunt.“It will not continue long,” said Miss Jean.“No, he will come soon, if he is coming.”“Oh, he is coming! ye needna doubt that. He is no seeking his ain way now. He’ll come back to his father’s house.”And so he did, and he found his father watching for him. He did not go all the way to Portie, but stopped, as his father knew he would, at a little station two or three miles on the other side of Saughleas, and walked home. It was late and all was quiet in the house. Summer rain was softly falling, but Mr Dawson stood at the gate as he had stood for many nights; and George heard his voice before he saw him.It might have been said—if there had been any one there to see—that Mr Dawson “took it quietly” even then. There were not many words spoken between them, and they were simple words, spoken quietly enough. How it happened neither of them could have told,—whether the father followed the son, or the son the father,—but instead of turning to the terrace, where the drawing-room window stood open to let them in, they turned down the walk, past the well into the wood; and whatever was said of confession or forgiveness was said by the grave of the lad’s mother, in the stillness of the summer midnight, in the hearing of God alone.No one but Jean knew that night that George had come home, and Jean did not go to her brother till she had heard her father shut himself into his room. Mr Dawson himself brought food to his son, and wine, and watched him as he partook of it. But when he would have poured out the wine, he staid his hand.“I promised Tam Saugster—we promised one another—not to touch or taste before he comes home to Portie.”“It is for his sake then?”“And for my own,” said George gravely.His father was silent. Strangely mingled feelings moved him.“Is he so weak that he cannot refrain? Is he so strong that he can resist?”Even in the midst of his joy in having his son back again, “clothed and in his right mind,” he was more inclined to resent the implied weakness, than to rejoice in the assured strength. But he uttered no word of his thoughts then or ever, though George did not release himself from his vow even when Tam Saugster came home to Portie “a changed man” also.When the house was quiet again, and the lights were out, Jean stole softly to her brother’s room, for one embrace, one kiss, a single word of welcome. But she would not linger.“We couldna stop, if we were once to begin, Geordie; and you are tired, and my father would be ill-pleased. I only wanted to be sure that you were really home again. And I’m no’ sure yet,” she added laughing and touching with caressing fingers the soft brown beard, that she could just see, for a faint gleam of dawn was breaking over the sea. They looked at each other with shy pleasure, these two. Jean blushed and smiled under her brother’s admiring eyes, but she would not linger.“My father will hear us, and he will not be pleased,” said she going softly away.But was it not a joyful morning?“May, are you ready? Come down quickly. I have something that I want you to see.”“May, I think it is I who have something to see,” said George, as his younger sister came in. One might search the countryside and find no other such brother and sisters as these three. The father looked at them with proud but sorrowful eyes, for their mother was not there to see them.George was changed, even more than his sisters. He had gone away a lad, and he had come back a man. There was more than the soft brown beard to show that. He had grown taller even, his father thought, he had certainly grown broader and stronger. The colour that used to be as clear red and white as his sisters’ was gone. His face was brown and his eye was bright and steady, and his smile—when it came—was the same sunny smile that his father had so longed for during the sorrowful days of his absence. But it did not come so often as it used to come, and at other times, his face was touched with a gravity new to them all.But there was no gloom on it, and no trace of any thing that those who loved him would have grieved to see. It was a stronger face now than it had been in the old days, but it was none less a pleasant face, and in a little while they forgot that it had changed. It was George’s face. That was enough.“It is aman’sface. And he’ll show himself a man yet, and do a man’s share in the work of the world,” said the proud and happy father. And in his heart he acknowledged his son’s right to take his own way and live his own life, even though the way might lie apart from his, and though the life he chose might not be just the life that his father would have chosen for him.“Your aunt should have been here, Jean. You should have sent for her,” said Mr Dawson in a little.“I will go and see her,” said George. “I will walk in with you to the town, by and by.”“But we must have her here, all the same, for a day or two. Ye’ll send for her afterward, Jean.”But they did not go in the morning as they meant to do. They lingered long over the breakfast-table, and then in the garden and in the wood, and the father and son went down the burn and through the green parks beyond, never thinking how the time was passing, till Jean came to tell them that dinner was waiting.After dinner they went to the town. But they did not go down the High-street. They were both shy at the thought of all the eyes that would be upon them there.“And it should be your aunt first,” said Mr Dawson.So they went down a lane that led straight to the sea and then turned to Miss Jean’s house.“You’ll go in by yourself and I’ll step on and come back in a while,” said his father.He had not stepped far before a hand touched his arm, and a pair of shining eyes met his.“Oh, Mr Dawson! Is it George come home? And isna your heart like to break for joy?”There were tears as well as smiles on the beautiful face that looked up into his with joyful sympathy and with entire confidence that sympathy would be welcome. For an instant Mr Dawson met her look with strangely contending emotions. Then a strange thing happened. He took the bonny moved face between his two hands, and stooping down, kissed it “cheek and chin” without a word.He would not have believed the thing possible a minute before, he could hardly believe if a minute afterwards, as he turned back again towards his sister’s house. Mrs Cairnie coming slowly down the street saw it—and then she doubted, telling herself, that “her e’en were surely nae marrows,” or that the last “drappie” she had taken at “The Kail Stock” had been ower muckle for her, and the first person to whom she told the story thought the same.Bonny Marion’s mother and brother saw it from the window of their own house: he with amazement, she with dismay.“It maun be that Geordie has come home, and that the joy of it has softened his heart,” said Willie.“Ay. He has gotten his son back again?” said Mrs Calderwood. And Willie knew that his mother was thinking of her child who would never return.Marion came dancing in with the glad news. She told it soberly after a glance at her mother’s face. And then they all sat waiting, knowing that George and his father would pass that way.But George did not pass. Both men stood still before their door, and George’s hand was laid for an instant on his father’s shoulder. They knew what he was saying though they did not hear him speak, and then Mr Dawson went on “looking grave, but no’ angry,” Marion whispered, and George came into the house.Mrs Calderwood received him as she had received her son, kissing him and thanking God for his safe home coming at last. Their meeting could not be all gladness, remembering how they had parted. George was very white and silent. Even Marion’s bright face and joyful welcome could not win a smile. Willie and he had much to say to each other, but all that must wait till another time. George could stay but a moment, for his father was waiting for him at the pier.That night Mrs Calderwood and her son sat together in the gathering gloaming, and after a long silence Willie said, “Would it break your heart altogether, mother, to think of leaving Portie?”“Hearts are no’ so easily broken as I used to think. I could leave it, if it were the wisest thing to do. I could leave even Scotland itself, for that matter.”“Yes, it would end in leaving Scotland—if any change were to be made. But as far as you are concerned, you needna be in haste for a time.”“A while sooner or later would make little difference,” said his mother.Nothing more was said; but from that night, Mrs Calderwood knew that it might come to leaving Portie with them, and she set herself calmly to look the possibility in the face.George came home about the middle of July, and the preparations for May’s marriage were nearly completed by that time. Jean had determined that it was to be a very pretty wedding, and so it was; and having said this, little more need be said about it. It was like all other pretty weddings—that is to say like pretty weddings in the north. The guests were many, and merrier than wedding guests usually are in other regions.Mr and Mrs Seldon came from London to be there, and other friends came from other places. George was “best man,” and there were many bridesmaids. Marion Calderwood was one of them, and Willie was an invited guest. But at the last moment Willie failed them, and the only reason given, was the unsatisfactory one of “business before pleasure.” On the very morning of the marriage he left home “for London, or Liverpool, or somewhere,—before I was up,” said Marion, who came early to put on her pretty bridesmaid’s dress in Jean’s room; and George, when May questioned him, said with absolute truth, that not a word had passed between him and Willie as to the reason of his going away.Mr Manners might have cast some light on the matter, though he also could have said that no word had been spoken with regard to it. Intent on making the acquaintance of George, they had set out the night before the wedding for a long walk along the shore, and meeting young Calderwood, he turned at their invitation and went with them.Probably Mr Manners learned more about both of them in listening to their conversation with each other than he would have had he had one of them to himself. As it was he enjoyed it much. They went far and before they returned the gloaming had fallen.Standing for a moment at the point where the High-street of Portie turns off from the road which leads in one direction along the shore, and in the other out towards Saughleas, they heard a voice, familiar enough to George and Willie, coming through an open cottage window.“Weel, weel! I maun be gaen. Ilka ane kens her ain trouble. And them that ha’e nane, whiles think they ha’e, and that’s as ill to thole till real trouble comes, and then they ken the difference. But I maun awa’ hame.”Mrs Cairnie lingered, however, at the open door.“Eh, woman! wha’s yon comin’ up the High-street? Wha would ha’e thought it? The Dawsons are on the top o’ the wave enow! Do ye no’ see, woman? Yon’s young Miss Jean’s Englishman.”Mr Manners had not followed all the speech, but he understood the last part of it, and never doubted that it referred to himself, “though she has mistaken the lady’s name,” said he, turning laughing eyes on young Calderwood.But Willie did not meet his look. He was looking down the High-street, and George was looking at Willie whose face had grown white through all its healthy brown. Mr Dawson was coming slowly up the street, and by his side there walked a young man large, and fair, and handsome; a gentleman evidently whom neither of them had ever seen before. A groom driving a dog-cart followed slowly after.“It must be Captain Harefield. May has spoken of him,” said Mr Manners.It was Captain Harefield. Mr Dawson introduced him as they came up, and from his father’s manner George knew that he was pleased at the meeting.“I have been trying to persuade Captain Harefield to come to the marriage to-morrow,” said he. “It is short notice, I know, but not too short, if you will come out to Saughleas to-night and see the bride.”Captain Harefield murmured something about an engagement, but he looked as though he would willingly be persuaded to break it. Mr Manners first, and then George added a word, and he yielded, and he and Mr Dawson drove off in the dog-cart at once.“Ye’ll come with us, Willie?” said George laying his hand on his shoulder, in boyish fashion. The friends looked at one another, and both changed colour a little.“No’ the nicht, I think, Geordie.”Then they shook hands and the mate went rapidly down the street, and the others were more than half way to Saughleas before George uttered a word.That night Willie Calderwood startled his mother by saying suddenly after a long time of silence,—“I am off to-morrow morning for Liverpool, mother. I have a letter that I meant to show to George, but I couldna, and you must tell him. I have a chance to be second officer on one of the great ocean steamships. What do you think of that, mother? I think I’ll take it.”“Then you’ve given up all thoughts of the ‘John Seaton’?”“Yes. This is a far better post—as you must see, mother, with a chance of promotion. I mean to command one of these fine ships yet.”“But must you go so soon? You are expected to go to the marriage to-morrow.”“Yes. And I would have liked to see the last o’ May Dawson. But ‘business before pleasure,’ ye ken, mother; and nobody will miss me, I dare say. And Marion will say all that is needful to the bride.”Willie spoke cheerily—too cheerily, his mother thought, to be quite natural. “No thought of Jean Dawson shall ever come between my mother and me,” Willie was thinking. “Even if she cared for me, it could never be; and I must get away from the sight of her, or I shall do something foolish, and give my mother all the old pain over again.” Then after a long time of silence, he said, “If you were to live in Liverpool, or near it, mother, I could see you oftener than if I had to come to Portie.”“Yes, I have been thinking of that.”“Marion wouldna like it?”“No, I dare say not. But it might be well for her to have a change.”“Well, then, that is settled. But there need be no haste, mother.”“A month or two sooner or later would make little difference.”And then they were silent again. Mrs Calderwood was thinking, “I am sorrier for her than I am for him. He is a man, with a man’s work to do, and he will forget her. But as for Jean—she’s no’ the kind of woman to forget.”So Willie kissed his sister in her morning sleep, and was away long before she opened her eyes on May’s marriage day. If any one but his sister missed him amid the gay doings of the day, no one said so. The eyes and thoughts of all were on the bride and her attendant maidens, and it was a sight worth seeing.May behaved as a bride should, who of her own free will is leaving her father’s house to go to the house of her husband. Jean stood by her and her quietness kept the bride quiet also. But even Jean’s colour changed many times as they stood with all the kindly admiring eyes upon them.And when the ceremony was over, and the breakfast, and the speech-making, and the few painful moments of lingering that followed, and the happy bridegroom had at last gone away with his bonny bride, then nobody saw Jean till a long hour and more was over.
That night Mr Dawson and Miss Jean sat long together, when the others had gone away, and for the most part they sat in silence. Mr Dawson had some thoughts which he would not have liked to tell his sister,—thoughts which he knew she would call wrong and thankless—which he would gladly have put away.
The good things of this life, the glad surprises, the unhoped for reprieves from sorrow, rarely come without some drawback of regret or pain. That he should have got tidings of his son; that he should be coming home, and glad to come; that he should be well and worthy, a man to honour and to trust,—how utterly beyond his hopes had this been yesterday!
His son was coming home; but, alas! he could never have his light-hearted, bonny laddie back again. George was a man now, “knowing good and evil.” It could never be again between them as it had been before their trouble came.
“Ane o’ your kind, Miss Jean,” the mate had said; “a changed man.”
Mr Dawson’s thoughts went back to the time of his sister’s trouble, when she had become “a changed woman.” All the anger and vexation, that had then seemed natural and right, because of her new ways, had passed out of his heart, a score of years and more. It was as though it had never been. He glanced up at her placid face, and said to himself, as he had said before many times, “A woman among a thousand.” But he remembered the old pain, though it was gone, and he shrank from the thought that he might have to suffer again through his son.
“He is a man now, and must go his ain way,” he said to himself, moving uneasily on his chair and sighing. “We canna begin again where we left off. Ungrateful? Yes, I dare say it would be so called; but, oh! Geordie, my lad! I doubt your way and mine must lie asunder now.”
Miss Jean too had some thoughts which she would not have cared to tell, but they were not about George; for him she was altogether joyful. If Willie Calderwood’s words about him were true, and he were indeed “a changed man,” nothing else mattered much in Miss Jean’s esteem. The “good,” for which he had God’s promise as security would be wrought out in him whether by health or sickness, by joy or sorrow, by possession or loss, and through him might be brought help and healing, higher hopes, and better lives to many. The Master who had chosen him would use him for His own work, and that implied all that was to be desired for any one to Miss Jean.
But in the midst of her joy for him, she could not forget Jean’s silence, and Willie Calderwood’s averted eyes. And though she told herself that possible pain and disappointment could work good to her niece as well as to her nephew, she could not but shrink beforehand from the suffering that might be before her. But it was not a trouble to be spoken about.
Neither had spoken for a long time, when the door opened and Jean came in. She was wrapped in her dressing-gown, over which her long hair hung, and her face looked pale and troubled.
“Are you here still, Auntie Jean? No, don’t go, papa,” said she as he rose. “I have something to tell you.”
“It maun be late. I thought you had been in your bed this hour and more,” said her father.
“Yes, papa, I was in bed, but I couldna sleep.”
“For joy, I suppose?” said he smiling.
“Yes, for joy and—because—papa, I knew that my brother had sailed in the John Seaton.”
“You knew! And never spoke?”
“Would it have been better if I had spoken? Would you have suffered less? But I did not know it till after the ship had sailed, and I thought it would break your heart to know that he could have been here and gone away again, without a word. I tried to tell you afterwards, and you, Auntie Jean, as well. I longed to tell you. I could hardly bear the doubt and fear of the last few weeks. But I thought if it was so terrible to me, what would it be to you!”
Mr Dawson did not answer for a moment. He was thinking of the stormy nights of last winter, and the dread in her eyes as they looked out over the angry sea.
“No wonder that you were anxious often, and afraid.”
“Ought I to have told you? But you are not angry now, papa?”
“There is no good being angry—and you did it for the best.”
And then Jean told them about the note that Robbie Saugster had brought too late to let her see her brother before the ship sailed. Miss Jean said it had doubtless been wisely and kindly ordered, that the lad would come home and be a better son, and a better man for the discipline of the time. And then when they went upstairs together, she added a few joyful words to Jean, about the change that had come to her brother, and about the peace that would henceforth be between his father and him. But she would not let her linger beside her for any more talk.
“Ye need your rest, my dear, and we’ll baith ha’e quieter hearts, and be better able to measure the greatness of the mercy that has come to us. And other things will take a mair natural look as well.”
Though Mr Manners had only one more day at Saughleas at this time, he accepted Mr Dawson’s invitation to walk with him to Portie in the morning. Mr Dawson wished to show him the “John Seaton,” and Mr Manners wished to see again the fine young fellow, who might, if he chose, henceforth have the command of the ship. Mr Dawson had something to say to him on the way.
“You will get a scanter portion with your wife than you would have gotten if—we had heard no news.”
“Oh! My wife! My bonny May,” said Mr Manners with smiling eyes. “But then I shall have a brother—I who never had one—and I shall have a right to my share of the family joy.”
Mr Dawson did not speak for a moment.
“There will be something at once,” and he named a sum, “and there will be something more at my death.”
Then he went on to mention certain arrangements that were to be made, and Mr Manners, of course, seemed to listen with interest; but when he ceased speaking, he said gravely,—
“I have only one fear, lest the joyful expectation of having her brother home again, may make May wish to delay her marriage.”
“As to that—if he come at once he will be here long before the first. And if he should delay—no, I do not think that that ought to be allowed to interfere with your plans.”
“Thank you,” said Mr Manners. “Oh, he will be sure to be here in time.”
“Wha kens?” said Mr Dawson. “It seems beyond belief that I should ever have my son back again. I never can in one sense. He is a man now, and changed. I wouldna seem unthankful; but, oh, man! if ye had ever seen my George, ye would ken what I mean.”
He was greatly moved. If he had tried to say more, daylight as it was, and on the open road, his voice must have failed him. They walked on in silence for a while—for what could Mr Manners say?—and before they reached the High-street, he was himself again.
There were many eyes upon him as they went down the street, for by this time it was known through all the town that George had sailed in the “John Seaton.” But “the old man took it quietly enough,” some said, and others, who saw him in the way of business through the day, said the same. The sailors in the “John Seaton,” when later he and Mr Manners went down to the pier, saw nothing unusual in his rough, but kindly, greetings. There was not one of them but would have liked to say a kindly and admiring word of “Geordie”; for “Geordie” he had been to them all, through the long year; and doubtless it would have pleased the father to hear it. But he heard nothing of it there.
It did not surprise these men to see that he took it quietly. Their own fathers and mothers took quietly the comings and goings of their sons. But it would have surprised them to know that the old man kept silence because he was not sure whether his voice would serve him if he should try to speak. He turned back again for a minute when Mr Manners and the mate came on deck, when all had been said that was necessary on that occasion, and it would have surprised them to know that it was to shut himself into the little cabin where George had so long served and comforted the dying captain, and that he there knelt down and thanked God for His goodness to his son.
He seemed to take it quietly as far as people generally saw during the next ten days; but Jean put away all remorseful thoughts as to the silence she had kept during the last long year.
“He never could have borne the long suspense,” she said to herself, as she watched him through the days and heard his restless movements through nights of sleepless waiting. He never spoke of his son, or his anxiety with regard to him; but Jean took pains to speak of her brother to others in his hearing; and sometimes she spoke to himself, and he listened, but he never made reply.
“He will grow morbid and ill if this continues long,” she said one day to her aunt.
“It will not continue long,” said Miss Jean.
“No, he will come soon, if he is coming.”
“Oh, he is coming! ye needna doubt that. He is no seeking his ain way now. He’ll come back to his father’s house.”
And so he did, and he found his father watching for him. He did not go all the way to Portie, but stopped, as his father knew he would, at a little station two or three miles on the other side of Saughleas, and walked home. It was late and all was quiet in the house. Summer rain was softly falling, but Mr Dawson stood at the gate as he had stood for many nights; and George heard his voice before he saw him.
It might have been said—if there had been any one there to see—that Mr Dawson “took it quietly” even then. There were not many words spoken between them, and they were simple words, spoken quietly enough. How it happened neither of them could have told,—whether the father followed the son, or the son the father,—but instead of turning to the terrace, where the drawing-room window stood open to let them in, they turned down the walk, past the well into the wood; and whatever was said of confession or forgiveness was said by the grave of the lad’s mother, in the stillness of the summer midnight, in the hearing of God alone.
No one but Jean knew that night that George had come home, and Jean did not go to her brother till she had heard her father shut himself into his room. Mr Dawson himself brought food to his son, and wine, and watched him as he partook of it. But when he would have poured out the wine, he staid his hand.
“I promised Tam Saugster—we promised one another—not to touch or taste before he comes home to Portie.”
“It is for his sake then?”
“And for my own,” said George gravely.
His father was silent. Strangely mingled feelings moved him.
“Is he so weak that he cannot refrain? Is he so strong that he can resist?”
Even in the midst of his joy in having his son back again, “clothed and in his right mind,” he was more inclined to resent the implied weakness, than to rejoice in the assured strength. But he uttered no word of his thoughts then or ever, though George did not release himself from his vow even when Tam Saugster came home to Portie “a changed man” also.
When the house was quiet again, and the lights were out, Jean stole softly to her brother’s room, for one embrace, one kiss, a single word of welcome. But she would not linger.
“We couldna stop, if we were once to begin, Geordie; and you are tired, and my father would be ill-pleased. I only wanted to be sure that you were really home again. And I’m no’ sure yet,” she added laughing and touching with caressing fingers the soft brown beard, that she could just see, for a faint gleam of dawn was breaking over the sea. They looked at each other with shy pleasure, these two. Jean blushed and smiled under her brother’s admiring eyes, but she would not linger.
“My father will hear us, and he will not be pleased,” said she going softly away.
But was it not a joyful morning?
“May, are you ready? Come down quickly. I have something that I want you to see.”
“May, I think it is I who have something to see,” said George, as his younger sister came in. One might search the countryside and find no other such brother and sisters as these three. The father looked at them with proud but sorrowful eyes, for their mother was not there to see them.
George was changed, even more than his sisters. He had gone away a lad, and he had come back a man. There was more than the soft brown beard to show that. He had grown taller even, his father thought, he had certainly grown broader and stronger. The colour that used to be as clear red and white as his sisters’ was gone. His face was brown and his eye was bright and steady, and his smile—when it came—was the same sunny smile that his father had so longed for during the sorrowful days of his absence. But it did not come so often as it used to come, and at other times, his face was touched with a gravity new to them all.
But there was no gloom on it, and no trace of any thing that those who loved him would have grieved to see. It was a stronger face now than it had been in the old days, but it was none less a pleasant face, and in a little while they forgot that it had changed. It was George’s face. That was enough.
“It is aman’sface. And he’ll show himself a man yet, and do a man’s share in the work of the world,” said the proud and happy father. And in his heart he acknowledged his son’s right to take his own way and live his own life, even though the way might lie apart from his, and though the life he chose might not be just the life that his father would have chosen for him.
“Your aunt should have been here, Jean. You should have sent for her,” said Mr Dawson in a little.
“I will go and see her,” said George. “I will walk in with you to the town, by and by.”
“But we must have her here, all the same, for a day or two. Ye’ll send for her afterward, Jean.”
But they did not go in the morning as they meant to do. They lingered long over the breakfast-table, and then in the garden and in the wood, and the father and son went down the burn and through the green parks beyond, never thinking how the time was passing, till Jean came to tell them that dinner was waiting.
After dinner they went to the town. But they did not go down the High-street. They were both shy at the thought of all the eyes that would be upon them there.
“And it should be your aunt first,” said Mr Dawson.
So they went down a lane that led straight to the sea and then turned to Miss Jean’s house.
“You’ll go in by yourself and I’ll step on and come back in a while,” said his father.
He had not stepped far before a hand touched his arm, and a pair of shining eyes met his.
“Oh, Mr Dawson! Is it George come home? And isna your heart like to break for joy?”
There were tears as well as smiles on the beautiful face that looked up into his with joyful sympathy and with entire confidence that sympathy would be welcome. For an instant Mr Dawson met her look with strangely contending emotions. Then a strange thing happened. He took the bonny moved face between his two hands, and stooping down, kissed it “cheek and chin” without a word.
He would not have believed the thing possible a minute before, he could hardly believe if a minute afterwards, as he turned back again towards his sister’s house. Mrs Cairnie coming slowly down the street saw it—and then she doubted, telling herself, that “her e’en were surely nae marrows,” or that the last “drappie” she had taken at “The Kail Stock” had been ower muckle for her, and the first person to whom she told the story thought the same.
Bonny Marion’s mother and brother saw it from the window of their own house: he with amazement, she with dismay.
“It maun be that Geordie has come home, and that the joy of it has softened his heart,” said Willie.
“Ay. He has gotten his son back again?” said Mrs Calderwood. And Willie knew that his mother was thinking of her child who would never return.
Marion came dancing in with the glad news. She told it soberly after a glance at her mother’s face. And then they all sat waiting, knowing that George and his father would pass that way.
But George did not pass. Both men stood still before their door, and George’s hand was laid for an instant on his father’s shoulder. They knew what he was saying though they did not hear him speak, and then Mr Dawson went on “looking grave, but no’ angry,” Marion whispered, and George came into the house.
Mrs Calderwood received him as she had received her son, kissing him and thanking God for his safe home coming at last. Their meeting could not be all gladness, remembering how they had parted. George was very white and silent. Even Marion’s bright face and joyful welcome could not win a smile. Willie and he had much to say to each other, but all that must wait till another time. George could stay but a moment, for his father was waiting for him at the pier.
That night Mrs Calderwood and her son sat together in the gathering gloaming, and after a long silence Willie said, “Would it break your heart altogether, mother, to think of leaving Portie?”
“Hearts are no’ so easily broken as I used to think. I could leave it, if it were the wisest thing to do. I could leave even Scotland itself, for that matter.”
“Yes, it would end in leaving Scotland—if any change were to be made. But as far as you are concerned, you needna be in haste for a time.”
“A while sooner or later would make little difference,” said his mother.
Nothing more was said; but from that night, Mrs Calderwood knew that it might come to leaving Portie with them, and she set herself calmly to look the possibility in the face.
George came home about the middle of July, and the preparations for May’s marriage were nearly completed by that time. Jean had determined that it was to be a very pretty wedding, and so it was; and having said this, little more need be said about it. It was like all other pretty weddings—that is to say like pretty weddings in the north. The guests were many, and merrier than wedding guests usually are in other regions.
Mr and Mrs Seldon came from London to be there, and other friends came from other places. George was “best man,” and there were many bridesmaids. Marion Calderwood was one of them, and Willie was an invited guest. But at the last moment Willie failed them, and the only reason given, was the unsatisfactory one of “business before pleasure.” On the very morning of the marriage he left home “for London, or Liverpool, or somewhere,—before I was up,” said Marion, who came early to put on her pretty bridesmaid’s dress in Jean’s room; and George, when May questioned him, said with absolute truth, that not a word had passed between him and Willie as to the reason of his going away.
Mr Manners might have cast some light on the matter, though he also could have said that no word had been spoken with regard to it. Intent on making the acquaintance of George, they had set out the night before the wedding for a long walk along the shore, and meeting young Calderwood, he turned at their invitation and went with them.
Probably Mr Manners learned more about both of them in listening to their conversation with each other than he would have had he had one of them to himself. As it was he enjoyed it much. They went far and before they returned the gloaming had fallen.
Standing for a moment at the point where the High-street of Portie turns off from the road which leads in one direction along the shore, and in the other out towards Saughleas, they heard a voice, familiar enough to George and Willie, coming through an open cottage window.
“Weel, weel! I maun be gaen. Ilka ane kens her ain trouble. And them that ha’e nane, whiles think they ha’e, and that’s as ill to thole till real trouble comes, and then they ken the difference. But I maun awa’ hame.”
Mrs Cairnie lingered, however, at the open door.
“Eh, woman! wha’s yon comin’ up the High-street? Wha would ha’e thought it? The Dawsons are on the top o’ the wave enow! Do ye no’ see, woman? Yon’s young Miss Jean’s Englishman.”
Mr Manners had not followed all the speech, but he understood the last part of it, and never doubted that it referred to himself, “though she has mistaken the lady’s name,” said he, turning laughing eyes on young Calderwood.
But Willie did not meet his look. He was looking down the High-street, and George was looking at Willie whose face had grown white through all its healthy brown. Mr Dawson was coming slowly up the street, and by his side there walked a young man large, and fair, and handsome; a gentleman evidently whom neither of them had ever seen before. A groom driving a dog-cart followed slowly after.
“It must be Captain Harefield. May has spoken of him,” said Mr Manners.
It was Captain Harefield. Mr Dawson introduced him as they came up, and from his father’s manner George knew that he was pleased at the meeting.
“I have been trying to persuade Captain Harefield to come to the marriage to-morrow,” said he. “It is short notice, I know, but not too short, if you will come out to Saughleas to-night and see the bride.”
Captain Harefield murmured something about an engagement, but he looked as though he would willingly be persuaded to break it. Mr Manners first, and then George added a word, and he yielded, and he and Mr Dawson drove off in the dog-cart at once.
“Ye’ll come with us, Willie?” said George laying his hand on his shoulder, in boyish fashion. The friends looked at one another, and both changed colour a little.
“No’ the nicht, I think, Geordie.”
Then they shook hands and the mate went rapidly down the street, and the others were more than half way to Saughleas before George uttered a word.
That night Willie Calderwood startled his mother by saying suddenly after a long time of silence,—
“I am off to-morrow morning for Liverpool, mother. I have a letter that I meant to show to George, but I couldna, and you must tell him. I have a chance to be second officer on one of the great ocean steamships. What do you think of that, mother? I think I’ll take it.”
“Then you’ve given up all thoughts of the ‘John Seaton’?”
“Yes. This is a far better post—as you must see, mother, with a chance of promotion. I mean to command one of these fine ships yet.”
“But must you go so soon? You are expected to go to the marriage to-morrow.”
“Yes. And I would have liked to see the last o’ May Dawson. But ‘business before pleasure,’ ye ken, mother; and nobody will miss me, I dare say. And Marion will say all that is needful to the bride.”
Willie spoke cheerily—too cheerily, his mother thought, to be quite natural. “No thought of Jean Dawson shall ever come between my mother and me,” Willie was thinking. “Even if she cared for me, it could never be; and I must get away from the sight of her, or I shall do something foolish, and give my mother all the old pain over again.” Then after a long time of silence, he said, “If you were to live in Liverpool, or near it, mother, I could see you oftener than if I had to come to Portie.”
“Yes, I have been thinking of that.”
“Marion wouldna like it?”
“No, I dare say not. But it might be well for her to have a change.”
“Well, then, that is settled. But there need be no haste, mother.”
“A month or two sooner or later would make little difference.”
And then they were silent again. Mrs Calderwood was thinking, “I am sorrier for her than I am for him. He is a man, with a man’s work to do, and he will forget her. But as for Jean—she’s no’ the kind of woman to forget.”
So Willie kissed his sister in her morning sleep, and was away long before she opened her eyes on May’s marriage day. If any one but his sister missed him amid the gay doings of the day, no one said so. The eyes and thoughts of all were on the bride and her attendant maidens, and it was a sight worth seeing.
May behaved as a bride should, who of her own free will is leaving her father’s house to go to the house of her husband. Jean stood by her and her quietness kept the bride quiet also. But even Jean’s colour changed many times as they stood with all the kindly admiring eyes upon them.
And when the ceremony was over, and the breakfast, and the speech-making, and the few painful moments of lingering that followed, and the happy bridegroom had at last gone away with his bonny bride, then nobody saw Jean till a long hour and more was over.
Chapter Eighteen.Another Proposal.Captain Harefield was at the wedding an honoured guest, as all could see, and for a very good reason, it was said. Through the Blackford groom, it had come to be known in Portie that a change had fallen on the fortunes of Captain Harefield.Through the sad and sudden death of a distant cousin, he had become heir to a large estate in one of the southern English counties, and though he might have a while to wait for the full enjoyment of his inheritance, and for the tide that was to come with it, there was in the mean time a happy change in his circumstances as far as money was concerned. He had not come to Blackford House this time, to escape duns. And his sister had not come to take care of him.The chances were that he had an object in view in coming, and on the wedding day more than one of those who saw the looks he cast at the bride and her maidens, had felt satisfied as to what that object might be. Mr Dawson was one of these.There were several guests still in the house, when a week had passed. Mr Dawson and his sister were sitting one afternoon on the terrace, when Captain Harefield rode up, and in a little he had joined Miss Dawson in the garden. The father watched them as they came and went among the trees.“Jean has the ba’ at her foot this time, I’m thinking,” said he. “Weel, weel! It it pleases her, it will please me.”“She’ll never please ye in that way. Dinna think it.”“I’m no’ so sure that it would please me—no’ so sure as I was this time last year. But I think she might be satisfied.”“She’ll need a stronger hand to guide her.”“She has strength and sense to guidehim, and that might do as well.”“It wouldna be for her happiness were she to be persuaded to such a marriage,” said Miss Jean gravely.“Persuaded! No, that is not likely. But, Jean, I like the lad, though he is no’ a Solomon, I confess, and he has a high place in the world—or he will ha’e ane—and Jean would do him credit.”“High place or no’, he is no’ her equal in any important sense. If she cared for him, she might guide him and put up with him, as many another woman has to do. As to persuading her—no one could do that; but if she thought your heart was set on it, she might persuade herself to her ain unhappiness.”“I’se never persuade her. And I would ha’e ill sparin’ her. But it would be a fine position, and she would keep it we’ll.”“Ay, if she could take it with a good conscience. But that she canna do,” said Miss Jean.When the bustle attending the wedding was over and all the guests were gone, a new life began at Saughleas. As far as George was concerned, it was not just the life his father would have chosen for him. But George was a man now, and every day that passed proved to his father that he was a man that might safely be trusted to guide himself. It would have pleased his father that he should at once have taken his place as the young laird of Saughleas. There were many signs among the other proprietors of the neighbourhood, that he would have been welcomed to the houses of people who had held hitherto only business intercourse with his father.There was no need for George to return to the counting-house again. Mr Dawson acknowledged himself to be a richer man than was generally supposed, and George, as the heir of Saughleas, might “take a long tether,” as far as the spending of money was concerned.And he need not lead an idle life. All the congenial occupations of a country gentleman were open to him, to say nothing of the amusements which only men of comparative leisure could enjoy. Or he might farm his own land. Whether he could make such farming profitable to himself might be doubtful, but he might do good in the countryside, and he would thus have an opportunity of bringing himself into contact with people whose acquaintance was to be desired,—the lairds and gentlemen farmers of the north.It was to his sister oftener than to his son that all this was said; and listening to him, Miss Jean could not but wonder what had become of the sense and judgment that had guided him through all his life till now.“When you are dead and gone, and George has a son of his ain, he’ll get willingly in the countryside what you are so anxious for him to take now. It would bring neither the honour nor the pleasure that you are dreaming about for him, if he were to turn his back upon—the shop—for that was the foundation o’ your fortune, though you are a banker and a ship-owner now. Let George win his ain way, as his father did before him; it will be mair to his credit, and mair to his happiness, than any such change as ye would fain see in his way of life. And he’ll be far safer.”“A body would think to hear ye, Jean, that I was like to be ashamed o’ the shop, and the makin’ o’ my ain way in the world; I’m so far from that, that I seek no other credit or honour in the countryside than what I have won as a man of business. But it might be different with my son.”“Weel, honour and consideration seldom come the sooner for the seeking. They’ll come to George in good time, if he shall deserve them. It’s little honour he would be like to get from men o’ sense if he were content to sit down with what you ha’e won for him, putting himself in the place that ye ha’e honestly and honourably won for yourself. That would be for the honour o’ neither you nor him, though ye may think it.”“It was for him I won it. There would be neither pleasure nor profit for me, at my time o’ life, in seekin’ any change. But I acknowledge it would be a pleasure to me to see my son taking his right place in the countryside. It is no’ as if he werena fit for it. Just look at him! Who is there to compare with him? And he has as good blood in his veins as the most o’ them, when a’ is said.”“He’ll get his right place in time, never fear. And he’ll get it all the readier that he’s no’ in haste about it.”In the mean time George was in his father’s office, setting himself to the mastering of all details and succeeding therein, in a way that astonished his father. It was that part of the business that had to do with shipping interests which he liked best, and which chiefly claimed his attention at this time. His father acknowledged that he had a clear head, and a power of application that would stand him in stead either as merchant or landed proprietor. And the pleasure he had in his son’s companionship, and in his sympathy with his work, went far to keep him silent as to any change in his present course.As for George, he was for the most part silent also, because he was unwilling by opposition to his father’s wishes to put in jeopardy the new and pleasant relations existing between them. But to his sister and his aunt he spoke plainly enough.If any of them were to have special consideration from their neighbours, it must be because of his father’s life, and what he had accomplished in it. As for his assuming the position of the young laird of Saughleas while his father continued the laborious life of a man of business, that would be only contemptible. If he were to take his own way in life, he must win the right to do so, and he made no secret of the possibility that, as the years went on, his way of life might in some respects be different from his father’s.He pleased his father in one way. He took great interest in all that concerned the management of the estate. He was fond of the place as his home. They agreed in most things which concerned its prosperity and prospects, and if George was less eager than his father in his desire to add to its extent, he did not vex him by showing this too plainly. They differed in opinion about this, and about other things often. But Mr Dawson put great restraint upon himself at such times, striving to remember that George had a right as a man to hold his own opinions and to act upon them though they differed from his. George, on his part, felt no temptation to fail in the perfect respect he owed to his father, in his words and in his ways. And so, in course of time, things bade fair to adjust themselves to the satisfaction of both.As was to be supposed, Jean and her aunt looked on with deep interest, while the father and son were thus happily though warily renewing their acquaintance, but they said little about it, even to each other. During the first month after May went away there was much going on at Saughleas. Emily Corbett, who had come for the wedding, stayed a while, and Hugh stayed also, though he was strong and well and able for any thing now. There were young people coming to the house for their sakes,—Marion Calderwood, who was Emily’s chief friend, and the young Petries, and others; and there were expeditions here and there, and garden parties at various houses; and Jean’s time and thoughts were much occupied.Captain Harefield made one of such parties now and then, but not so frequently as had been the case last summer. He was a person of more importance at Blackford House now than he had been then, and though his sister was not there to take care of him, there were others there ready and willing to do the work in which it must be confessed she had failed. He was so good-natured, and so unaccustomed to exert his own will against any one who assumed the right to guide him, that he was easily taken possession of. It was agreeable also to be made much of, to be consulted and included in all arrangements for business or pleasure, so that he did not find his stay at Blackford House “a bore,” as he had done last summer, and he was less inclined to stray away into other parts to look for pleasure.The less frequently that he came to Saughleas, the more kindly and frankly he was received by Jean, who liked him very well since he seemed to have put foolish thoughts out of his head. But he came often enough to put foolish thoughts into the heads of other people. The young people who came to the house, watched with interest the Captain’s shy devotion, and Jean’s friendly indifference, not quite sure the last was altogether real. Mrs Seldon, during the weeks of her stay, never doubted as to his object in coming, and sensible of the importance attached to having a place in county society and a title in prospect, she doubted as little as to the result of his devotion, and Mr Dawson, with a mingling of feelings which he could not easily have analysed, repeated to himself that “Jean had the ball at her foot, whatever way it might end.” But Miss Jean held fast to her first opinion, that Jean was safe from any temptation to yield to him, and so was another who had not had Miss Jean’s experience.“Oh! Miss Jean, I am the most unfortunate little creature in all Portie, I think. I’m ay doing or saying something that I shouldna.”“My dear, ye are worse than unfortunate if that be true. What have ye been at now?”“It was quite true, what I said, only I wish Mr Dawson hadna heard us. We were speaking about—about Miss Dawson—”Marion hesitated. She was not quite sure how Miss Jean herself would like to hear that the young folk had been discussing her niece and her affairs so freely.“It was only that he heard us. I’m ay vexing Mr Dawson, I think.”“Are you?” said Miss Jean, smiling.“Ay, am I. Don’t you mind the apple-tree that was broken, and don’t you mind?” several other circumstances that it vexed the girl to remember. But Jean herself coming in, the vexation of the moment could not be discussed and Marion was not sorry.It had happened thus. She had come early to Saughleas with the young Petries intending to set out at once on an expedition that had been planned to the Castle, but something had delayed several of their party, and the younger folk were whiling away the time of waiting, chatting and laughing as they sat on the grass. By and by the well-known dog-cart passed.“Haloo! There is your Englishman, Marion,” said Hugh Corbett. “I wonder he didn’t come in. He’ll be back again to go with us, unless we make haste to get away.”“Well, and why should not he come with us? The more the merrier,” said his sister.“And he’s no’myEnglishman,” said Marion with dignity; “and for that matter ye are only an Englishman yoursel’.”“Only an Englishman! Just hear her!” said Hugh.“And ye’re not even an Englishman. You are neither one thing nor the other,” said Grace Petrie laughing. “If ye were to bide a while in Portie, ye might maybe pass for a Scotchman, however.”“Oh, indeed! Might I? That’s encouraging.”This was a favourite subject of discussion between these young people, and much banter passed with regard to the nationality of the Corbetts.“But he is no’ Marion’s Englishman anyway,” said Jack Petrie in a little. “He only falls back on Marion when Miss Dawson’s company is no’ to be had.”“And it’s only because Marion saves him the trouble of saying a word. She is such a chatterbox,” said Hugh. “And he’ll have to fall back on her altogether soon, I’m thinking.”“I’m sure that’s no’ what our Milly thinks,” said Jack. “She says that Miss Dawson—”“Your Milly! She judges other folk by hersel’! Miss Dawson wouldna look at him,” said Marion Calderwood.“But she does look at him, whiles,” said Grace.“But that’s because she’s no’ ay thinkin’ about—about the like o’ that Him indeed! He might as well go and ask for one of the young princesses at once.”They all laughed and exclaimed.“Well, she would be no more above him in one way than Miss Dawson is in another. A baronet? What o’ that? Any body might be a baronet, I suppose,” said Marion.“But nothing short of a lord will do for Jean Dawson, ye think. I doubt she’ll bide a whilie,” said Jack scornfully.“And she can afford to bide a whilie. Miss Dawson is sufficient for herself,” said Marion loftily. “But I don’t expect you to understand me, Jack; and I don’t think it is nice for us to be speaking that way about Miss Dawson.”“I agree with you,” said Emily.“So do I,” said Hugh. “But I have one question to ask, and only one. Who of all the gentlemen you have ever seen would you think good enough or great enough for Miss Dawson.”“Oh! as to good enough, that is not what Marion means,” said Grace.“No. Nor great enough,” said Emily. “Well—just suitable—worthy of her, in every way? In mind, body, and estate. Come, let us hear.”“Yes, come, let us hear.”“In mind, body, and estate,” repeated Emily laughing. “I think enough has been said already,” and Marion rose to go away. “But if ye will have it—I never saw any body in every respect worthy of Miss Dawson—except, perhaps—But yet—” Marion hesitated, and then added,—“I dinna believe there is another in all Scotland like Miss Dawson.”“I agree—nor in England either,” said Hugh. “But I rise to ask a question—”He had risen, but it was evidently with the design of intercepting Marion, who was moving over the grass intent on getting away.“I leave it to the company if we have not a right to hear what is to be said; and, what is more, you are not going away till you tell us.”He did not touch her, but he looked quite ready to do it.“Nonsense, Hugh! You are not to vex Marion,” said his sister; but she drew near with the rest to listen.“‘Not one in all Scotland,’ she said,” repeated Grace laughing.“Let us stick to the point,” said Hugh.Marion reddened and fidgeted, and measured the distance with her eye with the evident intention of running away, and all this Hugh noted—nodding and smiling.“Ye canna gar Marion speak, if she’s no willin’. I’ve seen her tried,” said another Petrie.“Why shouldna I speak?” said Marion, realising the impossibility of getting away. “Except that—it’s no’ a thing to speak about—here. What I mean is this. But yet if she were to give her whole heart to any one—he would be the right one—even if—but she would never care for one who was not worthy. Now let me go.”“Yes—certainly. Well?”Marion had made up her mind to say no more. But when Grace Petrie, tossing her head and laughing, said that she could guess who the exception might be, she changed her mind again.“Well!” said Hugh, drawing still near as she receded. “‘Except, perhaps,’ whom?”“I except no one that ever I saw, for there is no one that ever I saw who, in all things—in mind, body, and estate, as you say—I would think fit for Miss Dawson. But what I was going to say was—except, perhaps—George—only he is her brother, ye ken.”“George!” echoed, many voices.“And what’s George more than another?” asked Jack scornfully. “She’ll be saying next, that there’s naebody likehimin all Scotland.”And then Marion, glancing up at the window beneath which they had been sitting, met the wondering look of Mr Dawson.“He must have heard every word,” said Grace in a whisper.Marion turned and fled to seek comfort with Miss Jean.They went away to the Castle, and Miss Dawson went with them; Captain Harefield came to the house soon after they set out, but he did not follow them, though Mr Dawson suggested that he might easily overtake them before they reached the place. It was Mr Dawson himself he had come to see; and when they all came back, and the young folk had had their tea and were gone home together in the moonlight, her father had something to say to Jean.“It’s a comfort that you can just leave it to Jean herself,” said his sister, when he told his news to her. Of what her own opinion might be she said nothing, nor was she curious to hear what Mr Dawson might think now about the chance that his daughter had of becoming the wife of Captain Harefield. “It is a thing that she must decide for herself; and indeed she will let no one else decide it.”There was a measure of comfort in that view of the matter. For though Mr Dawson was ambitious for his daughter, Captain Harefield as a man with expectations was by no means so interesting to him personally as he had been last year when he had none. He knew by Jean’s face at the first word spoken, that her aunt was right.“I gave him his answer last year,” said she.“But it’s no’ an unheard of thing that a woman should change her mind,” said her father dryly.“I have had no reason to change my mind, but many reasons against it. Fancy my leaving you and George and the happy life we are just beginning, to go away with a stranger to folk that would look down on me, and think he had thrown himself away?”“I could make it worth their while to think otherwise.” But Jean shook her head. “Last year you might, when he had nothing.”“As for his friends—ye need ha’e little to do with them. I dare say none o’ them can ha’e a higher sense o’ their ain importance than his sister, Mrs Eastwood, and I think ye could hold your own with her.”“If it were worth my while. But, papa—he is nothing in the world to me.”“He is not a clever man, I ken that. But I like him. He is sweet tempered, and he is a gentleman, and he cares for you. And I think, with you to stand by him, he might be a good man and a useful.”“But, papa—the weariness of it, even if I cared for him.”“But that might come in time.”“No, papa. I am not—going with him. He will find some one who will care for him, and who will fill the high position that he can give her better than I could do.”In his heart the father did not believe that, but he only said,—“Very likely. You must please yourself I only wish you to ken your ain mind, and understand what you are refusing. He will be Sir Percy Harefield, and there may come a time when you will regret your refusal.”“I don’t think it, papa.”“As for not wishing to leave your brother and me—George will marry sometime, and then you will be but second with him, though he may be first with you.”“Of course he will marry, papa. And I will be ‘Auntie Jean’ to his bairns. And I’ll ay have you, papa.”“But, Jean, I want you to understand. When George marries it is my intention to give up Saughleas to him. His wife will be mistress here then.”He watched her face as he said this. She was not looking at him, but out at the window, standing in the full light. She turned to him with a smile like sunshine on her face.“Then I could live with Auntie Jean when you didna need me any more. ‘The twa Miss Jean Dawsons!’ Wouldna ye like that, Auntie Jean? But, papa,” she added gravely, “it wouldna please George to hear you speak of giving up Saughleas to him.”“He need not hear it till the right time comes. There need be no haste. His choice will be the wiser the longer he waits, let us hope.”“And you are not vexed with me, papa?”“So that you are sure o’ yourself. That is the main thing. You might take longer time to think about it.”“No, no. A longer time would make no difference. It would not be fair to Captain Harefield—and I am quite sure of myself.”Miss Jean, as her manner was, had kept silence during the whole interview.“Her time will come, I dare say, but she is fancy-free at present,” said her father as Jean left the room.“She has done wisely this time,” said her aunt. “And it is well that she should wait till her time come.”“That is well over,” said Jean to herself. “And I can wait—yes, though it be all my life—if so it must be.”For Jean had found herself out long before this time—before the “John Seaton” had come home even. She knew that she “cared for” Willie Calderwood as she could care for no other man. And since that night when they had clasped hands and looked into each other’s eyes she had not been ashamed of her love. For there had been more than the gladness of home coming in Willie’s eyes, his hand-clasp had told of more than friendship.True he had guarded eyes and hands and voice since then, and he might keep silence still for years—there was cause enough, Jean acknowledged, remembering “bonny Elsie.” But he “cared for her,” and she could wait. “Patiently? Yes, hopefully, joyfully,” she had told herself often, and now she said it again as she sang softly to herself as she went about the house.But that night her brother came home with a sadder face than usual, for he had heard sad news, he said. Willie Calderwood had declined the command of the “John Seaton.” He was about to sail as second officer in one of the great ocean steamships. Indeed he had already sailed, for his note to George was written at the last moment, he said; and he must cross the wide Atlantic twice before she should see him again.“It is not so bad as a year’s voyage to the north,” she told herself. “Portie is his home while his mother is here and Marion.”But he had spoken no word to her before he went, as he might have done, if he had been going away to the dangers of the Arctic seas. That was the pain to her. But she comforted herself. Though she knew his pride was strong, she thought that his love would prove stronger still, and he would speak when the right time came.But when Willie had crossed the sea twice, and twice again, still he did not come to Portie. He went instead to London, and there he fell in with an aunt of his father’s who, in years long past, had been the wife of a London merchant, but who was a childless widow now. She had been left with a large house and a small income more than thirty years ago, when she was young and courageous, and she had put aside all the traditions of the class into which marriage had brought her, and had fallen back on the belief in which she had been brought up in her home in the north, that honest work honourably followed was a blessing to be thankful for, rather than a burden to be borne.So her head and her hands and her house were all put to use, and she had lived a busy and a happy life since then. But she was growing old now, and her heart longed for her own land and kindred, so when she saw Willie, and heard of his mother who was a widow, and his young sister Marion, she begged them to come to her for a while.It is doubtful whether Mrs Calderwood would have had the courage to accept the invitation, if the thought of leaving Portie had not been already familiar to her; and it is equally doubtful whether she would have had the courage to go away, if this invitation had not come. It was for a visit that they were going, she said, but her house was given up, the few things which she valued and could not take with her, were safely put away in an empty room in Miss Jean’s house. And no one knew when she might be expected in Portie again.Jean had not often seen Mrs Calderwood since the day she had gone to ask Marion to visit her at the time her sister May was in London, but she saw her now in her aunt’s house, where the last few days of the mother and daughter were passed, and though they both strove against it, there was a shadow of embarrassment between them.“We’ll maybe see May in London, and we’ll be sure to see you when you come to visit her there,” Marion said, including both George and Jean in her words.“London is a large place, and Mrs Manners has her own friends,” said Mrs Calderwood.“We shall find you out, never fear, and we winna forget you even if you should live in London all your life.”Marion laughed and then looked grave.“But that can never happen,” said she.If Jean was grave and silent for a while at this time, no one noticed it but her aunt, and she did not remark upon it. Indeed she was grave and a little sad herself for she greatly missed both mother and daughter, who had been her dear friends and daily visitors for many a year, and she confessed to a strange feeling of loneliness in her house by the sea.Jean came often to see her and so did George, but she seldom spoke about the Calderwoods to either of them. Now and then a letter came from Marion to Jean or to her aunt, but after the very first these letters said nothing about coming home to Portie again.And Jean waited. Not unhappily. Far from that, for her life was a busy one. She had much to do and much to enjoy in her father’s house and beyond it. She strove to forget herself, and to remember others, and made no one anxious or curious because of her grave looks and her sadness.She just waited, telling herself that if so it must be, she would do as her aunt had done, and wait on till the end.
Captain Harefield was at the wedding an honoured guest, as all could see, and for a very good reason, it was said. Through the Blackford groom, it had come to be known in Portie that a change had fallen on the fortunes of Captain Harefield.
Through the sad and sudden death of a distant cousin, he had become heir to a large estate in one of the southern English counties, and though he might have a while to wait for the full enjoyment of his inheritance, and for the tide that was to come with it, there was in the mean time a happy change in his circumstances as far as money was concerned. He had not come to Blackford House this time, to escape duns. And his sister had not come to take care of him.
The chances were that he had an object in view in coming, and on the wedding day more than one of those who saw the looks he cast at the bride and her maidens, had felt satisfied as to what that object might be. Mr Dawson was one of these.
There were several guests still in the house, when a week had passed. Mr Dawson and his sister were sitting one afternoon on the terrace, when Captain Harefield rode up, and in a little he had joined Miss Dawson in the garden. The father watched them as they came and went among the trees.
“Jean has the ba’ at her foot this time, I’m thinking,” said he. “Weel, weel! It it pleases her, it will please me.”
“She’ll never please ye in that way. Dinna think it.”
“I’m no’ so sure that it would please me—no’ so sure as I was this time last year. But I think she might be satisfied.”
“She’ll need a stronger hand to guide her.”
“She has strength and sense to guidehim, and that might do as well.”
“It wouldna be for her happiness were she to be persuaded to such a marriage,” said Miss Jean gravely.
“Persuaded! No, that is not likely. But, Jean, I like the lad, though he is no’ a Solomon, I confess, and he has a high place in the world—or he will ha’e ane—and Jean would do him credit.”
“High place or no’, he is no’ her equal in any important sense. If she cared for him, she might guide him and put up with him, as many another woman has to do. As to persuading her—no one could do that; but if she thought your heart was set on it, she might persuade herself to her ain unhappiness.”
“I’se never persuade her. And I would ha’e ill sparin’ her. But it would be a fine position, and she would keep it we’ll.”
“Ay, if she could take it with a good conscience. But that she canna do,” said Miss Jean.
When the bustle attending the wedding was over and all the guests were gone, a new life began at Saughleas. As far as George was concerned, it was not just the life his father would have chosen for him. But George was a man now, and every day that passed proved to his father that he was a man that might safely be trusted to guide himself. It would have pleased his father that he should at once have taken his place as the young laird of Saughleas. There were many signs among the other proprietors of the neighbourhood, that he would have been welcomed to the houses of people who had held hitherto only business intercourse with his father.
There was no need for George to return to the counting-house again. Mr Dawson acknowledged himself to be a richer man than was generally supposed, and George, as the heir of Saughleas, might “take a long tether,” as far as the spending of money was concerned.
And he need not lead an idle life. All the congenial occupations of a country gentleman were open to him, to say nothing of the amusements which only men of comparative leisure could enjoy. Or he might farm his own land. Whether he could make such farming profitable to himself might be doubtful, but he might do good in the countryside, and he would thus have an opportunity of bringing himself into contact with people whose acquaintance was to be desired,—the lairds and gentlemen farmers of the north.
It was to his sister oftener than to his son that all this was said; and listening to him, Miss Jean could not but wonder what had become of the sense and judgment that had guided him through all his life till now.
“When you are dead and gone, and George has a son of his ain, he’ll get willingly in the countryside what you are so anxious for him to take now. It would bring neither the honour nor the pleasure that you are dreaming about for him, if he were to turn his back upon—the shop—for that was the foundation o’ your fortune, though you are a banker and a ship-owner now. Let George win his ain way, as his father did before him; it will be mair to his credit, and mair to his happiness, than any such change as ye would fain see in his way of life. And he’ll be far safer.”
“A body would think to hear ye, Jean, that I was like to be ashamed o’ the shop, and the makin’ o’ my ain way in the world; I’m so far from that, that I seek no other credit or honour in the countryside than what I have won as a man of business. But it might be different with my son.”
“Weel, honour and consideration seldom come the sooner for the seeking. They’ll come to George in good time, if he shall deserve them. It’s little honour he would be like to get from men o’ sense if he were content to sit down with what you ha’e won for him, putting himself in the place that ye ha’e honestly and honourably won for yourself. That would be for the honour o’ neither you nor him, though ye may think it.”
“It was for him I won it. There would be neither pleasure nor profit for me, at my time o’ life, in seekin’ any change. But I acknowledge it would be a pleasure to me to see my son taking his right place in the countryside. It is no’ as if he werena fit for it. Just look at him! Who is there to compare with him? And he has as good blood in his veins as the most o’ them, when a’ is said.”
“He’ll get his right place in time, never fear. And he’ll get it all the readier that he’s no’ in haste about it.”
In the mean time George was in his father’s office, setting himself to the mastering of all details and succeeding therein, in a way that astonished his father. It was that part of the business that had to do with shipping interests which he liked best, and which chiefly claimed his attention at this time. His father acknowledged that he had a clear head, and a power of application that would stand him in stead either as merchant or landed proprietor. And the pleasure he had in his son’s companionship, and in his sympathy with his work, went far to keep him silent as to any change in his present course.
As for George, he was for the most part silent also, because he was unwilling by opposition to his father’s wishes to put in jeopardy the new and pleasant relations existing between them. But to his sister and his aunt he spoke plainly enough.
If any of them were to have special consideration from their neighbours, it must be because of his father’s life, and what he had accomplished in it. As for his assuming the position of the young laird of Saughleas while his father continued the laborious life of a man of business, that would be only contemptible. If he were to take his own way in life, he must win the right to do so, and he made no secret of the possibility that, as the years went on, his way of life might in some respects be different from his father’s.
He pleased his father in one way. He took great interest in all that concerned the management of the estate. He was fond of the place as his home. They agreed in most things which concerned its prosperity and prospects, and if George was less eager than his father in his desire to add to its extent, he did not vex him by showing this too plainly. They differed in opinion about this, and about other things often. But Mr Dawson put great restraint upon himself at such times, striving to remember that George had a right as a man to hold his own opinions and to act upon them though they differed from his. George, on his part, felt no temptation to fail in the perfect respect he owed to his father, in his words and in his ways. And so, in course of time, things bade fair to adjust themselves to the satisfaction of both.
As was to be supposed, Jean and her aunt looked on with deep interest, while the father and son were thus happily though warily renewing their acquaintance, but they said little about it, even to each other. During the first month after May went away there was much going on at Saughleas. Emily Corbett, who had come for the wedding, stayed a while, and Hugh stayed also, though he was strong and well and able for any thing now. There were young people coming to the house for their sakes,—Marion Calderwood, who was Emily’s chief friend, and the young Petries, and others; and there were expeditions here and there, and garden parties at various houses; and Jean’s time and thoughts were much occupied.
Captain Harefield made one of such parties now and then, but not so frequently as had been the case last summer. He was a person of more importance at Blackford House now than he had been then, and though his sister was not there to take care of him, there were others there ready and willing to do the work in which it must be confessed she had failed. He was so good-natured, and so unaccustomed to exert his own will against any one who assumed the right to guide him, that he was easily taken possession of. It was agreeable also to be made much of, to be consulted and included in all arrangements for business or pleasure, so that he did not find his stay at Blackford House “a bore,” as he had done last summer, and he was less inclined to stray away into other parts to look for pleasure.
The less frequently that he came to Saughleas, the more kindly and frankly he was received by Jean, who liked him very well since he seemed to have put foolish thoughts out of his head. But he came often enough to put foolish thoughts into the heads of other people. The young people who came to the house, watched with interest the Captain’s shy devotion, and Jean’s friendly indifference, not quite sure the last was altogether real. Mrs Seldon, during the weeks of her stay, never doubted as to his object in coming, and sensible of the importance attached to having a place in county society and a title in prospect, she doubted as little as to the result of his devotion, and Mr Dawson, with a mingling of feelings which he could not easily have analysed, repeated to himself that “Jean had the ball at her foot, whatever way it might end.” But Miss Jean held fast to her first opinion, that Jean was safe from any temptation to yield to him, and so was another who had not had Miss Jean’s experience.
“Oh! Miss Jean, I am the most unfortunate little creature in all Portie, I think. I’m ay doing or saying something that I shouldna.”
“My dear, ye are worse than unfortunate if that be true. What have ye been at now?”
“It was quite true, what I said, only I wish Mr Dawson hadna heard us. We were speaking about—about Miss Dawson—”
Marion hesitated. She was not quite sure how Miss Jean herself would like to hear that the young folk had been discussing her niece and her affairs so freely.
“It was only that he heard us. I’m ay vexing Mr Dawson, I think.”
“Are you?” said Miss Jean, smiling.
“Ay, am I. Don’t you mind the apple-tree that was broken, and don’t you mind?” several other circumstances that it vexed the girl to remember. But Jean herself coming in, the vexation of the moment could not be discussed and Marion was not sorry.
It had happened thus. She had come early to Saughleas with the young Petries intending to set out at once on an expedition that had been planned to the Castle, but something had delayed several of their party, and the younger folk were whiling away the time of waiting, chatting and laughing as they sat on the grass. By and by the well-known dog-cart passed.
“Haloo! There is your Englishman, Marion,” said Hugh Corbett. “I wonder he didn’t come in. He’ll be back again to go with us, unless we make haste to get away.”
“Well, and why should not he come with us? The more the merrier,” said his sister.
“And he’s no’myEnglishman,” said Marion with dignity; “and for that matter ye are only an Englishman yoursel’.”
“Only an Englishman! Just hear her!” said Hugh.
“And ye’re not even an Englishman. You are neither one thing nor the other,” said Grace Petrie laughing. “If ye were to bide a while in Portie, ye might maybe pass for a Scotchman, however.”
“Oh, indeed! Might I? That’s encouraging.”
This was a favourite subject of discussion between these young people, and much banter passed with regard to the nationality of the Corbetts.
“But he is no’ Marion’s Englishman anyway,” said Jack Petrie in a little. “He only falls back on Marion when Miss Dawson’s company is no’ to be had.”
“And it’s only because Marion saves him the trouble of saying a word. She is such a chatterbox,” said Hugh. “And he’ll have to fall back on her altogether soon, I’m thinking.”
“I’m sure that’s no’ what our Milly thinks,” said Jack. “She says that Miss Dawson—”
“Your Milly! She judges other folk by hersel’! Miss Dawson wouldna look at him,” said Marion Calderwood.
“But she does look at him, whiles,” said Grace.
“But that’s because she’s no’ ay thinkin’ about—about the like o’ that Him indeed! He might as well go and ask for one of the young princesses at once.”
They all laughed and exclaimed.
“Well, she would be no more above him in one way than Miss Dawson is in another. A baronet? What o’ that? Any body might be a baronet, I suppose,” said Marion.
“But nothing short of a lord will do for Jean Dawson, ye think. I doubt she’ll bide a whilie,” said Jack scornfully.
“And she can afford to bide a whilie. Miss Dawson is sufficient for herself,” said Marion loftily. “But I don’t expect you to understand me, Jack; and I don’t think it is nice for us to be speaking that way about Miss Dawson.”
“I agree with you,” said Emily.
“So do I,” said Hugh. “But I have one question to ask, and only one. Who of all the gentlemen you have ever seen would you think good enough or great enough for Miss Dawson.”
“Oh! as to good enough, that is not what Marion means,” said Grace.
“No. Nor great enough,” said Emily. “Well—just suitable—worthy of her, in every way? In mind, body, and estate. Come, let us hear.”
“Yes, come, let us hear.”
“In mind, body, and estate,” repeated Emily laughing. “I think enough has been said already,” and Marion rose to go away. “But if ye will have it—I never saw any body in every respect worthy of Miss Dawson—except, perhaps—But yet—” Marion hesitated, and then added,—
“I dinna believe there is another in all Scotland like Miss Dawson.”
“I agree—nor in England either,” said Hugh. “But I rise to ask a question—”
He had risen, but it was evidently with the design of intercepting Marion, who was moving over the grass intent on getting away.
“I leave it to the company if we have not a right to hear what is to be said; and, what is more, you are not going away till you tell us.”
He did not touch her, but he looked quite ready to do it.
“Nonsense, Hugh! You are not to vex Marion,” said his sister; but she drew near with the rest to listen.
“‘Not one in all Scotland,’ she said,” repeated Grace laughing.
“Let us stick to the point,” said Hugh.
Marion reddened and fidgeted, and measured the distance with her eye with the evident intention of running away, and all this Hugh noted—nodding and smiling.
“Ye canna gar Marion speak, if she’s no willin’. I’ve seen her tried,” said another Petrie.
“Why shouldna I speak?” said Marion, realising the impossibility of getting away. “Except that—it’s no’ a thing to speak about—here. What I mean is this. But yet if she were to give her whole heart to any one—he would be the right one—even if—but she would never care for one who was not worthy. Now let me go.”
“Yes—certainly. Well?”
Marion had made up her mind to say no more. But when Grace Petrie, tossing her head and laughing, said that she could guess who the exception might be, she changed her mind again.
“Well!” said Hugh, drawing still near as she receded. “‘Except, perhaps,’ whom?”
“I except no one that ever I saw, for there is no one that ever I saw who, in all things—in mind, body, and estate, as you say—I would think fit for Miss Dawson. But what I was going to say was—except, perhaps—George—only he is her brother, ye ken.”
“George!” echoed, many voices.
“And what’s George more than another?” asked Jack scornfully. “She’ll be saying next, that there’s naebody likehimin all Scotland.”
And then Marion, glancing up at the window beneath which they had been sitting, met the wondering look of Mr Dawson.
“He must have heard every word,” said Grace in a whisper.
Marion turned and fled to seek comfort with Miss Jean.
They went away to the Castle, and Miss Dawson went with them; Captain Harefield came to the house soon after they set out, but he did not follow them, though Mr Dawson suggested that he might easily overtake them before they reached the place. It was Mr Dawson himself he had come to see; and when they all came back, and the young folk had had their tea and were gone home together in the moonlight, her father had something to say to Jean.
“It’s a comfort that you can just leave it to Jean herself,” said his sister, when he told his news to her. Of what her own opinion might be she said nothing, nor was she curious to hear what Mr Dawson might think now about the chance that his daughter had of becoming the wife of Captain Harefield. “It is a thing that she must decide for herself; and indeed she will let no one else decide it.”
There was a measure of comfort in that view of the matter. For though Mr Dawson was ambitious for his daughter, Captain Harefield as a man with expectations was by no means so interesting to him personally as he had been last year when he had none. He knew by Jean’s face at the first word spoken, that her aunt was right.
“I gave him his answer last year,” said she.
“But it’s no’ an unheard of thing that a woman should change her mind,” said her father dryly.
“I have had no reason to change my mind, but many reasons against it. Fancy my leaving you and George and the happy life we are just beginning, to go away with a stranger to folk that would look down on me, and think he had thrown himself away?”
“I could make it worth their while to think otherwise.” But Jean shook her head. “Last year you might, when he had nothing.”
“As for his friends—ye need ha’e little to do with them. I dare say none o’ them can ha’e a higher sense o’ their ain importance than his sister, Mrs Eastwood, and I think ye could hold your own with her.”
“If it were worth my while. But, papa—he is nothing in the world to me.”
“He is not a clever man, I ken that. But I like him. He is sweet tempered, and he is a gentleman, and he cares for you. And I think, with you to stand by him, he might be a good man and a useful.”
“But, papa—the weariness of it, even if I cared for him.”
“But that might come in time.”
“No, papa. I am not—going with him. He will find some one who will care for him, and who will fill the high position that he can give her better than I could do.”
In his heart the father did not believe that, but he only said,—
“Very likely. You must please yourself I only wish you to ken your ain mind, and understand what you are refusing. He will be Sir Percy Harefield, and there may come a time when you will regret your refusal.”
“I don’t think it, papa.”
“As for not wishing to leave your brother and me—George will marry sometime, and then you will be but second with him, though he may be first with you.”
“Of course he will marry, papa. And I will be ‘Auntie Jean’ to his bairns. And I’ll ay have you, papa.”
“But, Jean, I want you to understand. When George marries it is my intention to give up Saughleas to him. His wife will be mistress here then.”
He watched her face as he said this. She was not looking at him, but out at the window, standing in the full light. She turned to him with a smile like sunshine on her face.
“Then I could live with Auntie Jean when you didna need me any more. ‘The twa Miss Jean Dawsons!’ Wouldna ye like that, Auntie Jean? But, papa,” she added gravely, “it wouldna please George to hear you speak of giving up Saughleas to him.”
“He need not hear it till the right time comes. There need be no haste. His choice will be the wiser the longer he waits, let us hope.”
“And you are not vexed with me, papa?”
“So that you are sure o’ yourself. That is the main thing. You might take longer time to think about it.”
“No, no. A longer time would make no difference. It would not be fair to Captain Harefield—and I am quite sure of myself.”
Miss Jean, as her manner was, had kept silence during the whole interview.
“Her time will come, I dare say, but she is fancy-free at present,” said her father as Jean left the room.
“She has done wisely this time,” said her aunt. “And it is well that she should wait till her time come.”
“That is well over,” said Jean to herself. “And I can wait—yes, though it be all my life—if so it must be.”
For Jean had found herself out long before this time—before the “John Seaton” had come home even. She knew that she “cared for” Willie Calderwood as she could care for no other man. And since that night when they had clasped hands and looked into each other’s eyes she had not been ashamed of her love. For there had been more than the gladness of home coming in Willie’s eyes, his hand-clasp had told of more than friendship.
True he had guarded eyes and hands and voice since then, and he might keep silence still for years—there was cause enough, Jean acknowledged, remembering “bonny Elsie.” But he “cared for her,” and she could wait. “Patiently? Yes, hopefully, joyfully,” she had told herself often, and now she said it again as she sang softly to herself as she went about the house.
But that night her brother came home with a sadder face than usual, for he had heard sad news, he said. Willie Calderwood had declined the command of the “John Seaton.” He was about to sail as second officer in one of the great ocean steamships. Indeed he had already sailed, for his note to George was written at the last moment, he said; and he must cross the wide Atlantic twice before she should see him again.
“It is not so bad as a year’s voyage to the north,” she told herself. “Portie is his home while his mother is here and Marion.”
But he had spoken no word to her before he went, as he might have done, if he had been going away to the dangers of the Arctic seas. That was the pain to her. But she comforted herself. Though she knew his pride was strong, she thought that his love would prove stronger still, and he would speak when the right time came.
But when Willie had crossed the sea twice, and twice again, still he did not come to Portie. He went instead to London, and there he fell in with an aunt of his father’s who, in years long past, had been the wife of a London merchant, but who was a childless widow now. She had been left with a large house and a small income more than thirty years ago, when she was young and courageous, and she had put aside all the traditions of the class into which marriage had brought her, and had fallen back on the belief in which she had been brought up in her home in the north, that honest work honourably followed was a blessing to be thankful for, rather than a burden to be borne.
So her head and her hands and her house were all put to use, and she had lived a busy and a happy life since then. But she was growing old now, and her heart longed for her own land and kindred, so when she saw Willie, and heard of his mother who was a widow, and his young sister Marion, she begged them to come to her for a while.
It is doubtful whether Mrs Calderwood would have had the courage to accept the invitation, if the thought of leaving Portie had not been already familiar to her; and it is equally doubtful whether she would have had the courage to go away, if this invitation had not come. It was for a visit that they were going, she said, but her house was given up, the few things which she valued and could not take with her, were safely put away in an empty room in Miss Jean’s house. And no one knew when she might be expected in Portie again.
Jean had not often seen Mrs Calderwood since the day she had gone to ask Marion to visit her at the time her sister May was in London, but she saw her now in her aunt’s house, where the last few days of the mother and daughter were passed, and though they both strove against it, there was a shadow of embarrassment between them.
“We’ll maybe see May in London, and we’ll be sure to see you when you come to visit her there,” Marion said, including both George and Jean in her words.
“London is a large place, and Mrs Manners has her own friends,” said Mrs Calderwood.
“We shall find you out, never fear, and we winna forget you even if you should live in London all your life.”
Marion laughed and then looked grave.
“But that can never happen,” said she.
If Jean was grave and silent for a while at this time, no one noticed it but her aunt, and she did not remark upon it. Indeed she was grave and a little sad herself for she greatly missed both mother and daughter, who had been her dear friends and daily visitors for many a year, and she confessed to a strange feeling of loneliness in her house by the sea.
Jean came often to see her and so did George, but she seldom spoke about the Calderwoods to either of them. Now and then a letter came from Marion to Jean or to her aunt, but after the very first these letters said nothing about coming home to Portie again.
And Jean waited. Not unhappily. Far from that, for her life was a busy one. She had much to do and much to enjoy in her father’s house and beyond it. She strove to forget herself, and to remember others, and made no one anxious or curious because of her grave looks and her sadness.
She just waited, telling herself that if so it must be, she would do as her aunt had done, and wait on till the end.