There was silence between the two outside the door of the Hewan—silence through which the sound of Robbie’s slow advancing step sounded with strange significance. He walked slowly nowadays—at least heavily, with the step of a man who has lost the spring of youth: and to-night he was tired, no doubt by the long day in Edinburgh, and going from place to place seeking news which, alas! he would only find very distinct, very positive, at home. While Mrs Ogilvy, in this suspense, almost counted her son’s steps as he drew near, the other watcher on the bench, almost invisible as the soft dimness grew darker and darker, listened too. He said “Groggy?” with a slight laugh, which was like a knife in her breast. She thought she smelt the sickening atmosphereof the whisky and tobacco come into the pure night air, but said half aloud, “No, no,” with a sense of the intolerable. No, no, he had never given her that to bear.
And then Robbie appeared another shadow in the opening of the road. He did not quicken his pace, even when he saw his mother waiting for him: his foot was like lead—not life enough in it to disturb the gravel on the path.
“You’re late, Robbie.”
“I might have been later and no harm done,” he said, sulkily. “Yes, I’m late, and tired, and with bad news which is the worst of all.”
“What bad news?” she cried.
Robbie did not see the vague figure, another shadow, in grey indistinguishable garments like the night, which lay on the bench. He came up to her heavily with his slow steps, and then stopped and said, with an unconscious dramatic distinctness, “That fellow—has come home. He’s in England, or perhaps even in Scotland, by now: and the peace of my life’s gone.”
“Oh, Robbie,” cried his mother in anguish, wringing her hands; and then she put her hands on his shoulders, trying to impart her information by the thrill of their trembling, which gave a shake to his heavy figure too. “Be silent, be silent; say no more!”
“Why should I say no more? I expected you would feel it as I do: home was coming over me, the feeling of being here—and you—and Susie. But now that’s all over. You cannot get away from your fate. That man’s my fate. He will turn me round his little finger,—he will make me do, not what I like, but what he likes. It’s my fault. I have put myself in his power. I would go away again, but I know I would meet him, round the first corner, outside the door.” And Robert Ogilvy sighed—a profound, deep breath of hopelessness which seemed to come from the bottom of his heart. He put his heavy hand on the chair which had supported his mother. She now stood alone, unsupported even by that slight prop.
“You will come in now, my dear, and rest. You have had a hard day: and everything is worse when you are tired. Janet has laid your supper ready; and when you have rested, then we’ll hear all that has happened—and think,” she said, with a tremor in her voice, “what to do.”
She did not dare to look at the stranger directly, lest Robbie should discover him; but she gave a glance, a movement, in his direction, an appeal—which that close observer understood well enough. She had the thought that her son might escape him yet—at which the other smiled in his heart, but humoured her so far that he did not say anything yet.
“It is easy for you,” said Robbie, with another profoundsigh, “to think what you will do—you neither know the man, nor his cleverness, nor the weak deevil I am. I’ll not go in. That craze of yours for all your windows open—they’re not shut yet, by George! and it’s ten o’clock and more—takes off any feeling of safety there might be in the house. I shall sit here and watch for him. At least I can see him coming, here.”
“Robbie, oh Robbie! come in, come in, if you would not kill me!”
“Don’t take so much trouble, old lady,” said the stranger from the bench, at the sound of whose voice Robbie started so violently, taking up the chair in his hand, that his mother made a spring and placed herself between them. “I see what you want to do, but you can’t do it. It’s fate, as he says; and he’ll calm down when he knows I am here. So, Bob, you stole a march on me,” he said, raising himself up. He was the taller man, but Robbie was the heavier. They stood for a moment—two dark shadows in the night—so near that the whiteness of Mrs Ogilvy’s shawl brushed them on either side.
“You’re here, then, already!” Robbie held the chair for a moment like a weapon of offence, and then pitched it from him. “What’s the good? I might have known, if there was an unlikely spot on the earth, that’s where you would be found.”
“You thought this an unlikely spot? Why, you’vetold me of it often enough, old fellow: safety itself and quiet; and your mother that would feed us like fighting cocks. Where else did you think I would come? The t’other places are too hot for us both. But I say, old lady, I should not mind having a look at that supper now: we’ve only been waiting for Rob, don’t you know?”
Mrs Ogilvy, in her anguish, made still another appeal. She said, “For one moment listen to me. I don’t even know your name; but there’s one thing I know—that you two are safest apart. I am not, sir, meaning my son alone,” she said with severity, for the stranger had given vent to a short laugh, “nor for the evil company that I have heard you are. I am speaking just of your safety. You are in more danger than he is, and there’s more chance they will look for you here than elsewhere. If it was to save your life,” she added, after a pause to recover her voice, “even for Robbie, no, I would not give up a young man like you to what you call your fate. But you’re safest apart: if you think a moment you will see that. I will,” cried the little indistinguishable whiteness between the two men, “take it in my hands. You shall have meat, you shall have rest, you shall have whatever you need to take you—wherever may be best; not for him, but for you. Young man, in the name of God listen to me—it’s not that I would harm you! The farther off you are from each other the safer you are—both. And I’ll help—I’ll help you with all my heart.”
“There’s reason in what she says, Bob,” said the stranger, in an easy voice, as if of a quite indifferent matter. “The old lady has a great deal of sense. You would have been wise to take her advice long ago while there was time for it.”
She stood between them, her hands clasped, with a forlorn hope in the new-comer, who was not contemptuous of her, like Robbie—who listened so civilly to all she said.
“But,” he added, with a laugh, “what’s safety after all? It’s death alive; it’s not for you and me. The time for a meal and a sleep, and then to face the world again—eh, Bob? that’s all a man wants. Let’s see that supper. I am half dead for want of food.”
Roberthad led the way sullenly into the dining-room. He had made as though he would not sit down at table, where the other placed himself at once unceremoniously, pulling towards him the dish which Janet had just placed on the table, and helping himself eagerly—waiting for no grace, giving no thanks, nor even the tribute of civility to his entertainers, as Mrs Ogilvy remarked in passing, though her mind was full of other and more important things. “I’m too tired, I think, to eat; I’ll go to bed, mother,” Robbie said. Mrs Ogilvy seized the chance of separating him from the other with rapture. She ventured—it was not always she could do so—to give him a good-night kiss on his cheek, and whispered, “I will send you up something,” unwilling that he should suffer by so much as a spoilt meal.
“What! are you going to leave me in the lurch, Bob? steal another march on me, now I’ve thrownmyself like an innocent on your good faith? That’s not like abon camarade. I thought we were to stick to each other for life or death.”
“I never bargained—you were to come here and frighten my mother.”
“No, no,” she cried; “no, no,” with her hand on his arm patting it softly, endeavouring to lead him away.
“Your mother’s not frightened, old boy. She’s full of pluck, and we’re the best of friends. It’s you that are frightened. You think I’ve got hold of you again. So I have, and you’re not going to give me the slip so soon. Sit down and don’t be uncivil. I never yet got the good of a dinner by myself.”
Mrs Ogilvy held her son’s arm with her hand. She felt the thrill in him turning towards his old comrade, though he did not move. Perhaps the pressure of her hand was too strong on his arm. A woman does not know exactly how far to go. An added hair’s-breadth is sometimes too much.
“I don’t want to be uncivil,” said Robbie, after a moment’s hesitation. “After all, I think I’ll try to eat a morsel, mother; I’m in my own place. And you asked him in, I suppose; he’s in a manner your guest——”
“If you think so, Robbie——” Her hand loosened from his arm. Perhaps if she had been firm at that moment,—but she had already been fighting for a long time; and when a woman is old she gets tired. Herlegs were trembling under her. She did not feel as if she could stand many minutes longer. She did, however; while Robbie, with an air of much sullenness and reluctance, took his place at the table, and secured the remains of the dish which his friend had nearly emptied. Robert held his place as host with an air of offended dignity, which would have touched his mother with amusement had her mind been more free. But there was no strength in him; already he was yielding to the stronger personality; and as he ate and listened, though in spite of himself, it was clear that one by one the reluctances gave way. Mrs Ogilvy did not pretend to take part in the meal. It was prepared for Robbie, as was always the case when he went to Edinburgh and returned late. She remained in the room for a time, sometimes going to the kitchen to see what more could be found to replenish the table,—for the stranger ate as if he had fasted for a twelvemonth, and Robbie on his part had always an excellent appetite. How it did not choke them even to swallow a morsel in the situation of danger in which they were, bewildered her. And greater wonders still arose. As she went and came, the conversation quickened between them; and when she came back the second time from the kitchen, Robbie was leaning back in his chair, his mouth open in a great peal of laughter, his countenance so brightened and smoothed out, that for the first time since his return Mrs Ogilvy’s heartbounded with a recognition of her bright-faced smiling boy as he had been, but was no more. His face overcast again for a moment at the sight of her, as if that was enough to damp all pleasurable emotion; and when she had again looked round the table to see if anything was wanted, the mother, with a little movement of wounded pride, left them. She went into her parlour, and sat down in the dark, in the silence, to rest a little. If her overstrained nerves and the quick sensation of the wound of the moment brought a tear or two to her eyes, that was nothing. Her mind immediately began to plan and arrange how this dangerous stranger could be got away, how his safety could be secured. I presume that Mrs Ogilvy had forgotten what his crime was. Is it not impossible to believe that a man who is under your own roof, who is like other men, who has smiled and spoken, and shown no barbarous tendency, should be a murderer? The consciousness of that had gone out of her mind. She thought, on the contrary, that there was good in him: that he was not without understanding, even of herself, an old woman, which was, Mrs Ogilvy was aware, unusual among young men. He had no contempt for her, which was what they generally had, even Robbie: perhaps—it was at least within the bounds of possibility—he might be got to do what she suggested. She searched into all the depths to find out what would be the best. To provide a place for him moreprivate than the Hewan, a room in a cottage which she knew, where he would be made quite comfortable; and then, after great thought taken, where would be the best and safest refuge, to get him to depart thither, with money enough—money which, with a faint pang to lose it for Robbie, she felt would be well-spent money to free him for ever from that dangerous companion. Mrs Ogilvy thought, and better thought, as she herself described the process: where would be the safest place for him to go? How would one of the Highland isles do, or the Isle of Man, or perhaps these other islands which she believed were French, though that would most likely make no difference—Guernsey or Jersey, or some of these? She was strongly, in her mind, in favour of an island. It was not so easy to get at, and yet it was easy to escape from should there be any pursuit. She thought, and better thought, sitting there in the dark, with the window still open, and the air of the night blowing in. The wind was cold rather; but her mind was so taken up that she scarcely felt it. It is when the mind is quite free that you have time to think of all these little things.
While she was sitting so quiet the conversation evidently warmed in the other room, the voices grew louder, there were peals of laughter, sounds of gaiety which had not been heard there for many a day. Mrs Ogilvy’s heart rose in spite of herself. She had not heard Robbie laugh like that—not since he wasa boy. God bless him! And, oh, might she not say, God bless the other too, that made him laugh so hearty? He could not be all bad, that other one: certainly there was good in him. It was not possible that he could laugh like that, a man hunted for his life, if he had his conscience against him too. She began to think that there must be some mistake. And so great are the inconsistencies of human nature, that this mother who had repulsed the stranger with almost tragic passion so short a time ago, sat in the dark soothed and almost happy in his presence—almost glad that her Robbie had a friend. She heard Janet come and go, with a cheerful word addressed to her, and giving cheerful words in return and advice to the young men to go to their beds and not sit up till all the hours of the night. After one of these colloquies Robbie came into the room where Mrs Ogilvy was. “Are you here, mother?” he said, “sitting in the dark without a candle—and the window still open. I think it is your craze to keep these windows open, whatever I may say.”
“It can matter little now, Robbie—since he’s here.”
“Oh, since he’s here! and how about those that may come after him? But you never will see what I mean. There is more need than ever to bar the doors.” He closed the window himself with vehemence, and the shutters, leaving her in total darkness.“I will tell Janet to bring you a light,” he said.
“You need not do that: I will maybe go up-stairs.”
“To your bed—as Janet has been bidding us to do.”
“I’ll not promise” said Mrs Ogilvy; “I’ve many things to think of.”
“Never mind to-night; but there’s one thing I want of you,—your keys. Janet says the mistress locks everything up but just what is going. There is next to nothing in the bottle.”
“Oh, Robbie, my man, it’s neither good for him nor for you! It would be far better, as Janet says, to go to your beds.”
“It is a pretty thing,” said Robbie, “that I cannot entertain a friend, not for once, and he a stranger that has heard me boast of my home; and that you should grudge me the first pleasant night I have had in this miserable dull place.”
“Oh, Robbie!” she cried, as if he had given her a blow. And then trembling she put her keys into his hand, groping to find it in the dark. He went away with a murmur, whether of thanks or grumbling she could not tell, and left her thus to feel the full force of that flying stroke. Then she picked herself up again, and allowed to herself that it was a dull place for a young man that had been out in the world and had seen much. And it was natural that he shouldbe pleased and excited, with a man to talk to. Almost all women are humble on this point. They do not hope that their men can be satisfied with their company, but are glad that they should have other men to add salt and savour to their life. It gave Mrs Ogilvy a pang to hear her gardevin unlocked, and the bottles sounding as they were taken out: but yet that he should make merry with his friend, was not that sanctioned by the very Scripture itself? She sat there a while trying to resume the course of her thoughts; but the sound of the talk, the laughing, the clinking of the glasses, filled the air and disordered all these thoughts. She went softly up-stairs after a while; but the sounds pursued her there almost more distinctly, for her room was over the dining-room,—the two voices in endless conversation, the laughter, the smell of their tobacco. You would have said two light-hearted laddies to hear them, Mrs Ogilvy said to herself: and one of them a hunted man, in danger of his life! She did not sleep much that night, nor even go to bed, but sat up fully dressed, the early daylight finding her out suddenly in her white shawl and cap when it came in, oh! so early, revealing the whole familiar world about,—giving her a surprise, too, to see herself in the glass, with her candle flickering on the table beside her. It was broad daylight—but they would not see it, their shutters being closed—before the sounds ceased, and she heard them stumblingup-stairs, still talking and making a great noise in the silence, to their rooms; and then after a while everything was still. And then she could think.
Then she could think! Oh, her plan was a very simple one, involving little thought,—first that house down the water, on the very edge of the river, where Andrew’s brother lived. It was as quiet a place as heart could desire, and a very nice room, where in her good days, in Robbie’s boyhood, in the time when there were often visitors at the Hewan, she had sent any guest she had not room for. Down the steep bank behind on which the Hewan stood, you could almost have slid down to the little house in the glen. There would be very little risk there. Robbie and he could see each other, and nobody the wiser; and then, after he was well rested, he would see the danger of staying in a place like the Hewan, where anybody at any moment might walk up to the door. And then the place must be chosen where he should go. If he would but go quiet to one of the islands, and be out of danger! Mrs Ogilvy’s mind was very much set on one of the islands; I cannot tell why. It seemed to her so much safer to be surrounded by the sea on every side. If he would consent to go to St Kilda or some place like that, where he would be as safe as a bird in its nest. Ah! but St Kilda—among the poor fisher-folk, where he would have no one to speak to. A chill came over her heart in the middle of her plans.Would he not laugh in her face if she proposed it? Would he go, however safe it might be? Did he care so much for his safety as that? She wrung her hands with a sense of impotence, and that all her fine plans, when she had made them, would come to nothing. She might plan and plan; but if he would not do it, what would her planning matter? If she planned for Robbie in the same way, would he do it? And she had no power over this strange man. Then after demonstrating to herself the folly of it, she began her planning all over again.
In the morning there were the usual pleasant sounds in the house of natural awakening and new beginning, and Mrs Ogilvy got up at her usual hour and dressed herself with her usual care. She saw, when she looked at herself in the glass, that she was paler than usual. But what did that matter for an old woman? She was not tired—she did not feel her body at all. She was all life and force and energy, thrilling to her finger-points with the desire of doing something—the ability to do whatever might be wanted. She would have gone off to St Kilda straight without the loss of a moment, if her doing so could have been of any avail. But of what avail could that have been? The early morning passed over in its usual occupations, and grew to noon before there was any stirring up-stairs. Then Janet, who had no responsibility, who had always kept her old footing withRobbie as his old nurse who might say anything and do anything—without gravity, laughing with him at herself and her old domineering ways, yet sometimes influencing him with her domineering more than his mother’s anxious love could do—Janet went boldly up-stairs with her jugs of hot water, and knocked at one door after another. Mrs Ogilvy then heard various stirrings, shouts to know what was wanted, openings of doors, Robbie, large and heavy, though with slippered feet, going into his companion’s room, and the loud talk of last night resumed. Nearly one o’clock, the middle of the day. Alas for that journey to St Kilda, or anywhere! When the day was half over, how was any such enterprise to be undertaken? And if the police were after him—the police! in her honourable, honest, stainless house—how was he to get away, to have a chance of escape? in his bed and undefended, sleeping and insensible to any danger, till one of the clock. It must have been two before Robbie showed down-stairs. He was a little abashed, not facing his mother—looking, she thought, as if his eyes had been boiled.
“We were a little late last night,” he said. “I’m sorry, but it’s nothing to look so serious about. Lew’s first night.”
“Robbie,” she said, “it’s nothing. I’m old-fashioned. I have my prejudices. But it was not that I was thinking of. Is he in danger of his life or no?”
Robbie blanched a little at this, but shook himself with nervous impatience. “That’s a big word to use,” he said.
“It was the word he used to me when he came upon me last night. If he is in danger of his life, he is not safe for a moment here.”
“Rubbish!” said Robbie; “why is he not safe? It is as out of the way as anything can be. Not a soul about but your village people, who don’t know him from Adam, nor anything about us, good or bad. I am just your son to them, and he is just my friend.”
“If that were so! It is not a thing I know about: it is only what you have told me, him and you. He said he was in danger of his life.”
“He was a fool for his pains; but he always liked a sensation, and to talk big——”
“Then it is not true?”
She looked at him, and he at her. He was pale, too, with the doings of last night, but a quick colour flashed over his face under her eyes. “I am not going to be cross-examined,” he said. Then after a pause: “It may be true, and it mayn’t be true—if they’re on his track. But he doesn’t think now that they are on his track.”
“He thought so last night, Robbie.”
“What does it matter about last night? You’re insufferable—you can imagine nothing. There is a difference between a man when he’s tired and fasting,and when he’s had a good rest and a square meal. He doesn’t think so now. He’s quite happy about us both. He says we’ll pull along here famously for a time. You so motherly (he likes you), and Janet such a good cook, and the whisky very decent. He’s a connoisseur, I can tell you!—and nobody here that has half an idea in their heads——”
“You may be deceived, there,” said Mrs Ogilvy, suddenly resenting what he said—“you may be deceived in that, both him and you——”
“Not about the cook and the whisky,” said Robbie, with a laugh. “In short, we think we can lie on our oars a little and watch events. We can cut and run at any moment if danger appears.”
“You say ‘we,’ Robbie?”
“Yes,” he said, with a momentary scowl, “I said ‘we.’ Of course, I’m in with Lew as soon as he turns up. I always said I was. You forget the nonsense I’ve talked about him. That’s all being out of sight that corrupts the mind. Lord, what a difference it makes to have him here!”
She looked a little wistfully at the young man to whom her own love and devotion mattered nothing. He calculated on it freely, took advantage of it, and thought no more of it—which was “quite natural”: she quieted all possibilities of rebellion in her own mind by this. “But, Robbie,” she said, “if he is in danger. I’m not one to advise you to beunfaithful to a friend—oh, not even if—— But his welfare goes before all. If it’s true all I’ve heard—if there’s been wild work out yonder in America, and he’s blamed for it——”
“Who told you that?”
“Partly Mr Somerville before you came, Robbie, and partly yourself—and partly it was in a newspaper I read.”
“A newspaper!” he cried, almost with a shout. “If it has been in the newspapers here——”
“I did not say it was a newspaper here.”
“I know what it was,” said Robbie, with a scornful laugh. “You’ve been at a woman’s tricks. I thought you were above them. You’ve searched my pockets, and you’ve found it there.”
“I found it lying with your coat, in no pocket: and I had seen it before in Mr Somerville’s hands. You go too far—you go too far!” she said.
“Well,” he said with bravado, “what does a Yankee paper matter?—nobody reads them here. Anyhow,” he added, “Lew and I, we’re going to face it out. We’ll stay where we are, and make ourselves as comfortable as we can. Danger at present there’s none. Oh, you need not answer me with supposing this or that; I know.”
Mrs Ogilvy opened her lips to speak, but said no word. She was perhaps tempted to suggest that it was her house, her money, her life and comfort, ofwhich these two men were disposing so calmly; but she did not. After all, she said to herself, it was not hers, but Robbie’s; everything that was hers was his. She had saved the money which he might have been spending had he been at home—which he might have been extravagant with, who could tell?—for him. And should she grudge him the use of it now? If he was right, if all was safe, if there was no need for alarm, why, then—— Her peace was gone; but had she not all these years been ready to sacrifice peace, comfort, life itself—everything in the world—for Robbie’s sake? And now that he had been brought back to her as if it were out of the grave,—“this thy son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found,”—what was there more to say? That father who ran out to meet his son, who fell upon his neck, and clothed him in the best garment, and would not even listen to his confession and penitence—perhaps when the prodigal had settled back again into the monotony of home, was not so happy in him as he had hoped to be.
Therefollowed after this a period which was the most terrible of Mrs Ogilvy’s life. It had not the anguish of that previous time when Robert had disappeared from his home; but in pain and active distress, and the horrors of fear and anxiety, it was sometimes almost as bad—sometimes worse than that. When she looked back on it after, it seemed to her like a nightmare, the dream of a long fever too dreadful to be true. The happiness of having her son under her own roof was turned into torture, though still remaining in its way a kind of terrible happiness; for did not she see him day by day falling into all that was to her mind most appalling—the habits of such a life as was odious and terrible to the poor lady, with all her traditions of decent living, all her prejudices and delicacies? His very voice had changed; it was more gay and lively at times than she had ever known, and this gave her a pang ofpleasure often in the midst of her trouble. Indeed there were times when even the noise of the two young men in the house affected her mind with a certain pleasure and elation, and gratitude to God that she was there to make their life possible, to make it comfortable, to give them occasion for the light-heartedness, though she could not understand it, which they showed. But these were evanescent moments, and her life day by day was a kind of horror to her, as if she were herself affected by the careless ways, the profane words, the self-indulgence, and disregard of everything lovely and honest and of good report, which she seemed to be encouraging and keeping up while she looked on and suffered.
The situation is too poignant to be easily recorded. One has heard of a wife oppressed and disgusted by a dissipated husband; one has heard of the horrors of a drunkard’s home. But this was a different thing. So far as any one in the house was aware, these young men were not drunkards. There were no dreadful scenes in which they lost control of themselves or the possession of their senses. Was it almost worse than that? Mrs Ogilvy felt as if she were being put through the treatment which some people suppose to be a cure for that terrible weakness, the mixture of intoxicating spirit with every meal and every dish. Her very cup of tea, the old lady’s modest indulgence, seemed to be flavoured from theeternal whisky-bottle which was always there, the smell and the sight of which made her sick, made her frantic with suppressed misery. They meant no harm, she tried to explain to herself. It was a habit of their rough life, and the much exercise and fatigue to which they subjected themselves, for good or for evil, in the far-away place from which they had come, the outskirts of civilisation. They were not capable of understanding what it was to her to see her trim dining-room always made disorderly (as she felt) by that bottle, the atmosphere flavoured with it, its presence always manifest. The pipes, too: her mantelpiece, always so nicely arranged with its clock, its flower-vases, its shells and ornaments, was now encumbered and dusty with pipes, with ashes of cigars, with cans and papers of tobacco: how they would have laughed had they known what a vexation this was! or rather Robbie would have been angry—he would have said it was one of her ridiculous ways—and only the other would have laughed. It is a little hard to have your son speak of your ridiculous ways before another man who is indulgent and laughs. But still the pipes were nothing in comparison with that other thing—the bottle of whisky always there. What would the grocer in Eskholm think, from whom she got her supplies, when, instead of the small discreet bottle at long intervals—for not to have whisky in the house, the old-fashioned Scotch remedy for somany things, would have seemed to Mrs Ogilvy almost a crime—there were gallon jars, she did not like to ask Andrew how many, supplied to the Hewan? The idea that it was not respectable cut into her like a knife. And it would be thought that it was Robbie who consumed all that,—Robbie, who was known to be there, yet never had been seen in Eskholm, or taking his walks like other sober folk on Eskside.
And they turned life upside down altogether, both in and out of the house. They rarely went out in daylight, but would take long walks, scouring the country in the late evening, and come home very late to sit down to a supper specially prepared for them, as on the first day of the stranger’s appearance. He had affected to think it was the ordinary habit of the house, and approved of it much, he said. And they sat late after it, always with a new bottle of whisky, and went to bed in the daylight of the early summer morning, with the natural consequence that they did not get up till the middle of the day, lacerating Mrs Ogilvy’s mind, doing everything that she thought most disorderly and wrong. She never went to bed until they had come in and she had seen them safely established at their supper. And then she would go quietly up-stairs, but not to rest—for her room was over the dining-room, as has been said, and the noise of their talk, their jokes and laughter, kept sleep from her eyes. She was not a very good sleeper at thebest. It could scarcely, she said to herself, be considered their fault. And sometimes the sound of their cheerful voices brought a sudden sense of strange happiness with it. Men that are ill men, that have done dreadful things, could not laugh like that, she would sometimes feel confident—and Robbie gay and loud, though all that she had once hoped to be refinement had gone out of his voice: this had something in it that went to her heart. If he was happy after all, what did anything else matter? His voice rang like a trumpet. There was no sound in it of depression or dejection. He had recovered his spirits, his confidence, his freedom. The heavy dulness, which was his prevailing mood before the stranger appeared, was gone. Then he had been discontented and miserable, notwithstanding the thankfulness he expressed to have escaped from the dominion of his former leader. But now he was, or appeared to be, happy, hugging his chains, delighted, as it seemed, to return to his bondage. It was not likely that this change could be a subject of gratification to his mother; and yet his altered tone, his brightened aspect, the sound of his laughter, gave her something that was almost like happiness. But for this, perhaps, she could not have borne as she did the transformation of her life.
The two young men sometimes went to Edinburgh, as Robbie had been in the habit of doing before the other’s arrival. They went in the morning and returnedlate at night, the much disturbed and troubled household sitting up for them to give them their meal and secure their perfect comfort. After the first time Mrs Ogilvy, though her heart was always full of anxiety for their safety, thought it best not to appear when they returned. They had both gibed at her anxiety, at the absurdity and impossibility of her sitting up for them, and her desire to tie her son to her apron-strings. Robbie was angry, indignantly accusing her of making him ridiculous by her foolish anxiety. Poor Mrs Ogilvy had no desire to tie him to her apron-strings. It was not foolish fondness, but terror, that was in her heart. She had a fear—almost a certainty—that one time or other they would not come back,—that they would hear bad news and not return at all, but depart again into the unknown, leaving her on the rack.
But though she did not appear, she sat up in her room at the window, watching for the click of the gate, the sound of their steps on the path, the dark figures in the half dark of the summer night. They had means of getting news, she knew not how, and came back sometimes elated and noisy, sometimes more quiet, according as these were bad or good. And then she heard Janet bustling below bringing their supper, asking, in the peremptory tones which amused them in her, if they wanted anything more, if they could not just get what they wanted themselves, and let a poor woman, thathad to be up in the morning to her work, get to her bed. Sometimes Janet held forth to them while she put their supper on the table. “It’s fine for you twa strong buirdly young men, without a hand’s turn to do, to turn day into nicht and nicht into day—though, losh me! how ye can pit up with it, just jabbering and reading idle books a’ the day, and good for nothing, is mair than I can tell. But me, I’m a hard-working woman. I’ve my man’s breakfast to get ready at seeven, and the house to clean up, and to keep the whole place like a new pin. Bless me, if ye were to take a turn at the garden and save Andrew’s auld bones, that are often very bad with the rheumatism, or carry in a bucket of coals or a pail of water for me that am old enough to be your mother, it would set you better. Just twa strong young men, and never doing a hand’s turn—no a hand’s turn from morning to nicht.”
“There’s truth in what she says, Bob—we are a couple of lazy dogs.”
“I was not just made,” said Robbie, who was less good-humoured than his friend, “to hew wood and to draw water in my own house.”
“It would be an honour and a credit to you to do something, Mr Robert,” said Janet, with a touch of sternness. “Eh, laddie! the thing that’s maist unbecoming in this world is to eat somebody’s bread and do nothing for it—no even in the way of civeelity—for here’s the mistress put out of everything. She has no peace by night or by day. Do you think she is sleepin’, with you making a’ that fracaw coming in in the middle of the nicht, and your muckle voices and your muckle steps just making a babel o’ the house? She’s no more sleepin’ than I am: and my opinion is that she never sleeps—just lies and ponders and ponders, and thinks what’s to become of ye. Eh, Mr Robert, if you canna exerceese your ain business, whatever it may be——”
Then there was a big laugh from both of the young men. “We have not got our tools with us, Janet,” said the stranger.
“I’m no one that holds very much with tools, Mr Lewis,” said Janet. “Losh! I would take up just the first thing that came, and try if I couldna do a day’s work with that, if it were me.”
Mr Lewis was what the household had taken to calling the visitor. He had never been credited with any name, and Robert spoke to him as Lew. It was Janet who had first changed this into Mr Lewis. Whether it was his surname or his Christian name nobody inquired, nor did he give any information, but answered to Mr Lewis quite pleasantly, as indeed he did everything. He was, as a matter of fact, far more agreeable in the house than Robbie, who, quiet enough before he came, was now disposed to be somewhat imperious and exacting, and show that he was master.The old servants, it need scarcely be said, were much aggrieved by this. “He would just like to be cock o’ the walk, our Robbie,” Andrew said.
“And if he is, it’s his ain mother’s house, and he has the best right,” said Janet, not disposed to have Robert objected to by any one but herself. “He was aye one that likit his ain way,” she added on her own account.
“That’s the worst o’ weemen wi’ sons,” said Andrew; “they’re spoilt and pettit till they canna tell if they’re on their heels or their head.”
“A bonnie one you are to say a word against the mistress,” cried Janet; “and weemen, says he! I would just like to ken what would have become of ye, that were just as bad as ony in your young days, if it hadna been for the mistress and me?”
But on the particular evening on which Janet had bestowed her advice on the young men in the dining-room, they continued their conversation after she was gone in another tone. “That good woman would be a little startled if she knew what work we had been up to,” said Lewis; “and our tools, eh, Bob?” They both laughed again, and then he became suddenly serious. “All the same, there’s justice in what she says. We’ll have to be doing something to get a little money. Suppose we had to cut and run all of a sudden, as may happen any day, where should we get the needful, eh?”
“There’s my mother,” said Robert; “she’ll give me whatever I want.”
“She’s a brick of an old woman; but I don’t suppose, eh, Bob? she’s what you would call a millionaire.” Lew gave his friend a keen glance under his eyelids. His eyes were keen and bright, always alive and watchful like the eyes of a wild animal; whereas Robbie’s were a little heavy and veiled, rather furtive than watchful, perhaps afraid of approaching danger, but not keeping a keen look-out for it, like the other’s, on every side.
“No,” said Robert, with a curious brag and pride, “not a millionaire—just what you see—no splendour, but everything comfortable. She must have saved a lot of money while I was away. A woman has no expenses. And I’m all she has; she’ll give me whatever I want.”
“You are all she has, and she’ll give you—whatever you want.”
“Yes; is there anything wonderful in that? You say it in a tone——”
“We’re not on such terms as to question each other’s tones, are we?” said Lew. “Though I’m idle, as Janet says, I have always an eye to business, Bob. Never mind your mother; isn’t there some old buffer in the country that could spare us some of his gold? The nights are pretty dark now, though they don’t last long—eh, Bob?”
There was more a great deal than was open to a listening ear in the tone of the question. And Robert Ogilvy grew red to his hair. “For God’s sake,” he cried, “not a word of that here—in my own place, Lew! If there’s anything in the world you care for——”
“Is there anything in the world I care for?” said the other. “Not very much, except myself. I’ve always had a robust regard for that person. Well—I’m not fond of doing nothing, though your folks think me a lazy dog. Janet’s eyes are well open, but she’s not so clever as she thinks. I’m beginning to get very tired, I can tell you, of this do-nothing life. I’d like to put a little money in my pocket, Rob. I’d like to feel a little excitement again. We’ll take root like potatoes if we go on like this.”
Mr Lewis’s talk was sprinkled with words of a more energetic description, but they waste a good deal of type and a great many marks of admiration. The instructed can fill them in for themselves.
“I don’t think we could be much better off,” said Robbie, with a certain offence; “plenty of grub, and good of its kind—you said that yourself—and a safe place to lie low in. I thought that was what you wanted most.”
“So it was, if a man happened always to be in the same mind. I want a little excitement, Bob. I want a good beast under me, and the wind in my face. Iwant a little fun—which perhaps wouldn’t be just fun, don’t you know, for the men we might have the pleasure of meeting——”
“If those detective fellows get on the trail you’ll have fun enough,” Robert said.
“I—both of us, if you please, old fellow: we’re in the same box. The captain—and one of the chief members of the gang. That’s how they’ve got us down, recollect. You never knew you were a chief member before—eh, Rob? But I don’t like that sort of fun. I like to hunt, not to be hunted, my boy. And I’m very tired of lying low. Let’s make a run somewhere—eh? I like the feeling of the money that should be in another man’s pocket tumbling into my own.”
“It’ll not do—it’ll not do, Lew, here; I won’t have it,” cried Robbie, getting up from his supper and pacing about the room. “I never could bear that part of it, you know. It seems something different in a wild country, where you never know whose the money may be—got by gambling, and cheating, and all that, and kind of lawful to take it back again. No, not here. I’ll give myself up, and you too, before I consent to that.”
“I’ve got a bit of a toy here that will have something to say to it if any fellow turns out a sneak,” said Lew, with that movement towards his pocket which Mrs Ogilvy did not understand.
“Does this look like turning out a sneak?” said Robbie, looking round with a wave of his hand. “You’ve been here nearly a month: has any one ever said you were not welcome? Keep your toys to yourself, Lew. Two can play at that game; but toys or no toys, I’m not with you, and I won’t follow you here. Oh, d—— it,here!where there’s such a thing as honesty, and a man’s money is his own!”
“My good fellow,” said the other, “but for information which you haven’t to give, and which I could get at any little tavern I turned into, what good are you? You never were any that I know of. You were always shaking your head. You didn’t mind, so far as I can remember, taking a share of the profits; but as for doing anything to secure them! I can work without you, thank you, if I take it into my head.”
“I hope you won’t take it into your head,” said Robbie, coming back to the table and resuming his chair. “Why should you, when I tell you I can get anything out of my mother? And with right too,” he continued, “for I should have been sure to spend it all had I been at home; and she only saved it because I was not here. Therefore the money’s justly mine by all rules. It isn’t that I should like to see you start without me, Lew, or that I wouldn’t take my share, whatever—whatever you might wish to do. But what’s the good, when you can get it, and begged to accept it, all straight and square close at hand?”
“For a squeamish fellow you’ve got a good stiff conscience, Bob,” said Lew, with a laugh. “I like that idea,—that though it’s bad with an old fogey trotting home from market, it ain’t the same with your mother. In that way it would be less of a privilege than folks would think to be near relations to you and me, eh? I’ve got none, heaven be praised! so I can’t practise upon ’em. But you, my chicken! that the good lady waits up for at nights, that she would like to tie to her apron-strings——”
“It’s my own money,” said Rob; “I should have spent it twice over if I had been at home.”
And presently they fell into their usual topics of conversation, and this case of conscience was forgotten.
Meanwhile Mrs Ogilvy fought and struggled with her thoughts up-stairs. She had all but divined that there had been a quarrel, and had many thoughts of going down, for she was still dressed, to clear it up. For if they quarrelled, what could be done? She could not turn Lewis out of her house—and indeed her heart inclined towards that soft-spoken ruffian with a most foolish softness. He might perhaps scoff a little now and then, but he was not unkind. He was always ready to receive her with a smile when she appeared, which was more than her son was, and had a way of seeming grateful and deferential whether he was really so or not, and sometimes said a word to soothe feelings which Robbie had ruffled, without appearingto see, which would have spoiled all, that Robbie had wounded them. Of the two, I am afraid that Mrs Ogilvy in her secret heart, so far down that she was herself unconscious of it, was most indulgent to Lew. Who could tell how he had been brought up, how he had been led astray? He might have been an orphan without any one to look after him, whereas Robbie—— Her heart bled to think how few excuses Robbie had, and yet excused him with innumerable eager pleas. But the chief thing was, that life was intolerable under these conditions: and what could she do, what could she propose, to mend them?—life turned upside down, a constant panic hanging over it, a terror of she knew not what, a sensation as of very existence in danger. What could be done, what could any one do? Nothing, for she dared not trust any one with the secret. It was heavy upon her own being, but she dared not share it with any other. She dared not even reveal to Janet anything of the special misery that overwhelmed her: that it was possible the police might come—the police!—and watch the innocent house, and bring a warrant, as if it were a nest of criminals. It made Mrs Ogilvy jump up from her seat, spring from her bed, whenever this thought came back to her. And in the meantime she could do nothing, but only sit still and bear it until some dreadful climax came.
She had a long struggle with herself before shepermitted herself the indulgence of going in to Edinburgh to see Mr Somerville, who was the only other person who knew anything about it. After many questions with herself, and much determined endurance of her burden, it came upon her like an inspiration that this was the thing to do. It would be a comfort to be able to speak to some one, to have the support of somebody else’s judgment. It is true that she was afraid of leaving her own house even for the little time that was necessary; but she decided that by doing this early in the morning before the young men were up, she might do it without risk. She gave Janet great charges to admit no one while she was away. “Nobody—I would like nobody to come in. Mr Robert is up so late at night that we cannot expect him to get up earlytoo; but I would not like strange folk who do not know how late he has to sit up with his friend, to come in and find him still in his bed at twelve o’clock in the day. There’s no harm in it; but we have all our prejudices, and I cannot bide it to be known. You will just make the best excuse you can——”
“You may make your mind easy, mem,” said Janet; “I will no be wanting for an excuse.”
“So long as you just let nobody in,” said her mistress. Mrs Ogilvy had never in her life availed herself even of the common and well-understood fiction, “Not at home,” to turn away an unwelcome visitor; but she did not inquire now what it was that Janetmeant to say. She went away with a little lightening of her heavy heart. To be able to speak to somebody who was beyond all doubt, and incapable of betraying her, of perhaps having something suggested to her, some plan that would afford succour, was for the moment almost as if she had attained a certain relief. It was July now, the very heat and climax of the year. The favoured fields of Mid-Lothian were beginning to whiten to the harvest; the people about were in light dresses, in their summer moods and ways, saying to each other, “What a beautiful day—was there ever such fine weather?”—for indeed it was a happy year without rain, without clouds. To see everybody as usual going about their honest work was at once a pang and a relief to Mrs Ogilvy. The world, then, was just as before—it was not turned upside down; most people were busy doing something; there was no suspension of the usual laws. And yet all the more for this universal reign of law and order, which it was a refreshment to see—all the more was it terrible to think of Robbie, lawless, careless of all rules, wasting his life—of the two young men whom she had left behind her, both in the strength of their manhood, doing nothing, good for nothing. These two sensations, which were so different, tore Mrs Ogilvy’s heart in two.
Mr Somervillewas engaged with another client, and it was a long time before Mrs Ogilvy could see him. She had to wait, trembling with impatience, and dismayed by the passage of time, following the hands of the clock with her eyes, wondering what perhaps might be happening at home. She was not, perhaps, on the face of things, a very strong defensive force, but she had got by degrees into the habit of feeling that safety depended more or less upon her presence. She might have perhaps a little tendency that way by nature, to think that her little world depended upon her, and that nothing went quite right when she was away; but this feeling was doubly strong now. She felt that the little house was quite undefended in her absence, that all the doors and windows which she could not bear to have shut were now standing wide open to let misfortune come in.
When she did at last succeed in seeing Mr Somerville,however, he was very comforting to her. It was not that he did not see the gravity of the situation. He was very grave indeed upon the whole matter. He did not conceal from her his conviction that Robert stood a much worse chance if he were found in the company of the other man. “Which is no doubt unjust,” he said, “for I understood you to say that your son had a great repugnance to this scoundrel who had led him astray.” Mrs Ogilvy responded to this by a very faltering and doubtful “Yes.” Yes indeed—Robbie had said he hated the man; but there was very little appearance on his part of hating him now—and Mrs Ogilvy herself did not hate Lew. She hated nobody, so that this perhaps was not wonderful, but her feeling towards the scoundrel, as Mr Somerville called him, was more than that abstract one. She felt herself his defender, too, as well as her son’s. She was eager to save him as well as her son. To ransom Robbie by giving up his companion was not what she thought of.
I do not know whether she succeeded in conveying this impression to Mr Somerville’s mind. But yet it was a relief to her to pour out her heart, to tell all her trouble; and the old lawyer had a sympathetic ear. They sat long together, going over the case, and he insisted that she should share his lunch with him, and not go back to the Hewan fasting after the long agitating morning. Even that was a relief to Mrs Ogilvy, though she was scarcely aware of it, and inher heart believed that she was very impatient to get away. But the quiet meal was grateful to her, with her kind old friend taking an interest in her, persuading her to eat, pouring out a modest glass of wine, paying all the attention possible in his old-fashioned old-world way. She was very anxious to get back, and yet the tranquil reflection gave her a sense of peace and comfort to which she had been long a stranger. There were still people in the world who were kind, who were willing to help her, who would listen and understand what she had to bear, who believed everything that was good about Robbie,—that he had been “led away,” but was now anxious, very anxious, to return to righteous ways. Mrs Ogilvy’s heart grew lighter in spite of herself, even though the news was not good—though she ascertained that there was certainly an American officer in Edinburgh whose mission was to track out the fugitives. “He must not stay at the Hewan—it would be most dangerous for Robert: you must get him to go away,” the old gentleman said.
“If I could but get him to do that! but, oh, you know by yourself how hard it is for the like of me, that never shut my doors in my life to a stranger, to say to a man, Go!—a man that is a well-spoken man, and has a great deal of good in him, and has no parents of his own, and never has had instruction nor even kindness to keep him right.”
“Mrs Ogilvy, he is a murderer,” said Mr Somerville, severely.
“Oh, but are you sure of that? If I were sure! But a man that sits at your table, that you see every day of his life, that does no harm, nor is unkind to any one—how is it possible to think he has done anything like that?”
“But, my dear lady,” said Mr Somerville, “it is true.”
“Oh,” cried Mrs Ogilvy, “how little do we know, when it comes to that, what’s true and what’s not true! He’s not what you would call a hardened criminal,” she said, with a pleading look.
“It’s not a small matter,” said the lawyer, “to kill a man.”
“Oh, it is terrible! I am not excusing him,” said Mrs Ogilvy, humbly.
These young men had disturbed all the quiet order of her life. They had turned her house into something like the taverns which, without knowing them, were Mrs Ogilvy’s horror. Nobody could tell what a depth of shame and misery there was to her in the noisy nights, the long summer mornings wasted in sleep; nor how much she suffered from the careless contempt of the one, the angry criticism of the other. It was her own boy who was angrily critical, treating her as if she knew nothing, and made the other laugh. One of these scenes sprang up in her mind as she spoke,with all its accessories of despair. But yet she could not but excuse the stranger, who had some good in him, who was not a hardened criminal, and make her fancy picture of Robert, who had been “led astray.” The sudden realisation of that scene, and the terror lest something might have happened in the meantime, something from which she might have protected them, seized upon her once more after her moment of repose. She accepted with trembling Mr Somerville’s proposal to come out to the Hewan to see Robbie, and to endeavour to persuade him that his friend must be got away. “It is just some romantic notion of being faithful to a friend,” said the old gentleman, “and the prejudice which is in your mind too, my dear mem, in favour of one that has taken refuge in your house—but you must get over that, in this case, both him and you. It is too serious a matter for any sentiment,” said Mr Somerville, very gravely.
In the meantime things had been following their usual routine at the Hewan. The late breakfast had been served; the three o’clock dinner, arranged at that amazing hour in order to divide the day more or less satisfactorily for the two young men, had followed. That the mistress should not have come home was a great trouble and anxiety to Janet, but not to them, who were perhaps relieved in their turn not to have her anxious face, trying so hard toapprove of them, to laugh at their jests and mix in their conversation, superintending their meal. “Where’s your mother having her little spree?” said the stranger. “In Edinburgh, I suppose,” said Robbie. “Eh! Edinburgh? that’s not very good for our health, Bob. She might drop a word——” “She will never drop any word that would involve me,” said Robert. “Well, she’s a brick of an old girl, and pluck for anything,” said the other. And then the conversation came to a stop. Their talk was almost unintelligible to Janet, who was of opinion that Mr Lewis’s speech was too “high English” for any honest sober faculties to understand. Mrs Ogilvy’s presence, though all that she felt was their general contempt for her, had in fact a subduing influence upon them, and the mid-day meal was generally a comparatively quiet one. But when that little restraint was withdrawn, the afternoon stillness became as noisy as the night, and their voices and laughter rose high.
It was while they were in full enjoyment of their meal that certain visitors arrived at the Hewan—not unusual or unfamiliar visitors, for one of them was Susan Logan, whose visits had lately been very few. Susie had been more wounded than words could say by Robbie’s indifference. He had been now more than a month at home, but he had never once found his way to the manse, or showed the slightest inclinationto renew his “friendship,” as she called it, with his old playfellow. Susie, whose fortunes and spirits were very low, who was now aware of what was in store for her, and whose mind was painfully occupied with the consideration of what her own life was to be when her father’s second marriage took place, was more than usually susceptible to such an unkindness and affront, and she had deserted the Hewan and her dearest friend his mother, though it was the moment in her life when she wanted support and sympathy most. “He shall never think I am coming after him, if he does not choose to come after me,” poor Susie had said proudly to herself. And Mrs Ogilvy, without at all inquiring into it, was glad and thankful beyond measure that Susan, whom next to her son she loved best in the world, did not come. She, too, wanted sympathy and support more than she had ever done in her life, but in her present fever of existence she was afraid lest the secrets of her house should be betrayed even to the kindest eye.
Susie was accompanied on this occasion by Mrs Ainslie, her future stepmother, a very uncongenial companion. It was not with her own will, indeed, that she made the visit. It had been forced upon her by this lady, who thought it “most unnatural” that Susie should see so little of her friends, and who was anxious in her own person to secure MrsOgilvy’s countenance. They did not approach the house in the usual way, but went up the brae through the garden behind, which was a familiarity granted to Susie all her life, and which Mrs Ainslie eagerly desired to share. The way was steep, though it was shorter than the other, and the elder lady paused when they reached the level of the house to take breath. “Dear! the old lady must have company to-day. Listen! there must be half-a-dozen people to make so much noise as that. I never knew she entertained in this way.”
“She does not at all entertain, as you call it, Mrs Ainslie: though it may be some of Robbie’s friends.” Susie spoke with a deeper offence than ever in her voice; for if Robbie was amusing himself with friends, it was more marked than ever that he did not come to the manse.
“Entertain is a very good word, Miss Susie, let me tell you, and I shall entertain and show you what it means as soon as your dear father brings me home.”
“I shall not be there to see, Mrs Ainslie,” said Susie, glad to have something which justified the irritation and discomfort in her mind.
“Oh yes, you will,” said the lady. “You shan’t make a stolen match to get rid of me. I have set my heart on marrying you, my dear, like a daughter of my own.”
To this Susie made no reply; and Mrs Ainsliehaving recovered her breath, they walked together round the corner, which was the dining-room corner, with one window opening upon the shrubbery that sheltered that side of the house. Susie’s rapid glance distinguished only that there were two figures at table, one of which she knew to be Robbie; but her companion, who was not shy or proud like Susie, took a more deliberate view, and received a much stronger sensation. Immediately opposite that side window, receiving its light full on his face, sat the mysterious inmate of Mrs Ogilvy’s house, the visitor of whom the gossips in the village had heard, but who never was seen anywhere nor introduced to any visitor. Mrs Ainslie uttered a suppressed exclamation and clutched Susie’s arm; but at the same time hurried her along to the front of the house, where she dropped upon one of the garden benches with a face deeply flushed, and panting for breath. The dining-room had another window on this side, but the blinds were drawn down to keep out the sunshine. This did not, however, keep out the sound of the voices, to which she listened with the profoundest attention, still clutching Susie’s arm. “My goodness gracious! my merciful goodness gracious!” Mrs Ainslie said.
Susie was not, it is to be feared, sympathetic or interested. She pulled her arm away. “Have you lost your breath again?” she said.
Mrs Ainslie remained on the bench for some time, panting and listening. The voices were quite loud and unrestrained. One of them was telling stories with names freely mentioned, at which the other laughed, and at which this lady sitting outside clenched her fist in her light glove. After a minute Susie left her, saying, “I will go and find Mrs Ogilvy,” and she remained there alone, with the most extraordinary expressions going over her face. Her usual little affectations and fine-ladyism were gone. It must have been an expressive face by nature; for the power with which it expressed deadly panic, then hatred, then a rising fierceness of anger, was extraordinary. There came upon her countenance, which was that of a well-looking, not unamiable, but affected, middle-aged woman in ordinary life, something of that snarl of mingled terror and ferocity which one sees in an outraged dog not yet wound up to a spring upon his offender. She sat and panted, and by some curious gift which belongs to highly-strained feeling heard every word.
This would not have happened had Mrs Ogilvy been at home—the voices would not have been loud enough to be audible so clearly out of doors; for the respect of things out of doors and of possible listeners, and all the safeguards of decorum, were always involved in her presence. Also, that story would not have been told; there was a woman in it who was not a goodwoman, nor well treated by Lew’s strong speech: therefore everything that happened afterwards no doubt sprang from that visit of Mrs Ogilvy’s to Edinburgh; and, indeed, she herself had foreseen, if not this harm, which she could not have divined, at least harm of some kind proceeding from the self-indulgence to which for one afternoon she gave way.
“No, Miss Susie, the mistress is no in, and I canna understand it. She went to Edinburgh to see her man of business, but was to be back long before the dinner. The gentlemen—that is, Mr Robert and his friend—are just at the end o’t, as ye may hear them talking. I’ll just run ben and tell Mr Robert you are here.”
“Don’t do that on any account, Janet. Mrs Ainslie is with me, sitting on the bench outside, and she has lost her breath coming up the hill. Probably she would like a glass of water or something. Don’t disturb Mr Robert. It is of no consequence. I’ll come and see Mrs Ogilvy another day.”
“You are a sight for sore een as it is. The mistress misses ye awfu’, Miss Susie: you’re no kind to her, and her in trouble.”
“In trouble, Janet! now that Robbie has come home!”
“Oh, Miss Susie, wherever there are men folk there is trouble; but I’ll get a glass of wine for the lady.”
Janet’s passage into the dining-room to get the wine was signalised by an immediate lowering of the toneof the conversation going on within. She came out carrying a glass of sherry, and was reluctantly followed by Robert, who came into the drawing-room, somewhat down-looked and shamefaced, to see his old companion and playmate. Janet, for her part, took the sherry to Mrs Ainslie, who had drawn her veil, a white one, over her face, concealing a little her agitated and excited countenance. The lady was profuse in her thanks, swallowed the wine hastily, and gave back the glass to Janet, almost pushing her away. “Thanks, thanks very much; that will do. Now leave me quiet a little to recover myself.”
“Maybe you would like to lie down on the sofa in the drawing-room out of the sun. The mistress is no in, but Mr Robert is there with Miss Susie.”
“No, thanks; I am very well where I am,” said Mrs Ainslie, with a wave of her hand. The conversation inside had ceased, and from the other side of the house there came a small murmur of voices. Mrs Ainslie waited until Janet had disappeared, and then she moved cautiously, making no sound with her feet upon the gravel, round the corner once more to the end window. Cautiously she stooped down to the window ledge and looked in. He was still seated opposite to the window, stretching out his long legs, and laying back his head as if after his dinner he was inclined for a nap. His eyes were closed. He was most perfectly at the mercy of the spy, who gazed inupon him with a fierce eagerness, noting his dress, his thickly grown beard, all the peculiarities of his appearance. She even noticed with an experienced eye the heaviness of his pocket, betraying something within that pocket to which he had moved his hand without conveying any knowledge to Mrs Ogilvy. All of these things this woman knew. She devoured his face with her keen eyes, and there came from her a little unconscious sound of excitement which, though it was not loud, conveyed itself to his watchful ear. He opened his eyes drowsily, said something, and then closed them again, taking no more notice. Lew had dined well and drank well; he was very nearly asleep.
She crept round again to the front and took her seat on the bench, again pulling down and arranging the white veil, which was almost like a mask over her face. Susie and Robert came out to her a few minutes after, she leading, he following. “If you will come in and rest,” said Robert, “my mother will probably be back very soon.”
“Oh no, it is best for us to get home,” said Mrs Ainslie. “Tell your dear mother we were so sorry to miss her. You were very merry with your friend, Mr Robert, when we came up to the house.”
“My friend?” said Robbie, startled. “Yes—I have a friend in the house.”
“All the village knows that,” said the lady, “butnot who he is. Now I have the advantage of the rest, for I saw him through the window.”
Robert was still more startled and disturbed. “We’re—not fond of society—neither he nor I. I was trying to explain to Susie; but it sounds disagreeable. I—can’t leave him, and he knows nobody, so he won’t come with me.”
“Tell him he has an acquaintance now. You will come to see me, won’t you? I’ve been a great deal about the world, and I’ve met almost everybody—perhaps you, Mr Robert, I thought so the other day, and certainly—most other people: you can come to see me when you go out for your night walks that people talk of so. Oh, I like night walks. I might perhaps go out a bit with you. Dark is very long of coming these Scotch nights, ain’t it? But one of these evenings I’ll look out for you.” She paused here, and gave him a malicious look through her veil. “I’ll look for you, Mr Robert—and Lew.”
Robert stood thunderstruck as the ladies went away. Susie’s eyes had sought his with a wistful look, a sort of appeal for a word to herself, a something to be said which should not be merely formal. But Robbie was far too much concerned to have a thought to spare for Susie. She had not heard Mrs Ainslie’s last words: if she had heard them, she would have cared nothing, nor thought anything of them. What could this woman be to Robbie? was she trying to charm himas she had charmed the innocent unconscious minister? Susie turned away indignantly, and with a sore heart. She saw that she was nothing to her old comrade, her early lover; but yet she did not know how entirely she was nothing to him, and how full his mind was of another interest. He hurried back into the dining-room with panic in his soul. Lew lay stretched out on his chair as Mrs Ainslie had seen him; the warm afternoon and the heavy meal had overcome him; his long legs stretched half across the room; his head was thrown back on the high back of his chair. His eyes were shut, his mouth a little open. More complete rest never enveloped and soothed any fat and greasy citizen after dinner. Robert looked at him with mingled irritation and admiration. It is true that there was no thought of peril in the outlaw’s mind—this long interval of quiet had put all his alarms to sleep—but he would have been equally reckless, equally ready to take his rest and his pleasure, had he been consciously in the midst of his foes.