CHAPTER XIII: THE MARQUIS OF LOSSIE
The next morning rose as lovely as if the mantle of the departing Resurrection day had fallen upon it. Malcolm rose with it, hastened to his boat, and pulled out into the bay for an hour or two's fishing. Nearly opposite the great conglomerate rock at the western end of the dune, called the Bored Craig (Perforated Crag) because of a large hole that went right through it, he began to draw in his line. Glancing shoreward as he leaned over the gunwale, he spied at the foot .of the rock, near the opening, a figure in white, seated, with bowed head. It was of course the mysterious lady, whom he had twice before seen thereabout at this unlikely if not untimely hour; but with yesterday fresh in his mind, how could he fail to see in her an angel of the resurrection waiting at the sepulchre to tell the glad news that the Lord was risen?
Many were the glances he cast shoreward as he rebaited his line, and, having thrown it again into the water, sat waiting until it should be time to fire the swivel. Still the lady sat on, in her whiteness a creature of the dawn, without even lifting her head. At length, having added a few more fishes to the little heap in the bottom of his boat, and finding his watch bear witness that the hour was at hand, he seated himself on his thwart, and rowed lustily to the shore, his bosom filled with the hope of yet another sight of the lovely face, and another hearing of the sweet English voice and speech. But the very first time he turned his head to look, he saw but the sloping foot of the rock sink bare into the shore. No white robed angel sat at the gate of the resurrection; no moving thing was visible on the far vacant sands. When he reached the top of the dune, there was no living creature beyond but a few sheep feeding on the thin grass. He fired the gun, rowed back to the Seaton, ate his breakfast, and set out to carry the best of his fish to the House.
The moment he turned the corner of her street, he saw Mrs Catanach standing on her threshold with her arms akimbo; although she was always tidy, and her house spotlessly trim, she yet seemed forever about the door, on the outlook at least, if not on the watch.
"What hae ye in yer bit basket the day, Ma'colm?" she said, with a peculiar smile, which was not sweet enough to restore vanished confidence.
"Naething guid for dogs," answered Malcolm, and was walking past.
But she made a step forward, and, with a laugh meant to indicate friendly amusement, said,
"Let's see what's intill't, ony gait (anyhow).—The doggie's awa on 's traivels the day."
"'Deed, Mistress Catanach," persisted Malcolm, "I canna say I like to hae my ain fish flung i' my face, nor yet to see ill-faured tykes rin awa' wi' 't afore my verra een."
After the warning given him by Miss Horn, and the strange influence her presence had had on his grandfather, Malcolm preferred keeping up a negative quarrel with the woman.
"Dinna ca' ill names," she returned: "my dog wad tak it waur to be ca'd an ill faured tyke, nor to hae fish flung in his face. Lat's see what's i' yer basket, I say."
As she spoke, she laid her hand on the basket, but Malcolm drew back, and turned away towards the gate.
"Lord safe us!" she cried, with a yelling laugh; "ye're no feared at an auld wife like me?"
"I dinna ken; maybe ay an' maybe no—I wadna say. But I dinna want to hae onything to du wi' ye, mem."
"Ma'colm MacPhail," said Mrs Catanach, lowering her voice to a hoarse whisper, while every trace of laughter vanished from her countenance, "ye hae had mair to du wi' me nor ye ken, an' aiblins ye'll hae mair yet nor ye can weel help. Sae caw canny, my man."
"Ye may hae the layin' o' me oot," said Malcolm, "but it sanna be wi' my wull; an' gien I hae ony life left i' me, I s' gie ye a fleg (fright)."
"Ye may get a war yersel': I hae frichtit the deid afore noo. Sae gang yer wa's to Mistress Coorthoup, wi' a flech (flea) i' yer lug (ear). I wuss ye luck—sic luck as I wad wuss ye I—"
Her last words sounded so like a curse, that to overcome a cold creep, Malcolm had to force a laugh.
The cook at the House bought all his fish, for they had had none for the last few days, because of the storm; and he was turning to go home by the river side, when he heard a tap on a window, and saw Mrs Courthope beckoning him to another door.
"His lordship desired me to send you to him, Malcolm, the next time you called," she said.
"Weel, mem, here I am," answered the youth.
"You'll find him in the flower garden," she said. "He's up early today for a wonder."
He left his basket at the top of the stairs that led down the rock to the level of the burn, and walked up the valley of the stream.
The garden was a curious old fashioned place, with high hedges, and close alleys of trees, where two might have wandered long without meeting, and it was some time before he found any hint of the presence of the marquis. At length, however, he heard voices, and following the sound, walked along one of the alleys till he came to a little arbour, where he discovered the marquis seated, and, to his surprise, the white robed lady of the sands beside him. A great deer hound at his master's feet was bristling his mane, and baring his eye teeth with a growl, but the girl had a hold of his collar.
"Who are you?" asked the marquis rather gruffly, as if he had never seen him before.
"I beg yer lordship's pardon," said Malcolm, "but they telled me yer lordship wantit to see me, and sent me to the flooer garden. Will I gang, or will I bide?"
The marquis looked at him for a moment, frowningly, and made no reply. But the frown gradually relaxed before Malcolm's modest but unflinching gaze, and the shadow of a smile slowly usurped its place. He still kept silent, however.
"Am I to gang or bide, my lord?" repeated Malcolm.
"Can't you wait for an answer?"
"As lang's yer lordship likes—Will I gang an' walk aboot, mem —my leddy, till his lordship's made up his min'? Wad that please him, duv ye think?" he said, in the tone of one who seeks advice.
But the girl only smiled, and the marquis said, "Go to the devil."
"I maun luik to yer lordship for the necessar' directions," rejoined Malcolm.
"Your tongue's long enough to inquire as you go," said the marquis.
A reply in the same strain rushed to Malcolm's lips, but he checked himself in time, and stood silent, with his bonnet in his band, fronting the two. The marquis sat gazing as if he had nothing to say to him, but after a few moments the lady spoke—not to Malcolm, however.
"Is there any danger in boating here, papa?" she said.
"Not more, I daresay, than there ought to be," replied the marquis listlessly. "Why do you ask?"
"Because I should so like a row! I want to see how the shore looks to the mermaids."
"Well, I will take you some day, if we can find a proper boat."
"Is yours a proper boat?" she asked, turning to Malcolm with a sparkle of fun in her eyes.
"That depen's on my lord's definition o' proper."
"Definition!" repeated the marquis.
"Is 't ower lang a word, my lord?" asked Malcolm.
The marquis only smiled.
"I ken what ye mean. It's a strange word in a fisher lad's mou', ye think. But what for should na a fisher lad hae a smatterin' o' loagic, my lord? For Greek or Laitin there's but sma' opportunity o' exerceese in oor pairts; but for loagic, a fisher body may aye haud his ban' in i' that. He can aye be tryin' 't upo' 's wife, or 's guid mother, or upo' 's boat, or upo' the fish whan they winna tak. Loagic wad save a heap o' cursin' an' ill words—amo' the fisher fowk, I mean, my lord."
"Have you been to college?"
"Na, my lord—the mair's the pity! But I've been to the school sin' ever I can min'."
"Do they teach logic there?"
"A kin' o' 't. Mr Graham sets us to try oor ban' whiles—jist to mak 's a bit gleg (quick and keen), ye ken."
"You don't mean you go to school still?"
"I dinna gang reg'lar; but I gang as aften as Mr Graham wants me to help him, an' I aye gether something."
"So it 's schoolmaster you are as well as fisherman? Two strings to your bow!—Who pays you for teaching?"
"Ow! naebody. Wha wad pay me for that?"
"Why, the schoolmaster."
"Na, but that wad be an affront, my lord!"
"How can you afford the time for nothing?"
"The time comes to little, compairt wi' what Mr Graham gies me i' the lang forenichts—i' the winter time, ye ken, my lord, whan the sea's whiles ower contumahcious to be meddlet muckle wi'."
"But you have to support your grandfather."
"My gran'father wad be ill pleased to hear ye say 't, my lord. He's terrible independent; an' what wi' his pipes, an' his lamps, an' his shop, he could keep's baith. It's no muckle the likes o' us wants. He winna lat me gang far to the fishin', so that I hae the mair time to read an' gang to Mr Graham."
As the youth spoke, the marquis eyed him with apparently growing interest.
"But you haven't told me whether your boat is a proper one," said the lady.
"Proper eneuch, mem, for what's required o' her. She taks guid fish."
"But is it a proper boat for me to have a row in?"
"No wi' that goon on, mem, as I telled ye afore."
"The water won't get in, will it?"
"No more than's easy gotten oot again."
"Do you ever put up a sail?"
"Whiles—a wee bit o' a lug sail."
"Nonsense, Flow!" said the marquis. "I'll see about it."
Then turning to Malcolm,—"You may go," he said. "When I want you I will send for you."
Malcolm thought with himself that he had sent for him this time before he wanted him; but he made his bow, and departed—not without disappointment, for he had expected the marquis to say something about his grandfather going to the House with his pipes, a request he would fain have carried to the old man to gladden his heart withal.
Lord Lossie had been one of the boon companions of the Prince of Wales—considerably higher in type, it is true, yet low enough to accept usage for law, and measure his obligation by the custom of his peers: duty merely amounted to what was expected of him, and honour, the flitting shadow of the garment of truth, was his sole divinity. Still he had a heart, and it would speak,—so long at least, as the object affecting it was present. But, alas! it had no memory. Like the unjust judge, he might redress a wrong that cried to him, but out of sight and hearing it had for him no existence. To a man he would not have told a deliberate lie—except, indeed, a woman was in the case; but to women he had lied enough to sink the whole ship of fools. Nevertheless, had the accusing angel himself called him a liar, he would have instantly offered him his choice of weapons.
There was in him by nature, however, a certain generosity which all the vice he had shared in had not quenched. Overbearing, he was not yet too overbearing to appreciate a manly carriage, and had been pleased with what some would have considered the boorishness of Malcolm's behaviour—such not perceiving that it had the same source as the true aristocratic bearing—namely, a certain unselfish confidence which is the mother of dignity.
He had, of course, been a spendthrift—and so much the better, being otherwise what he was; for a cautious and frugal voluptuary is about the lowest style of man. Hence he had never been out of difficulties, and when, a year or so agone, he succeeded to his brother's marquisate, he was, notwithstanding his enlarged income, far too much involved to hope any immediate rescue from them. His new property, however, would afford him a refuge from troublesome creditors; there he might also avoid expenditure for a season, and perhaps rally the forces of a dissolute life; the place was not new to him, having, some twenty years before, spent nearly twelve months there, of which time the recollections were not altogether unpleasant: weighing all these things he had made up his mind, and here he was at Lossie House.
The marquis was about fifty years of age, more worn than his years would account for, yet younger than his years in expression, for his conscience had never bitten him very deep. He was middle sized, broad shouldered but rather thin, with fine features of the aquiline Greek type, light blue hazy eyes, and fair hair, slightly curling and streaked with gray. His manners were those of one polite for his own sake. To his remote inferiors he was kind—would even encourage them to liberties, but might in turn take greater with them than they might find agreeable. He was fond of animals—would sit for an hour stroking the head of Demon, his great Irish deerhound; but at other times would tease him to a wrath which touched the verge of dangerous. He was fond of practical jokes, and would not hesitate to indulge himself even in such as were incompatible with any genuine refinement: the sort had been in vogue in his merrier days, and Lord Lossie had ever been one of the most fertile in inventing, and loudest in enjoying them. For the rest, if he was easily enraged, he was readily appeased; could drink a great deal, but was no drunkard; and held as his creed that a God had probably made the world and set it going, but that he did not care a brass farthing, as he phrased it, how it went on, or what such an insignificant being as a man did or left undone in it. Perhaps he might amuse himself with it, he said, but he doubted it. As to men, he believed every man loved himself supremely, and therefore was in natural warfare with every other man. Concerning women he professed himself unable to give a definite utterance of any sort—and yet, he would add, he had had opportunities.
The mother of Florimel had died when she was a mere child, and from that time she had been at school until her father brought her away to share his fresh honours. She knew little, that little was not correct, and had it been, would have yet been of small value. At school she had been under many laws, and had felt their slavery: she was now in the third heaven of delight with her liberty. But the worst of foolish laws is, that when the insurgent spirit casts them off, it is but too ready to cast away with them the genial self-restraint which these fretting trammels have smothered beneath them.
Her father regarded her as a child, of whom it was enough to require that she should keep out of mischief. He said to himself now and then that he must find a governess for her; but as yet he had not begun to look for one. Meantime he neither exercised the needful authority over her, nor treated her as a companion. His was a shallow nature, never very pleasantly conscious of itself except in the whirl of excitement, and the glitter of crossing lights: with a lovely daughter by his side, he neither sought to search into her being, nor to aid its unfolding, but sat brooding over past pleasures, or fancying others yet in store for him—lost in the dull flow of life along the lazy reach to whose mire its once tumultuous torrent had now descended. But, indeed, what could such a man have done for the education of a young girl? How many of the qualities he understood and enjoyed in women could he desire to see developed in his daughter? There was yet enough of the father in him to expect those qualities in her to which in other women he had been an insidious foe; but had he not done what in him lay to destroy his right of claiming such from her?
So Lady Florimel was running wild, and enjoying it. As long as she made her appearance at meals, and looked happy, her father would give himself no trouble about her. How he himself managed to live in those first days without company—what he thought about or speculated upon, it were hard to say. All he could be said to do was to ride here and there over the estate with his steward, Mr Crathie, knowing little and caring less about farming, or crops, or cattle. He had by this time, however, invited a few friends to visit him, and expected their arrival before long.
"How do you like this dull life, Flory?" he said, as they walked up the garden to breakfast.
"Dull, papa!" she returned. "You never were at a girls' school, or you wouldn't call this dull. It is the merriest life in the world. To go where you like, and have miles of room! And such room! It's the loveliest place in the world, papa!"
He smiled a small, satisfied smile, and stooping stroked his Demon.
CHAPTER XIV: MEG PARTAN'S LAMP
Malcolm went down the riverside, not over pleased with the marquis; for, although unconscious of it as such, he had a strong feeling of personal dignity.
As he threaded the tortuous ways of the Seaton towards his own door, he met sounds of mingled abuse and apology. Such were not infrequent in that quarter, for one of the women who lived there was a termagant, and the door of her cottage was generally open. She was known as Meg Partan. Her husband's real name was of as little consequence in life as it is in my history, for almost everybody in the fishing villages of that coast was and is known by his to-name, or nickname, a device for distinction rendered absolutely necessary by the paucity of surnames occasioned by the persistent intermarriage of the fisher folk. Partan is the Scotch for crab, but the immediate recipient of the name was one of the gentlest creatures in the place, and hence it had been surmised by some that, the grey mare being the better horse, the man was thus designated from the crabbedness of his wife; but the probability is he brought the agnomen with him from school, where many such apparently misfitting names are unaccountably generated.
In the present case, however, the apologies were not issuing as usual from the mouth of Davy Partan, but from that of the blind piper. Malcolm stood for a moment at the door to understand the matter of contention, and prepare him to interfere judiciously.
"Gien ye suppose, piper, 'at ye're peyed to drive fowk oot o' their beds at sic hoors as yon, it 's time the toon cooncil was informed o' yer mistak," said Meg Partan, with emphasis on the last syllable.
"Ta coot peoples up in ta town are not half so hart upon her as you, Mistress Partan," insinuated poor Duncan, who, knowing himself in fault, was humble; "and it 's tere tat she's paid," he added, with a bridling motion, "and not town here pelow."
"Dinna ye glorifee yersel' to suppose there's a fisher, lat alane a fisher's wife, in a' the haill Seaton 'at wad lippen (trust) till an auld haiveril like you to hae them up i' the mornin'! Haith! I was oot o' my bed hoors or I hard the skirlin' o' your pipes. Troth I ken weel hoo muckle ower ear' ye was! But what fowk taks in han', fowk sud put oot o' han' in a proper mainner, and no misguggle 't a'thegither like yon. An' for what they say i' the toon, there's Mistress Catanach—"
"Mistress Catanach is a paad 'oman," said Duncan.
"I wad advise you, piper, to haud a quaiet sough about her. She's no to be meddlet wi', Mistress Catanach, I can tell ye. Gien ye anger her, it'll be the waur for ye. The neist time ye hae a lyin' in, she'll be raxin' (reaching) ye a hairless pup, or, deed, maybe a stan' o' bagpipes, as the produck."
"Her nain sel' will not pe requiring her sairvices, Mistress Partan; she'll pe leafing tat to you, if you'll excuse me," said Duncan.
"Deed, ye're richt there! An auld speldin' (dried haddock) like you! Ha! ha! ha!"
Malcolm judged it time to interfere, and stepped into the cottage. Duncan was seated in the darkest corner of the room, with an apron over his knees, occupied with a tin lamp. He had taken out the wick and laid its flat tube on the hearth, had emptied the oil into a saucer, and was now rubbing the lamp vigorously: cleanliness rather than brightness must have been what he sought to produce.
Malcolm's instinct taught him to side so far with the dame concerning Mrs Catanach, and thereby turn the torrent away from his grandfather.
"'Deed ye're richt there, Mistress Findlay!" he said. "She's no to be meddlet wi'. She's no mowse (safe)."
Malcolm was a favourite with Meg, as with all the women of the place; hence she did not even start in resentment at his sudden appearance, but, turning to Duncan, exclaimed victoriously,– "Hear till her ain oye! He's a laad o' sense!"
"Ay, hear to him!" rejoined the old man with pride. "My Malcolm will always pe speaking tat which will pe worth ta hearing with ta ears. Poth of you and me will be knowing ta Mistress Catanach pretty well—eh, Malcolm, my son? We'll not be trusting her fery too much—will we, my son?"
"No a hair, daddy," returned Malcolm.
"She's a dooms clever wife, though; an' ane 'at ye may lippen till i' the w'y o' her ain callin'," said Meg Partan, whose temper had improved a little under the influence of the handsome youth's presence and cheery speech.
"She'll not pe toubting it," responded Duncan; "put, ach! ta voman 'll be hafing a crim feesage and a fearsome eye!"
Like all the blind, he spoke as if he saw perfectly.
"Weel, I hae hard fowk say 'at ye bude (behoved) to hae the second sicht," said Mrs Findlay, laughing rudely; "but wow! it stan's ye in sma' service gien that be a' it comes till. She's a guid natur'd, sonsy luikin' wife as ye wad see; an' for her een, they're jist sic likes mine ain.—Haena ye near dune wi' that lamp yet?"
"The week of it 'll pe shust a lettle out of orter," answered the old man. "Ta pairns has been' pulling it up with a peen from ta top, and not putting it in at ta hole for ta purpose. And she'll pe thinking you'll be cleaning off ta purnt part with a peen yourself, rna'am, and not with ta pair of scissors she tolt you of, Mistress Partan."
"Gae 'wa' wi' yer nonsense!" cried Meg. "Daur ye say 1 dinna ken hoo to trim an uilyie lamp wi' the best blin' piper that ever cam frae the bare leggit Heelans?"
"A choke's a choke, ma'am," said Duncan, rising with dignity; "put for a laty to make a choke of a man's pare leks is not ta propriety!"
"Oot o' my hoose wi' ye!" screamed the she Partan. "Wad ye threep (insist) upo' me onything I said was less nor proaper. 'At I sud say what wadna stan' the licht as weels the bare houghs o' ony heelan' rascal 'at ever lap a lawlan' dyke!"
"Hoot toot, Mistress Findlay," interposed Malcolm, as his grandfather strode from the door; "ye maunna forget 'at he's auld an' blin'; an' a' heelan' fowk's some kittle (touchy) about their legs."
"Deil shochle them!" exclaimed the Partaness; "what care I for 's legs!"
Duncan had brought the germ of this ministry of light from his native Highlands, where he had practised it in his own house, no one but himself being permitted to clean, or fill, or, indeed, trim the lamp. How first this came about, I do not believe the old man himself knew. But he must have had some feeling of a call to the work; for he had not been a month in Portlossie, before he had installed himself in several families as the genius of their lamps, and he gradually extended the relation until it comprehended almost all the houses in the village.
It was strange and touching to see the sightless man thus busy about light for others. A marvellous symbol of faith he was—not only believing in sight, but in the mysterious, and to him altogether unintelligible means by which others saw! In thus lending his aid to a faculty in which he had no share, he himself followed the trail of the garments of Light, stooping ever and anon to lift and bear her skirts. He haunted the steps of the unknown Power, and flitted about the walls of her temple as we mortals haunt the borders of the immortal land, knowing nothing of what lies behind the unseen veil, yet believing in an unrevealed grandeur. Or shall we say he stood like the forsaken merman, who, having no soul to be saved, yet lingered and listened outside the prayer echoing church? Only old Duncan had got farther: though he saw not a glimmer of the glory, he yet asserted his part and lot in it, by the aiding of his fellows to that of which he lacked the very conception himself. He was a doorkeeper in the house, yea, by faith the blind man became even a priest in the temple of Light.
Even when his grandchild was the merest baby, he would never allow the gloaming to deepen into night without kindling for his behoof the brightest and cleanest of train oil lamps. The women who at first looked in to offer their services, would marvel at the trio of blind man, babe, and burning lamp, and some would expostulate with him on the needless waste. But neither would he listen to their words, nor accept their offered assistance in dressing or undressing the child. The sole manner in which he would consent to avail himself of their willingness to help him, was to leave the baby in charge of this or that neighbour while he went his rounds with the bagpipes: when he went lamp cleaning he always took him along with him.
By this change of guardians Malcolm was a great gainer, for thus he came to be surreptitiously nursed by a baker's dozen of mothers, who had a fund of not very wicked amusement in the lamentations of the old man over his baby's refusal of nourishment, and his fears that he was pining away. But while they honestly declared that a healthier child had never been seen in Portlossie, they were compelled to conceal the too satisfactory reasons of the child's fastidiousness; for they were persuaded that the truth would only make Duncan terribly jealous, and set him on contriving how at once to play his pipes and carry his baby.
He had certain days for visiting certain houses, and cleaning the lamps in them. The housewives had at first granted him as a privilege the indulgence of his whim, and as such alone had Duncan regarded it; but by and by, when they found their lamps burn so much better from being properly attended to, they began to make him some small return; and at length it became the custom with every housewife who accepted his services, to pay him a halfpenny a week during the winter months for cleaning her lamp. He never asked for it; if payment was omitted, never even hinted at it; received what was given him thankfully; and was regarded with kindness, and, indeed, respect, by all. Even Mrs Partan, as he alone called her, was his true friend: no intensity of friendship could have kept her from scolding. I believe if we could thoroughly dissect the natures of scolding women, we should find them in general not at all so unfriendly as they are unpleasant.
A small trade in oil arose from his connection with the lamps, and was added to the list of his general dealings. The fisher folk made their own oil, but sometimes it would run short, and then recourse was had to Duncan's little store, prepared by himself of the best; chiefly, now, from the livers of fish caught by his grandson. With so many sources of income, no one wondered at his getting on. Indeed no one would have been surprised to hear, long before Malcolm had begun to earn anything, that the old man had already laid by a trifle.