Heather and Snow

CHAPTER XL
MRS. GORDON

When Mrs. Gordon came to herself, she thought to behave as if nothing had happened, and rang the bell to order her carriage. The maid informed her that the coachman had driven away with it before lunch, and had not said where he was going.

'Driven away with it!' cried her mistress, starting to her feet; 'I gave him no orders!'

'I saw the laird giein him directions, mem,' rejoined the maid.

Mrs. Gordon sat down again. She began to remember what her son had said when first he gave her the carriage.

'Where did he send him?' she asked.

'I dinna ken, mem.'

'Go and ask the laird to step this way.'

'Please, mem, he's no i' the hoose. I ken, for I saw him gang—hoors ago.'

'Did he go in the carriage?'

'No, mem; he gaed upo' 's ain fit.'

'Perhaps he's come home by this time!'

'I'm sure he's no that, mem.'

Mrs. Gordon went to her room, all but finished the bottle of whisky, and threw herself on her bed.

Toward morning she woke with aching head and miserable mind. Now dozing, now tossing about in wretchedness, she lay till the afternoon. No one came near her, and she wanted no one.

At length, dizzy and despairing, her head in torture, and her heart sick, she managed to get out of bed, and, unable to walk, literally crawled to the cupboard in which she had put away the precious bottle:—joy! there was yet a glass in it! With the mouth of it to her lips, she was tilting it up to drain the last drop, when the voice of her son came cheerily from the drive, on which her window looked down:

'See what I've brought you, mother!' he called.

Fear came upon her; she took the bottle from her mouth, put it again in the cupboard, and crept back to her bed, her brain like a hive buzzing with devils.

When Francis entered the house, he was not surprised to learn that she had not left her room. He did not try to see her.

The next morning she felt a little better, and had some tea. Still she did not care to get up. She shrank from meeting her son, and the abler she grew to think, the more unwilling she was to see him. He came to her room, but she heard him coming, turned her head the other way, and pretended to be asleep. Again and again, almost involuntarily, she half rose, remembering the last of the whisky, but as often lay down again, loathing the cause of her headache.

Stronger and stronger grew her unwillingness to face her son: she had so thoroughly proved herself unfit to be trusted! She began to feel towards him as she had sometimes felt toward her mother when she had been naughty. She began to see that she could make her peace, with him or with herself, only by acknowledging her weakness. Aided by her misery, she had begun to perceive that she could not trust herself, and ought to submit to be treated as the poor creature she was. She had resented the idea that she could not keep herself from drink if she pleased, for she knew she could; but she had not pleased! How could she ever ask him to trust her again!

What further passed in her, I cannot tell. It is an unfailing surprise when anyone, more especially anyone who has hitherto seemed without strength of character, turns round and changes. The only thing Mrs. Gordon then knew as helping her, was the strong hand of her son upon her, and the consciousness that, had her husband lived, she could never have given way as she had. But there was another help which is never wanting where it can find an entrance; and now first she began to pray, 'Lead me not into temptation.'

There was one excuse which David alone knew to make for her—that her father was a hard drinker, and his father before him.

Doubtless, during all the period of her excesses, the soul of the woman in her better moments had been ashamed to know her the thing she was. It could not, when she was at her worst, comport with her idea of a lady, poor as that idea was, to drink whisky till she did not know what she did next. And when the sleeping woman God made, wakes up to see in what a house she lives, she will soon grasp at besom and bucket, nor cease her cleansing while spot is left on wall or ceiling or floor.

How the waking comes, who can tell! God knows what he wants us to do, and what we can do, and how to help us. What I have to tell is that, the next morning, Mrs. Gordon came down to breakfast, and finding her son already seated at the table, came up behind him, without a word set the bottle with the last glass of whisky in it before him, went to her place at the table, gave him one sorrowful look, and sat down.

His heart understood, and answered with a throb of joy so great that he knew it first as pain.

Neither spoke until breakfast was almost over. Then Francis said,

'You've grown so much younger, mother, it is quite time you took to riding again! I've been buying a horse for you. Remembering the sort of pony you bought for me, I thought I should like to try whether I could not please you with a horse of my buying.'

'Silly boy!' she returned, with a rather pitiful laugh, 'do you suppose at my age I'm going to make a fool of myself on horseback? You forget I'm an old woman!'

'Not a bit of it, mother! If ever you rode as David Barclay says you did, I don't see why you shouldn't ride still. He's a splendid creature! David told me you liked a big fellow. Just put on your habit, mammy, and we'll take a gallop across, and astonish the old man a bit.'

'My dear boy, I have no nerve! I'm not the woman I was! It's my own fault, I know, and I'm both sorry and ashamed.'

'We are both going to try to be good, mother dear!' faltered Francis.

The poor woman pressed her handkerchief with both hands to her face, and wept for a few moments in silence, then rose and left the room. In an hour she was ready, and out looking for Francis. Her habit was a little too tight for her, but wearable enough. The horses were sent for, and they mounted.

CHAPTER XLI
TWO HORSEWOMEN

There was at Corbyknowe a young, well-bred horse which David had himself reared: Kirsty had been teaching him to carry a lady. For her hostess in Edinburgh, discovering that she was fond of riding and that she had no saddle, had made her a present of her own: she had not used it for many years, but it was in very good condition, and none the worse for being a little old-fashioned. That same morning Kirsty had put on a blue riding-habit, which also lady Macintosh had given her, and was out on the highest slope of the farm, hoping to catch a sight of the two on horseback together, and so learn that her scheme was a success. She had been on the outlook for about an hour, when she saw them coming along between the castle and Corbyknowe, and went straight for a certain point in the road so as to reach it simultaneously with them. For she had just spied a chance of giving Gordon the opportunity which her father had told her he was longing for, of saying something about her to his mother.

'Who can that be?' said Mrs. Gordon as they trotted gently along, when she spied the lady on horseback. 'She rides well! But she seems to be alone! Is there really nobody with her?'

As she spoke, the young horse came over a dry-stane-dyke in fine style.

'Why, she's an accomplished horsewoman!' exclaimed Mrs. Gordon. 'She must be a stranger! There's not a lady within thirty miles of Weelset can ride like that!'

'No such stranger as you think, mother!' rejoined Francis. 'That's Kirsty Barclay of Corbyknowe.'

'Never, Francis! The girl rides like a lady!'

Francis smiled, perhaps a little triumphantly. Something like what lay in the smile the mother read in it, for it roused at once both her jealousy and her pride. Her son to fall in love with a girl that was not even a lady! A Gordon of Weelset to marry a tenant's daughter! Impossible!

Kirsty was now in the road before them, riding slowly in the same direction. It was the progress, however, not the horse that was slow: his frolics, especially when the other horses drew near, kept his rider sufficiently occupied.

Mrs. Gordon quickened her pace, and passed without turning her head or looking at her, but so close, and with so sudden a rush that Kirsty's horse half wheeled, and bounded over the dyke by the roadside. Her rudeness annoyed her son, and he jumped his horse into the field and joined Kirsty, letting his mother ride on, and contenting himself with keeping her in sight. After a few moments' talk, however, he proposed that they should overtake her, and cutting off a great loop of the road, they passed her at speed, and turned and met her. She had by this time got a little over her temper, and was prepared to behave with propriety, which meant—the dignity becoming her.

'What a lovely horse you have, Miss Barclay!' she said, without other greeting. 'How much do you want for him?'

'He is but half-broken,' answered Kirsty, 'or I would offer to change with you. I almost wonder you look at him from the back of your own!'

'He is a beauty—is he not? This is my first trial of him. The laird gave me him only this morning. He is as quiet as a lamb.'

'There, Donal,' said Kirsty to her horse, 'tak example by yer betters! Jist luik hoo he stan's!—The laird has a true eye for a horse, ma'am,' she went on, 'but he always says you gave it him.'

'Always! hm!' said Mrs. Gordon to herself, but she looked kindly at her son.

'How did you learn to ride so well, Kirsty?' she asked.

'I suppose I got it from my father, ma'am! I began with the cows.'

'Ah, how is old David?' returned Mrs. Gordon. 'I have seen him once or twice about the castle of late, but have not spoken to him.'

'He is very well, thank you.—Will you not come up to the Knowe and rest a moment? My mother will be very glad to see you.'

'Not to-day, Kirsty. I haven't been on horseback for years, and am already tired. We shall turn here. Good-morning!'

'Good-morning, ma'am! Good-bye, Mr. Gordon!' said Kirsty cheerfully, as she wheeled her horse to set him straight at a steep grassy brae.

CHAPTER XLII
THE LAIRD AND HIS MOTHER

The laird and his mother sat and looked at Kirsty as her horse tore up the brae.

'She can ride—can't she, mother?' said Francis.

'Well enough for a hoiden,' answered Mrs. Gordon.

'She rides to please her horse now, but she'll have him as quiet as yours before long,' rejoined her son, both a little angry and a little amused at her being called a hoiden who was to him like an angel grown young with aeonian life.

'Yes,' resumed his mother, as if she would be fair, 'she does ride well! If only she were a lady, that I might ask her to ride with me! After all it's none of my business what she is—so long as you don't want to marry her!' She concluded, with an attempt at a laugh.

'But I do want to marry her, mother!' rejoined Francis.

A short year before, his mother would have said what was in her heart, and it would not have been pleasant to hear; but now she was afraid of her son, and was silent. But it added to her torture that she must be silent. To be dethroned in castle Weelset by the daughter of one of her own tenants, for as such she thought of them, was indeed galling. 'The impudent quean!' she said to herself, 'she's ridden on her horse into the heart of the laird!' But for the wholesome consciousness of her own shame, which she felt that her son was always sparing, she would have raged like a fury.

'You that might have had any lady in the land!' she said at length.

'If I might, mother, it would be just as vain to look for her equal.'

'You might at least have shown your mother the respect of choosing a lady to sit in her place! You drive me from the house!'

'Mother,' said Francis, 'I have twice asked Kirsty Barclay to be my wife, and she has twice refused me.'

'You may try her again: she had her reasons! She never meant to let you slip! If you got disgusted with her afterwards, she would always have her refusal of you to throw in your teeth.'

Francis laid his hand on his mother's, and stopped her horse.

'Mother, you compel me!' he said. 'When I came home ill, and, as I thought, dying, you called me bad names, and drove me from the house. Kirsty found me in a hole in the earth, actually dying then, and saved my life.'

'Good heavens, Francis! Are you mad still? How dare you tell such horrible falsehoods of your own mother? You never came near me! You went straight to Corbyknowe!'

'Ask Mrs. Bremner if I speak the truth. She ran out after me, but could not get up with me. You drove me out; and if you do not know it now, you do not need to be told how it is that you have forgotten it.'

She knew what he meant, and was silent.

'Then Kirsty went to Edinburgh, to sir Haco Macintosh, and with his assistance brought me to my right mind. If it were not for Kirsty, I should be in my grave, or wandering the earth a maniac. Even alive and well as I am, I should not be with you now had she not shown me my duty.'

'I thought as much! All this tyranny of yours, all your late insolence to your mother, comes from the power of that low-born woman over you! I declare to you, Francis Gordon, if you marry her, I will leave the house.'

He made her no answer, and they rode the rest of the way in silence. But in that silence things grew clearer to him. Why should he take pains to persuade his mother to a consent which she had no right to withhold? His desire was altogether reasonable: why should its fulfilment depend on the unreason of one who had not strength to order her own behaviour? He had to save her, not to please her, gladly as he would have done both!

When he had helped her from the saddle, he would have remounted and ridden at once to Corbyknowe, but feared leaving her. She shut herself in her room till she could bear her own company no longer, and then went to the drawing-room, where Francis read to her, and played several games of backgammon with her. Soon after dinner she retired, saying her ride had wearied her; and the moment Francis knew she was in bed, he got his horse, and galloped to the Knowe.

CHAPTER XLIII
THE CORONATION

When he arrived, there was no light in the house: all had gone to rest. Unwilling to disturb the father and mother, he rode quietly to the back of the house, where Kirsty's room looked on the garden. He called her softly. In a moment she peeped out, then opened her window.

'Cud ye come doon a minute, Kirsty?' said Francis.

'I'll be wi' ye in less time,' she replied; and he had hardly more than dismounted, when she was by his side.

He told her what had passed between him and his mother since she left them.

'It's a rael bonny nicht!' said Kirsty, 'and we'll jist tak oor time to turn the thing ower—that is, gien ye bena tired, Francie. Come, we'll put the beastie up first.'

She led the horse into the dark stable, took his bridle off, put a halter on him, slackened his girths, and gave him a feed of corn—all in the dark; which things done, she and her lover set out for the Horn.

The whole night seemed thinking of the day that was gone. All doing seemed at an end, yea God himself to be resting and thinking. The peace of it sank into their bosoms, and filled them so, that they walked a long way without speaking. There was no wind, and no light but the starlight. The air was like the clear dark inside some diamonds. The only sound that broke the stillness as they went was the voice of Kirsty, sweet and low—and it was as if the dim starry vault thought, rather than she uttered, the words she quoted:—

 
           'Summer Night, come from God,
           On your beauty, I see,
           A still wave has flowed
           Of Eternity!'
 

At a certain spot on the ridge of the Horn, Francis stopped.

'This is whaur ye left me this time last year, Kirsty,' he said;'—left me wi' my Maker to mak a man o' me. It was 'maist makin me ower again!'

There was a low stone just visible among the heather; Kirsty seated herself upon it. Francis threw himself among the heather, and lay looking up in her face.

'That mother o' yours is 'maist ower muckle for ye, Francie!' said Kirsty.

'It's no aften, Kirsty, ye tell me what I ken as weel 's yersel!' returned Francis.

'Weel, Francie, ye maun tell me something the night!—Gien it wudna mismuve ye, I wad fain ken hoo ye wan throu that day we pairtit here.'

Without a moment's hesitation, Francis began the tale—giving her to know, however, that in what took place there was much he did not understand so as to tell it again.

When he made an end, Kirsty rose and said,

'Wad ye please to sit upo' that stane, Francie!'

In pure obedience he rose from the heather, and sat upon the stone.

She went behind him, and clasped his head, round the temples, with her shapely, strong, faithful hands.

'I ken ye noo for a man, Francis. Ye hae set yersel to du his wull, and no yer ain: ye're a king; and for want o' a better croon, I croon ye wi my twa ban's.'

Little thought Kirsty how near she came, in word and deed, to the crowning of Dante by Virgil, as recorded toward the close of the Purgatorio.

Then she came round in front of him, he sitting bewildered and taking no part in the solemn ceremony save that of submission, and knelt slowly down before him, laying her head on his knees, and saying,—

'And here's yer kingdom, Francis—my heid and my hert! Du wi' me what ye wull.'

'Come hame wi' me, and help save my mother,' he answered, in a voice choked with emotion.

'I wull,' she said, and would have risen; but he laid his hands on her head, and thus they remained for a time in silence. Then they rose, and went.

They had gone about half-way to the farm before either spoke. Then Kirsty said,—

'Francie, there's ae thing I maun beg o' ye, and but ane—'at ye winna desire me to tak the heid o' yer table. I canna but think it an ungracious thing 'at a young wuman like me, the son's wife, suld put the man's ain mother, his father's wife, oot o' the place whaur his father set her. I'm layin doon no prenciple; I'm sayin only hoo it affecs me. I want to come hame as her dochter, no as mistress o' the hoose in her stead. And ye see, Francie, that'll gie ye anither haud o' her, agen disgracin o' hersel! Promise me, Francie, and I'll sune tak the maist pairt o' the trouble o' her aff o' yer han's.'

'Ye're aye richt, Kirsty!' answered Francis. 'As ye wull.'

CHAPTER XLIV
KIRSTY'S TOCHER

The next morning, Kirsty told her parents that she was going to marry Francie.

'Ye du richt, my bairn,' said her father. 'He's come in sicht o' 's high callin, and it's no possible for ye langer to refuse him.'

'But, eh! what am I to du wantin ye, Kirsty?' moaned her mother. 'Ye min', mother,' answered Kirsty, 'hoo I wad be oot the lang day wi' Steenie, and ye never thoucht ye hadna me!'

'Na, never. I aye kenned I had the twa o' ye.'

'Weel, it's no a God's-innocent but a deil's-gowk I'll hae to luik efter noo, and I maun come hame ilka possible chance to get hertenin frae you and my father, or I winna be able to bide it. Eh, mother, efter Steenie, it'll be awfu' to spen' the day wi' her! It's no 'at ever she'll be fou: I s' see to that!—it's 'at she'll aye be toom!—aye ringin wi' toomness!'

Here Kirsty turned to her father, and said,—

'Wull ye gie me a tocher, father?'

'Ay wull I, lassie,—what ye like, sae far as I hae 't to gie.'

'I want Donal—that's a'. Ye see I maun ride a heap wi' the puir thing, and I wud fain hae something aneth me 'at ye gae me! The cratur'll aye hing to the Knowe, and whan I gie his wull he'll fess me hame o' himsel.—I wud hae likit things to bide as they are, but she wud hae worn puir Francie to the verra deid!'

CHAPTER XLV
KIRSTY'S SONG

Mrs. Gordon manages the house and her reward is to sit at the head of the table. But she pays Kirsty infinitely more for the privilege than any but Kirsty can know, in the form of leisure for things she likes far better than housekeeping—among the rest, for the discovery of such songs as this, the last of hers I have seen:—

  LOVE IS HOME

 
  Love is the part, and love is the whole;
    Love is the robe, and love is the pall;
  Ruler of heart and brain and soul,
    Love is the lord and the slave of all!
  I thank thee, Love, that thou lovest me;
  I thank thee more that I love thee.
 
 
  Love is the rain, and love is the air;
    Love is the earth that holdeth fast;
  Love is the root that is buried there,
    Love is the open flower at last!
  I thank thee, Love all round about,
  That the eyes of my love are looking out.
 
 
  Love is the sun, and love is the sea;
    Love is the tide that comes and goes;
  Flowing and flowing it comes to me;
    Ebbing and ebbing to thee it flows!
  Oh my sun, and my wind, and tide!
  My sea, and my shore, and all beside!
 
 
  Light, oh light that art by showing;
    Wind, oh wind that liv'st by motion;
  Thought, oh thought that art by knowing;
    Will, that art born in self-devotion!
  Love is you, though not all of you know it;
  Ye are not love, yet ye always show it!
 
 
  Faithful creator, heart-longed-for father,
    Home of our heart-infolded brother,
  Home to thee all thy glories gather—
    All are thy love, and there is no other!
  O Love-at-rest; we loves that roam—
  Home unto thee, we are coming home!