The Laird of Norlaw; A Scottish Story

CHAPTER LXIII

The presence of Desirée made no small sensation in the house of Norlaw, which did not quite know what to make of her. The Mistress herself, after that first strange impulse of kin and kindness which prompted her to bring the young stranger home, relapsed into her usual ways, and did not conceal from either son or servant that she expected to be “fashed” by the little Frenchwoman; while Marget, rather displeased that so important a step should be taken without her sanction, and mightily curious to know the reason, was highly impatient at first of Desirée’s name and nation, and discontented with her presence here.

“I canna faddom the Mistress,” said Marget, angrily; “what she’s thinking upon, to bring a young flirt of a Frenchwoman into this decent house, and ane of our lads at home is just beyond me. Do I think her bonnie? No’ me! She’s French, and I daur to say, a papisher to the boot; but the lads will, take my word for it—callants are aye keen about a thing that’s outray. I’m just as thankfu’ as I can be that Huntley’s at the other end of the world—there’s nae fears of our Patie—and Cosmo, you see, he’s ower young.”

This latter proposition Marget repeated to herself as she went about her dairy. It did not seem an entirely satisfactory statement of the case, for if Cosmo was too young to be injured, Desirée was also a couple of years his junior, and could scarcely be supposed old enough to do any great harm.

“Ay, but it’s in them frae their cradle,” said the uncharitable Marget, as she rinsed her great wooden bowls and set them ready for the milk. The honest retainer of the family was quite disturbed by this new arrival. She could not “get her mouth about the like of thae outlandish names,” so she never called Desirée any thing but Miss, which title in Marget’s lips, unassociated with a Christian name, was by no means a title of high respect, and she grumbled as she was quite unwont to grumble, over the additional trouble of another inmate. Altogether Marget was totally dissatisfied.

While Desirée, suddenly dropped into this strange house, every custom of which was strange to her, and where girlhood and its occupations were unknown, felt somewhat forlorn and desolate, it must be confessed, and sometimes even longed to be back again in Melmar, where there were many women, and where her pretty needle-works and graceful accomplishments were not reckoned frivolous, the Mistress was busy all day long, and when she had ended her household employments, sat down with her work-basket to mend shirts or stockings with a steadiness which did not care to accept any assistance.

“Thank you, they’re for my son, Huntley; I like to do them a’ mysel’,” she would answer to Desirée’s offer of aid. “Much obliged to you, but Cosmo’s stockings, poor callant, are no work for the like of you.” In like manner, Desirée was debarred from the most trifling assistance in the house. Marget was furious when she ventured to wash the Mistress’s best tea-service, or to sweep the hearth on occasion.

“Na, miss, we’re no’ come to that pass in Norlaw that a stranger visitor needs to file her fingers,” said Marget, taking the brush from Desirée’s hand; so that, condemned to an uncomfortable idleness in the midst of busy people, and aware that the Mistress’s “Humph!” on one occasion, at least, referred to her pretty embroideries, poor little Desirée found little better for it than to wander round and round the old castle of Norlaw, and up the banks of Tyne, where, to say truth, Cosmo liked nothing better than to wander along with her, talking about her mother, about St. Ouen, about his travels, about every thing in earth and heaven.

And whether Cosmo was “ower young” remains to be seen.

But Desirée had not been long in Norlaw when letters came from Madame Roche, one to the Mistress, brief yet effusive, thanking that reserved Scottish woman for her kindness to “my little one;” another to Cosmo, in which he was called my child and my friend so often, that though he was pleased, he was yet half ashamed to show the epistle to his mother; and a third to Desirée herself. This was the most important of the three, and contained Madame Roche’s scheme of poetic justice. This is what the Scotch-French mother said to little Desirée:—

“My child, we, who have been so poor, are coming to a great fortune. It is as strange as a romance, and we can never forget how it has come to us. Ay, my Desirée, what noble hearts! what princely young men! Despite of our good fortune, my heart bleeds for the generous Huntley, for it is he who is disinherited. Must this be, my child? He is far away, he knows not we are found; he will return to find his inheritance gone. But I have trained my Desirée to love honor and virtue, and to be generous as the Livingstones. Shall I say to you, my child, what would glad my heart most to see? Our poor Marie has thrown away her happiness and her liberty; she can not reward any man, however noble; she can not make any compensation to those whom we must supplant, and her heart wanders after that vagabond, that abandoned one! But my Desirée is young, only a child, and has not begun to think of lovers. My love, keep your little heart safe till Huntley returns—your mother bids you, Desirée. Look not at any one, think not of any one, till you have seen this noble Huntley; it is the only return you can give—nay, my little one! it is all I can do to prove that I am not ungrateful. This Melmar, which I had lost and won without knowing it, will be between Marie and you when I die. You can not give it all back to your kinsman, but he will think that half which your sister has doubly made up, my child, when I put into his hand the hand of my Desirée; and we shall all love each other, and be good and happy, like a fairy tale.

“This is your mamma’s fondest wish, my pretty one: you must keep your heart safe, you must love Huntley, you must give him back half of the inheritance. My poor Marie and I shall live together, and you shall be near us; and then no one will be injured, but all shall have justice. I would I had another little daughter for the good Cosmo, who found me out in St. Ouen. I love the boy, and he shall be with us when he pleases, and we will do for him all we can. But keep your heart safe, my Desirée, for Huntley, and thus let us reward him when he comes home.”

Poor Madame Roche! she little knew what a fever of displeasure and indignation this pretty sentimental letter of hers would rouse in her little daughter’s heart. Desirée tore the envelope in pieces in her first burst of vexation, which was meant to express by similitude that she would have torn the letter, and blotted out its injunctions, if she dared. She threw the epistle itself out of her hands as if it had stung her. Not that Desirée’s mind was above those sublime arrangements of poetic justice, which in this inconsequent world are always so futile; but, somehow, a plan which might have looked pretty enough had it concerned another, filled Madame Roche’s independent little daughter with the utmost shame and mortification when she herself was the heroine.

“Let him take it all!” she cried out half aloud to herself, in her little chamber. “Do I care for it? I will work—I will be a governess; but I will not sell myself to this Huntley—no, not if I should die!”

And having so recorded her determination, poor little Desirée sat down on the floor and had a hearty cry, and after that thought, with a girlish effusion of sympathy, of poor Cosmo, who, after all, had done it all, yet whom no one thought of compensating. When straightway there came into Desirée’s heart some such bitter thoughts of justice and injustice as once had filled the mind of Cosmo Livingstone. Huntley!—what had Huntley done that Madame Roche should dedicate her—her, an unwilling Andromeda, to compensate this unknown monster; and Desirée sprang up and stamped her little foot, and clapped her hands, and vowed that no force in the world, not even her mother’s commands, should compel her to show her mother’s gratitude by becoming Huntley’s wife.

A most unnecessary passion; for there was Katie Logan all the time, unpledged and unbetrothed, it is true, but thinking her own thoughts of some one far away, who might possibly break in some day upon those cares of elder-sisterhood, which made her as important as a many-childed mother, even in those grave days of her orphan youth; and there was Huntley in his hut in the bush, not thriving over well, poor fellow, thinking very little of Melmar, but thinking a great deal of that manse parlor, where the sun shone, and Katie darned her children’s stockings—a scene which always would shine, and never could dim out of the young man’s recollection. Poor Madame Roche, with her pretty plan of compensation, and poor Desirée, rebelliously resistant to it, how much trouble they might both have saved themselves, could some kind fairy have shown to them a single peep of Huntley Livingstone’s solitary thoughts.

CHAPTER LXIV

Five years had made countless revolutions in human affairs, and changed the order of things in more houses than Melmar, but had not altered the fair face of the country, when, late upon a lovely June evening, two travelers alighted from the coach at the door of the Norlaw Arms. They were not anglers, nor tourists, though they were both bronzed and bearded. The younger of the two looked round him with eager looks of recognition, directing his glances to particular points—a look very different from the stranger’s vague gaze at every thing, which latter was in the eyes of his companion. At the manse, where the white gable was scarcely visible through the thick foliage of the great pear-tree—at the glimmering twilight path through the fields to Norlaw—even deep into the corner of the village street, where bowed Jaacob, with his red cowl pushed up from his bullet head behind, stood, strongly relieved against the glow within, at the smithy door. To all these familiar features of the scene, the new-comer turned repeated and eager glances. There was an individual recognition in every look he gave as he sprang down from the top of the coach, and stood by with a certain friendly, happy impatience and restlessness, not easy to describe, while the luggage was being unpacked from the heavy-laden public conveyance; that was a work of time. Even now, in railway days, it is not so easy a matter to get one’s portmanteau embarked or disembarked at Kirkbride station as one might suppose; and the helpers at the Norlaw Arms were innocent of the stimulus and external pressure of an express train. They made a quantity of bustle, but did their business at their leisure, while this new arrival, whom none of them knew, kept looking at them all with their names upon his lips, and laughter and kindness in his eyes. He had “seen the world,” since he last saw these leisurely proceedings at the Norlaw Arms—he had been on the other side of this big globe since he last stood in the street of Kirkbride; and the young man could not help feeling himself a more important person now than when he set out by this same conveyance some seven years ago, to make his fortune and his way in the world.

Huntley Livingstone, however, had not made his fortune; but he had made what he thought as much of—a thousand pounds; and having long ago, with a tingle of disappointment and a flush of pride, renounced all hopes of the Melmar which belonged to Madame Roche, had decided, when this modest amount of prosperity came to him, that he could not do better than return to his homely little patrimony, and lay out his Australian gains upon the land at home. It is true we might have told all this much more dramatically by bringing home the adventurer unexpectedly to his mother, and leaving him to announce his riches by word of mouth. But Huntley was too good a son to make dramatic surprises. When he made his thousand pounds, he wrote the Mistress word of it instantly—and he was not unexpected. The best room in Norlaw was prepared a week ago. It was only the day and hour of his return which the Mistress did not know.

So Huntley stood before the Norlaw Arms, while the gray twilight, which threw no shadows, fell over that leaf-covered gable of the manse; and gradually the young man’s thoughts fell into reverie even in the moment and excitement of arrival. Katie Logan! she was not bound to him by the faintest far-away implication of a promise. It was seven years now since Huntley bade her farewell. Where was the orphan elder-sister, with her little group of orphan children now?

Huntley’s companion was as much unlike himself as one human creature could be unlike another. He was a Frenchman, with shaved cheeks and a black moustache, lank, long locks of black hair falling into one of his eyes, and a thin, long, oval face. He was in short—except that he had no habit de bal, no white waistcoat, no bouquet in his buttonhole—a perfect type of the ordinary Frenchman whom one sees in every British concert-room as the conductor of an orchestra or the player of a fiddle. This kind of man does not look a very fine specimen of humanity in traveler’s dress, and with the dust of a journey upon him. Huntley was covered with dust, but Huntley did not look dirty; Huntley was roughly attired, had a beard, and was somewhat savage in his appearance, but, notwithstanding, was a well-complexioned, pure-skinned Briton, who bore the soil of travel upon his surface only, which was not at all the case with his neighbor. This stranger, however, was sufficiently familiar with his traveling-companion to strike him on the shoulder and dispel his thoughts about Katie.

“Where am I to go? to this meeserable little place?” asked the Frenchman, speaking perfectly good English, but dwelling upon the adjective by way of giving it emphasis, and pointing at the moment with his dirty forefinger, on which he wore a ring, to the Norlaw Arms.

Huntley was a Scotsman, strong in the instinct of hospitality, but he was at the same time the son of a reserved mother, and hated the intrusion of strangers at the moment of his return.

“It’s a very good inn of its kind,” said Huntley, uneasily, turning round to look at it. The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders, and eyed the respectable little house with contempt.

“Ah! bah! of its kind—I believe it,” said the stranger, kicking away a poor little dog which stood looking on with serious interest, and waiting for the fresh start of the coach; “I perceive your house is a chateau, an estate, my friend,” he continued; “is there no little room you can spare a comrade? I come on a good errand, the most virtuous, the most honest! Madame, your mother, will give me her blessing—I go to seek my wife.”

Huntley turned away to look after his trunks, but the stranger followed with a pertinacity which prevailed over Huntley. He gave a reluctant invitation at last, was restored to better humor by a sudden recognition from the landlord of the Norlaw Arms, and after pausing to receive the greetings and congratulations of everybody within hearing, set off, hastily accompanied by the Frenchman. Huntley endured his companion with great impatience, especially as they came within sight of home, and all the emotions connected with that familiar place rushed to the young man’s heart and to his eyes. The Frenchman’s voice ran on, an impertinent babble, while the gray old castle, the quiet house, with its pale vane pointing to the north, and the low hill-side, rustling to its summit with green corn, lay once more before the eyes which loved them better than any other landscape in the world. Then a figure became visible going in and out at the kitchen-door, a tall, angular form, with the “kilted” gown, the cap with its string pinned back, the little shawl over the shoulders, all of which homely details Huntley remembered so well. The young man quickened his pace, and held out his hands unconsciously. And then Marget saw him; she threw down her milk-pail, arched her hand over her eyes for a moment to gaze at him and assure herself and then with a loud, wild exclamation, rushed into the house. Huntley remembered no more, either guest or hospitality; he rushed down the little bank which intervened, splashed through the shallow Tyne, too much excited to take the bridge, and reached the door of Norlaw, as the Mistress, with her trembling hands, flung it unsteadily open to look for herself, and see that Marget was wrong. Too much joy almost fainted the heart of the Mistress within her; she could not speak to him—she could only sob out big, slow sobs, which fell echoing through the still air with the strangest pathos of thanksgiving. Huntley had come home.

“So you werna wrang, as it happened,” said the Mistress, with dignity, when she had at last become familiar with the idea of Huntley’s return, and had contented her eye with gazing on him; “you werna wrang after a’; but I certainly thought that myself, and me only, would be the person to get the first sight of my bairn. He minded you too, very well, Marget, which was less wonder than you minding him, and him such a grown man with such a black beard. I didna believe ye, it’s true, but it was a’ because I thought no person could mind upon him to ken him at a distance, but only me.”

“Mind!” cried Marget, moved beyond ordinary patience; “did I no’ carry the bairn in my arms when he was just in coats and put his first breeks upon him! Mind!—me that have been about Norlaw House seven-and-twenty years come Martinmas—wha should mind if it wasna me?”

But though this speech was almost concluded before the Mistress left the kitchen, it was not resented. The mother’s mind was too full of Huntley to think of any thing else. She returned to the dining-parlor, where, in the first effusion of her joy, she had placed her first-born in his father’s chair, and began to spread the table with her own hands for his refreshment. As yet she had scarcely taken any notice of the Frenchman. Now his voice startled her; she looked at him angrily, and then at her son. He was not quite such a person as fathers and mothers love to see in the company of their children.

“No doubt, Huntley,” said the Mistress, at last, with a little impatient movement of her head—“no doubt this gentleman is some great friend of yours, to come hame with you the very first day, and you been seven years from home.”

“Ah! my good friend Huntley is troubled, madame,” interposed the subject of her speech; “I have come to seek my wife. I have heard she is in Scotland—she is near; and I did ask for one little room in his castle rather than go to the inn in the village. For I must ask you for my wife.”

“Your wife? what should I know about strange men’s wives?” said the Mistress; “Huntley’s friends have a good right to be welcome at Norlaw; but to tell the truth he’s new come home and I’m little accustomed to strangers. You used to ken that, Huntley, laddie, though you’ve maybe forgotten now; seven years is a long time.”

“My wife,” resumed the Frenchman, “came to possess a great fortune in this country. I have been a traveler, madame. I have come with your son from the other side of the world. I have been bon camarade. But see! I have lost my wife. Since I am gone she has found a fortune, she has left her country, she is here, if I knew where to find her. Madame Pierrot, my wife.”

“I’m little acquaint with French ladies,” said the Mistress, briefly; but as she spoke she turned from her occupation to look full at her strange visitor with eyes a little curious and even disquieted. The end of her investigation was a “humph,” which was sufficiently significant. After that she turned her back upon him and went on with her preparations, looking somewhat stormy at Huntley. Then her impatience displayed itself under other disguises. In the first place she set another chair for him at the table.

“Take you this seat, Huntley, my man,” said the Mistress; “and the foot of the table, like the master of the house; for doubtless Norlaw is yours for any person it’s your pleasure to bring into it. Sit in to the table, and eat your supper like a man; and I’ll put this back out of the way.”

Accordingly, when Huntley rose, his mother wheeled back the sacred chair which she had given him in her joy. Knowing how innocent he was of all friendship with his companion, Huntley almost smiled at this sign of her displeasure, but, when she left the room, followed her to explain how it was.

“I asked him most ungraciously and unwillingly,” said poor Huntley; “don’t be displeased on account of that fellow; he came home with me from Australia, and I lost sight of him in London, only to find him again coming here by the same coach. I actually know nothing about him except his name.”

“But I do,” said the Mistress.

“You, mother?”

“Ay, just me, mother; and a vagabond he is, as ony person may well see,” said the Mistress; “I ken mair than folk think; and now go back for a foolish bairn as you are, in spite of your black beard. Though I never saw the blackguard before, a’ my days, I’ll tell you his haill story this very night.”