Produced by Delphine Lettau, Mary Meehan & the online
Distributed Proofreaders Canada team at
http://www.pgdpcanada.net (This file was produced from
images generously made available by The Internet
Archive/American Libraries.)

                     THE WIZARD'S SON

                         A Novel

                     BY MRS. OLIPHANT

    AUTHOR OF "THE CURATE IN CHARGE," "YOUNG MUSGRAVE," ETC.

    IN THREE VOLUMES
    VOL. III.

    London
    MACMILLAN AND CO.
    1884

    [_The Right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved_]

    LONDON:
    R. CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS,
    BREAD STREET HILL.

THE WIZARD'S SON.

CHAPTER I.

Was this then the conclusion of all things--that there was nothing so
perfect that it was worth a man's while to struggle for it; that any
officious interference with the recognised and existing was a mistake;
that nothing was either the best or the worst, but all things mere
degrees in a round of the comparative, in which a little more or a
little less was of no importance, and the most strenuous efforts tended
to failure as much as indifference? Walter, returning to the old house
which was his field of battle, questioned himself thus, with a sense of
despair not lessened by the deeper self-ridicule within him, which
asked, was he then so anxious for the best, so ready to sacrifice his
comfort for an ideal excellence? That he, of all men, should have this
to do, and yet that, being done, it should be altogether ineffectual,
was a sort of climax of clumsy mortal failure and hopelessness. The
only good thing he had done was the restoration of those half-evicted
cotters, and that was but a mingled and uncertain good, it appeared.
What was the use of any struggle? If it was his own personal freedom
alone that he really wanted, why here it was within his power to
purchase it--or at least a moderate amount of it--a comparative freedom,
as everything was comparative. His mind by this time had ceased to be
able to think, or even to perceive with any distinctness the phrase or
_motif_ inscribed upon one of those confused and idly-turning wheels of
mental machinery which had stood in the place of thought to him. It was
the afternoon when he got back, and everything within him had fallen
into an afternoon dreariness. He lingered when he landed on the waste
bit of grass that lay between the little landing-place and the door of
the old castle. He had no heart to go in and sit down unoccupied in that
room which had witnessed so many strange meetings. He was no longer
indeed afraid of his visitor there, but rather looked forward with a
kind of relief to the tangible presence which delivered him from
meetings of the mind more subtle and painful. But he had no expectation
of any visitor; nor was there anything for him to do except to sit down
and perhaps attempt to read, which meant solely a delivering over of
himself to his spiritual antagonists--for how was it possible to give
his mind to any fable of literature in the midst of a parable so urgent
and all-occupying, of his own?

He stood therefore idly upon the neglected turf, watching the ripple of
the water as it lapped against the rough stones on the edge. The breadth
of the loch was entirely hidden from him by the projection of the old
tower, which descended into the water at the right, and almost shut off
this highest corner of Loch Houran into a little lakelet of its own.
Walter heard the sound of oars and voices from the loch without seeing
any one: but that was usual enough, and few people invaded his privacy:
so that he was taken by surprise when, suddenly raising his eyes, he was
aware of the polished and gilded galley from Birkenbraes, in which
already Mr. Williamson, seated in the stern, had perceived and was
hailing him. "Hallo, my Lord Erradeen! Here we've all come to see ye
this fine afternoon. I told them we should find ye under your own vine
and your own fig-tree." This speech was accompanied by a general laugh.
The arrival of such a party, heralded by such laughter in a desolate
house, with few servants and no readiness for any such emergency, to a
young man in Walter's confused and distracted condition would not, it
may be supposed, have been very welcome in any case, and at present in
his exhaustion and dismay he stood and gazed at them with a sort of
horror. There was not even a ready servitor like Hamish to assist in the
disembarkation. Duncan had rowed cheerfully off upon some other errand
after landing his master, and old Symington and old Macalister were
singularly ill-adapted for the service. Lord Erradeen did his best,
with a somewhat bad grace, to receive the boat at the landing-place. The
gravity of his countenance was a little chill upon the merry party, but
the Williamsons were not of a kind that is easily discouraged.

"Oh, yes, here we all are," said the millionnaire. "I would not let our
English visitor, Mr. Braithwaite here, leave without showing him the
finest thing on the loch. So I just told him I knew I might take the
liberty. Hoot! we know ye have not your household here, and that it is
just an old family ruin, and not bound to produce tea and scones like
the Forresters' isle. Bless me! I hope we have a soul above tea and
scones," Mr. Williamson cried with his hearty laugh.

By this time the young, hardy, half-clad rowers had scrambled out, and
grouped themselves in various attitudes, such as would suit a new and
light-hearted Michael Angelo--one kneeling on the stones holding the bow
of the boat, another with one foot on sea and one on shore helping the
ladies out. Walter in his dark dress, and still darker preoccupied
countenance, among all those bronzed and cheerful youths looked like a
being from another sphere: but the contrast was not much to his
advantage either in bodily or mental atmosphere. He looked so grave and
so unlike the joyous hospitality of a young housekeeper surprised by a
sudden arrival, that Katie, always more on her guard than her father,
looked at him with a countenance as grave as his own.

"I am not the leader of this expedition, Lord Erradeen," she said; "you
must not blame me for the invasion. My father took it into his head, and
when that happens there is nothing to be done. I don't mean I was not
glad to be brought here against my will," she added, as his face, by a
strain of politeness which was far from easy to him, began to brighten a
little. Katie was not apt to follow the leading of another face and
adopt the woman's _rôle_ of submission, but she felt herself so
completely in the wrong, an intruder where she was very sure she and her
party, exuberant in spirits and gaiety, were not wanted, that she was
compelled to watch his expression and make her apologies with a
deference quite unusual to her. "I hope it will not be a very
great--interruption to you," she said after a momentary pause.

"That could never matter," Walter said, with some stateliness. "I could
have wished to have notice and to have received my friends at
Auchnasheen rather than here. But being here--you must excuse the
primitive conditions of the place."

"Hoot! there is nothing to excuse--a fine old castle, older than the
flood--just the very thing that is wanted for the picturesque, ye see,
Braithwaite; for as ye were remarking, we are in general too modern for
a Highland loch. But you'll not call this modern," said Mr. Williamson.
"Will that old body not open the door to ye when he sees ye have
friends? Lord! that just beats all! That is a step beyond Caleb
Balderstone."

"Papa!" cried Katie in keen reproof, "we have been quite importunate
enough already. I vote we all go over to Auchnasheen--the view there is
much finer, and we could send over for Oona----"

"Is it common in this country," said the member of Parliament, "to have
two residences so very near? It must be like going next door for change
of air when you leave one for the other, Lord Erradeen."

At this there was that slight stir among the party which takes place
when an awkward suggestion is made; the young men and the girls began to
talk hurriedly, raising up a sort of atmosphere of voices around the
central group. This however was curiously and suddenly penetrated by the
reply which--who?--was it Walter? made, almost as it seemed without a
pause.

"Not common--but yet not unknown in a country which has known a great
deal of fighting in its day. The old castle is our family resource in
danger. We do our family business here, our quarrels: and afterwards
retire to Auchnasheen, the house of peace (perhaps you don't know that
names have meanings hereabouts?) to rest."

There was a pause as slight, as imperceptible to the ignorant, as
evident to the instructed as had been the stir at the first sound of
those clear tones. Walter himself to more than one observer had seemed
as much startled as any of them. He turned quickly round towards the
speaker with a sudden blanching of his face which had been pale enough
before; but this was only momentary; afterwards all that was remarkable
in him was a strange look of resolution and determined self-control.
Perhaps the only one completely unmoved was the Englishman, who at once
accepted the challenge, and stepped forward to the individual who it was
evident to him was the only duly qualified cicerone in the party, with
eager satisfaction.

"That is highly interesting. Of course the place must be full of
traditions," he said.

"With your permission, Walter, I will take the part of cicerone," said
the new voice. To some of the party it seemed only a voice. The ladies
and the young men stumbled against each other in their eager curiosity
about the stranger. "I will swear there was nobody near Erradeen when we
landed," said young Tom Campbell in the nearest ear that presented
itself; but of course it was the number of people about which caused
this, and it could be no shadow with whom the M.P. went forth delighted,
asking a hundred questions. "You are a member of the family?" Mr.
Braithwaite said. He was not tall, and his companion was of a splendid
presence. The Englishman had to look up as he spoke and to quicken his
somewhat short steps as he walked to keep up with the other's large and
dignified pace. Katie followed with Walter. There was a look of
agitation and alarm in her face; her heart beat she could not tell why.
She was breathless as if she had been running a race. She looked up into
Lord Erradeen's face tremulously, not like herself. "Is this
gentleman--staying with you?" she said in a scarcely audible voice.

Walter was not agitated for his part, but he had little inclination to
speak. He said "Yes" and no more.

"And we have been--sorry for you because you were alone? Is it
a--relation? is it--? You have never," said Katie, forcing the words out
with a difficulty which astonished her, and for which she could not
account, "brought him to Birkenbraes."

Walter could not but smile. A sort of feeble amusement flew over his
mind touching the surface into a kind of ripple. "Shall I ask him to
come?" he said.

Katie was following in the very footsteps of this altogether new and
unexpected figure. There was nothing like him, it seemed to her, in all
the country-side. His voice dominated every other sound, not loud, but
clear. It subdued her little being altogether. She would not lose a
word, yet her breath was taken away by an inexplicable terror.

"He is--like somebody," she said, panting, "out of a book," and could
say no more.

Old Macalister came towards them from the now open door, at which stood
Symington in attendance. The servants had been disturbed by the unusual
sounds of the arrival. Macalister's old face was drawn and haggard.

"Where will ye be taking all thae folk?" he said, no doubt forgetting
his manners in his bewilderment.

"Come back, ye'll get into mischief that road," he cried, putting out
his hand to catch the arm of Braithwaite, who, guided by the stranger,
was passing the ordinary entrance. He became quite nervous and angry
when no heed was paid to him. "My lord, you're no so well acquaint
yourself. Will you let that lad just wander and break his neck?" he
cried, with a kind of passion.

"Never mind," said Walter, with a strange calm which was as
unaccountable as all the rest. "Will you tell your wife to prepare for
these ladies--when we come back."

Here Symington too came forth to explain somewhat loudly, addressing his
master and Braithwaite alternately, that the roads were not safe about
the old castle, that the walls were crumbling, that a person not
acquaint might get a deadly fall, with unspeakable anxiety in his eyes.
The party all followed, notwithstanding, led by the stranger, whom even
the least of them now thought she could distinguish over Katie's head,
but of whom the servants took no notice, addressing the others in front
as if he had not been there.

"My lord, ye'll repent if ye'll no listen to us," Symington said, laying
his hand in sudden desperation on Walter's arm.

"You fool!" cried the young man, "can't you see we have got a safe
guide?"

Symington gave a look round him wildly of the utmost terror. His scared
eyes seemed to retreat into deep caverns of anguish and fear. He stood
back out of the way of the somewhat excited party, who laughed, and yet
scarcely could laugh with comfort, at him. The youngsters had begun to
chatter: they were not afraid of anything--Still--: though it was
certainly amusing to see that old man's face.

Turning round to exchange a look with Macalister, Symington came in
contact with Mr. Williamson's solid and cheerful bulk, who brought up
the rear. "I'm saying," said the millionnaire confidentially, "who's
this fine fellow your master's got with him? A grand figure of a man!
It's not often you see it, but I always admire it. A relation, too; what
relation? I would say it must be on the mother's side, for I've never
seen or heard tell of him. Eh? who's staying with your master, I'm
asking ye? Are ye deaf or doited that ye cannot answer a simple
question?"

"Na, there is nothing the matter with me; but I think the rest of the
world has just taken leave of their senses," Symington said.

CHAPTER II.

Julia Herbert had failed altogether in her object during that end of the
season which her relations had afforded her. Walter had not even come to
call. He had sent a hurried note excusing himself, and explaining that
he was "obliged to leave town," an excuse by which nobody was deceived.
It is not by any easy process that a girl, who begins with all a girl's
natural pride and pretensions, is brought down to recognise the fact
that a man is avoiding and fleeing from her, and yet to follow and seek
him. Hard poverty, and the memories of a life spent in the tiny cottage
with her mother, without any enlargement or wider atmosphere, and with
but one way of escape in which there was hope or even possibility, had
brought Julia to this pass. She had nothing in her life that was worth
doing except to scheme how she could dress and present the best
appearance, and how she could get hold of and secure that only
stepping-stone by which she could mount out of it--a man who would marry
her and open to her the doors of something better. In every other way it
is worth the best exertions of either man or woman to get these doors
opened, and to come to the possibility of better things; and a poor girl
who has been trained to nothing more exalted, who sees no other way,
notwithstanding that this poor way of hers revolts every finer spirit,
is there not something pitiful and tragic in her struggles, her sad and
degrading attempt after a new beginning? How much human force is wasted
upon it, what heart-sickness, what self-contempt is undergone, what a
debasement of all that is best and finest in her? She has no pity, no
sympathy in her pursuit, but ridicule, contempt, the derision of one
half of humanity, the indignation of the other. And yet her object after
all may not be entirely despicable. She may feel with despair that there
is no other way. She may intend to be all that is good and noble were
but this one step made, this barrier crossed, the means of a larger life
attained. It would be better for her no doubt to be a governess, or even
a seamstress, or to put up with the chill meannesses of a
poverty-stricken existence, and starve, modestly keeping up appearances
with her last breath.

But all women are not born self-denying. When they are young, the blood
runs as warmly in their veins as in that of men; they too want life,
movement, sunshine and happiness. The mere daylight, the air, a new
frock, however hardly obtained, a dance, a little admiration, suffice
for them when they are very young; but when the next chapter comes, and
the girl learns to calculate that, saving some great matrimonial
chance, there is no prospect for her but the narrowest and most meagre
and monotonous existence under heaven, the life of a poor, very poor
single woman who cannot dig and to beg is ashamed--is it to be wondered
at if she makes a desperate struggle anyhow (and alas! there is but one
_how_) to escape. Perhaps she likes too, poor creature, the little
excitement of flirtation, the only thing which replaces to her the
manifold excitement which men of her kind indulge in--the tumultuous
joys of the turf, the charms of play, the delights of the club, the
moors, and sport in general, not to speak of all those developments of
pleasure, so-called, which are impossible to a woman. She cannot dabble
a little in vice as a man can do, and yet return again, and be no worse
thought of than before. Both for amusement and profit she has this one
way, which, to be sure, answers the purpose of all the others in being
destructive of the best part in her, spoiling her character, and
injuring her reputation--but for how much less a cause, and with how
little recompense in the way of enjoyment! The husband-hunting girl is
fair game to whosoever has a stone to throw, and very few are so
charitable as to say, Poor soul! Julia Herbert had been as bright a
creature at eighteen as one could wish to see. At twenty-four she was
bright still, full of animation, full of good humour, clever in her way,
very pretty, high-spirited, amusing--and still so young! But how
profoundly had it been impressed upon her that she must not lose her
time! and how well she knew all the opprobrious epithets that are
directed against a young woman as she draws towards thirty--the very
flower and prime of her life. Was she to blame if she was influenced by
all that was said to this effect, and determined to fight with a sort of
mad persistence, for the hope which seemed so well within her reach?
Were she but once established as Lady Erradeen, there was not one of her
youthful sins that would be remembered against her. A veil of light
would fall over her and all her peccadilloes as soon as she had put on
her bridal veil. Her friends, instead of feeling her a burden and
perplexity, would be proud of Julia; they would put forth their
cousinhood eagerly, and claim her--even those who were most anxious now
to demonstrate the extreme distance of the connection--as near and dear.
And she liked Walter, and thought she would have no difficulty in loving
him, had she ever a right to do so. He was not too good for her; she
would have something to forgive in him, if he too in her might have
something to forgive. She would make him a good wife, a wife of whom he
should have no occasion to be ashamed. All these considerations made it
excusable--more than excusable, almost laudable--to strain a point for
so great an end.

And in her cousin's wife she had, so far as this went, a real friend.
Lady Herbert not only felt that to get Julia settled was most desirable,
and that, as Lady Erradeen, she would become a most creditable cousin,
and one who might return the favours showed to her, but also, which is
less general, felt within herself a strong inclination to help and
further Julia's object. She thought favourably of Lord Erradeen. She
thought he would not be difficult to manage (which was a mistake as the
reader knows). She thought he was not so strong as Julia, but once fully
within the power of her fascinations, would fall an easy prey. She did
not think less of him for running away. It was a sign of weakness, if
also of wisdom; and if he could be met in a place from which he could
not run away, it seemed to her that the victory would be easy. And Sir
Thomas must have a moor somewhere to refresh him after the vast labours
of a session in which he had recorded so many silent votes. By dint of
having followed him to many a moor, Lady Herbert had a tolerable
geographical knowledge of the Highlands, and it was not very difficult
for her to find out that Mr. Campbell of Ellermore, with his large
family, would be obliged this year to let his shootings. Every thing was
settled and prepared accordingly to further Julia's views, without any
warning on the point having reached Walter. She had arrived indeed at
the Lodge, which was some miles down the loch, beyond Birkenbraes, a few
days after Walter's arrival, and thus once more, though he was so far
from thinking of it, his old sins, or rather his old follies, were about
to find him out.

Lady Herbert had already become known to various people on the
loch-side. She had been at the Lodge since early in September, and had
been called upon by friendly folk on all sides. There had been a
thousand chances that Walter might have found her at luncheon with all
the others on his first appearance at Birkenbraes, and Julia had already
been introduced to that hospitable house. Katie did not recognise Lady
Herbert either by name or countenance. But she recognised Julia as soon
as she saw her.

"I think you know Lord Erradeen?" was almost her first greeting, for
Katie was a young person of very straight-forward methods.

"Oh yes," Julia had answered with animation, "I have known him all my
life."

"I suppose you know that he lives here?"

Upon this Julia turned to her chaperon, her relation in whose hands all
these external questions were.

"Did you know, dear Lady Herbert, that Lord Erradeen lived here?"

"Oh yes, he has a place close by. Didn't I tell you? A pretty house,
with that old castle near it, which I pointed out to you on the lock,"
Lady Herbert said.

"How small the world is!" cried Julia; "wherever you go you are always
knocking up against somebody. Fancy Walter Methven living here!"

Katie was not taken in by this little play. She was not even irritated
as she had been at Burlington House. If it might so happen that some
youthful bond existed between Lord Erradeen and this girl, Katie was not
the woman to use any unfair means against it.

"You will be sure to meet him," she said calmly. "We hope he is not
going to shut himself up as he did last year."

"Oh tell me!" Julia cried, with overflowing interest, "is there not some
wonderful ghost story? something about his house being haunted; and he
has to go and present himself and have an interview with the ghost?
Captain Underwood, I remember, told us----"

"Did you know Captain Underwood?" said Katie, in that tone which says so
much.

And then she turned to her other guests: for naturally the house was
full of people, and as was habitual in Birkenbraes a large party from
outside had come to lunch. The Williamsons were discussed with much
freedom among the visitors from the Lodge when they went away. Sir
Thomas declared that the old man was a monstrous fine old fellow, and
his claret worth coming from Devonshire to drink.

"No expense spared in that establishment," he cried; "and there's a
little girl, I should say, that would be worth a young fellow's while."

He despised Julia to the bottom of his heart, but he thought of his
young friends on the other side without any such elevated sentiment, and
decided it might not be a bad thing to have Algy Newton down, to whom it
was indispensable that he should marry money. Sir Thomas, however, had
not the energy to carry his intention out.

Next day it so happened that Lady Herbert had to return the visit of
Mrs. Forrester, who--though she always explained her regret at not
being able to entertain her friends--was punctilious in making the
proper calls. The English ladies were "charmed" with the isle. They said
there had never been anything so original, so delightful, so
unconventional; ignoring altogether, with a politeness which Mrs.
Forrester thought was "pretty," any idea that necessity might be the
motive of the mother and daughter in settling there.

"I am sure it is very kind of you to say so; but it is not just a matter
of choice, you know. It is just an old house that came to me from the
Macnabs--my mother's side. And it proved very convenient when all the
boys were away and nothing left but Oona and me. Women want but little
in comparison with gentlemen; and though it is a little out of the way
and inconvenient in the winter season, it is wonderful how few days
there are that we can't get out. I am very well content with the Walk
when there is a glint of sunshine; but Oona, she just never minds the
weather. Oh, you will not be going just yet! Tell Mysie, Oona, to bring
ben the tea. If it is a little early what matter? It always helps to
keep you warm on the loch, and my old cook is rather noted for her
scones. She just begins as soon as she hears there's a boat, and she
will be much disappointed if ye don't taste them. Our friends are all
very kind; we have somebody or other every day."

"It is you who are kind, I think," Lady Herbert said.

"No, no; two ladies--it is nothing we have it in our power to do: but a
cup of tea, it is just a charity to accept it; and as you go down to
your boat I will let you see the view."

Julia, for her part, felt, or professed, a great interest in the girl
living the life of a recluse on this little island.

"It must be delightful," she said with enthusiasm; "but don't you
sometimes feel a little dull? It is the sweetest place I ever saw. But
shouldn't you like to walk on to the land without always requiring a
boat?"

"I don't think I have considered the subject," Oona said; "it is our
home, and we do not think whether or not we should like it to be
different."

"Oh what a delightful state of mind! I don't think I could be so
contented anywhere--so happy in myself. I think," said Julia with an
ingratiating look, "that you must be very happy in yourself."

Oona laughed. "As much and as little as other people," she said.

"Oh not as little! I should picture to myself a hundred things I wanted
as soon as I found myself shut up here. I should want to be in town. I
should want to go shopping. I should wish for--everything I had not got.
Don't you immediately think of dozens of things you want as soon as you
know you can't get them? But you are so good?"

"If that is being good! No, I think I rather refrain from wishing for
what I should like when I see I am not likely to get it."

"I call that goodness itself--but perhaps it is Scotch. I have the
greatest respect for the Scotch," said Julia. "They are so sensible."
Then she laughed, as at some private joke of her own, and said under her
breath, "Not all, however," and looked towards Kinloch Houran.

They were seated on the bench, upon the little platform, at the top of
the ascent which looked down upon the castle. The sound of Mrs.
Forrester's voice was quite audible behind in the house, pouring forth a
gentle stream. The sun was setting in a sky full of gorgeous purple and
golden clouds; the keen air of the hills blowing about them. But Julia
was warmly dressed, and only shivered a little out of a sense of what
was becoming: and Oona was wrapped in the famous fur cloak.

"It is so strange to come upon a place one has heard so much of," Julia
resumed. "No doubt you know Lord Erradeen?"

The name startled Oona in spite of herself. She was not prepared for any
allusion to him. She coloured involuntarily, and gave her companion a
look of surprise.

"Do you know him?" she asked.

"Oh, so well! I have known him almost all my life. People said
indeed----" said Julia, breaking off suddenly with a laugh. "But that
was nonsense. You know how people talk. Oh, yes, we have been like
brother and sister--or if not quite that--at least--Oh yes, I know
Walter, and his mother, and everything about him. He has been a little
strange since he came here; though indeed I have no reason to say so,
for he is always very nice to me. When he came home last year I saw a
great deal of him; but I don't think he was very communicative
about--what do you call it?--Kinloch----"

"He was not here long," Oona said.

"No? He did not give himself time to find out how many nice people there
are. He did not seem very happy about it when he came back. You see all
his habits were formed--it was something so new for him. And though the
people are extremely nice, and so hospitable and kind, they were
different--from those he had been used to."

Oona smiled a little. She did not see her new acquaintance from the best
side, and there came into her mind a slightly bitter and astonished
reflection that Walter, perhaps, preferred people like _this_ to
other--people. It was an altogether incoherent thought.

"Does he know that you are here?" she said.

"Oh, I don't think he does--but he will soon find me out," said Julia,
with an answering smile. "He always tells me everything. We are such old
friends, and perhaps something--more. To be sure that is not a thing to
talk of; but there is something in your face which is so sweet, which
invites confidence. With a little encouragement I believe I should tell
you everything I ever did."

She leant over Oona as if she would have kissed her: but compliments so
broad and easy disconcerted the Highland girl. She withdrew a little
from this close contact.

"The wind is getting cold," she said. "Perhaps we ought to go in. My
mother always blames me for keeping strangers, who are not used to it,
in this chilly air."

"Ah, you do not encourage me," Julia said. And then after a pause added,
with the look of one preoccupied by her subject--"Is he there now?"

"I think Lord Erradeen is still at Kinloch Houran, if that is what you
mean. That is another house of his among the trees."

"How curious! two houses so close together. If you see him," said Julia,
rising to join her cousin who had come out to the door of the cottage
with Mrs. Forrester, "if you see him, don't, please don't, tell him you
have met me. I prefer that he should find it out. He is quite sure, oh,
sooner than I want him, to find me out."

And then the ladies were attended to the boat in the usual hospitable
way.

"You will get back before it is dark," said Mrs. Forrester. "I am always
glad of that, for the wind is cold from the hills, especially to
strangers that are not used to our Highland climate. I take your visit
very kind, Lady Herbert. In these days I can do so little for my
friends: unless Sir Thomas would take his lunch with me some day--and
that is no compliment to a gentleman that is out on the hills all his
time--I have just no opportunity of showing attention. But if you are
going further north, my son, the present Mr. Forrester of Eaglescairn,
would be delighted to be of any service. He knows how little his mother
can do for her friends, perched up here in the middle of the water and
without a gentleman in the house. Hamish, have ye got the cushions in,
and are ye all ready? You'll be sure to take her ladyship to where the
carriage is waiting, and see that she has not a long way to walk."

Thus talking, the kind lady saw her visitors off, and stood on the beach
waving her hand to them. The fur cloak had been transferred to her
shoulders. It was the one wrap in which everybody believed. Oona, who
moved so much more quickly, and had no need to pause to take breath, did
not now require such careful wrapping. She too stood and waved her hand
as the boat turned the corner of the isle. But her farewells were not so
cordial as her mother's. Julia's talk had been very strange to Oona; it
filled her with a vague fear. Something very different from the
sensation with which she had heard Katie's confessions on the subject of
Lord Erradeen moved her now. An impression of unworthiness had stolen
into her mind, she could not tell how. It was the first time she had
been sensible of any thought of the kind. Walter had not been revealed
to her in any of the circumstances of his past life. She had known him
only during his visit at Kinloch Houran, and when he was in profound
difficulty and agitation, in which her presence and succour had helped
him she could not tell how, and when his appeal to her, his dependence
on her, had seized hold of her mind and imagination with a force which
it had taken her all this time to throw off, and which, alas! his first
appearance and renewed appeal to her to stand by him had brought back
again in spite of her resistance and against her will. She had been
angry with herself and indignant at this involuntary subjugation--which
he had not desired so far as she knew, nor she dreamt of, until she had
fallen under it--and had recognised, with a sort of despair and angry
sense of impotence, the renewal of the influence, which she seemed
incapable of resisting.

But Julia's words roused in her a different sentiment. Julia's laugh,
the light insinuations of her tone, her claim of intimacy and previous
knowledge, brought a revulsion of feeling so strong and powerful that
she felt for the moment as if she had been delivered from her bonds.
Delivered--but not with any pleasure in being free: for the deliverance
meant the lowering of the image of him in whom she had suddenly found
that union of something above her with something below, which is the
man's chief charm to the woman, as probably it is the woman's chief
charm to the man. He had been below her, he had needed her help, she had
brought to him some principle of completeness, some moral support which
was indispensable, without which he could not have stood fast. But now
another kind of inferiority was suggested to her, which was not that in
which a visionary and absolute youthful mind could find any charm, which
it was difficult even to tolerate, which was an offence to her and to
the pure and overmastering sentiment which had drawn her to him. If he
was so near to Miss Herbert, so entirely on her level, making her his
confidant, he could be nothing to Oona. She seemed to herself to burst
her bonds and stand free--but not happily. Her heart was not the lighter
for it. She would have liked to escape, yet to be able to bear him the
same stainless regard, the same sympathy as ever; to help him still, to
honour him in his resistance to all that was evil.

All this happened on the afternoon of the day which Walter had begun
with a despairing conviction that Oona's help must fail him _when she
knew_. She had begun to know without any agency of his: and if it moved
her so to become aware of a frivolous and foolish connection in which
there was levity and vanity, and a fictitious counterfeit of higher
sentiments but no harm, what would her feelings be when all the truth
was unfolded to her? But neither did she know of the darker depths that
lay below, nor was he aware of the revelation which had begun. Oona
returned to the house with her mother's soft-voiced monologue in her
ears, hearing vaguely a great many particulars of Lady Herbert's family
and connections and of her being "really an acquisition, and Sir Thomas
just an honest English sort of man, and Miss Herbert very pretty, and a
nice companion for you, Oona," without reply, or with much consciousness
of what it was. "It is time you were indoors, mamma, for the wind is
very cold," she said.

"Oh yes, Oona, it is very well for you to speak about me: but you must
take your own advice and come in too. For you have nothing about your
shoulders, and I have got the fur cloak."

"I am coming, mother," Oona said, and with these words turned from the
door and going to the rocky parapet that bordered the little platform,
cast an indignant glance towards the ruined walls so far beneath her on
the water's edge, dark and cold, out of the reach of all those autumn
glories that were fading in the sky. There was no light or sign of life
about Kinloch Houran. She had looked out angrily, as one defrauded of
much honest feeling had, she felt, a right to do; but something softened
her as she looked and gazed--the darkness of it, the pathos of the ruin,
the incompleteness, and voiceless yet appealing need. Was it possible
that there was no need at all or vacancy there but what Miss Herbert,
with her smiles and dimples, her laughing insinuations, her claim upon
him from the past, and the first preference of youth, could supply?
Oona felt a great sadness take the place of her indignation as she
turned away. If that was so, how poor and small it all was--how
different from what she had thought!

CHAPTER III.

This was not the only danger that once more overshadowed the path of
Lord Erradeen. Underwood had been left alone in one of those foreign
centres of "pleasure," so called, whither he had led his so often
impatient and unruly pupil. He had been left, without notice, by a
sudden impulse, such as he was now sufficiently acquainted with in
Walter--who had always the air of obeying angrily and against his will
the temptations with which he was surrounded: a sort of moral
indignation against himself and all that aided in his degradation
curiously mingling with the follies and vices into which he was led. You
never knew when you had him, was Captain Underwood's own description. He
would dart aside at a tangent, go off at the most unlikely moment, dash
down the cup when it was at the sweetest, and abandon with disgust the
things that had seemed to please him most. And Underwood knew that the
moment was coming when his patron and _protégé_ must return home: but
notwithstanding he was left, without warning, as by a sudden caprice;
the young man, who scorned while he yielded to his influence, having
neither respect nor regard enough for his companion to leave a word of
explanation. Underwood was astonished and angry as a matter of course,
but his anger soon subsided, and the sense of Lord Erradeen's importance
to him was too strong to leave room for lasting resentment, or at least
for anything in the shape of relinquishment. He was not at all disposed
to give the young victim up. Already he had tasted many of what to him
were the sweets of life by Walter's means, and there were endless
capabilities in Lord Erradeen's fortune and in his unsettled mind, which
made a companion like Underwood too wise ever to take offence, necessary
to him--which that worthy would not let slip. After the shock of finding
himself deserted, he took two or three days to consider the matter, and
then he made his plan. It was bold, yet he thought not too bold. He
followed in the very track of his young patron, passing through
Edinburgh and reaching Auchnasheen on the same momentous day which had
witnessed Julia Herbert's visit to the isle. Captain Underwood was very
well known at Auchnasheen. He had filled in many ways the position of
manager and steward to the last lord. He had not been loved, but yet he
had not been actively disliked. If there was some surprise and a little
resistance on the part of the household there was at least no open
revolt. They received him coldly, and required considerable explanation
of the many things which he required to be done. They were all aware, as
well as he was, that Lord Erradeen was to be expected from day to day,
and they had made such preparations for his arrival as suggested
themselves: but these were not many, and did not at all please the
zealous captain. His affairs, he felt, were at a critical point. It was
very necessary that the young man should feel the pleasure of being
expected, the surprise of finding everything arranged according to his
tastes.

"You know very well that he will come here exhausted, that he will want
to have everything comfortable," he said to the housekeeper and the
servants. "No one would like after a fatiguing journey to come into a
bare sort of a miserable place like this."

"My lord is no so hard to please," said the housekeeper, standing her
ground. "Last year he just took no notice. Whatever was done he was not
heeding."

"Because he was unused to everything: now it is different; and I mean to
have things comfortable for him."

"Well, captain! I am sure it's none of my wish to keep the poor young
gentleman from his bits of little comforts. Ye'll have _his_ authority?"

"Oh, yes, I have his authority. It will be for your advantage to mind
what I tell you; even more than with the late lord. I've been abroad
with him. He left me but a short time ago; I was to follow him, and look
after everything."

At this the housekeeper looked at the under-factor Mr. Shaw's
subordinate, who had come to intimate to her her master's return. "Will
that be all right, Mr. Adamson?" Adamson put his shaggy head on one side
like an intelligent dog and looked at the stranger. But they all knew
Captain Underwood well enough, and no one was courageous enough to
contradict him.

"It will, maybe, be as ye say," said the under-factor cautiously.
"Anyway it will do us no harm to take his orders," he added, in an
undertone to the woman. "He was always very far ben with the old lord."

"The worse for him," said that important functionary under her breath.
But she agreed with Adamson afterwards that as long as it was my lord's
comfort he was looking after and not his own, his orders should be
obeyed. As with every such person, the household distrusted this
confident and unpaid major domo. But Underwood had not been tyrannical
in his previous reign, and young Lord Erradeen during his last residence
at Auchnasheen had frightened them all. He had been like a man beside
himself. If the captain could manage him better, they would be grateful
to the captain; and thus Underwood, though by no means confident of a
good reception, had no serious hindrances to encounter. He strolled
forth when he had arranged everything to "look about him." He saw the
Birkenbraes boat pass in the evening light, returning from the castle,
with a surprise which took away his breath. The boat was near enough to
the shore as it passed to be recognised and its occupants; but not even
Katie, whose eyesight was so keen, recognised the observer on the
beach. He remarked that the party were in earnest conversation,
consulting with each other over something, which seemed to secure
everybody's attention, so that the ordinary quick notice of a stranger,
which is common to country people, was not called forth by his own
appearance. It surprised him mightily to see that such visitors had
ventured to Kinloch Houran. They never would have done so in the time of
the last lord. Had Walter all at once become more friendly, more
open-hearted, perhaps feeling in the company of his neighbours a certain
safety? Underwood was confounded by this new suggestion. It did not
please him. Nothing could be worse for himself than that Lord Erradeen
should find amusement in the society of the neighbourhood. There would
be no more riot if this was the case, no "pleasure," no play; but
perhaps a wife--most terrible of all anticipations. Underwood had been
deeply alarmed before by Katie Williamson's ascendancy; but when Lord
Erradeen returned to his own influence, he had believed that risk to be
over. If, however, it recurred again, and, in this moment while
undefended by his, Underwood's, protection, if the young fellow had
rushed into the snare once more, the captain felt that the incident
would acquire new significance.

There were women whom he might have tolerated if better could not be.
Julia Herbert was one whom he could perhaps--it was possible--have "got
on with," though possibly she would have changed after her marriage; but
with Katie, Underwood knew that he never would get on. If this were so
he would have at once to disappear. All his hopes would be over--his
prospect of gain or pleasure by means of Lord Erradeen. And he had "put
up with" so much! nobody knew how much he had put up with. He had
humoured the young fellow, and endured his fits of temper, his changes
of purpose, his fantastic inconsistencies of every kind. What friendship
it was on his part, after Erradeen had deserted him, left him planted
there--as if he cared for the d---- place where he had gone only to
please the young'un! thus to put all his grievances in his pocket and
hurry over land and sea to make sure that all was comfortable for the
ungrateful young man! That was true friendship, by Jove; what a man
would do for a man! not like a woman that always had to be waited upon.
Captain Underwood felt that his vested rights were being assailed, and
that if it came to this it would be a thing to be resisted with might
and main. A wife! what did Erradeen want with a wife? Surely it would be
possible to put before him the charms of liberty once more and prevent
the sacrifice. He walked along the side of the loch almost keeping up
with the boat, hot with righteous indignation, in spite of the cold wind
which had driven Mrs. Forrester into the house. Presently he heard the
sound of salutations on the water, of oars clanking upon rowlocks from a
different quarter, and saw the boat from the isle--Hamish rowing in his
red shirt--meet with the large four-oared boat from Birkenbraes and
pause while the women's voices exchanged a few sentences, chorused by
Mr. Williamson's bass. Then the smaller boat came on towards the shore,
towards the point near which a carriage was waiting. Captain Underwood
quickened his steps a little, and he it was who presented himself to
Julia Herbert's eyes as she approached the bit of rocky beach, and
hurrying down, offered his hand to help her.

"What a strange meeting," cried Julia; "what a small world, as everybody
says! Who could have thought, Captain Underwood, of seeing you here?"

"I might reply, if the surprise were not so delightful, who could have
thought, Miss Herbert, of seeing you here? for myself it is a second
home to me, and has been for years."

"My reason for being here is simple. Let me introduce you to my cousin,
Lady Herbert. Sir Thomas has got the shootings lower down. I suppose you
are with Lord Erradeen."

Lady Herbert had given the captain a very distant bow. She did not like
the looks of him, as indeed it has been stated no ladies did, whether in
Sloebury or elsewhere; but at the name of Erradeen she paid a more
polite attention, though the thought of her horses waiting so long in
the cold was already grievous to her. "I hope," she said, "that Lord
Erradeen does not lodge his friends in that old ruin, as he does
himself, people say."

"We are at Auchnasheen, a house you may see among the trees," said the
captain. "Feudal remains are captivating, but not to live in. Does our
friend Walter know, Miss Herbert, what happiness awaits him in your
presence here?"

"What a pretty speech," Julia cried; "far prettier than anything Walter
could muster courage to say. No, Captain Underwood, he does not. It was
all settled quite suddenly. I did not even know that he was here."

"Julia, the horses have been waiting a long time," said Lady Herbert. "I
have no doubt Lord Erradeen is a very interesting subject--but I don't
know what Barber (who was the coachman) will say. I shall be glad to see
your friends any day at luncheon. Tell Lord Erradeen, please. We are two
women alone, Sir Thomas is on the hills all day; all the more we shall
be glad to see him--I mean you both--if you will take pity on our
loneliness. Now, Julia, we really must not wait any longer."

"Tell Walter I shall look for him," said Julia, kissing her hand as they
drove away. Underwood stood and looked after the carriage with varied
emotions. As against Katie Williamson, he was overjoyed to have such an
auxiliary--a girl who would not stand upon any punctilio--who would
pursue her object with any assistance she could pick up, and would not
be above an alliance defensive or offensive, a girl who knew the
advantage of an influential friend. So far as that went he was glad:
but, heavens! what a neighbourhood, bristling with women; a girl at
every corner ready to decoy his prey out of his hands. He was rueful,
even though he was in a measure satisfied. If he could play his cards
sufficiently well to detach Walter from both one and the other, to show
the bondage which was veiled under Julia's smiles and complacency, as
well as under Katie's uncompromising code, and to carry him off under
their very eyes, that would indeed be a triumph; but failing that, it
was better for him to make an ally of Julia, and push her cause, than to
suffer himself to be ousted by the other, the little parvenue, with her
cool impertinence, who had been the first, he thought, to set Walter
against him.

He walked back to Auchnasheen, full of these thoughts, and of plans to
recover his old ascendancy. He had expedients for doing this which would
not bear recording, and a hundred hopes of awakening the passions, the
jealousies, the vanity of the young man whom already he had been able to
sway beyond his expectations. He believed that he had led Walter by the
nose, as he said, and had a mastery over him which would be easily
recovered if he but got him for a day or two to himself. It was a matter
of fact that he had done him much, if not fatal harm; and if the captain
had been clever enough to know that he had no mastery whatever over his
victim, and that Walter was the slave of his own shifting and uneasy
moods, of his indolences and sudden impulses, and immediate abandonment
of himself to the moment, but not of Captain Underwood, that tempter
might have done him still more harm. But he did not possess this finer
perception, and thus lost a portion of his power.

He went back to Auchnasheen to find a comfortable dinner, a good fire, a
cheerful room, full of light and comfort, which reminded him of "old
days," which he gave a regretful yet comfortable thought to in
passing--the time when he had waited, not knowing what moment the old
lord, his former patron, should return from Kinloch Houran. And now he
was waiting for the other--who was so unlike the old lord--and yet had
already been of more use to Underwood, and served him better in his own
way, than the old lord had ever done. He was much softened, and even
perhaps a little maudlin in his thoughts of Walter as he sat over that
comfortable fire. What was he about, poor boy? Not so comfortable as
this friend and retainer, who was drinking his wine and thinking of him.
But he should find some one to welcome him when he returned. He should
find a comfortable meal and good company, which was more than the
foolish fellow would expect. It was foolish of him, in his temper, to
dart away from those who really cared for him, who really could be of
use to him; but by this time the young lord would be too glad, after his
loneliness, to come back and find a faithful friend ready to make
allowances for him, and so well acquainted with his circumstances here.

So well acquainted with his circumstances! Underwood, in his time, had
no doubt wondered over these as much as any one; but that was long ago,
and he had in the mean time become quite familiar with them, and did not
any longer speculate on the subject. He had no supernatural curiosity
for his part. He could understand that one would not like to see a
ghost: and he believed in ghosts--in a fine, healthy, vulgar, natural
apparition, with dragging chains and hollow groans. But as for anything
else, he had never entered into the question, nor had he any thought of
doing so now. However, as he sat by the fire with all these comfortable
accessories round him, and listened now and then to hear if any one was
coming, and sometimes was deceived by the wind in the chimneys, or the
sound of the trees in the fresh breeze which had become keener and
sharper since he came indoors, it happened, how he could not tell, that
questions arose in the captain's mind such as he had never known before.

The house was very still, the servants' apartments were at a
considerable distance from the sitting-rooms, and all was very quiet.
Two or three times in the course of the evening, old Symington, who had
also come to see that everything was in order for his master, walked all
the way from these retired regions through a long passage running from
one end of the house to the other, to the great door, which he opened
cautiously, then shut again, finding nobody in sight, and retired the
same way as he came, his shoes creaking all the way. This interruption
occurring at intervals had a remarkable effect upon Underwood. He began
to wait for its recurrence, to count the steps, to feel a thrill of
alarm as they passed the door of the room in which he was sitting. Oh,
yes, no doubt it was Symington, who always wore creaking shoes, confound
him! But what if it were not Symington? What if it might be some one
else, some mysterious being who might suddenly open the door, and freeze
into stone the warm, palpitating, somewhat unsteady person of a man who
had eaten a very good dinner and drunk a considerable quantity of wine?
This thought so penetrated his mind, that gradually all his thoughts
were concentrated on the old servant's perambulation, watching for it
before it came, thinking of it after it had passed. The steady and
solemn march at intervals, which seemed calculated and regular, was
enough to have impressed the imagination of any solitary person. And the
captain was of a primitive simplicity of mind in some respects. His
fears paralysed him; he was afraid to get up, to open the door, to make
sure what it was. How could he tell that he might not be seized by the
hair of the head by some ghastly apparition, and dragged into a chamber
of horrors! He tried to fortify himself with more wine, but that only
made his tremor worse. Finally the panic came to a crisis, when
Symington, pausing, knocked at the library door. Underwood remembered to
have heard that no spirit could enter without invitation, and he shut
his mouth firmly that no habitual "come in" might lay him open to the
assault of the enemy. He sat breathless through the ensuing moment of
suspense, while Symington waited outside. The captain's hair stood up on
his head; his face was covered with a profuse dew; he held by the table
in an agony of apprehension when he saw the door begin to turn slowly
upon its hinges.

"My lord will not be home the night," said Symington, slowly.

The sight of the old servant scarcely quieted the perturbation of
Underwood. It had been a terrible day for Symington. He was ashy pale or
grey, as old men become when the blood is driven from their faces. He
had not been able to get rid of the scared and terror-stricken sensation
with which he had watched the Birkenbraes party climbing the old stairs,
and wandering as he thought at the peril of their lives upon the unsafe
battlements. He had been almost violent in his calls to them to come
down: but nobody had taken any notice, and they had talked about their
guide and about the gentleman who was living with Lord Erradeen, till it
seemed to Symington that he must go distracted. "Where there ever such
fools--such idiots! since there is nobody staying with Lord Erradeen but
me, his body servant," the old man had said tremulously to himself. At
Symington's voice the captain gave a start and a cry. Even in the relief
of discovering who it was, he could not quiet the excitement of his
nerves.

"It's you, old Truepenny," he cried, yet looked at him across the table
with a tremor, and a very forced and uncomfortable smile.

"That's not my name," said Symington, with, on his side, the irritation
of a disturbed mind. "I'm saying that it's getting late, and my lord
will not be home to-night."

"By Jove!" cried Captain Underwood, "when I heard you passing from one
end of the house to the other, I thought it might be--the old fellow
over there, coming himself----"

"I cannot tell, sir, what you are meaning by the old fellow over there.
There's no old fellow I know of but old Macalister; and it was not for
him you took me."

"If you could have heard how your steps sounded through the house! By
Jove! I could fancy I hear them now."

"Where?" Symington cried, coming in and shutting the door, which he held
with his hand behind him, as if to bar all possible comers. And then the
two men looked at each other, both breathless and pale.

"Sit down," said Underwood. "The house feels chilly and dreary, nobody
living in it for so long. Have a glass of wine. One wants company in a
damp, dreary old hole like this."

"You are very kind, captain," said the old man; "but Auchnasheen, though
only my lord's shooting-box, is a modern mansion, and full of every
convenience. It would ill become me to raise an ill name on it."

"I wonder what Erradeen's about?" said the captain. "I bet he's worse
off than we are. How he must wish he was off with me on the other side
of the Channel."

"Captain! you will, maybe, think little of me, being nothing but a
servant; but it is little good you do my young lord on the ither side of
the Channel."

Underwood laughed, but not with his usual vigour.

"What can I do with your young lord," he said. "He takes the bit in his
teeth, and goes--to the devil his own way."

"Captain, there are some that think the like of you sore to blame."

Underwood said nothing for a moment. When he spoke there was a quiver in
his voice.

"Let me see the way to my room, Symington. Oh yes, I suppose it is the
old room; but I've forgotten. I was there before? well, so I suppose;
but I have forgotten. Take the candle as I tell you, and show me the
way."

He had not the least idea what he feared, and he did not remember ever
having feared anything before; but to-night he hung close to Symington,
following at his very heels. The old man was anxious and alarmed, but
not in this ignoble way. He deposited the captain in his room with
composure, who would but for very shame have implored him to stay. And
then his footsteps sounded through the vacant house, going further and
further off till they died away in the distance. Captain Underwood
locked his door, though he felt it was a vain precaution, and hastened
to hide his head under the bed-clothes: but he was well aware that this
was a vain precaution too.

CHAPTER IV.

It was on the evening of the day after Captain Underwood's arrival that
Lord Erradeen left Kinloch Houran for Auchnasheen. After labour, rest.
He could not but compare as he walked along in the early falling
autumnal twilight the difference between himself now, and the same self
a year ago, when he had fled from the place of torture to the house of
peace, a man nearly frantic with the consciousness of all the new bonds
upon him, the uncomprehended powers against which he had to struggle,
the sense of panic and impotence, yet of mad excitement and resistance,
with which his brain was on flame. The recollection of the ensuing time
spent at Auchnasheen, when he saw no one, heard no voice but his own,
yet lived through day after day of bewildering mental conflict, without
knowing who it was against whom he contended, was burned in upon his
recollection. All through that time he had been conscious of such a
desire to flee as hurried the pace of his thoughts, and made the
intolerable still more intolerable. His heart had sickened of the
unbearable fight into which he was compelled like an unwilling soldier
with death behind him. To resist had always been Walter's natural
impulse; but the impulse of flight had so mingled with it that his soul
had been in a fever, counting no passage of days, but feeling the whole
period long or short, he did not know which, as one monstrous
uninterrupted day or night, in which the processes of thought were never
intermitted. His mind was in a very different condition now. He had got
over the early panic of nature. The blinding mists of terror had melted
away from his eyes, and the novelty and horror of his position,
contending with unseen dominations and powers, had almost ceased for the
moment to affect his mind, so profoundly exhausted was he by the renewed
struggle in which he had been engaged.

The loch was veiled in mist, through which it glimmered faintly with
broken reflections, the wooded banks presenting on every side a sort of
ghostly outline, with the colour no more than indicated against the
dreary confusion of air and vapour. At some points there was the glimpse
of a blurred light, looking larger and more distant than it really was,
the ruddy spot made by the open door of the little inn, the whiter and
smaller twinkle of the manse window, the far-off point, looking no more
than a taper light in the distance, that shone from the isle. There was
in Walter's mind a darkness and confusion not unlike the landscape. He
was worn out: there was in him none of that vivid feeling which had
separated between his human soul in its despair and the keen sweetness
of the morning. Now all was night within him and around. His arms had
fallen from his hands. He moved along, scarcely aware that he was
moving, feeling everything blurred, confused, indistinct in the earth
about him and in the secret places of his soul. Desire for flight he had
none: he had come to see that it was impossible: and he had not energy
enough to wish it. And fear had died out of him. He was not afraid. Had
he been joined on the darkling way by the personage of whom he had of
late seen so much, it would scarcely have quickened his pulses. All such
superficial emotion had died out of him: the real question was so much
superior, so infinitely important in comparison with any such transitory
tremors as these. But at the present moment he was not thinking at all,
scarcely living, any more than the world around him was living, hushed
into a cessation of all energy and almost of consciousness, looking
forward to night and darkness and repose.

It was somewhat surprising to him to see the lighted windows at
Auchnasheen, and the air of inhabitation about the house with which he
had no agreeable associations, but only those which are apt to hang
about a place in which one has gone through a fever, full of miserable
visions, and the burning restlessness of disease. But when he stepped
into the hall, the door being opened to him by Symington as soon as his
foot was heard on the gravel, and turning round to go into the library
found himself suddenly in the presence of Captain Underwood, his
astonishment and dismay were beyond expression. The dismay came even
before the flush of anger, which was the first emotion that showed
itself. Underwood stood holding open the library door, with a smile that
was meant to be ingratiating and conciliatory. He held out his hand, as
Walter, with a start and exclamation, recognised him.

"Yes," he said, "I'm here, you see. Not so easy to get rid of when once
I form a friendship. Welcome to your own house, Erradeen."

Walter did not say anything till he had entered the room and shut the
door. He walked to the fire, which was blazing brightly, and placed
himself with his back to it, in that attitude in which the master of a
house defies all comers.

"I did not expect to find you here," he said. "You take me entirely by
surprise."

"I had hoped it would be an agreeable surprise," said the captain, still
with his most amiable smile. "I thought to have a friend's face waiting
for you when you came back from that confounded place would be a
relief."

"What do you call a confounded place?" said Walter, testily. "You know
nothing about it, as far as I am aware. No, Underwood, it is as well to
speak plainly. It is not an agreeable surprise. I am sorry you have
taken the trouble to come so far for me."

"It was no trouble. If you are a little out of sorts, never mind. I am
not a man to be discouraged for a hasty word. You want a little cheerful
society----"

"Is that what you call yourself?" Walter said with a harsh laugh. He was
aware that there was a certain brutality in what he said; but the sudden
sight of the man who had disgusted him even while he had most influenced
him, and of whom he had never thought but with a movement of resentment
and secret rage, affected him to a sort of delirium. He could have
seized him with the force of passion and flung him into the loch at the
door. It would have been no crime, he thought, to destroy such vermin
off the face of the earth--to make an end of such a source of evil would
be no crime. This was the thought in his mind while he stood upon his
own hearth, looking at the man who was his guest and therefore sacred.
As for Captain Underwood, he took no offence; it was not in his _rôle_
to do so, whatever happened. What he had to do was to regain, if
possible, his position with the young man upon whom he had lived and
enriched himself for the greater part of the year, to render himself
indispensable to him as he had done to his predecessor. For this object
he was prepared to bear everything, and laugh at all that was too strong
to be ignored. He laughed now, and did his best, not very gracefully, to
carry out the joke. He exerted himself to talk and please throughout the
dinner, which Walter went through in silence, drinking largely, though
scarcely eating at all--for Kinloch Houran was not a place which
encouraged an appetite. After dinner, in the midst of one of
Underwood's stories, Walter lighted a candle abruptly, and saying he was
going to bed, left his companion without apology or reason given. It was
impossible to be more rude. The captain felt the check, for he had a
considerable development of vanity, and was in the habit of amusing the
people to whom he chose to make himself agreeable. But this affront,
too, he swallowed. "He will have come to himself by morning," he said.
In the morning, however, Walter was only more gloomy and unwilling to
listen, and determined not to respond. It was only when in the middle of
the breakfast he received a note brought by a mounted messenger who
waited for an answer, that he spoke. He flung it open across the table
to Underwood with a harsh laugh.

"Is this your doing, too?" he cried.

"My doing, Erradeen!"

Underwood knew very well what it was before he looked at it. It was from
Lady Herbert, explaining that she had only just heard that Lord Erradeen
was so near a neighbour, and begging him, if he was not, like all the
other gentlemen, on the hills, that he would come ("and your friend
Captain Underwood") to luncheon that day to cheer two forlorn ladies
left all by themselves in this wilderness. "And you will meet an old
friend," it concluded playfully. The composition was Julia's, and had
not been produced without careful study.

"My doing!" said Captain Underwood. "Can you suppose that _I_ want you
to marry, Erradeen?"

It was a case, he thought, in which truth was best.

Walter started up from his seat.

"Marry!" he cried, with a half-shout of rage and dismay.

"Well, my dear fellow, I don't suppose you are such a fool; but, of
course, that is what _she_ means. The fair Julia----"

"Oblige me," cried Lord Erradeen, taking up once more his position on
the hearth, "by speaking civilly when you speak of ladies in my house."

"Why, bless me, Erradeen, you gave me the note----"

"I was a fool--that is nothing new. I have been a fool since the first
day when I met you and took you for something more than mortal. Oh, and
before that!" cried Walter bitterly. "Do not flatter yourself that you
did it. It is of older date than you."

"The fair Julia----" Underwood began; but he stopped when his companion
advanced upon him threatening, with so gloomy a look and so tightly
strained an arm that the captain judged it wise to change his tone. "I
should have said, since we are on punctilio, that Miss Herbert and you
are older acquaintances than you and I, Erradeen."

"Fortunately you have nothing to do with that," Walter said, perceiving
the absurdity of his rage.

Then he walked to the window and looked out so long and silently that
the anxious watcher began to think the incident over. But it was not
till Walter, after this period of reflection, had written a note and
sent it to the messenger, that he ventured to speak.

"You have accepted, of course. In the circumstances it would be
uncivil----"

Walter looked at him for a moment, breaking off his sentence as if he
had spoken.

"I have something to tell you," he said. "My mother is coming to
Auchnasheen."

"Your mother!" Underwood's voice ran into a quaver of dismay.

"You will see that in the circumstances, as you say, I am forced to be
uncivil. When my mother is here she will, of course, be the mistress of
the house; and she, as you know----"

"Will not ask me to prolong my visit," said the captain, with an attempt
at rueful humour. "I think we may say as much as that, Erradeen."

"I fear it is not likely," Walter said.

Captain Underwood gave vent to his feelings in a prolonged whistle.

"You will be bored to death. Mark my words, I know you well enough. You
will never be able to put up with it. You will be ready to hang yourself
in a week. You will come off to me. It is the best thing that could
happen so far as I am concerned--wishing to preserve your friendship as
I do----"

"Is it friendship, then, that has bound us together?" said Lord
Erradeen.

"What else? Disinterested friendship on my part. I take your laugh
rather ill, Erradeen. What have I gained by it, I should like to know?
I've liked you, and I liked the last man before you. I have put up with
a great deal from you--tempers like a silly woman, vagaries of all
sorts, discontent and abuse. Why have I put up with all that?"

"Why indeed? I wish you had not," said the young man scornfully. "Yes,
you have put up with it, and made your pupil think the worse of you with
every fresh exercise of patience. I should like to pay you for all that
dirty work."

"Pay me!" the captain said, faltering a little. He was not a very brave
man, though he could hold his own; and there was a force of passion and
youth in his "pupil"--with what bitterness that word was said!--that
alarmed him a little. Besides, Walter had a household of servants behind
him--grooms, keepers, all sorts of people--who held Captain Underwood in
no favour. "Pay me! I don't know how you could pay me," he said.

"I should like to do it--in one way; and I shall do it--in another,"
said Walter still somewhat fiercely. Then once more he laughed. He took
out a pocket-book from his coat, and out of that a cheque. "You have
been at some expense on my account," he said; "your journey has been
long and rapid. I consider myself your debtor for that, and for
the--good intention. Will this be enough?"

In the bitter force of his ridicule and dislike, Walter held out the
piece of paper as one holds a sweetmeat to a child. The other gave a
succession of rapid glances at it to make out what it was. When he
succeeded in doing so a flush of excitement and eagerness covered his
face. He put out his hand nervously to clutch it with the excited look
of the child before whom a prize is held out, and who catches at it
before it is snatched away. But he would not acknowledge this feeling.

"My lord," he said, with an appearance of dignity offended, "you are
generous; but to pay me, as you say, and offer money in place of your
friendship----"

"It is an excellent exchange, Underwood. This is worth something, if not
very much--the other," said Walter with a laugh, "nothing at all."

Perhaps this was something like what Captain Underwood himself thought,
as he found himself, a few hours later, driving along the country roads
towards the railway station, retracing the path which he had travelled
two days before with many hopes and yet a tremor. His hopes were now
over, and the tremor too; but there was something in his breast pocket
better, for the moment at least, than any hopes, which kept him warm,
even though the wind was cold. He had failed in his attempt to fix
himself once more permanently on Lord Erradeen's shoulders--an attempt
in which he had not been very sanguine. It was a desperate venture, he
knew, and it had failed; but, at the same time, circumstances might
arise which would justify another attempt, and that one might not fail:
and, in the mean time, his heart rose with a certain elation when he
thought of that signature in his breast pocket. _That_ was worth an
effort, and nothing could diminish its value. Friendship might fail, but
a cheque is substantial. He had something of the dizzy feeling of one
who has fallen from a great height, and has not yet got the giddiness of
the movement out of his head. And yet he was not altogether discouraged.
Who could tell what turn the wheel of fortune might take? and, in the
mean time, there was that bit of paper. The horse was fresh, and flew
along the road, up and down, at a pace very different from that of Big
John's steeds, which had brought Captain Underwood to Auchnasheen. About
half-way along he came up to the waggonette from Birkenbraes, in which
was Mr. Braithwaite and his luggage, along with two other guests,
ladies, bound for the station, and escorted by Mr. Williamson and Katie,
as was their way.

"Dear me, is that Underwood?" cried Mr. Williamson with the lively and
simple curiosity of rural use and wont. "So you're there, captain," he
said, as the dog-cart came up behind the heavier carriage.

"No, I'm not here--I'm going," said Underwood, quickly, "hurrying to
catch the train."

"Oh, there is plenty of time; we are going too (Bless me," he said
aside, "how many visitors think you they can have had in yon old place?)
I am thinking ye have been with our young neighbour, Lord Erradeen."

"That is an easy guess. I am leaving him, you mean. Erradeen is a
reformed character. He is turning over a new leaf--and full time too,"
Captain Underwood cried, raising his voice that he might be heard over
the rattle of the two carriages. Notwithstanding the cheque which kept
him so warm, he had various grudges against Walter, and did not choose
to lose the opportunity for a little mischief.

"It is always a good thing," said Mr. Williamson, "to turn over a new
leaf. We have all great occasion to do that."

"Especially when there are so many of them," the captain cried, as his
light cart passed the other. He met the party again at the station,
where they had to wait for the train. Katie stood by herself in a
thoughtful mood while the departing guests consulted over their several
boxes, and Captain Underwood seized the moment: "I am sorry to lose the
fun," he said, in a confidential tone, "but I must tell you, Miss
Williamson, what is going to happen. Erradeen has been pursued up here
into his stronghold by one of the many ladies----I expect to hear she
has clutched hold of him before long, and then you'll have a wedding."

"Is that why you are going away, Captain Underwood?"

"He has gone a little too far, you know, that is the truth," said the
captain. "I am glad he is not going to take in any nice girl. I couldn't
have stood by and seen that. I should have had to warn her people. Even
Miss Julia, by Jove! I'm sorry for Miss Julia, if she gets him. But she
is an old campaigner; she will know how to take care of herself."

"Is it because Lord Erradeen is so bad that you are leaving him, or
because he is going to be good?" Katie asked. Captain Underwood on
ordinary occasions was a little afraid of her; but his virtuous object
fortified him now.

"Oh, by Jove! he goes too far," said Underwood. "I am not squeamish,
heaven knows, but he goes too far. I can speak now that it's all over
between him and me. I never could bear to see him with nice girls; but
he's got his match in Miss Julia. The fair Julia--that is another pair
of shoes."

"Who was he meaning with his fair Julias?" said Mr. Williamson as they
drove away. "Yon's a scoundrel, if there ever was one, and young
Erradeen is well rid of him. But when thieves cast out, honest folk get
their ain. Would yon be true?"

Katie was in what her father called "a brown study," and did not care to
talk. She only shook her head--a gesture which could be interpreted as
any one pleased.

"I am not sure," said Mr. Williamson, in reply. "He knows more about
Lord Erradeen than any person on the loch. But who is the fair Julia,
and is he really to be married to her? I would like fine to hear all
about it. I will call at Auchnasheen in the afternoon and see what he
has to say."

But Katie remained in her brown study, letting her father talk. She knew
very well who the fair Julia was. She remembered distinctly the scene at
Burlington House. She saw with the clearest perception what the tactics
were of the ladies at the Lodge. Katie had been somewhat excited by the
prospect of being Oona's rival, which was like something in a book. It
was like the universal story of the young man's choice, not between
Venus and Minerva, or between good and evil, but perhaps, Katie thought,
between poetry and prose, between the ideal and the practical. She was
interested in that conflict and not unwilling in all kindness and honour
to play her part in it. Oona would be the ideal bride for him, but she
herself, Katie felt, would be better in a great many ways, and she did
not feel that she would have any objection to marry Lord Erradeen. But
here was another rival with whom she did not choose to enter the lists.
It is to be feared that Katie in her heart classified Miss Herbert as
Vice, as the sinner against whom every man is to be warned, and turned
with some scorn from any comparison with her meretricious attractions.
But she was fair and just, and her heart had nothing particular to do
with the matter; so that she was able calmly to wait for information,
which was not Oona's case.

It had been entirely at random that Lord Erradeen had announced his
mother's approaching arrival to Underwood. The idea had come into his
mind the moment before he made use of it, and he had felt a certain
amusement in the complete success of this hastily-assumed weapon. It had
been so effectual that he began to think it might be available in other
conflicts as well as this: and in any case he felt himself pledged to
make it a matter of fact. He walked to the village when Underwood had
gone, to carry at once his intention into effect. Though it was only a
cluster of some half-dozen houses, it had a telegraph-office--as is so
general in the Highlands--and Walter sent a brief, emphatic message,
which he felt would carry wild excitement into Sloebury. "You will do me
a great favour if you will come at once, alone," was Walter's message.
He was himself slightly excited by it. He began to think over all those
primitive relationships of his youth as he walked along the quiet road.
There was sweetness in them, but how much conflict, trouble,
embarrassment!--claims on one side to which the other could not
respond--a sort of authority, which was no authority--a duty which did
nothing but establish grievances and mutual reproach. His mind was still
in the state of exhaustion which Captain Underwood had only temporarily
disturbed; and a certain softening was in the weakened faculties, which
were worn out with too much conflict. Poor mother, after all! He could
remember, looking back, when it was his greatest pleasure to go home to
her, to talk to her, pouring every sort of revelation into her
never-wearied ears; all his school successes and tribulations, all
about the other fellows, the injustices that were done, the triumphs
that were gained. Could women interest themselves in all that as she had
seemed to interest herself? or had she sometimes found it a bore to have
all these schoolboy experiences poured forth upon her? Miss Merivale had
very plainly thought it a bore; his voice had given her a headache. But
Mrs. Methven never had any headaches, or anything that could cloud her
attention. He remembered now that his mother was not a mere nursery
woman--that she read a great deal more than he himself did, knew many
things he did not know, was not silly, or a fool, or narrow-minded, as
so many women are. Was it not a little hard, after all, that she should
have nothing of her son but the schoolboy prattle? She had been
everything to him when he was a boy, and now she was nothing to him;
perhaps all the time she might have been looking forward to the period
when he should be a man, and have something more interesting to talk
over with her than a cricket-match--for, to be sure, when one came to
think of it, she could have no personal interest in a cricket-match. A
momentary _serrement_ of compunction came to Walter's heart. Poor
mother! he said to himself; perhaps it was a little hard upon her. And
she must have the feeling, to make it worse, that she had a right to
something better. He could not even now get his mind clear about that
right.

As he returned from the telegraph-office he too met the waggonette from
Birkenbraes, which was stopped at sight of him with much energy on the
part of Mr. Williamson.

"We've just met your friend Captain Underwood. If you'll not take it
amiss, Lord Erradeen, I will say that I'm very glad you're not keeping a
man like that about you. But what is this about--a lady? I hear there's
a lady--the fair----What did he call her, Katie? I am not good at
remembering names."

"It is of no consequence," said Katie, with a little rising colour,
"what such a man said."

"That's true, that's true," said her father; "but still, Erradeen, you
must mind we are old friends now, and let us know what's coming. The
fair----Toots, I thought of it a minute ago? It's ridiculous to forget
names."

"You may be sure I shall let you know what's coming. My mother is
coming," Walter said.

And this piece of news was so unexpected and startling that the
Williamsons drove off with energy to spread it far and near. Mr.
Williamson himself was as much excited as if it had been of personal
importance to him.

"Now that will settle the young man," he said; "that will put many
things right. There has not been a lady at Auchnasheen since ever I have
been here. A mother is the next best thing to a wife, and very likely
the one is in preparation for the other, and ye will all have to put on
your prettiest frocks for her approval." He followed this with one of
his big laughs, looking round upon a circle in which there were various
young persons who were very marriageable. "But I put no faith in
Underwood's fair--what was it he called her?" Mr. Williamson said.

CHAPTER V.

Two days after, Mrs. Methven arrived at Kinloch Houran by the afternoon
coach, alone.

She had interpreted very literally the telegram which had brought such a
tremor yet such a movement of joy to her heart. Her son wanted her.
Perhaps he might be ill, certainly it must be for something serious and
painful that she was called; yet he wanted her! She had been very quiet
and patient, waiting if perhaps his heart might be touched and he might
recall the tie of nature and his own promises, feeling with a sad pride
that she wanted nothing of him but his love, and that without that the
fine houses and the new wealth were nothing to her. She was pleased even
to stand aloof, to be conscious of having in no way profited by Walter's
advancement. She had gained nothing by it, she wished to gain nothing by
it. If Walter were well, then there was no need for more. She had enough
for herself without troubling him. So long as all was well! But this is
at the best a forlorn line of argument, and it cannot be doubted that
Mrs. Methven's bosom throbbed with a great pang of disappointment when
she sat and smiled to conceal it, and answered questions about Walter,
yet could not say that she had seen him or any of his "places in
Scotland," or knew much more than her questioners did. When his message
arrived her heart leapt in her breast. There were no explanations, no
reason given, but that imperative call, such as mothers love to have
addressed to them: "Come;" all considerations of her own comfort set
aside in the necessity for her which had arisen at last. Another might
have resented so complete an indifference to what might happen to suit
herself. But there are connections and relationships in which this is
the highest compliment. He knew that it did not matter to her what her
own convenience was, as long as he wanted her. She got up from her chair
at once, and proceeded to put her things together to get ready for the
journey. With a smiling countenance she prepared herself for the night
train. She would not even take a maid. "He says, alone. He must have
some reason for it, I suppose," she said to Miss Merivale. "I am the
reason," said Cousin Sophy: "He doesn't want me. You can tell him, with
my love, that to travel all night is not at all in my way, and he need
have had no fear on that subject." But Mrs. Methven would not agree to
this, and departed hurriedly without any maid. She was surprised a
little, yet would not allow herself to be displeased, that no one came
to meet her: but it was somewhat forlorn to be set down on the side of
the loch in the wintry afternoon, with the cold, gleaming water before
her, and no apparent way of getting to the end of her journey.

"Oh yes, mem, you might drive round the head of the loch: but it's a
long way," the landlady of the little inn said, smoothing down her apron
at the door, "and far simpler just crossing the water, as everybody does
in these parts."

Mrs. Methven was a little nervous about crossing the water. She was
tired and disappointed, and a chill had crept to her heart. While she
stood hesitating a young lady came up, whose boat waited for her on the
beach, a man in a red shirt standing at the bow.

"It is a lady for Auchnasheen, Miss Oona," said the landlady, "and no
boat. Duncan is away, and for the moment I have not a person to send:
and his lordship will maybe be out on the hill, or he will have
forgotten, or maybe he wasna sure when to expect you, mem?"

"No, he did not know when to expect me. I hope there is no illness,"
said Mrs. Methven, with a thrill of apprehension.

At this the young lady came forward with a shy yet frank grace.

"If you will let me take you across," she said, "my boat is ready. I am
Oona Forrester. Lord Erradeen is quite well I think, and I heard that he
expected--his mother."

"Yes," said Mrs. Methven. She gave the young stranger a penetrating
look. Her own aspect was perhaps a little severe, for her heart had
been starved and repressed, and she wore it very warm and low down in
her bosom, never upon her sleeve. There rose over Oona's countenance a
soft and delicate flush under the eyes of Walter's mother. She had
nothing in the world to blush for, and probably that was why the colour
rose. They were of infinite interest to each other, two souls meeting,
as it were, in the dark, quite unknown to each other and yet--who could
tell?--to be very near perhaps in times to come. The look they
interchanged was a mutual question. Then Mrs. Methven felt herself bound
to take up her invariable defence of her son.

"He did not, most likely, think that I could arrive so soon. I was wrong
not to let him know. If I accept your kindness will it be an
inconvenience to you?"

This question was drowned in Oona's immediate response and in the louder
protest of Mrs. Macfarlane. "Bless me, mem, you canna know the loch! for
there is nobody but would put themselves about to help a traveller: and
above all Miss Oona, that just has no other thought. Colin, put in the
lady's box intill the boat, and Hamish, he will give ye a hand."

Thus it was settled without farther delay. It seemed to the elder lady
like a dream when she found herself afloat upon this unknown water, the
mountains standing round, with their heads all clear and pale in the
wonderful atmosphere from which the last rays of the sunset had but
lately faded, while down below in this twilight scene the colour had
begun to go out of the autumn trees and red walls of the ruined castle,
at which she looked with a curiosity full of excitement. "That is----?"
she said pointing with a strange sensation of eagerness.

"That is Kinloch Houran," said Oona, to whose sympathetic mind, she
could not tell how, there came a tender, pitying comprehension of the
feelings of the mother, thus thrust alone and without any guide into the
other life of her son.

"It is very strange to me--to see the place where Walter----You know
perhaps that neither my son nor I were ever here until he----"

"Oh yes," Oona said hastily, interrupting the embarrassed speech; and
she added, "My mother and I have been here always, and everybody on the
loch knows everybody else. We were aware----"

And then she paused too; but her companion took no notice, her mind
being fully occupied. "I feel," she said, "like a woman in a dream."

It was very still on the loch, scarcely a breath stirring (which was
very fortunate, for Mrs. Methven, unaccustomed, had a little tremor for
the dark water even though so smooth). The autumnal trees alone, not
quite put out by the falling darkness, seemed to lend a little light as
they hung, reflected, over the loch--a redder cluster here and there
looking like a fairy lamp below the water. A thousand suggestions were
in the air, and previsions of she knew not what, a hidden life
surrounding her on every side. Her brain was giddy, her heart full.
By-and-by she turned to her young companion, who was so sympathetically
silent, and whose soft voice when she spoke, with the little cadence of
an accent unfamiliar yet sweet, had a half-caressing sound which touched
the solitary woman. "You say your mother and you," she said. "Are you
too an only child?"

"Oh no! there are eight of us: but I am the youngest, the only one left.
All the boys are away. We live on the isle. I hope you will come and see
us. My mother will be glad----"

"And she is not afraid to trust you--by yourself? It must be a happy
thing for a woman to have a daughter," Mrs. Methven said, with a sigh.
"The boys, as you say, go away."

"Nobody here is afraid of the loch," said Oona. "Accidents happen--oh,
very rarely. Mamma is a little nervous about yachting, for the winds
come down from the hills in gusts; but Hamish is the steadiest oar, and
there is no fear. Do you see now the lights at Auchnasheen? There is
some one waiting, at the landing-place. It will be Lord Erradeen, or
some one from the house. Hamish, mind the current. You know how it
sweeps the boat up the loch?"

"It will just be the wash of that confounded steam-boat," Hamish said.

The voices bounded in the air without conveying any sense to her mind.
Was that Walter, the vague line of darker shadow upon the shade? Was it
his house she was going to, his life that she was entering once more?
All doubts were put to an end speedily by Walter's voice.

"Is it Hamish?" he cried out.

"Oh, Lord Erradeen, it is me," cried Oona, in her soft Scotch. "And I am
bringing you your mother."

The boat grated on the bank as she spoke, and this disguised the tremor
in her voice, which Mrs. Methven, quite incapable of distinguishing
anything else, was yet fully sensible of. She stepped out tremulously
into her son's arms.

"Mother," he cried, "what must you think of me for not coming to meet
you? I never thought you could be here so soon."

"I should have come by telegraph if I could," she said, with an agitated
laugh: so tired, so tremulous, so happy, the strangest combination of
feelings overwhelming her. But still she was aware of a something, a
tremor, a tingle in Oona's voice. The boat receded over the water almost
without a pause, Hamish under impulsion of a whispered word, having
pushed off again as soon as the traveller and her box were landed.
Walter paused to call out his thanks over the water, and then he drew
his mother's arm within his, and led her up the bank.

"Where is Jane?" he said. "Have you no one with you? Have you travelled
all night, and alone, mother, for me?"

"For whom should I do it, but for you? And did you think I would lose a
minute after your message, Walter? But you are well, there is nothing
wrong with your health?"

"Nothing wrong with my health," he said, with a half-laugh. "No, that is
safe enough. I have not deserved that you should come to me, mother----"

"There is no such word as deserving between mother and son," she said
tremulously, "so long as you want me, Walter."

"Take care of those steps," was all he said. "We are close now to the
house. I hope you will find your rooms comfortable. I fear they have not
been occupied for some time. But what shall you do without a maid?
Perhaps the housekeeper----"

"You said to come alone, Walter."

"Oh yes. I was afraid of Cousin Sophy; but you could not think I wanted
to impair your comfort, mother? Here we are at the door, and here is
Symington, very glad to receive his lady."

"But you must not let him call me so."

"Why not? You are our lady to all of us. You are the lady of the house,
and I bid you welcome to it, mother," he said, pausing to kiss her. She
had a thousand things to forgive, but in that moment they were as though
they had not been.

And there was not much more said until she had settled down into
possession of the library, which answered instead of a drawing-room: had
dined, and been brought back to the glowing peat fire which gave an
aromatic breath of warmth and character to a Highland house. When all
the business of the arrival had thus been gone through, there came a
moment when it was apparent that subjects of more importance must be
entered upon. There was a pause, and an interval of complete silence
which seemed much longer than it really was. Walter stood before the
fire for some time, while she sat close by, her hands clasped in her
lap, ready to attend. Then he began to move about uneasily, feeling the
compulsion of the moment, yet unprepared with anything to say. At length
it was she who began.

"You sent for me, Walter?" she said.

"Yes, mother."

Was there nothing more to tell her? He threw into disorder the books on
the table, and then he came back again, and once more faced her,
standing with his back to the fire.

"My dear," she said hesitating, "it is with no reproach I speak, but
only----There was some reason for sending for me?"

He gave once more a nervous laugh.

"You have good reason to be angry if you will; but I'll tell you the
truth, mother. I made use of you to get rid of Underwood. He followed me
here, and I told him you were coming, and that he could not stay
against the will of the mistress of the house. Then I was bound to ask
you----"

The poor lady drew back a little, and instinctively put her hand to her
heart, in which there was a hot thrill of sensation, as if an arrow had
gone in. And then, in the pang of it, she laughed too, and cried--

"You were bound, to be sure, to fulfil your threat. And this is
why--this is why, Walter----"

She could not say more without being hysterical, and departing from
every rule she had made for herself.

Meanwhile, Walter stood before her, feeling in his own heart the twang
of that arrow which had gone through hers, and the pity of it and wonder
of it, with a poignant realisation of all; and yet found nothing to say.

After a while Mrs. Methven regained her composure, and spoke with a
smile that was almost more pathetic than tears.

"After all, it was a very good reason. I am glad you used me to get rid
of that man."

"I always told you, mother," he said, "that you had a most absurd
prejudice against that man. There is no particular harm in the man. I
had got tired of him. He is well enough in his own way, but he was out
of place here."

"Well, Walter, we need not discuss Captain Underwood. But don't you see
it is natural that I should exaggerate his importance by way of giving
myself the better reason for having come?"

The touch of bitterness and sarcasm that was in her words made Walter
start from his place again, and once more turn over the books on the
table. She was not a perfect woman to dismiss all feeling from what she
said, and her heart was wrung.

After a while he returned to her again.

"Mother, I acknowledge you have a good right to be displeased. But that
is not all. I am glad, anyhow--heartily glad to have you here."

She looked up at him with her eyes full, and quivering lips. Everything
went by impulse in the young man's mind, and this look--in which for
once in his life he read the truth, the eagerness to forgive, the
willingness to forget, the possibility, even in the moment of her
deepest pain, of giving her happiness--went to his heart. After all it
is a wonderful thing to have a human creature thus altogether dependent
upon your words, your smile, ready to encounter all things for you,
without hesitation, without a grudge. And why should she? What had he
ever done for her? And she was no fool. These thoughts had already
passed through his mind with a realisation of the wonder of it all,
which seldom strikes the young at sight of the devotion of the old. All
these things flashed back upon him at the sight of the dumb anguish yet
forgiveness in her eyes.

"Mother," he cried, "there's enough of this between you and me. I want
you not for Underwood, but for everything. Why should you care for a cad
like me? but you do----"

"Care for you? Oh, my boy!"

"I know; there you sit that have travelled night and day because I held
up my finger: and would give me your life if you could, and bear
everything, and never change and never tire. Why, in the name of God,
why?" he cried with an outburst. "What have I ever done that you should
do this for me? You are worth a score of such as I am, and yet you make
yourself a slave--"

"Oh, Walter, my dear! how vain are all these words. I am your mother,"
she said.

Presently he drew a chair close to her and sat down beside her.

"All these things have been put before me," he said, "to drive me to
despair. I have tried to say that it was this vile lordship, and the
burden of the family, that has made me bad, mother. But you know better
than that," he said, looking up at her with a stormy gleam in his face
that could not be called a smile, "and so do I."

"Walter, God forbid that I should ever have thought you bad. You have
been led astray."

"To do--what I wanted to do," he said with another smile, "that is what
is called leading astray between a man and those who stand between him
and the devil; but I have talked with one who thinks of no such
punctilios. Mother, vice deserves damnation; isn't that your creed?"

"Walter!"

"Oh, I know; but listen to me. If that were so, would a woman like you
stand by the wretch still?"

"My dearest boy! you are talking wildly. There are no circumstances,
none! in which I should not stand by you."

"That is what I thought," he said, "you and--But they say that you don't
know, you women, how bad a man can be: and that if you knew--And then as
for God----"

"God knows everything, Walter."

"Ay: and knows that never in my life did I care for or appeal to Him,
till in despair. If you think of it, these are not things a man can do,
mother: take refuge with women who would loathe him if they knew; or
with God, who does know that only in desperation, only when nothing else
is left to him, he calls out that name like a spell. Yes, that is all;
like an incantation, to get rid of the fiend."

The veins were swollen on Walter's forehead; great drops of moisture
hung upon it; on the other hand his lips were parched and dry, his eyes
gleaming with a hot treacherous lustre. Mrs. Methven, as she looked at
him, grew sick with terror. She began to think that his brain was giving
way.

"What am I to say to you?" she cried; "who has been speaking so? It
cannot be a friend, Walter. That is not the way to bring back a soul."

He laughed, and the sound alarmed her still more.

"There was no friendship intended," he said, "nor reformation either.
It was intended--to make me a slave."

"To whom, oh! to whom?"

He had relieved his mind by talking thus; but it was by putting his
burden upon her. She was agitated beyond measure by these partial
confidences. She took his hands in hers, and pleaded with him--

"Oh, Walter, my darling, what has happened to you? Tell me what you
mean."

"I am not mad, mother, if that is what you think."

"I don't think so, Walter. I don't know what to think. Tell me. Oh, my
boy, have pity upon me; tell me."

"You will do me more good, mother, if you will tell me--how I am to get
this burden off, and be a free man."

"The burden of--what? Sin? Oh, my son!" she cried, rising to her feet,
with tears of joy streaming from her eyes. She put her hands upon his
head and bade God bless him. God bless him! "There is no doubt about
that; no difficulty about that," she said; "for everything else in the
world there may be uncertainty, but for this none. God is more ready to
forgive than we are to ask. If you wish it sincerely with all your
heart, it is done. He is never far from any of us. He is here,
Walter--here, ready to pardon!"

He took her hands which she had put upon him, and looked at her, shaking
his head.

"Mother, you are going too fast," he said. "I want deliverance, it is
true; but I don't know if it is _that_ I mean."

"That is at the bottom of all, Walter."

He put her softly into her chair, and calmed her agitation; then he
began to walk up and down the room.

"That is religion," he said. "I suppose it is at the bottom of all. What
was it you used to teach me, mother, about a new heart? Can a man enter
a second time--and be born? That seems all so visionary when one is
living one's life. You think of hundreds of expedients first. To thrust
it away from you, and forget all about it; but that does not answer; to
defy it and go the other way out of misery and spite. Then to try
compromises; marriage, for instance, with a wife perhaps, one
thinks----"

"My dear," said Mrs. Methven, with a sad sinking of disappointment in
her heart after her previous exultation, yet determined that her
sympathy should not fail, "if you had a good wife no one would be so
happy as I--a good girl who would help you to live a good life."

Here he came up to her again, and, leaning against the table, burst into
a laugh. But there was no mirth in it. A sense of the ludicrous is not
always mirthful.

"A girl," he said, "mother, who would bring another fortune to the
family: who would deluge us with money, and fill out the lines of the
estates, and make peace--peace between me and--And not a bad girl
either," he added with a softening tone, "far too good for me. An
honest, upright little soul, only not--the best; only not the one
who--would hate me if she knew----"

"Walter," said Mrs. Methven, trembling, "I don't understand you. Your
words seem very wild to me. I am all confused with them, and my brain
seems to be going. What is it you mean? Oh, if you would tell me all you
mean and not only a part which I cannot understand!"

There never happens in any house a conversation of a vital kind, which
is not interrupted at a critical moment by the entrance of the servants,
those legitimate intruders who can never be staved off. It was Symington
now who came in with tea, which, with a woman's natural desire to
prevent any suspicion of agitation in the family, she accepted. When he
had gone the whole atmosphere was changed. Walter had seated himself by
the fire with the newspapers which had just come in, and all the emotion
and _attendrissement_ were over. He said to her, looking up from his
reading--

"By-the-bye, mother, Julia Herbert is here with some cousins; they will
be sure to call on you. But I don't want to have any more to do with
them than we can help. You will manage that?"

"Julia Herbert," she said. The countenance which had melted into so much
softness, froze again and grew severe. "Here! why should she be here?
Indeed, I hope I shall be able to manage that, as you say."

But oh, what ignoble offices for a woman who would have given her life
for him as he knew! To frighten away Underwood, to "manage" Julia.
Patience! so long as it was for her boy.

CHAPTER VI.

On the next morning after his mother's arrival, Lord Erradeen set out
early for Birkenbraes. Everything pushed him towards a decision; even
her prompt arrival, which he had not anticipated, and the clearing away
from his path of the simpler and more easy difficulties that beset him,
by her means. But what was far more than this was the tug at his heart,
the necessity that lay before him to satisfy, one way or the other, the
demands of his tyrant. He could not send away that spiritual enemy, who
held him in his grip, as he did the vulgar influence of Underwood.
_That_ had disgusted him almost from the first; he had never tolerated
it, even when he yielded to it; and the effort he had made in throwing
it over had been exhilarating to him, and gave a certain satisfaction to
his mind. But now that was over, and he had returned again to the
original question, and found himself once more confronted by that
opponent who could not be shaken off--who, one way or other, must be
satisfied or vanquished, if life were to be possible. Vanquished? How
was he to be vanquished?--by a pure man and a strong--by a pure woman
and her love--by the help of God against a spiritual tyranny. He smiled
to himself as he hurried along the road, thinking of the hopelessness of
all this--himself neither pure nor strong; and Oona, who, if she
knew--and God, whom, as his tempter had said, he had never sought nor
thought of till now. He hurried along to try if the second best was
within his reach; perhaps even that might fail him for anything he knew.
The thought of meeting the usual party in the house of the Williamsons
was so abhorrent to him, and such a disgust had risen in his mind of all
the cheerful circumstances of the big, shining house, that he set out
early with the intention of formally seeking an interview with Katie,
and thus committing himself from the beginning. The morning was bright
and fair, with a little shrill wind about, which brought the yellow
leaves fluttering to his feet, and carried them across him as he
walked--now detached and solitary, now in little drifts and heaps. He
hurried along, absorbed in his own thoughts, shutting his eyes to the
vision of the isle, as it lay all golden, russet, and brown upon the
surface of the water which gave its colours back; Walter would not look
nor see the boat pushing round the corner, with the back of Hamish's red
shirt alone showing, as the prow came beyond the shade of the trees. He
did not see the boat, and yet he knew it was there, and hurried, hurried
on to escape all reminders. The great door at Birkenbraes stood open, as
was its wont--the great stone steps lying vacant in the sunshine, and
everything still about. It was the only hour at which the place was
quiet. The men were out on the hill, the ladies following such rational
occupations as they might have to resort to, and the house had an air of
relief and repose. Walter felt that he pronounced his own fate when he
asked to see Miss Williamson.

"Mr. Williamson is out, my lord," the solemn functionary said, who was
far more important and dignified than the master of the house. "I asked
to see Miss Williamson," Lord Erradeen repeated, with a little
impatience; and he saw the man's eyebrows raised.

So far as the servants were concerned, and through them the whole
district, Walter's "intentions" stood revealed.

Katie Williamson was alone. She was in her favourite room--the room
especially given over to her amusements and occupations. It was not a
small room, for such a thing scarcely existed in Birkenbraes. It was
full of windows, great expanses of plate glass, through which the
mountains and the loch appeared uninterrupted, save by a line of
framework here and there, with a curious open-air effect. It was in one
of the corners of the house, and the windows formed two sides of the
brilliant place; on the others were mirrors reflecting the mountains
back again. She sat between them, her little fair head the only solid
thing which the light encountered. When she rose, with a somewhat
astonished air, to receive her visitor, her trim figure, neat and alert,
stood out against the background of the trees and rocks on the lower
slopes of the hills. A curious transparency, distinctness, and absence
of privacy and mystery were in the scene. The two seemed to stand
together there in the sight of all the world.

"Lord Erradeen!" Katie said, with surprise, almost consternation. "But
if I had been told, I should have come down-stairs to you. Nobody but my
great friends, nobody but women, ever come here."

"I should have thought that any one might come. There are no
concealments here," he said, expressing the sentiment of the place
unconsciously. Then, seeing that Katie's colour rose: "Your boudoir is
not all curtained and shadowy, but open and candid--as you are."

"That last has saved you," said Katie, with a laugh. "I know what you
mean--and that is that my room (for it is not a boudoir--I never
_boude_) is far too light, too clear for the fashion. But this is my
fashion, and people who come to me must put up with it." She added,
after a moment: "What did you say to Sanderson, Lord Erradeen, to induce
him to bring you here?"

"I said I wanted to see Miss Williamson."

"That was understood," said Katie, once more with an increase of colour,
and looking at him with a suppressed question in her eyes. Her heart
gave a distinct knock against her breast, but did not jump up and
flutter, as hearts less well regulated will do in such circumstances;
for she too perceived what Sanderson had perceived, that the interview
was not one to take place amid all the interruptions of the
drawing-room. Sanderson was a very clever person, and his young
mistress agreed with him; but, nevertheless, made a private memorandum
that he should have notice, and that she would speak to papa.

"Yes, I think it must be easily understood. I have come to you with a
great deal that is very serious to say."

"You look very serious," said Katie; and then she added, hurriedly, "And
I want very much to speak to you, Lord Erradeen. I want you to tell
me--who was that gentleman at Kinloch Houran? I have never been able to
get him out of my mind. Is he paying you a visit? What is his name? Has
he been in this country before? But oh, to be sure, he must have been,
for he knew everything about the castle. I want to know, Lord
Erradeen----"

"After you have heard what I have got to say----"

"No, not after--before. I tremble when I think of him. It is ridiculous,
I know; but I never had any such sensation before. I should think he
must be a mesmerist, or something of that sort," Katie said, with a pale
and nervous smile; "though I don't believe in mesmerism," she added,
quickly.

"You believe in nothing of the kind--is it not so? You put no faith in
the stories about my family, in the influence of the past on the
present, in the despotism--But why say anything on that subject. You
laugh."

"I believe in superstition," said Katie somewhat tremulously, "and that
it impresses the imagination, and puts you in a condition to
believe--things. And then there is a pride in having anything of the
sort connected with one's own family," she said recovering herself. "If
it was our ghost I should believe in it too."

"Ghost--is not a word that means much?" Walter said. And then there was
a pause. It seemed to him that his lips were sealed, and that he had no
longer command of the ordinary words. He had known what he had meant to
say when he came, but the power seemed to have gone from him. He stood
and looked out upon the wide atmosphere, and the freedom of the hills,
with a blank in his mind, and that sense that nothing is any longer of
importance or meaning which comes to those who are baffled in their
purpose at the outset. It was Katie who with a certain sarcasm in her
tone recalled him to himself. "You came--because you had something
serious to say to me, Lord Erradeen." She was aware of what he intended
to say; but his sudden pause at the very beginning had raised the
mocking spirit in Katie. She was ready to defy and provoke, and silence
with ridicule, the man whom she had no objection to accept as her
husband--provided he found his voice.

"It is true--I had something very serious to say. I came to ask you
whether you could--" All this time he was not so much as looking at her;
his eyes were fixed dreamily and rather sadly upon the landscape, which
somehow seemed so much more important than the speck of small humanity
which he ought to have been addressing. But at this point Walter
recollected himself, and came in as it were from the big, silent,
observing world, to Katie, sitting expectant, divided between mockery
and excitement, with a flush on her cheeks, but a contraction of her
brows, and an angry yet smiling mischief in her eyes.

"To ask you," he said, "whether you would--pass your life with me. I am
not much worth the taking. There is a poor title, there is a family
which we might restore and--emancipate perhaps. You are rich, it would
be of no advantage to you. But at all events it would not be like asking
you to banish yourself, to leave all you cared for. I have little to say
for myself," he went on after a pause with a little more energy, "you
know me well enough. Whether I should ever be good for anything
would--most likely--rest with you. I am at present under great
depression--in trouble and fear--"

Here he came to another pause, and looked out upon the silent mountains
and great breadths of vacant air in which there was nothing to help:
then with a sigh turned again and held out his hand. "Will you have
me--Katie?" he said.

Katie sat gazing at him with a wonder which had by degrees extinguished
the sarcasm, the excitement, the expectation, that were in her face. She
was almost awestricken by this strangest of all suits that could be
addressed to a girl--a demand for herself which made no account of
herself, and missed out love and every usual preliminary. It was serious
indeed--as serious as death: more like that than the beginning of the
most living of all links. She could not answer him with the indignation
which in other circumstances she might have felt. It was too solemn for
any ebullition of feeling. She felt overawed, little as this mood was
congenial to her.

"Lord Erradeen," she said, "you seem to be in great trouble."

He made an affirmative movement of his head, but said no more.

"--Or you would not put such a strange question to me," she went on.
"Why should I have you? When a man offers himself to a girl he says it
is because he loves her. You don't love me--"

She made a momentary breathless pause with a half-hope of being
interrupted; but save by a motion of his hand, Walter made no sign. "You
don't love me," she went on with some vehemence, "nor do you ask me to
love you. Such a proposal might be an insult. But I don't think you mean
it as an insult."

"Not that. You know better. Anything but that!"

"No--I don't think it is that. But what is it then, Lord Erradeen?"

Her tone had a certain peremptory sound which touched the capricious
spring by which the young man's movements were regulated. He came to
himself. "Miss Williamson," he said, "when you ran away from me in
London it was imminent that I should ask you this question. It was
expected on all sides. You went away, I have always believed, to avoid
it."

"Why should it have been imminent? I went away," cried Katie, forgetting
the contradiction, "because some one came in who seemed to have a prior
right. She is here now with the same meaning."

"She has no prior right. She has no right at all, nor does she claim
any," he said hurriedly. "It is accident. Katie! had you stayed, all
would have been determined then, and one leaf of bitter folly left out
of my life."

"Supposing it to be so," she said calmly, "I am not responsible for your
life, Lord Erradeen. Why should I be asked to step in and save you
from--bitter folly or anything else? And this life that you offer me,
are you sure it is fit for an honest girl to take? The old idea that a
woman should be sacrificed to reform a man has gone out of fashion. Is
that the _rôle_ you want me to take up?" Katie cried, rising to her feet
in her excitement. "Captain Underwood (whose word I would never take)
said you were bad, unworthy a good woman. Is that true?"

"Yes," he said in a low tone, "it is true."

Katie gazed at him for a moment, and then in her excitement sat down and
cried, covering her face with her hands. She it was, though she was not
emotional, who was overcome with feeling. Walter stood gazing at her
with a sort of stupefaction, seeing the scene pass with a sense that he
was a spectator rather than an actor in it, his dark figure swaying
slightly against the clearness of the landscape which took so strange a
part in all that was happening. It had passed now altogether out of his
hands.

As for Katie, it would be impossible to tell what sudden softening, what
pity, mingled with keen vexation and annoyance, forced these tears from
her eyes. Her heart revolted against him and melted towards him all at
once. Her pride would not let her accept such a proposal; and yet she
would have liked to accept him, to take him in hand, to be his
providence, and the moulder of his fate. A host of hurrying thoughts and
sentiments rushed headlong through her mind. She had it in her to do it,
better than any silly woman of the world, better than a creature of
visionary soul like Oona. She was practical, she was strong, she could
do it. But then all her pride rose up in arms. She wept a few hot
impatient tears which were irrestrainable: then raised her head again.

"I am very sorry for you," she said. "If you were my brother, Lord
Erradeen, I would help you with all my might, or if I--cared for you
more than you care for me. But I don't," she added after a pause.

He made an appealing, deprecating movement with his hands, but did not
speak.

"I almost wish I did," said Katie regretfully; "if I had been fond of
you I should have said yes: for you are right in thinking I could do it.
I should not have minded what went before. I should have taken you up
and helped you on. I know that I could have done it; but then I am
not--fond of you," she said slowly. She did not look at him as she
spoke; but had he renewed his claim upon her, even with his eyes, Katie
would have seen it, and might have allowed herself to be persuaded
still. But Walter said nothing. He stood vaguely in the light, without a
movement, accepting whatever she might choose to say. She remained
silent for a time, waiting. And then Katie sprang to her feet again, all
the more indignant and impatient that she had been so near yielding, had
he but known. "Well!" she said, "is it I that am to maintain the
conversation? Have you anything more to say, Lord Erradeen?"

"I suppose not," he answered slowly. "I came to you hoping perhaps for
deliverance, at least partial--for deliverance--Now that you will not,
there is nothing for it but a struggle to the death."

She looked at him with a sort of vertigo of amazement. Not a word about
her, no regret for losing her, not a touch of sentiment, of gratitude,
not even any notice of what she had said! The sensation of awe came back
to her as she stood before this insensibility which was half sublime.
Was he mad? or a wretch, an egotist, wanting a woman to do something for
him, but without a thought for the woman?

"I am glad," she said, with irrepressible displeasure, "that it affects
you so little. And now I suppose the incident is over and we may return
to our occupations. I was busy--with my housekeeping," she said with a
laugh. "One might sometimes call a struggle with one's bills a struggle
to the death."

He gave her a look which was half-anger, half-remonstrance; and then to
Katie's amazement resumed in a moment the tone of easy intercourse which
had always existed between them.

"You will find your bills refreshing after this highflown talk," he
said. "Forgive me. You know I am not given to romantic sentiment any
more than yourself."

"I don't know," said Katie, offended, "that I am less open to the
romantic than other people when the right touch is given."

"But it is not my hand that can give the right touch?" he said. "I
accept my answer as there is nothing else for me to do. But I cannot
abandon the country," he added after a moment, "and I hope we may still
meet as good friends."

"Nothing has happened," said Katie with dignity, "to lessen my
friendship for you, Lord Erradeen." She could not help putting a faint
emphasis on the pronouns. The man rejected may dislike to meet the woman
who has rejected him, but the woman can have no feeling in the matter.
She held out her hand with a certain stateliness of dismissal. "Papa
need not know," she said, "and so there will be nothing more about it.
Good-bye."

Walter took her hand in his, with a momentary perception that perhaps
there had been more than lay on the surface in this interview, on her
side as well as his. He stooped down and kissed it respectfully, and
even with something like tenderness. "You do not refuse it to me, in
friendship, even after all you have heard?"

"It shall always be yours in friendship," Katie said, the colour rising
high in her face.

She was glad he went away without looking at her again. She sat down and
listened to his footsteps along the long corridor and down the stairs
with a curious sensation as if he carried something with him that would
not return to her again. And for long after she sat in the broad
daylight without moving, leaving the books upon the table--which were
not housekeeping books--untouched--going over this strange interview,
turning over all the past that had any connection with Lord Erradeen. It
seemed all to roll out before her like a story that had been full of
interest: and now here was the end of it. Such a fit of wistful sadness
had seldom come over the active and practical intelligence of Katie. It
gave her for the moment a new opening in nature. But by degrees her
proper moods came back. She closed this poetical chapter with a sigh,
and her sound mind took up with a more natural regret the opportunity
for congenial effort which she had been compelled to give up. She said
to herself that she would not have minded that vague badness which he
had owned, and Underwood had accused him of. She could have brought him
back. She had it in her to take the charge even of a man's life. So she
thought in inexperience, yet with the powerful confidence which so often
is the best means of fulfilling triumphantly what it aims at. She would
not have shrunk from the endeavour. She would have put her vigorous
young will into his feeble one, she thought, and made him, with her
force poured into him, a man indeed, contemptuous of all miserable
temptations, able to sail over and despise them. As she mused her eyes
took an eager look, her very fingers twitched with the wish to be doing.
Had he come back then it is very possible that Katie would have
announced to him her change of mind, her determination "to pull him
through." For she could have done it! she repeated to herself. Whatever
his burdens had been, when she had once set her shoulder to the wheel
she would have done it. Gambling, wine, even the spells of such women as
Katie blushed to think of--she would have shrunk before none of these.
His deliverance would not have been partial, as he had said, but
complete. She would have fought the very devils for him and brought him
off. What a work it was that she had missed! not a mere commonplace
marriage with nothing to do. But with a sigh Katie had to acknowledge
that it was over. She could not have accepted him, she said, excusing
herself to herself. It would have been impossible. A man who asks you
like _that_, not even pretending to care for you--you could not do it!
But, alas! what an opportunity lost! Saying this she gave herself a
shake, and smoothed her hair for luncheon, and put the thought away from
her resolutely. Katie thought of Dante's nameless sinner who made "the
great refusal." She had lost perhaps the one great opportunity of her
life.

CHAPTER VII.

Lord Erradeen retired very quietly, as became a man defeated. Though
Katie heard his retiring steps, he hardly did so himself, as he came
down the broad softly-carpeted stair-case. There was a sound of voices
and of movement in the great dining-room, where a liveried army were
preparing the table for one of the great luncheons, under the orders of
the too discreet and understanding Sanderson--but nobody about to see
the exit of the rejected suitor, who came out into the sunshine with a
sort of dim recognition of the scenery of Katie's boudoir; but the hills
did not seem so near as they were in that large-windowed and shining
place. Failure has always a subduing effect upon the mind even when
success was scarcely desired; and Walter came out of the great house
with the sense of being cut off from possibilities that seemed very
near, almost certain, that morning. This subduing influence was the
first that occupied his mind as he came out, feeling as if he were
stealing away from the scene of what had been far from a triumph.
Perhaps he was a little ashamed of his own certainty; but at all events
he was subdued and silent, refraining almost from thought.

He had got securely out of the immediate neighbourhood, and was safe
from the risk of meeting any one belonging to it, and being questioned
where he had been, before he began to feel the softening of relief, and
a grateful sense of freedom. Then his heart recurred with a bound to the
former situation. Expedients or compromises of any kind were no more to
be thought of; the battle must be fought out on its natural ground. He
must yield to the ignominious yoke, or he must conquer. Last year he had
fled, and forced himself to forget, and lived in a fever of impulses
which he could not understand, and influences which drew him like--he
could not tell like what--mesmerism, Katie had said, and perhaps she was
right. It might be mesmerism; or it might be only the action of that
uncontrolled and capricious mind which made him do that to-day which he
loathed to-morrow. But however it was, the question had again become a
primary one, without any compromise possible. He must yield, or he must
win the battle. He put the losing first, it seemed so much the most
likely, with a dreary sense of all the impossibilities that surrounded
him. He had no standing ground upon which to meet his spiritual foe.
Refusal, what was that? It filled his life with distraction and
confusion, but made no foundation for anything better, and afforded no
hope of peace. Peace! The very word seemed a mockery to Walter. He must
never know what it was. His soul (if he had one) would not be his own;
his impulses, hitherto followed so foolishly, would be impotent for
everything but to follow the will of another. To abdicate his own
judgment altogether, to give up that power of deciding for himself which
is the inheritance of the poorest, never to be able to help a poor
neighbour, to aid a friend: to be a mere puppet in the hands of
another--was it possible that he, a man, was to give himself up, thus
bound hand and foot, to a slavery harder than that of any negro ever
born? It was this that was impossible he cried within himself.

And then there suddenly came before Walter, like a vision set before him
by the angels, a gleam of the one way of escape. When a poor wretch has