Project Gutenberg's The House on the Moor, v. 1/3, by Mrs. Oliphant

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Title: The House on the Moor, v. 1/3

Author: Mrs. Oliphant

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Language: English

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                         THE HOUSE ON THE MOOR

                                  BY

                             THE AUTHOR OF

                  "MARGARET MAITLAND," "ADAM GRAEME,"

                        "THE LAIRD OF NORLAW,"

                               &c., &c.

                           IN THREE VOLUMES.

                                VOL. I.

                                LONDON:

                    HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS,

                     SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN,

                     13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.

                                 1861.

                _The right of Translation is reserved._


                                LONDON:

                PRINTED BY R. BORN, GLOUCESTER STREET,

                            REGENT'S PARK.




PREFACE.


This book was overshadowed and interrupted by the heaviest grief. The
author says so, not to deprecate criticism, but to crave the tender
forbearance of her unknown friends.




                        THE HOUSE ON THE MOOR.




CHAPTER I.


In a gloomy room, looking out through one narrow window upon a moor, two
young people together, and yet alone, consumed the dreary hours of a
February afternoon. The scene within doors exhibited scarcely less
monotony and dreariness than did the moor without, which stretched black
and heavy to the hills under a leaden sky. The room was well-sized, and
lighted only by that one window, which was deeply sunk in the deep wall,
and hung with terrible curtains of red moreen, enough to kill what
little amount of light there was. A large dining-table, of cold,
well-polished mahogany, occupied the centre of the apartment--an
old-fashioned sideboard and mysterious bureau of the same character
stood out darkly from the walls--and hard, angular chairs furnished
forth the dining-room, as it was called--but which was, indeed,
drawing-room, study, boudoir, everything to the brother and sister who
held occupation of it now.

And here were none of those traces of feminine presence which one reads
of in books--no pretty things, no flowers, no embroideries, nothing to
cast a grace upon the dulness. Perhaps that might be partly Susan's
fault; but when one lives all one's life on the borders of Lanwoth Moor,
ten miles off from the humblest attempt at a town, without any money,
and seeing nobody to stir one's ambition, even a girl of seventeen may
be pardoned if she can make little brightness except that of her
presence in her shady place. To tell the truth, nobody made much
account of Susan; she was not expected to exert much influence on the
changeless atmosphere of Marchmain. No one supposed her to be the flower
of that solitude: any little embellishments which she tried were put
down ruthlessly; and the little girl had long ago learned, as the first
duties of womankind, to do as she was bid, and hold her peace. She was
seated now before the fire, making a little centre with her work upon
the cold glimmer of the uncovered table. She was very fair in her
complexion, with hair almost flaxen, white teeth, blue eyes, and a
pretty colour. She did not look intellectual, nor interesting, nor
melancholy; but sat leaning very closely over her work, because there
was not much light, and Horace stood full between her and what little
there was. She had a pair of scissors, a reel of cotton, and a paper of
buttons on the table before her; and on the back of her chair hang a
huge bag, made of printed cotton, which it was safe to believe was her
work-bag. There she sat, with a little firelight playing vainly upon her
dark woollen dress--a domestic creature, not very happy, but very
contented, dully occupied in the silence and the gray afternoon, living
a life against which her youth protested, but somehow managing to get on
with tolerable comfort, as women unawakened and undisturbed do.

Of a different character altogether was the other inmate of this room.
On the end of the table nearest the light lay a confusion of open books
and an old-fashioned inkstand, which two instruments of learning had, it
seemed, gone towards the composition of a German exercise, which
appeared, half finished, and with a big blot on the last word, between
them. Twenty times over, while that blurred page was being compounded,
the young student had flown at the fire in silent irritability, and
poked it half out; and he now stood in the recess of the window, between
the red curtains, blocking up the light, and looking out with angry eyes
upon the dim black blast of February rain which came with the darkness
from the hills. It was certainly a dismal prospect. The very shower was
not the hearty, violent shower which sweeps white over a landscape in
vehement sheets of water; it had not a characteristic of storm or
vitality about it; but, saturating, penetrating, invisible, went chill
to the heart of the sodden land, if heart was in that wild, low stretch
of blackened moss and heather, where nothing living moved. The young man
stood in the window, looking out with a vexation and dull rage
indescribable upon the falling night. He had this only in common with
Susan, that his features were cast in an unheroic type, and could only
have been handsome under the influence of good humour and good spirits,
two beneficent fairies unknown to that lowering face. Good health and
much exercise kept the colour on his cheeks and the light in his
eye--against his will, one was tempted to suppose. He was short-sighted,
and contracted his eyes in his gaze out, till the eyelids hung in heavy
folds over the stormy stare which he sent across the moor--and querulous
lines of discontent puckered the full youthful lips, which were made for
a sweeter expression. Weariness, disgust, the smouldering rage of one
oppressed, was in his face. He was not only in unnatural circumstances,
but somebody had injured him: he carried his head with all the loftiness
and superiority of a conscious victim; but it was evident that the
sentiment of wrong--just or unjust--poisoned and embittered all his
life.

"Rain!" he exclaimed, jerking the word out as if he threw something at
fate. "My luck!--not so much as the chance of a run on the moor!"

"Are you tired of your German already, Horace?" asked Susan, as he came
to the fire to make a last attempt upon its life--lifting up her
contented woman's face, not without the shadow of a smile upon it, to
her restless brother.

"Tired? D'ye think I'm a child or a girl like you? Do you think I can
spend my days over German exercises? What's the good of it? Have _I_ a
chance of ever using that or any other language, unless, perhaps, as a
beggar? Pshaw!--look after your work, and don't aggravate me."

"But it would please papa," said Susan, with some timidity, as if this
was rather a doubtful argument; "and then, perhaps he might be persuaded
to do what you wish, Horace, if you tried to please _him_."

"To please papa," said her brother, imitating her words with
contemptuous mockery, "is an inducement indeed. To please _him_! Why
should I please him, I should like to know? What has he ever done for
me? At least, I shan't cheat him with a false submission. I'd rather
chuck the lot of them into the fire, than have him suppose that I read
German, or anything else, for _his_ sake!"

"But oh, Horace, you would make me _so_ unhappy!" said Susan, with a
little unconscious gesture of entreaty, letting her work fall, and
clasping her hands as she looked up in his face.

"I suppose so," said the young man, with perfect indifference.

"And you don't care?" cried his sister, moved to a momentary overflow of
those sudden tears of mortification and injured affection which women
weep over such cool, conscious, voluntary disregard. "I would do
anything in the world for you, but you don't mind how I feel; and yet
there are only two of us in the world."

"So much the better," said Horace, throwing himself down in a chair
before the fire; "and as for those vain professions, what is the use of
them, I should like to know? What _could_ you do for me, if you were
ever so anxious? Anything in the world, in our circumstances, means
simply nothing, Susan. Oh! for heaven's sake, don't cry!--you're a good
girl, and sew on my buttons--but what, in the name of fortune, could
_you_ do? You know as well as I that it is only a fashion of words----"

"I did not mean it so," cried Susan, quickly--but stopping as suddenly,
cast a hurried, painful look at him, and dried her tears with a hasty
hand--the look which natural Truth casts upon that cruel, reasonable
fool, Wisdom, whom she cannot contest, yet knows in the wrong. A little
indignation burning up upon her ingenuous cheek helped the hurried hand
to dry the tears, and she returned to her work with a little tremble of
haste, such as a discussion with her brother very frequently threw Susan
into. She did not pretend to argue with him: she was not clever, but his
philosophy filled her with impatience. She "could not bear it." She felt
inclined to get up and seize hold of him, and try physical measures to
shake this arrogant pretence of truth out of him; for Susan, though she
could not argue, was not without a temper and opinion of her own.

Silence ensued. Susan made nervous haste with her needlework, and
stumbled over it in her little flutter of vexation; but Horace was too
much absorbed to notice this girlish show of feeling. When he had rocked
in his chair a little, placing one foot on the side of the old-fashioned
grate, he suddenly sprang up and thrust away his seat. "By George!"
cried Horace--but not as that exclamation is usually uttered, "I've not
got a friend in the world!--there isn't a man in existence, so far as I
know, that will do anything for me!"

"Oh, Horace!" said Susan, "think how much better off you are than some
people. Don't always make the worst of everything! Think of poor Roger
Musgrave at Tillington, who has neither father nor home--his godfather
dead without making any provision for him, and nothing to do and nobody
to look to, poor fellow--and breaking his heart for grief besides, and
Peggy says will either 'list or die!"

"And a very good alternative too," said Horace; "he's very well off for
a poor milk-and-water nobody--free! and able to 'list if he likes, or
die if he likes, without any one troubling their head about the matter.
As to home and father, I heartily wish he had my share of these precious
commodities. Do you think anywhere else a man like me would sell his
soul for a bed and a dinner? There! there! hold your tongue, or talk of
what you understand."

"What do I understand, I wonder," cried Susan, "sewing on your worship's
buttons? A man like you!--you are only nineteen after all, when the
truth is told."

"I am man enough to make my own way," said the youth, angrily; "it is
not a question of years or days, if indeed you were able to judge of it
at all, which you are not."

"If I were so very certain of my own strength," cried Susan, following
up her advantage, "I'd run away, if I did not care for home, or father,
or--or anybody. If I did not mind about duty or affection, or such
trifles, I'd go and make my own way, and not talk of it--I would! I know
something, though I'm not so wise as you. I think it's shocking to talk
discontent for ever, and gloom at everything. Why don't you go away?
Think of the great people in books, that go to London with sixpence in
their pockets, and turn out great merchants--or with a tragedy, and turn
out Dr. Johnson. Think of Chatterton, whom you were reading of. You are
better off a great deal than he!"

"Chatterton was a fool," said Horace. "I promise you I'll wait for the
tide, and not shoot myself when it's in the flow. I am much obliged for
your advice. I've neither a tragedy nor a sixpence that I can call my
own--but some of these days I'll go."

Pronouncing these words with slow and formal emphasis, as if he meant
something dreadful, Horace marched solemnly to his German exercise, and
sat down to it once more. The evening grew darker round the two; by
degrees Susan's head drooped down on her needlework, till you could see
that she had been seized by a womanish panic, and was secretly putting
up the linen on her knee to wipe her wet eyes. This terror and
compunction worked its way silently as the early wintry night came on.
By-and-by, through the quietness, which was broken only by Horace's pen,
the ashes from the grate, and a slow patter outside of the wet which
dropped from the eaves, there broke a little hurried, suppressed sob.
Then Susan's white work, more distinct than herself in the twilight,
went down suddenly upon the floor, and a darkling figure glided round to
Horace's side. "Oh, don't think of it any more!" cried Susan; "it was
only my ill-temper. Oh, Horace, never mind me!--don't think of it
again."

"Think of what?" said Horace, peevishly; "what on earth do you mean,
thrusting your arms about me? I did not ask to be petted, did I?--what
do you mean?"

"Oh, Horace--what we were saying," said his sister, with humility.

"What were we saying? Can I remember all the nonsense you talk?" cried
the young man, shaking off her arms with impatience--"can't you keep to
your own business, and let me alone? Oh, you wanted me to be Whittington
and the cat, didn't you?--thank you, that's not my vocation. Isn't it
bad enough I must stand your sauciness, without standing your
repentance--oh, for mercy's sake, go away!"

Susan went away without another word, gathered her work into her big
work-bag, and went out of the room, not without making it sufficiently
audible that she had closed the door.

"He's a coward! he does nothing but talk!" she said between her teeth,
as she went up the dark stairs; but nobody save herself knew that her
momentary passion had brought these words to Susan's lips, and ten
minutes after she would not have believed she had said them--nevertheless,
sometimes passion, unawares, says the truth.




CHAPTER II.


The household of Marchmain consisted of four persons. The brother and
sister we have already seen, their father, and one female servant. In
this little interval of twilight, while Susan puts on her clean collar
for dinner, and which Horace, who would rather disarrange than improve
his dress, out of pure ill-humour and disrespect, spends in the dark,
staring into the fire with his head between his hands, we will explain
to our readers the economy of this singular household. At this hour all
is dark in the solitary house. Without, the chill invisible rain, the
great unbroken blackness of the moor and the night--within, an unlighted
hall and staircase, with a red glow of firelight at the end of a long
passage, betraying the kitchen, and a faint thread of light coming out
beneath a door opposite the dining-room. Thrift, severe and rigid,
reigns in this dwelling. In Mr. Scarsdale's own room a single candle
burns, when it is no longer possible to read without one; but there are
no lights in the family sitting-room till the dinner is placed on the
table, and Peggy has nothing but firelight in the kitchen, and Susan
puts on her collar by intuition upstairs. Everything is under inexorable
rule and law. The family have breakfast between nine and ten, sometimes
even later; for Mr. Scarsdale is not a man to modify his own habits for
any consideration of suitability. From that time till six o'clock, when
there is dinner, the young people see nothing of their father. He sits
with them in the evening, imposing silence by his presence; and that, so
far as family intercourse goes, is the chronicle of their life.

Let us enter at this door, which marks itself off from the floor of the
hall by that slender line of light. It has the same prospect as the
dining-room, when there is any daylight to see it; but it is smaller
than that gloomy apartment; two large bookcases, shut in by a brass
network, stand out with sharp and angular corners from the walls, no
attempt having been made to fill up the vacant space at either side of
them, or to harmonize these gaunt pieces of furniture with anything else
in the room. There are two or three chairs, which stand fixed and
immovable in corners, plainly testifying that nobody ever sits there;
and before the fire a library table, and in a round-backed elbow-chair
the father of the house. He sits there reading with a forlorn
persistence wonderful to see--reading for no purpose, reading with
little interest, yet turning page after page with methodical regularity,
and bending his lowering forehead on the book as if it were the business
of his life. He is dark, not so much in complexion as in sentiment--a
close, self-absorbed, impenetrable man. It is not difficult to perceive
that he is neither a student by ardent inclination, nor by profession a
searcher into books; but what is the secret of these solitary studies is
hard to discover. He sits with his head leaning upon one hand, and the
other turning the pages--sits often for hours in that one position. He
is scarcely ever stimulated into interest, and never owns the enlivening
touch of that zeal and curiosity which hunts for proofs or illustrations
of a favourite theory through a dozen volumes. There is no heap of
books by his side, but only one orderly volume, which is not of the
class of those fantastic delightful reverie books in which studious men
delight. The blank, straightforward manner in which he reads on comes to
be impressive in its singularity after a time. He seems to pursue this
occupation as a clerk keeps books, and counts his progress, you could
imagine, by the number of the pages he has read, and by no less tangible
criterion; and nothing moves the settled darkness of his uncommunicative
face.

Behind him, hung by the side of the window, in the worst light of the
room, is a portrait, a very common work, done by a mediocre painter, but
in all probability very like its original, for the face looks down
through the gloom with a real smile, which paint cannot give--a sweet,
home-like, domestic woman, such another as Susan will be when the years
and the hours have carried her into her own life. There can be no doubt
it is Susan's mother and this man's wife. There is no other picture in
the house, and he cares so little for anyone seeing this, that he has
hung it in the shadows of the red moreen curtains, where nobody can
distinguish the features. Most likely he knows the features well enough
to penetrate that darkness; for though he sits with his back to it most
usually, it is for his pleasure it is here.

Nobody knows anything about this man; he has not any family connection
whatever with the house or locality. Nobody can understand why of all
places in the world he should come here to the tumble-down old house on
the edge of the moor, which nobody else would live in. When he came, ten
years ago, the country people paid him visits--half in curiosity, half
in kindness--which were never returned, till at last society dropped
off entirely, even from the attempt to break upon his seclusion. To
account for his ungraciousness, rumours of great crimes and great
misfortunes were whispered about him; but as the novelty failed, these
sunk into abeyance; and it was tacitly understood or believed now that
the loss of a great lawsuit, which materially lessened his means, was
the cause of his withdrawal from the world. He was then but a young man,
scarcely forty; and if neither sport nor society had attractions for him
then, it was not to be supposed that his heart had expanded now. He
lived in a severe, rectangular, mathematical poverty, which calculated
every item, and left room for no irregularity. He kept his children
rigidly within the same bounds which confined himself. If they formed
acquaintances, it must needs have been at "kirk or market," in the roads
or the fields, for he strictly forbade them from either receiving or
accepting invitations; while for his own part he gave a certain cold
attention to their education as a duty, but spent as little time as
possible in their society. It is not surprising, under these
circumstances, that this gloomy and brooding man should have roused the
kindred temper of his son to a slight degree of desperation, or
succeeded in making the thraldom of his life very irksome to a youth who
was neither amiable nor submissive, to begin with. Mr. Scarsdale did not
even pretend a fatherly regard for Horace; all his life he had treated
the lad with a cutting and desperate civility, which would have pierced
a more sensitive child to the heart; and from his boyhood had given him
a certain position of equality and rivalship, totally contrary to the
relationship they really held, and which at once stimulated the pride
and raised the passions of the solitary youth. This unhappy state of
things had never come to a climax by any outburst of passion. Horace
might be as disrespectful, as sullen, as defiant as he pleased. His
father extorted a certain hard lineal obedience, but neither expected
nor seemed to wish for, reverence, love, or any filial sentiment; and
this aspect of affairs had become so habitual, that even Susan did not
observe it. Most likely she thought all fathers were more or less the
same; her whole heart of tenderness went back to her little recollection
of her mother--and Mr. Scarsdale was still human so far as Susan was
concerned. He was not kind certainly, but at least he seemed conscious
that he _was_ her father and she his child.

Notwithstanding his seclusion, his limited means, and morose habits, he
still bore the appearance, and something of the manners, of a
gentleman--something which even those neighbours whose kindnesses he had
repulsed acknowledged by an involuntary respect. When the half-hour
chimed from his clock on the mantel-piece--almost the only article of
luxury visible in the house--he closed his book as a labourer gives up
his work, pausing only to place a mark in the page, and, taking up his
candle, went solemnly upstairs. He was scarcely of middle size, but so
spare and erect that he seemed tall; thin almost to the point of
emaciation, with marked and prominent features, unlike either of his
children. Yet, strangely enough, though Horace's face resembled that of
his mother, the expression--the spiritual resemblance--was like this
dark and brooding face: possibly, the very pang and keenness of
opposition between the father and the son lay in their likeness. Mr.
Scarsdale carried his candle up the gloomy staircase, leaving his study
in darkness, to exchange his easy dressing-gown for a coat, and prepare
himself for dinner. Dinner for ten years, at least, had been to him a
solitary meal: during all that time his doors had never opened to admit
a stranger; but he never once failed in the customary punctilio, or
neglected to close his book when the timepiece chimed the half-hour.

Meanwhile, the preparations of the kitchen were coming to a climax. This
was the only cheerful place in the house. It had a large old-fashioned
chimney, with a settle in its warm corner, and the warmth centered in
that recess as in a chamber of light. Bundles of herbs were hung up to
dry over the mantel-shelf, where was a little oil-lamp attached to the
wall, but rarely lighted--so that the apartment itself, with its broad
but high window, its great wooden presses and tables, was but half seen
in the wavering light. There stood Peggy, putting on her "dinner cap."
Peggy was, at least, as tall as her master, and very little younger. She
was his foster-sister, attached all her life to his family, and knew the
secret of his retirement, if anybody did; but Peggy was of the faithful
type of ancient servants, and gave no sign. She had been comely in her
youth, and was still fresh-coloured and neat when she pleased--and she
did please at dinner-time. She had on a dark stuff gown, with a white
soft muslin handkerchief covering her neck under it, as is the fashion
with elderly women in the north country; a great white apron, and the
before-mentioned cap, which had pink ribbons in it. Peggy had rather a
large face, and features big and strong. Had she been born a lady, with
nothing to do, she would have been a strong-minded woman; but Providence
had been kinder to Peggy. As it was, she had her own opinions about most
things, and hesitated not at all to express her approbation and
disapprobation. She was, in short, very much what old servants were, as
we have said, a generation or two ago. But one thing was the pride of
Peggy's life: to have everything in perfect order for her master's
dinner, which was the event of the day to her; to feel convinced that
her cookery was as careful and delicate as if she had been attended by a
score of scullions; to do everything indeed, as far as it lay in one
pair of active hands and one vigorous brain to do, as perfectly as if a
whole establishment of servants waited on the comforts of "the
family"--was the ambition of Mr. Scarsdale's solitary waiting-woman. If
no one else felt the compliment, Peggy was continually flattered and
inspirited by her master's evening-coat.

And it was she, though nearly fifty, who did everything in the house, it
was she alone who knew the former history of "the family" which she
tended so carefully. If ever Mr. Scarsdale unbended his reserved soul
for a moment, it was Peggy who received the rare confidence. It was she
who had helped the inherent woman to come to feminine life in poor
little Susan's neglected education; and it was she, the only busy,
cheerful living inhabitant of the house, who now carried those slender
silver candlesticks into the dark dining-room, and disturbed Master
Horace in his reverie with the gleam of the unexpected light.




CHAPTER III.


There were strange elements of incongruity in the scene presented by
that dinner-table. Mr. Scarsdale sat at the head of the table, with his
son and daughter at the sides, and Peggy behind his chair, erect and
stately in his evening dress. All the furniture of the table, the linen,
the silver, the china, were of the finest description, and in beautiful
order; and strangely around this little centre of light gloomed the
meagre unadorned walls, the homely furniture, the heavy hangings of the
cheerless apartment, which, however, scarcely formed a greater contrast
to the dainty arrangements of the table than Horace Scarsdale's gray
morning jacket, and disordered hair, did to the formal toilette of his
father. Susan sat at Mr. Scarsdale's right hand, in her clean collar.
Her dress was very homely; but Susan, at seventeen, was one of those
women who have a natural fitness for their place everywhere, and never
fall out of harmony. Perhaps she was not over-sensitive by nature; at
all events, she was not distressed by the silence of this meal, at which
there was no conversation. It was their invariable custom, and Susan had
seen no other family-table to make her aware of the misery of this.
Horace was of another temper: everything was an offence to the unhappy
lad; the silence galled almost beyond endurance; and when his father
addressed him as he did always, with formal politeness, upon helping him
to anything, the blood rushed to the young man's cheeks with such sudden
violence and force, that no one, who watched his countenance, could
have been surprised to see him answer with some demonstration of
passion. But he never did; he replied, in the stifled voice of rage,
with thanks and formal courtesy. Thus they sat like two enemies, forced
to civility by the circumstances of sitting at the same table, and
together ate, as if it choked them, their unblessed bread. "Shall I help
you to some soup?" asked Mr. Scarsdale, and Horace made a stubborn bow
and said, "Thank you." Neither spoke the other's name, neither even
looked in the other's face--yet, by that strange magic of antagonism,
which is as strong as love, were aware, instinctively, of every
movement, almost of every sentiment, which influenced each other's
conduct for the moment. But they had this little duel all to
themselves--Susan, dulled by habit, and knowing that it had always been
so, observed it not--Peggy, behind her master's chair, saw everything,
and said nothing. Sometimes, indeed, an acute observer might have
noticed that the faithful servant set down something on the table with
an unnecessary emphasis, which answered, instead of words, to give her
impatience vent, and which her master never failed to notice. Peggy,
too, did not hesitate to interfere in the business of the table--to
remark that Mr. Horace did not eat, and to recommend a particular dish
to Miss Susan. Peggy's dialect was rather a remarkable one, and
difficult to identify. She was a North-countrywoman by birth, but had
lived in many districts of England, and had taken up, with great
impartiality and candour of mind, their different manners of speech. But
Mr. Scarsdale, who had killed all natural utterance in his children, had
no power over Peggy; he never even tried to restrain her. Her discourse
ran on a cheerful chorus during the whole solemn period of dinner; and
this it was, more perhaps than anything else, which prevented a
positive outbreak between the father and the son.

"Young Master Roger, Miss Susan, dear, he's agoin' hoam," said Peggy;
"he's got father and mother livin' _after_ all, as I hear say, and none
so poorly off neither, for all his goin' off in a despair wi' talk o'
'listin'. Natur's a mystery, that's for certain--to turn off a manchild
upon a godfayther, and rather to 'list nor to go hoam! I dunno know
which is worst if ye ask me. Stewed chicken, master, and done perfect,
though I say it as should not; but I'm none so pleased with the peatoes.
I'll not have no more from the mill--they're agoin' in the disease.
Wine?--this very minute, if I had the keys."

Mr. Scarsdale brought forth the keys from his pocket; and, totally
regardless of Peggy's monologue, which ran on in further gossip, broke
the silence of the table in his own person--a most portentous and
unusual incident. He spoke without either addressing or looking at
anyone, though it was, in fact, a question which he asked.

"There is, I believe," observed Mr. Scarsdale, "a spare bedroom in the
house?"

Peggy did not hear for the first moment, being taken aback by the
unusual event; and Susan said, timidly, "Yes, papa," taking the remark
to herself.

"The door was open this very day, master," said Peggy, when she
recovered her surprise; "I judge you wur lookin' with your own eyes what
like it was; but the good of a spare bedroom in this house I would wish
a wise woman to tell to me."

Mr. Scarsdale made no response, but delivered himself of his further
intelligence as though he heard her not. "I wish it to be put in order,"
he said, briefly; "Colonel Sutherland arrives here on a visit,
to-morrow."

Even Horace was moved to a momentary start and look of surprise at his
father's immovable countenance, while Susan clasped her hands in spite
of herself, and cried--"Oh! papa, is it my uncle?" with the most eager
and joyful anxiety suddenly suffusing her face.

But Susan's voice was drowned in Peggy's more decided accents. "Master
Edward!" cried Peggy, with a restrained shout of triumph--"blessings on
his honest face! he never crossed a door but he brought comfort--and as
handsome a man as eye could see, and the pleasantest gentleman to speak
to that ever said good-morrow. So he's Cornel now!--and well deserves
it, I'll be bold to say. Custard, master?--as light as a May breeze--and
the very tarts you had in holiday times, when you were a boy. I had a
thought of old times, and knew no reason--to be sure, it was for a
forewarning of the news!"

Mr. Scarsdale thrust the china dish containing the tarts out of his way
with an unusual expression of impatience. Then, recollecting himself,
took it up and turned to Horace--that is to say, turned his head to him,
without turning his eyes, as was his custom. "May I have the pleasure of
helping you?" said the father, with a tone of suppressed bitterness.
Horace put forth his plate immediately; Peggy's harmless confectionery
was evidently vexatious and annoying to Mr. Scarsdale, and his son took
pains to express his enjoyment of it, and compliment Peggy on her
handiwork. It was as rare an event to hear Horace's voice at dinner as
his father's. The approaching event seemed to have loosed the tongues of
both.

This little incident put an end to Peggy's gossip; she removed the
remainder of her tarts with a visible flutter of offence, and set down
the wine on the table with double emphasis. When Peggy withdrew, Mr.
Scarsdale took a book from his pocket, and set up a small folding
reading-desk, which had been placed by his hand when the cloth was
withdrawn. There he sat, with his glass of purple claret reflected in
the shining mahogany, and the two tall, slender candles illuminating a
little circle round him, and his head relieved against the dark
curtains, which looked almost black in the feeble light. A line of magic
drawn round him could not have screened him more completely from the
other inmates of the room. Horace thrust his chair away rudely, and
leaving it thus at a little distance from the table, went to the window
and disappeared behind the curtains to look out on the night. Susan
stole quietly round to the side of the table, and produced out of her
big bag her evening work--an occupation dear to her heart, though it was
only a patchwork quilt, the only fancy work that Susan knew; but before
she sat down, withdrew her brother's chair noiselessly to the side of
the fire, where it looked human and companionable. Then silence, entire
as if these three human creatures were statues, fell upon the room,
where still Mr. Scarsdale sat at the shining table with its two lines of
reflection, with the claret jug at his elbow, and his book supported on
the reading-desk, and the glass before him half-full of purple wine. He
turned the leaves at regular intervals, and went through them with
mechanical gravity; but his ears were keen to every rustle of the
curtain, and with all the virulence of domestic strife the mind of this
singular father watched his son.

As for Susan, her whole mind, as she worked in silence, was full of the
wonderful intimation she had just heard. Perhaps by this time you are
disposed to think that Susan was very insensible and dull in her
feelings not to be miserable about the enmity which existed between her
father and brother; but Susan was accustomed to it, and had never seen
other fathers and sons, and had seen this go on in the same way so long,
that, though she felt it uncomfortable, she entertained no apprehensions
about it. As for Horace, if he would remain by himself in the window,
looking out upon the black night, Susan could not help it. He was not
more miserable there than he would be at the table with his father's
austere shadow upon him; and conversation was tacitly prohibited in
those dismal evenings. Susan's was still an unawakened mind; her brother
did not encourage her to think her own influence over him of any
importance, nor permitted her to suppose that she had any power to
soothe him; and the trembling, timid, mediatory love, which holds a
fearful balance in many a divided household, needs love and softness of
some kind, on one side or the other, to keep it alive. Love Susan found
none in either of her two nearest relatives. She loved them by nature
and custom; sometimes a terrible impatience of their discord seized
her, and a momentary impulse of passion, to do something or say
something which should stir this stagnant, stormy calm, or perhaps
change the manner of their existence, had possessed her once or twice in
her life; but the tender, anxious, intense love which cruelty cannot
kill when it has once developed itself, never can develop itself without
the stimulus and creating power of dear love from some one to begin
with. Thus it was that Susan beheld with vexation and distress
sometimes, but without agony, the unnatural feud beside her, that she
took neither side, because either side was equally cold, repulsive, and
unaffectionate. She did not know life; she knew not even the fictitious
life of books. She did not fear when her brother rushed out into the
night, as he did often, that Horace would fall into the rude snares of
village dissipation, or run in the way of vulgar crime. She was not
alarmed for a possible outbreak of violence between the father and son;
such things had never been suggested to her inexperienced mind.

So she sat in the silence, not resenting it for her own part, content in
herself, and making out of that dismal quiet a little circle of domestic
tranquillity when she arranged her patches and contrasted her colours,
and secretly entertained vague anticipations of unknown pleasure, and a
warmth of inextinguishable personal happiness, in the very heart of the
misery through which her life had grown.

At eight o'clock to a minute Peggy brought in the tea-tray, and removed
the claret-jug, which, though he had only once filled his glass, stood
all that time by Mr. Scarsdale's side. Then he took his cup of tea from
his daughter's hand without even looking at her, and went on with his
reading. Comfort was not to be got out of anything in this house. Horace
drank his standing--told his sister it did not rain now, and went off
out of the room like a wind. And when Susan looked over her tea-tray to
see her father's eyes fixed upon his book, and the door closed upon her
brother, and herself compelled to sit formally there till Mr. Scarsdale,
sipping it slowly and by intervals, had finished his second cup of
tea--a certain forlorn sensation of solitude and discomfort moistened
Susan's eyes, and brought an ache to her heart. Then her thoughts went
back with a joyful rebound to the promised visitor of to-morrow--her
mother's brother, an actual relation, whose love and kindness she had a
claim on. She lost herself in wonder what like he would be, and how he
would treat his sister's children. To-morrow would solve Susan's long
and troubled problem--whether all men were like papa: to-morrow would
give her a glimpse into that world of which she knew nothing. Nature was
sceptical in Susan's heart: she could not believe that papa was the
type and impersonation of man. Kindness, unknown and longed for, seemed
coming to her in the person of that uncle. She returned to her patches,
longing to run into the cheerful kitchen to Peggy, to ask all about the
new-comer; but bound by the customary punctilio of the house to sit
there silent and occupied opposite the reading-desk--a bondage which
Susan had never felt more oppressive than on this particular
night--while Mr. Scarsdale still turned the mechanical pages, and Horace
roamed through the black moor and the falling rain, cursing his fate.




CHAPTER IV.


This same evening, while Susan sat at her patchwork, comforting herself
with fancies concerning the unknown uncle who was to make so strange and
unexpected a break upon their solitude, an old gentleman, carrying his
own carpet-bag, went into one of the carriages of the night-trains about
to start from Edinburgh for the south. He was not a first-class
passenger, but the railway people put up instinctive fingers to their
caps as he addressed them. He was tall, thin, erect--of a soldierly
bearing, with a grey moustache and gray hair, wearing thin upon the
crown. That he was a little deaf it was easy to perceive, from the
sudden stoop he made when the person sitting next him in the carriage
put a question to him unexpectedly; and that his eyes were touched by
years and usage was equally apparent when, unable to find his
spectacles, he held his time-bill at arm's length to read it the better.
But there was something ingratiating and prepossessing even in the bend
which brought his ear to the level of the voice which addressed him,
with that instinctive and delicate courtesy which will not treat the
most trivial application with carelessness. The good woman who spoke
felt flattered--she could not tell how; it was only to ask when the
train would start--a thing which her next neighbour knew no better than
she did--but the ready attention, and sincere endeavour which the old
soldier instantly made to satisfy her, gave the questioner all the
feeling of a personal compliment. When the long line of carriages got
under weigh, our friend wrapped himself up in his warm cloak, and leaned
back in his unluxurious corner. It was a gloomy, rainy, miserable night;
the little lamp jolting in the roof, and throwing a feeble illumination
over four benches full of drowsing night-travellers, was the only light
visible in earth and heaven, save when the nocturnal express plunged
with ostentatious speed through some little oasis of a station, with
faint lamps gleaming through the universal gloom. The old soldier,
however, was not easily disturbed by the discomforts of his journey; if
there were any special meditations in his mind, he showed no sign of
them; but, with his face half buried in his cloak, kept motionless in
his corner--where, in the very midst of the black night, or, to speak
more properly, about three o'clock in the winter morning, the guard
awaked him. He had reached the end of his journey. The rest of the night
he passed in the Railway Inn of a country town, from which he set out
next morning in a gig, to face the raw February blast for a drive of
fourteen miles over an exposed country. Colonel Edward Sutherland,
though he had been twenty years in India, had come home still a poor
man; and habits of economy were strong upon the old officer, accustomed
all his life, even in the luxurious eastern climate, to spare and
restrain unnecessary expenses. He was a solitary man, but he was not a
free old bachelor, at liberty to expend his own means on his own
pleasure; wife and many children had been left behind in Indian graves,
but he had a boy at Addiscombe, and one at St. Andrew's, and
consequently not a shilling of his income to spare; so he placed his
carpet bag carefully below the seat out of the reach of rain, and tied a
travelling-cap over his ears, and muffled his cloak half over his face,
and so turned his face to the wind for his chilly journey to Lanwoth
Moor.

"Ay, sure the wind's in the east--it's ever in the east on this road,"
said the man who drove him. "When it's could as could all the country
over, it's double could Lanwoth way. Beg your pardon, Cornel," said the
man, touching his cap, "but it's strange for a gen'l'man to goo this
gate in ought but a shay."

"That is my business, my man," said the traveller, quietly; "is it a
good road?"

"Bits," said the postboy, shrugging his shoulders; "and bits the very
dyeuce for the poor beasts; but we never goo this direction, Cornel, not
twicest in a year--not all the way. There's Tillington, five mile this
side o' Lanwoth, but the road strikes off to the reet--Lord blees you,
gen'l'men know better nor to build on a moorside. The wind comes down
off the fells fit to pull your skin off, Cornel; and ne'er a shelter,
and ne'er a tree, but bits o' saplings in the moss. Rain and snow and
hail, they sweep a' things before them. I'd never set a brute beast, let
alone a christian, with its nose to Lanwoth Moor."

"Yet somebody must live there," said the traveller, shivering in spite
of himself within his cloak.

"Not a soul, Cornel, but the one house," said the driver, eagerly; "not
a thatch roof or a clay wall--nought but Marchmain. They say it was
built at the riding of the Marches, that's once in the hunderd year, and
a' foor strife, foor to part the lands of the twae Allonbys, brothers
and foes as should never be seen in God's world. But sure there it
stands, black as hate, and----"--the man made a sudden pause, and looked
suddenly up in the old officer's face--"Cornel, you're gooing there?"

"Do you know me, driver?" said Colonel Sutherland, with a little
curiosity.

The man held down his head with a sly, half-abashed smile, not quite
sure whether to pretend knowledge or to confess that he acquired his
information from the card on the carpet bag. The result of his
deliberations was an equivocal reply. "I know an army gen'l'man when I
see him, sir," he said, raising his slouching rustic shoulders, and
quickening his speech out of its Cumbrian drawl. "My father was an ould
53d, and Cornel Toppe Sawyer's own man; and, begging your pardon,
Cornel, a blind man could see you had borne command."

Colonel Sutherland was human; he was not only human, but a little
amiable vanity was one of his foibles. He inclined his ear blandly to
this clever compliment, and perhaps thought his driver rather a sensible
fellow; but at that moment the blast came wild in their faces--wet,
dismal, cold--a wind that cut to the bone, and the chattering teeth and
shivering frame which owned its influence was not lively enough for
conversation. The horse winced, and turned his unfortunate head aside,
making a momentary pause. The hills--low, gray, and piebald, with their
yellow circles of lichen, and brown turrets of rock--were blurred into
the dull horizon, which expressed nothing but that dismal, penetrating
moisture and murderous cold; and when, by a sudden turn of the road, the
hapless traveller found himself suddenly under the shelter of high banks
and hedges which intercepted the blast, the sudden contrast was so
grateful that Colonel Sutherland withdrew his cloak from his blue face,
and looked about him with a sigh of relief. There was nothing very
particular to see: a common country road descending a slope--for which
some necessity of the soil had made a deep cutting expedient--with a
village within sight, and a soft, broad valley; green fields, dotted
with farm-houses and haystacks, and leafless trees. The houses were all
of the silvery-grey limestone of the district, and walls of the same
stone, more frequent than hedge-rows, divided the fields. The old
Colonel, drawing breath under the shadow of the bank, thought to himself
that under sunshine the prospect would be very pleasant, and was
scarcely pleased to find that this, the only comfortable bit of the
road, was the one on which their progress was most rapid--and to hear
that they were still ten long dreary miles from Marchmain.

"There was talk enow in the country, Cornel," said the driver, resuming
his discourse, "when a strange gen'l'man coom'd to take that 'ouse.
Ne'er a sowl in twenty mile but had heard of Marchmain. I reckon you've
never been there?"

"No," said the traveller, briefly.

"He's a terrible quiet gen'l'man too, as we hear say," continued the
man; "a great scholard, I do suppose--and ignorant folks have little
understanding on the ways of sich. They say strange foot has never
crossed the door this nine year. It's a terrible place to bring up
children, Cornel, is Lanwoth Moor, and the young gen'l'man and Miss
they're kepp as close at hoam as if they were but six-year-olds; never a
gun on young master's shoulder, and the young lady ne'er saw a dance in
her born days. Them things come natural to young folks. I'm saying but
what I hear: it might be a parcel o' stories for ought I know--but Mr.
Scarsdale yonder, he's a very uncommon man."

"Poor children!" said Colonel Sutherland half aloud, with a sigh. The
open air, the rustle of the wind, and the noise of the wheels improved
the Colonel's hearing, as it so often does a gentle imperfection of the
kind. He beard every word of these scattered observations, and began to
feel more anxiety touching his visit to his morose brother-in-law than
he would have thought possible when he started. He knew, it was true,
the secret calamity which had driven his sister's husband to the
wilderness; but his own simple, pious, cheery spirit had no
understanding of the unwholesome passions of a self-regarding soul. He
had blamed himself for years for unconsciously feeling his relative's
withdrawal from life to be pusillanimous and unworthy of a man; but
nothing had suggested to the practical and innocent-minded soldier a
gloomy retreat such as that which began to be revealed to him by hints
and suggestions now. He was unable to conceive how a man with children
could make an utter hermit of himself, "especially children under their
extraordinary circumstances," said the Colonel anxiously, in his own
heart. He grew silent, absorbed, troubled, as they proceeded on their
way. When, immediately after settling himself on his return from India
in a home of his own, that home often longed for, to which his sons
could come in their holidays, he had volunteered a visit to his
brother-in-law--it was the reciprocity of honest affection and kindred
which the veteran wished to re-establish between his own family and
their nearest relatives. He set out to visit the Scarsdales in the full
idea that they too would visit him, and that the father of that
household lived like himself in the tenderest friendship with those
inheritors of his blood in whom he renewed his own youth; and with an
old man's sentiment of tender gallantry, this old soldier thought of
Susan, the only surviving woman of his race, his sister's daughter and
representative, his baby-favourite long ago. Perhaps a floating idea of
appropriating this only woman of the house had dawned upon his fatherly
mind with other matters--for the Addiscombe cadet was a year older than
Susan, and boys are so likely to marry when they go to India. At all
events, it was a sunny, simple picture of family kindness and comfort
which had presented itself to the honest eyes of the old soldier when he
set out upon his journey. This prospect began to cloud over sadly now;
he could not understand nor explain these singular circumstances, which
must be facts, and visible to the common eye. A lonely house which no
one else would live in, a seclusion which no stranger ever broke, young
people shut out from the society of their fellows, and gloom and mystery
upon the whole house! The Colonel wrapt his face once more in his cloak
and subsided into deafness and silence, pondering painfully in his own
mind what might be required of himself under such unexpected
circumstances, and what he could do for the relief of Horace and Susan,
whom in his kind heart he fondly called "the children." These
deliberations had come to no satisfactory result, when, rounding a
corner of the road, the bare extent of Lanwoth Moor became suddenly
visible, stretching to the fells, and the sky to the horizon, blurred
with rain, where it was scarcely possible to tell which was hill and
which was cloud.

They drove along in silence, a long half mile, seeing nothing but that
same blank expanse traversed by the long, deep cuttings of an attempted
drainage, until at last the driver silently, with a certain sympathy for
the silence of his companion, pointed out the solitary walls rising on
the edge of the moor. The house was a square, common-place erection of
two stories, with no remarkable feature, but that one side was raised a
story higher than the other, and stood up square and gray, like the
little distinguishing tower of an Italian house. Like--yet how
unlike!--the rough, gray limestone, unpolished and savage, the deep
walls into which those small windows sank like cavernous eyes, the cold
blue slated roof, the cold door coming bare out upon the path, without a
morsel of garden or any enclosure, all enclosed and backed by that
monotonous mystery of moor, the distant spectral hills, the clouds that
carried them out in ghostly ranges, the wind and the rain so blended
together that they made but one--and they went to the heart with a chill
indescribable, and not to be resisted.

Colonel Sutherland looked upon all this with a sensation of anguish. It
was incomprehensible to him. That he should find his relatives here, and
not in the cheerful village house he had expected, overpowered him with
complete wonder. He ceased even to be indignant at the father who
sacrificed wilfully the happiness of his children--he suspended his
judgment till he should hear what extraordinary circumstances had fixed
them thus. In his unsuspecting heart he felt certain that something
which he did not know must have produced this exaggerated and unnatural
retirement. The sudden impression produced upon him by the sight of this
house made his cheek pale, and added a nervous trembling to the shiver
of the cold; he got down, stumbling at the door, which the driver
watched with undisguised curiosity, as if something unnatural and
portentous was about to make its appearance--and, in his emotion, let
the money fall out of the purse which he took out to pay his conductor.
While he stooped to pick it up, the door opened hastily, and Peggy
rushed forth and seized the carpet-bag. At sight of her the Colonel
recovered a little from his confusion and tremor.

"Thank God!" he exclaimed fervently, "there is some sunshine here at
last."

The driver opened his eyes somewhat disappointed. Peggy was not known at
the country town, though Mr. Scarsdale's extraordinary life had been
heard of there; and the vigorous servant-woman, who began to scold
forthwith between the exclamations of her joyful recognition, reduced
the mysterious house to matter-of-fact. The man drove off, not knowing
what to make of it; and fearing to hear of some new misfortune, with his
honest heart beating with grief, sympathy, and anxiety to mend the
position of his friends, Colonel Sutherland, after twenty years'
absence, entered at his brother-in-law's inhospitable door.




CHAPTER V.


The kitchen of Marchmain was built out from the house, and was a long
and somewhat narrow apartment, quite unlike the rest of the building.
People said it had been a cottage standing on the spot before this house
was built, and arbitrarily connected with it--and the unceiled roof and
large old-fashioned chimney favoured the notion. The mud or brick floor
had been, however, replaced by a deal one; and the roof was now covered,
instead of thatch, with the less picturesque but safer slates, which
gave so cold an aspect to the house. Within, two large articles of
furniture filled up half the space, though furniture these fixed
encumbrances could scarcely be called. One was a prodigious press, in
which Peggy kept her household linen--the other, a great square box with
a sloping lid, which contained the immediate supply of coals, brought
from the coal cellar outside. Beneath the window--which was large but
high, so that Peggy, though she was tall, could do no more than look
out, and Susan could only reach up to it on tiptoe--stood a large deal
table, clean to the utmost extent of cleanliness, where Peggy did her
ironing--(Peggy was punctilious in her concerns, and kept everything in
its proper place)--another table in quite another quarter was
appropriated to the cooking--and a third, a small round one, stood aside
in a corner to be lifted in front of the fireplace at nights when
Peggy's work was over, beside the big old heavy elbow-chair, where Peggy
took an evening nap and sipped a fourth cup of tea.

In this apartment, in the morning of the same day, while Colonel
Sutherland drove through the rain, Susan, excited, happy, and restless,
fluttered round Peggy at her work. Susan had in her hand the front of
one of Master Horace's new shirts, which she pretended to be
stitching--but everybody knows that stitching is a delicate operation,
and not to be performed on foot, or in a state of restlessness. This was
the time of the day when Susan was most free to follow her own desires.
Horace was out, and Mr. Scarsdale in his study. When this fortunate
concurrence of circumstances was secured, Susan came lightly out of the
dull dining-room to the bright kitchen, the only place in the house
which had an appearance or sentiment of home. Peggy was better company
for Susan than a thousand philosophers; she laughed, she sang, she
danced about, she looked like a young living creature, as she was, in
Peggy's womanly presence. Her father and her brother were rather hard
examples of the rule of man to Susan. Horace exacted endless
sympathy--sympathy more bitter than it was in her to bestow--and scorned
it when it was given; but Peggy cherished the girl with an all-indulgent
tenderness--a motherly, nursely, homely love, advising, and interfering,
and fretting, which kept her heart and her youth alive. But something
more than usual occupied their thoughts to-day.

"Ay, honey--as if it was yesterday," said Peggy. "R'c'lect him!--he was
not the young man to be forgot, I can tell you! Many a handsome lady
would have gone over seas to follow the young soldier. He was just the
innocentest, bravest, kindest man I ever looked in the eye."

"Why in the eye?" said Susan, who was a little matter-of-fact, and liked
to understand a new phrase.

"Eh, child! his heart was in it!" cried Peggy. "When your mamma was
alive, she was a dear, blessed creature, and kept religion and comfort
in the house; but when Mr. Edward came, it was pleasure to be about, and
the world was changed. He never arguified with a soul, nor set up his
opinions, nor took slights nor offences, nor a single mortal thing that
a' persons beside did. He was just right himself and happy himself
without thinking upon't, and was a happiness to be nigh night and day.
The master, so far as I can think, had never a cross word with Mr.
Edward. Think you any other man would ever have come, or been let come,
to this house?"

"No, indeed," said Susan, gravely; "it is very strange. I wonder how he
thought of it at all; one would suppose he must like us, Peggy, to come
here--though I don't see how that can be either. Hasn't he been in India
all our lives?"

"Little matter for that; but you understand nothing about friends'
feelings; and how should you, poor forlorn infant!" said Peggy. "He
likes you, I'll warrant; and he's held you on his knee, Miss Susan--and
besides, for your mamma's sake."

"To be sure, for mamma's sake," said Susan, satisfied; "but surely,
other people, when she knew so many, must have loved mamma. Peggy, what
can make papa so stiff and hard to strangers, and putting everybody out
of the house, and never letting us make any friends--what do you think
it can be?"

Peggy drew a long breath, which seemed to end in some inward words, said
for her own private relief and satisfaction.

"Your papa has his own reasons, Miss Susan, and that's neither for you
nor me; but you see he lets Mr. Edward come. Who can tell how many
more?--for Mr. Edward has the tongue of a nightingale, and steals
folks's hearts."

"I wish he would sing into papa's," said Susan, laughing; "there's never
any music at Marchmain, Peggy. Oh, I wonder when Uncle Edward will come;
look out and see if there's anybody in the road; such a morning! and
Horace will come in all muddy and sulky, and not get goodtempered the
whole of the day. Peggy," cried Susan, jumping down from the chair she
had mounted to look out, "are boys _always_ so dreadfully cross?"

"Indeed, Miss Susan, they're little to be trusted," said Peggy, with a
grave face of wisdom, prudently refraining from blaming Horace, while
she inculcated the moral lessons supposed to be most advantageous to
feminine youth.

Susan shrugged her shoulders with a private internal reflection, which
perhaps meant, "I should like to judge for myself;" but which said, "I
am very glad, then, that we see so little of them." For people don't
permit themselves to be very ingenuous, even in their thoughts--at least
women and young girls do not. "I suppose, then," she said very demurely
aloud, "there never was but one Uncle Edward in the whole world, Peggy."

"Eh, honey! if there were a hunderd the world would be saved, like the
Lord said to Abraham," cried Peggy. "My heart jumped when the master
said it last night. I said to myself, 'a good man's coming, and a
blessing will come with him.' If I saw you out of this, you two
unfortunate things, I would be content to go foot foremost the same day
to Lanwoth Church."

"That would be cheerful and pleasant for us, I am sure," cried Susan; "I
wonder how you dare say such a thing, Peggy--all about your own
nonsense, and not a word of Uncle Edward! But, I say, Peggy--oh! tell
me--Uncle Edward's not a _young_ man?"

Peggy took time to consider, pausing in her work for the purpose, with
her hands covered with flour--for it was baking day. "I'm bound to allow
he cannot be young--nay, it's fifteen years since he was home," cried
Peggy, with a sigh. "Time flies!--it was the very same year, Miss Susan,
that your mamma died."

Susan paused with a question on her lips, awed by these last words; for
she understood dimly that it was in some season of extreme and
mysterious calamity that her mother's life concluded. She could not have
told how this impression had settled on her mind, but there it certainly
was.

"Peggy," she said suddenly, putting into words the suggestion of the
moment, "was it mamma's death that made papa so--so--"--Susan hesitated
for a word, and at last, with a natural hypocrisy, substituted one that
did not express her meaning for a less dutiful term--"so sad?"

Peggy made no audible answer, but she screwed her lips into a tight
round circle, through which came an invisible, inarticulate "No," most
emphatic and unmistakable though unpronounced, shaking her head
violently as she did so. Susan was first frightened, then amused, at the
extraordinary pantomime.

"Don't shake your head off, however," she cried, laughing. "But about
Uncle Edward--you never will keep to the point, you troublesome Peggy!
If he is an old man, what is he? Has he got any children?--where does he
live?--do you know anything about him at all?"

"Not a mortal thing," said Peggy, relieving herself by speaking loud.
"Who can hear anything here, I would like to know? Not of my own
brother, Miss Susan, let alone your mamma's. But he's coming, bless
him! I'm strong in the hope nature will come with him, and something
will be done for you two."

"Peggy, you never spoke of us two before like that," said Susan. "Has
anything happened to us that we don't know?"

"Oh, bless the innocent!--what do you know?" cried Peggy. "If I never
said it before, it was because I saw no hope; but I've told your papa my
mind, and that I can tell you, Miss Susan; and I'll tell it to Mr.
Edward, if Providence spares me, before he's been twelve hours in this
unlucky house!"

"You are very odd to-day, Peggy," said Susan, looking at her with
curiosity. "But I am sure if Uncle Edward gets us permission to see
people sometimes, I should be very glad--but then, we have affronted
everybody," added Susan, with a little shrug of her shoulders. "However,
he is coming himself--that is the great matter. Peggy, what will you
have ready if he comes early? He cannot wait all the time till dinner!
How foolish I was, never to think of it before! What _shall_ we do?"

"We'll have in the lunch, Miss Susan, and as good a lunch as anybody
need wish for," said Peggy, in triumph. "Is that all the good Peggy is
for, to think upon things at the last moment?--for as sure as I'm
living, there's a wheel upon the big stones in the road!"

Susan sprang up upon the chair, leaped down again, her colour rising,
her heart beating. Then she ran breathless towards the door--then
paused. "Oh, Peggy! who must tell papa?" she cried, in great excitement
and trepidation. Peggy, without pausing to answer her question, rushed
past her and through the hall, to throw the door open and seize upon the
carpet-bag, as before related. Peggy was not afraid of papa, and her
shriek of joy and welcome, "Eyeh, Master Edward!" penetrated even
through the closed windows and doors of the study, where Mr. Scarsdale
sat as usual, while Susan stood in the hall, eagerly bending forward to
see the newcomer, and speculating with herself whether it was safe to
secure herself the pleasure of her uncle's first greeting, without the
dreadful operation of telling papa. The issue was, a sudden spring
forward on the part of the excited girl, while her uncle--sad,
oppressed, and wondering--stooped his deaf ear to Peggy, and tremulously
bent over his carpet-bag. Susan had no sooner seen his face than the
long restrained heart yearned within her--her mother's brother--somebody
who loved them! She sprang forward and clasped his arm with both her
hands, and fell a-crying, poor child, as girls use, and looked up in his
face, all-conquering in her wistfulness, and her smiles, and her tears.
The old man caught her in his arms, and read her face as if it had been
a picture, with eager wet eyes that, after a moment, could scarcely tell
what they gazed on. In that moment the poor lonely girl woke up, by dint
of finding it, to discover the love that had been wanting, the
immeasurable lack of her young life. And the old soldier took his
sister's child--the only woman of the family--a new, tender, delicate
tie, almost more touching and intimate than any other, into his fatherly
old heart; and, on the instant, took courage about all the unknown
troubles of the mysterious house, and was at home and himself again.
They went in together to the dull dining-room, where Susan had no desire
to remember that papa had not been told, and grew friends in half a
minute, saying nothing but the common words that every stranger at the
end of a journey hears from his entertainers. But the "Oh, Uncle, I am
so glad you are come!"--the glistening eyes--the joyful young
voice--the little figure fluttering about him, unable to rest for
anxiety that he should rest, and have exactly what he wanted--spoke more
eloquently than volumes of fine words. And Susan's face had already
almost reconciled Uncle Edward to the savage solitude of Marchmain, and
the dreary blank of Lanwoth Moor.




CHAPTER VI.


WHEN Colonel Sutherland had been established for nearly half-an-hour in
the angular arm-chair, which was the most luxurious seat this room
afforded, where he sat holding Susan's hand and keeping her by his side,
it suddenly occurred to him that he had forgotten the other members of
the family in his satisfaction with his new-found niece. "But, my dear
child, your father?" he said, hastily; "he expected me, did he not?--he
is surely at home."

And instantly Susan's countenance fell.

The old Colonel had begun to recover his spirits about his
brother-in-law's house. He saw Susan in blooming health, affectionate,
frank, and cheerful, and he began, with natural hopefulness, to impute
the dismal house and solitary life to some caprice, and to imagine to
himself a loving, united family, who were society enough to themselves.
But it was impossible to mistake the cloud which fell instantly upon
Susan's face. "Oh!--I ought to have told papa," she said, with a
hesitation and reluctance in her voice which went to her uncle's heart.
He drew her still closer to him, and looked in her face anxiously. But
Susan knew nothing of that domestic martyrdom which conceals and smiles
on the family skeleton. She was not aware how great a skeleton it
was--it was simply a thing of course, to her inexperienced spirit.

"I should think he must have heard--I should think Peggy must have told
him," said Susan. "He is not so angry when Peggy goes into the study as
when I go; but if you like, I will go and tell him, uncle, now."

"Never mind, Susan. I daresay your father will come when he chooses. A
deaf man would have heard Peggy's shout," said Colonel Sutherland; "and
Horace--was there nobody but my little girl who came to see the old
uncle--is your brother in the study too?"

"In the study!--he would as soon go down the well or up the chimney,"
said Susan, with a very short and half-frightened laugh. "No,
uncle--Horace is in Faneleigh Woods, or on the Moor. He never minds the
weather. I do think at this time of the year he gets wet through three
times a-week; but I am sure Horace will be very glad to see you--as glad
as I was--oh, I am quite sure!"

This expression of conviction, made with some heat and anxiety, had a
very different effect from that which Susan intended--it revealed to the
Colonel very plainly that Susan was anything but _quite_ sure of
Horace's sentiment; and, perhaps, Colonel Sutherland's first sensation
thereupon was offence and indignation; and his personal dignity suffered
a momentary mortification, from the idea that he had volunteered a visit
which was welcome to nobody but this little girl. This personal feeling,
however, was but momentary. A deeper pain returned to his heart; he
looked anxiously into Susan's blue eyes to find out, if possible, how
and why this unnatural state of things existed; or, failing that, what
effect upon her the loneliness and the hardness of her life had made.
But there were no mysteries in those eyes of Susan's--her girlish,
undisturbed heart, clouded by a little terror of her father, which took
no deeper form than that of discomfort and uneasiness, gleamed in them
with otherwise unmingled joy and satisfaction. All the natural filial
love hitherto denied her had sprung to life in a moment in Susan's
heart. She looked at her uncle with an affectionate pride, which made
her breast swell and astonished herself. To stand by his side, to feel
her hand held in his kind hand, to know by intuition that there was
interest for all her little affairs, and sympathy for all her unregarded
troubles in this new friend, was a new life to Susan. She felt
encouraged and emboldened without knowing how, as she appropriated,
involuntarily, his affection, his aid, his succour. She kept naming him
over and over within herself, with a secret inexplainable swell of pride
and comfort. Susan had never been disposed before to use the possessive
pronoun in regard to anything more important than pin-cushions and
scissors; and now to say, "My uncle!" was something as new as pleasant.
But notwithstanding that reference to her father curbed her tongue and
brought a shade of restraint over her thoughts in spite of herself; and
Uncle Edward's affectionate questions flagged--he too had something else
to think of--the change was apparent to both; and Susan, for the first
time in her life, moved to exert herself to seek a less unfortunate
subject, immediately remembered that her uncle must want refreshment,
and proposed to call Peggy to bring in his luncheon.

"Suppose we ring," said Colonel Sutherland, putting out his hand with a
smile to the unused bell-rope.

Susan started with terror to prevent him.

"Oh, uncle, we never ring!" she cried, in an alarmed tone.

The sound of that bell tinkling through the house might produce Susan
could not tell what tragedy in the study. She put out her trembling
hand and caught at her uncle's to stop his intended action. When she did
so, to Susan's great surprise the Colonel, dropping the bell, turned
round upon her suddenly, and put his arm round her.

"My poor child!" he exclaimed, with some sudden access of feeling,
scarcely intelligible to Susan, and with tears in his eyes.

She did not know what it meant, and yet she was very much inclined to
cry too.

At this moment fortunately Peggy came in unsummoned, bringing the tray,
but not the dainty dish which her care had prepared for Mr. Edward. When
she set it down upon the table, she addressed the visitor with the tone
and manner of one who has something disagreeable to say.

"The master's in his study, Mr. Edward: he never comes out on't at this
hour of the day. Will you please to step athwart the hall, and see him
there?"

"Certainly," said Colonel Sutherland, and rose at once, releasing Susan,
who could not help feeling a little tremor for the consequences of his
visit to her father. The old Colonel himself stepped solemnly, with a
certain melancholy in his whole figure and bearing, as he went out of
the room. It went to his heart to see the clouded face with which Susan
responded to his mention of her father, and he went to meet him
forgetting even the discourtesy which did not come to meet
him--oppressed, and grieved, and wondering. When he had closed the door
behind him he laid his arm on Peggy's arm, detaining her.

"What does it all mean?" he asked, with a troubled face, and stooped his
deaf ear to Peggy's voice.

"What does't mean? Mischief and the devil!--and good reason he has to be
proud of his handiwork," cried Peggy, vehemently, though in a whisper;
"and oh, Mr. Edward! before the two unfortunate things are killed and
murdered, save him from himself!"

Perhaps Colonel Sutherland did not perfectly hear this strange
communication; he nodded and went on after her, looking puzzled and
distressed--he was not of an intrusive or interfering nature. He had no
idea of thrusting into any man's secrets, with the view of doing him
good. And then, what influence had he, whom after twenty years absence
his host would not come to meet. So he went across the hall, stooping
his lofty grizzled head, and with a great confusion of grieved thoughts
in his mind--while Susan, left behind, went to the window to look for
Horace, and stirred the fire into a flame, and placed the tray and the
arm-chair in the most comfortable position possible, and trembled a
little, in a vague idea that Uncle Edward might somehow dissolve in that
awful study, or come out a different man.

In the study, just risen up from his chair, Mr. Scarsdale received his
visitor; he scarcely made a step forward to meet him, but he shook him
coldly by the hand. They stood there together, two strangely different
men--the recluse standing bolt upright, with his wide dressing gown
falling off from his spare figure, and his book open on the table--cold,
self-absorbed, in a passion of unnatural stillness; the soldier, with
his tall stooping figure, his deaf ear bending with that benign and kind
humility which made the infirmity a grace, and his anxious countenance
afraid to lose a word of anything that might be said to him. Mr.
Scarsdale's greetings were few and hurried; he asked when he returned,
and how he had travelled, and then, reaching a chair which happened to
be within arm's length, begged that Colonel Sutherland would sit down,
in a tone which plainly signified that the request itself was a favour.
Colonel Sutherland did so, looking at him with a strange
wistfulness--and then, reseating himself, his host spoke.

"Since you have come to Marchmain, I have something to say to you at the
commencement of what I suppose you will call our renewed intercourse. I
will deal with you frankly. I should not have ventured to invite, if you
had left it to me, a man of your tastes and feelings here."

"I can guess as much," said Colonel Sutherland, with a passing, angry
blush.

"I should not," said Mr. Scarsdale, coldly; "because my establishment is
very limited. I live in great seclusion, and I remember that you are a
lover of society, and what is called cheerfulness. But you _have_ come,
and yours is the responsibility if our life oppresses you. And one thing
I would say; I do not fear your discretion, having warned you. You are
aware of the very peculiar circumstances under which I stand--you know,
in short, the blight of my life. Pshaw! why speak of it, or give it a
name?--you know, of course, thanks to your sister's frankness, exactly
what I mean. Now this, I beg you to observe, is totally unknown to my
children: my son is not aware of his advantage over his father. I do not
mean that he shall be, until," added Mr. Scarsdale, with a ghastly
smile, "until the time of his triumph approaches; but, in the meantime,
I have to request that you will not think of extending to these young
people a confidence which I do not wish them to possess."

A flood of painful feelings rose during this speech over the Colonel's
face, of which kindness misconstrued and personal dignity wounded were
the least and lightest. He looked with an amazed, grieved,
uncomprehending wonder in the face of his brother-in-law, and was silent
for a few minutes, while the first pangs of indignant pain were
subsiding, though he involuntarily rose to his feet, an action which Mr.
Scarsdale followed. Perhaps this last rudeness might have roused the
warlike blood of the old soldier, had not his eye at the moment lighted
upon that portrait in the shadow of the curtain. That touch of old love
and sorrow moved him in the midst of his resentment almost to tears. He
had to pause before he could speak as calmly as he wished to speak. "I
have never thought it my duty," said Colonel Sutherland, "to interfere
in any man's house: I will not begin in yours--nor would I remain in it
even for a night, but for recollections which neither you nor I can
efface by any measure of hard words. But, for heaven's sake, Robert
Scarsdale, why is all this?--why do you meet me after this extraordinary
fashion?--why do you shut yourself out from human sympathy?--why refuse
yourself the comfort of your own children? As for myself, I am neither
an enemy nor a stranger. Old ties and kindness have never died out of my
recollection through all the sorrows and labours of my life, which have
not been few. Why have they passed out of yours? We are relations--not
antagonists."

"We _were_ relatives," said Mr. Scarsdale, stiffly.

"_Were!_ And my dear sister--your good wife--do you count her, then,
only among the things that _were_?"

"I beg your pardon: a man is generally the best judge of the goodness of
his wife; but there is no question at present of the virtues of the late
Mrs. Scarsdale," said the recluse. "I can see no benefit to result from
discussing past circumstances. You are welcome to my house, such as it
is; but, knowing my position as you do, I think myself quite justified
in requesting your silence on this matter. It was not my will,
certainly, which made you aware of it at first."

Colonel Sutherland stood before his brother-in-law in a flush of unusual
and inexpressible passion. He could not give utterance to the indignant,
mortified, impatient surprise with which he heard these words. But what
can any one say? It is hard for the voice of kindred to praise a poor
woman--even when she is dead--while her husband looks on blankly, and is
the best judge whether his wife has been a good wife or not. So he is,
of course: therefore, be silent, brother of the dead--say nothing about
her--she is judged elsewhere, and beyond human criticism now. But the
old soldier stood listening, with the pang of wonder, almost stronger
than that of anger and indignation, at his heart. He was so much
surprised, that he was speechless. This unexpected sentiment shook him
suddenly in his supposed position, and turned all his previous ideas
into folly. He was not the brother of a wife beloved, the uncle of
children who cherished their mother's memory, but an intruder, presuming
upon a past relationship. A flush of deep mortification came upon his
face: he made a stately, ceremonious bow to his ungracious host--

"In that case--as things are," stammered the Colonel, "I will make no
encroachments upon your hospitality. Pray, don't say anything--it is
unnecessary. I--I shall take care to pay due respect to your desires so
far as your children are concerned. In short, I beg you to understand
that your secret is, and has always been, with me as though I knew it
not; but," said Colonel Sutherland, pausing in his haste, and steadying
his voice, "it was, as you are well enough aware, known to half, at
least, of your former friends, and that by no--no indiscretion on the
part of--my sister--and it is open at this day, or any day, to the most
indifferent stranger who chooses to pay a fee at Doctors' Commons. What
you can mean, in these circumstances, by a precaution so--by such
precautions, I cannot tell. Is it not better your son should learn this
from his father, than from any ill-disposed companion whom the young man
may pick up? But that is certainly not my business. I presume that I
may, without objection on your part, see my niece and nephew sometimes
during the few days I remain in the nearest village? The children must
acknowledge a certain relationship with their mother's brother."

"Oh!" said Mr. Scarsdale, with a slight blush of shame on his cheek, "I
shall be glad to have you remain here."

Glad! the word was out of keeping entirely with his aspect and that of
the scene; it looked like a piece of mockery. Colonel Sutherland bowed
again with still more ceremony.

"It is too late," he said, quietly.

"Your room is prepared--you have been expected," said Scarsdale,
awaking, not only to the reproach of sending a stranger away, which,
distant as he was from the opinions of the world, touched him still, but
to the vexation of being resisted. "My daughter, so far as looks can
express it, has been expecting you eagerly. I beg you to reconsider your
decision--nay, I entreat, I insist that you should remain."

"Too late for that," said the Colonel, with a smile and a bow; "but I
will not detain you from your studies. Susan, I believe, has some
refreshment ready for her old uncle. I will not carry a punctilio of
welcome so far as not to break bread in your house; but I will bid you
now, and finally, good-bye."

So saying, the old soldier made a superb bow, and, without lifting his
eyes again to his churlish host to see how he took it, turned round on
his heel and left the room.

In the hall he encountered Peggy waiting for him, who, familiar in her
anxiety, laid her hand upon his sleeve, and stretched up on tiptoe to
whisper her anxious interrogation into the Colonel's deaf ear. He waved
his hand to her with an assumed carelessness, which he was far from
feeling.

"We should not 'gree, Peggy, if I stayed a day," he said, familiarly,
and with a smile. "You must direct me to the next village, where I can
get a bed and a dinner--for I will not leave the quarter till I know my
sister's bairns."

"But ye'll not forsake them; say you'll never go away till he promises
their rights," cried Peggy, in a whispered shriek.

The Colonel shook his head, and put her aside with his hand.

"If I can do anything for them, I will," he said briefly; and so went
into the dining-room, where Susan waited, trembling for the issue of
this scene: while Peggy, retiring to her kitchen in fierce
disappointment and mortification, threw her apron over her head and wept
a sudden torrent of hot tears; then comforting herself, repeated over
his words, wiped her tears, and carried in the luncheon. She would not
lose faith in her favourite with so short a trial. Daylight, good sense,
common affection did but need to breathe into this morbid house, and all
might yet be right.




CHAPTER VII.


When Peggy re-entered the dining-room, she found poor Susan struggling
to restrain the sudden sobs of her distress and disappointment in
finding that her uncle was not to remain at Marchmain. He had not meant
to tell her at once, and even now he told her cheerfully, and without
offence, as if he had changed his intention for his own convenience
solely. He had just opened the carpet-bag, of which he had been so
careful on the journey, and was taking out a parcel very carefully and
elaborately packed up, which he proceeded at once to uncover. Susan
looked on, a little curious, but not much interested; she had no
conception what it was, or that she had any connection with it; and when
at last it was all unfolded, and spread out before her, she looked on
rather more interested, but no less wondering. What might Uncle Edward
be going to do with those snowy lengths of India muslin, the fragile
foundation of which was scarcely sufficient to bear the wreaths of
embroidery, which Susan had never seen anything like in her life, and
instantly longed, with a girlish instinct, to copy and emulate--pretty
collars, too, and cuffs, feminine articles which the Colonel could have
no possible use for; and wrapped up with these one or two unknown
articles, rich with that wonderful tiny mosaic work which embellishes
the card-cases and blotting-books of people who are fortunate enough to
have friends in India. Susan had a vague idea that one of these was a
card-case; it certainly was like something of her mother's which Peggy
preserved as a relic, and had promised to make over to her young
mistress when she was old enough to pay visits--an impossible age, which
Susan laughed to think of ever attaining at Marchmain. When he had
opened them all out upon the shining uncovered table, which reflected
the spotless whiteness of the muslin, the Colonel looked down at Susan
with a smile, bending his ear towards her, and looking for gratification
and pleasure in a face which was only admiring and puzzled. "Are you
pleased with them?" said Uncle Edward. "I puzzled my old brains to think
what you would like, and there you have the results of my
cogitations--not anything very extraordinary, but bought a good many
thousand miles off for you, when the only recollection I had of you was
that of a baby. I had to count the years very carefully, I assure you,
and was near committing myself, and losing credit for ever by bringing
you a little frock."

"But, uncle, do you mean they are for _me?_" cried Susan, in amazement.

"Eh? Precisely--for you," said the Colonel, who had not quite heard her
question, but understood her look. "There is but one woman in the
family, my dear child: you don't suppose that my boy Ned could wear
muslin, or that Tom knows how to use a fan? But eh?--what's happened?
Have I vexed you without knowing it, for a blundering old blockhead?
What's the matter, Susan? I'll toss them all into the fire rather than
make you cry."

"Oh, uncle, I can't help crying--then, I like to cry!" exclaimed Susan,
finding the old Colonel really concerned, and disposed to carry out his
threat. "To think they should be for _me_--to think you should have
thought of me in India! Do you suppose I could just say, 'Thank you?'
Nobody ever gave me anything all my life before--and oh, uncle, to take
the trouble of _thinking_ of me!"

"If that is a troublesome operation, I have taken a great deal of
trouble about you, one time and another, Susan," said Colonel
Sutherland. "Now, dry your eyes, my love, and tell me if you approve of
my taste. They are nothing extraordinary, you little goose--you will
make me ashamed of my bundle. Why, everybody brings such things from
India, and bring them very often to people they care much less about
than I do about my little niece. If I had been richer, you should have
seen what we can do in the East; but I just managed, you perceive, to
get you one shawl."

Which shawl the Colonel extricated accordingly, as he spoke. Poor Susan,
afraid he might think her foolish, managed to stop her crying, and
gazed--half with dismay, half with admiration--at all the pretty things
before her. What could _she_ do with them? Colonel Sutherland, it was
true, knew that she never was allowed to see anybody, or to make any
friends, but a fact which is alien to nature makes no impression upon a
natural mind. He could not remember or suppose that a young girl had no
possible use for the pretty, simple dress he had brought, and looked on
with a pleased face to see the effect of his gifts, as Susan began to
examine them. Peggy, going backward and forward, saw it was now time
enough for her to interpose, and, with a genuine woman's interest,
plunged into the delightful investigation, which Susan--flushed and
agitated quite out of her wont, and tremulous with many new
sensations--had just concluded, when Horace entered the room.

That room, all its life, had never looked so homelike, and the reason
was not explainable; for, except in the heap of litter at one end of the
table, and the old man eating his luncheon hard by, there was
absolutely no change upon the apartment. That soldier's face,
weatherworn and brown, full of command yet full of tenderness, with
grizzled hair and moustache, and erect soldierly _pose_, was not by any
means a common-place countenance, or one which could have passed unnoted
anywhere; but it was not even that which made the charm. It was the
bright, pleased look which the Colonel, as he sat, lifted upon the girl
before him--the amused, kind, tender smile which went over all his face
like sunshine--the kindly, homely inclination towards her of that deaf
ear--the care he took to hear all she said--the interest and indulgent
regard with which he followed her movements and listened to her words.
There was no criticism in those kind eyes--they were eyes accustomed to
give a genial interpretation of everything--and the light of them
changed the aspect of this dismal room. It did not even look so dark or
so stifling--the very mahogany brightened, and hearty blazes awoke in
the once-smouldering fire. Everything seemed to have become aware,
somehow, that living human love and kindness, indulgence, tenderness
were there.

Yes, indulgence--though, to be sure, it is very bad to spoil our
children; but what would not one give, when one grows old, for that
dear, lost indulgence of our youth, which will never come back to
us--that consciousness that there is one at least who will see
everything we do in the best light, and put the kindest construction
upon our failings, and think us cleverer and better, and fairer and
pleasanter, than we are and can be! Youth cannot thrive at all without
this sunshine; but heaven help us, how it dies and disappears out of the
noon of life! Susan had never once felt it before--the feeling came upon
her, as she met her uncle's eyes, that she had never really lived
before--that she was only awaking to find out what she herself was, and
what were the people around her. Somehow the dawning of a happiness
unthought of brought with it the sudden revelation of miseries which had
not struck her in all her past experience. Fathers, it became visible to
her in a moment, were not all like her father--homes were different from
this home--even Uncle Edward's presents helped that enlightenment. These
pretty things were common to girls of her own age, and in ordinary use
among them. Her uncle was even puzzled that she should look at them as
she did, and think them so beautiful, so wonderful, so much "too fine
for _me_!" And as Susan came to comprehend this, between the pleasure
and the pain, her cheeks flushed, her young limbs trembled, her heart
beat loud with strange emotion. Even that excitement helped the effect
of Uncle Edward's kind face in the room. This very confusion and
commotion was life.

When Horace appeared, wet as Susan had predicted he would be, and sulky
as he always was, the sudden gleam of warmth in the familiar apartment
penetrated even into his sullen heart. Its first result was the natural
one of making him feel more unhappy; but in another moment, and with
reflection, a change came upon Horace. He did not desire or care for the
kindness of his uncle. _He_ was not a domestic creature!--he longed to
escape from home, and was exceedingly indifferent as to what he should
have there, if he could but attain that desirable end. And Colonel
Sutherland appeared a very likely assistant to Horace--as, his deaf
uncle not having heard him enter, he stood for a moment looking at him
before he advanced. The young man, in his hard wisdom, perceived the
simplicity of the old man who sat unconscious before him. As far as he
could comprehend a spirit so different from his own, he read his nature
in the Colonel's face, and took up his part accordingly with cleverness
and dexterity. He advanced quickly to his uncle and held out his hand,
Susan watching him with an unusual anxiety which she could not explain
to herself.

"Uncle!--I need not ask who it is--uncle, welcome!" cried Horace, with a
heartiness unknown to him heretofore, and perhaps more reality in the
expression than he himself could have thought possible.

The Colonel rose with a little stumble of haste, putting his hand to his
ear. For the moment he was perplexed, and thought it a stranger; but
catching the sound of uncle, hailed his nephew with all the affectionate
sincerity of his unsuspicious heart. He shook both his hands as Horace's
hands had never been touched before; he looked in his face, too, as in
Susan's, to trace the lineaments of their mother, and called him "my
dear boy;" and shook his hands again with an effusion of satisfaction
and kindness. For Horace, so far as features went, _was_ somewhat like
his mother, and, with his smile and his smoothed-out brow, looked a very
different person from the Horace of every-day use and wont. "But will he
persevere?" said Susan to herself, with an ache of delight in her heart;
and "How to keep it up?" said Horace within his own saturnine spirit.
The uncle knew nothing of these secret questions--did not suspect for a
moment that the young man who met him so joyfully had changed his
manners for the occasion, and congratulated himself in his simple heart
that both the children had kept their hearts and feelings warm in their
solitude. The old man grew quite radiant and talkative. He who had
intended to leave Marchmain directly, sat still, opening out his honest
heart to the young people like a long absent father. He told them first
and principally about his boys, their cousins, whom they must
know--about the house he had got, which was exactly what he wanted, and
where he only wished he could have Susan to be "mistress and mair!" as
he broke out joyfully in his Scotch--about India, where almost all his
life had been spent, and which, with Edinburgh, and a peep of London,
made up the world to the veteran. And the light had actually begun to
wane in the short afternoon, when it suddenly occurred to Uncle Edward
that he was forgetting himself, and that he must face the blast again to
find his inn. A momentary austerity came into his face as he recollected
this, and, rising hastily, begged of Horace to show him or to tell him
the way to the nearest village. The nearest village worthy the name was
five miles off; there was a miserable little hamlet nearer, with a
miserable little public house, but that Uncle Edward shrugged his
shoulders at.

"Can Susan walk five miles in a good day?" said the Colonel, smiling.
"Then come along, my boy--we'll go there."




CHAPTER VIII.


A walk of five miles on that dismal February afternoon was not a
pleasure excursion; nor was it pleasant to look back upon poor Susan's
face at the window--flushed, tearful, ashamed, mortified, Susan had not
experienced an equal vexation in the whole course of her life. To think
of Uncle Edward having to go away through the damp and twilight five
miles off to find a lodging! Uncle Edward, who had come closer to
Susan's heart in half-an-hour than all the rest of the world in all her
life! When they were out of sight she subsided into the arm-chair and
had a good cry over it, and then went to talk to Peggy, who was actively
furious, relieving herself by incomprehensible ejaculations. Still
somehow, mortified and vexed as she was, there was all the promise of a
new life remaining for Susan. Uncle Edward would return to-morrow; so
long as he stayed he would see them every day--and the idea disturbed
the stagnant atmosphere, and diffused an indescribable cheerfulness
through the house. Even Peggy, though she fumed, was exhilarated by the
thought--perhaps on the whole, it was even better that the Colonel's
tender, honest heart should not be grieved by the sight of the ghost of
family life existing here. So long as he did not see it to make himself
wretched with the view, Uncle Edward's sweet and healthful imagination
could conceive of no such scene as Mr. Scarsdale's dinner, or the
evening hours which followed it. And then he was coming back to-morrow!

So Susan took her presents upstairs, and fell wondering and dreaming
over them, making impossible fancy scenes of cheerful rooms and pleasant
people, and smiles, and flowers, and kindness unknown. Somehow whispers
of all these delightful things seemed to breathe out of that pretty
muslin, with its graceful wreaths of embroidery. The horizon opened to
her awakened girlish fancy, far off, and almost inconceivable, yet with
a vague brightness of possibility--and Susan spent an hour arranging her
new riches in the drawer, which was the only scene they were likely to
enlighten at present, and making herself happy with her novel thoughts.

While in the meantime the Colonel and his nephew trudged onward across
the moor. The rain had ceased, but the sky was low and the air damp--and
evening darkened round the vast blurred circle of the horizon, dropping
down among the hills. The scene was dismal enough for anything: the
exposed path across the moor--the black furze bushes and withered
crackling heather--the slender saplings cowering together here and there
in a little circle, where attempts had been made to naturalize them--and
the great, monotonous, unbroken stretch of desert soil around, inspected
from the lower heights by gaunt clumps of fir-trees, savage and
melancholy anchorites, debarred from the change and variety, the autumn
and the spring of common nature. Colonel Sutherland threw a shivering
glance round him, and drew his cloak close about his throat. We will not
say that even at that moment, when his thoughts were occupied with more
important things, an involuntary patriotic comparison did not occur to
the old soldier, who was native to the rich fields of Lothian, and might
be disposed to wonder complacently whether _this_ were indeed the
sunnier south. He had, however, a more immediate subject of observation
in Horace, who trudged beside him with the stoop and slouch, and heavy
irregular step, of a neglected and moody youth. He was well-looking
enough, and not deficient in any bodily quality, but the lad's
_physique_ had been totally unattended to, and he had never been in
circumstances which could have led himself to perceive his faults of
bearing and carriage. The Colonel's soldierly eye could not help
regarding him with manifest dissatisfaction. We will not take it upon us
to affirm that Colonel Sutherland at the head of his regiment might not
be something of a martinet, or the least thing in the world particular
about stocks and cross-belts. He looked at Horace, and could not help
looking at him as he might have done at an awkward recruit. How he held
his sullen head down against the wind, as if he butted at an invisible
enemy; how he swung his hands in the pockets of his shooting-coat; how
he dragged his heavy feet as if there was a clod at each heel. The
Colonel did not quite understand how it was that his nephew's person
inspired him with a vague distrust, and, somehow, contradicted his
nephew's face; but the fact was that Horace could change the expression
of his countenance when he had sufficient motive, but could not alter
the habits into which neglect, and indolence, and sullen temper had
thrown his outer man. And he himself was entirely unconscious of the
clownish walk and ungracious demeanour which gave the old officer so
much annoyance. Colonel Sutherland respected everybody's _amour propre_.
He could scarcely find it in his heart to wound any one, on the virtuous
principle of doing them good; but, between professional sentiment, and
that family pride which is wounded by being obliged to admit the
imperfections of those it is interested in, he never exercised more
self-denial in his life than that which he showed during this walk, in
restraining an exhortation to his nephew in respect to his bearing and
deportment; while his kind imagination went to work directly, to
contrive expedients, and inducements, and hints for Horace's benefit, to
lead him to perceive his own deficiencies and adopt means to correct
them, without wounding his feelings or his pride.

While Colonel Sutherland occupied himself with these reflections,
Horace, totally unconscious of criticisms upon himself, which would have
stung his self-love deeply, pondered, in his turn, the best means of
bringing his uncle over to the length of helping him, by any means or in
any way, to escape from Marchmain. The most palpable mode of entering on
the subject--that of lamenting his father's want of hospitality--had
been made impracticable by Colonel Sutherland, who laid all the weight
of the arrangement upon his own convenience; and his simplicity and
straightforwardness made a sidelong approach to it equally out of the
question. Horace was compelled, accordingly, to bring in his subject all
at once, and without introduction. Colonel Sutherland, without meaning
it, said something half consciously about the dreary country, and his
nephew seized upon the chance.

"Dreary, indeed!--and nothing else do we see, uncle, from year's end to
year's end!" cried Horace. "Is it not enough to kill a man?--without a
human face to break it, either; and here am I, strong and young,
condemned to this life, and kept from any information--any advice--which
can direct me what to do. Uncle, you are the only friend I have been
able to see with freedom and confidence, and I am almost glad you don't
stay at Marchmain--for there is no freedom there. Tell me, I beg of you,
what can I do?"

"My dear boy!" cried the Colonel, grasping his nephew's hand in sudden
sympathy, and with a little gasp of earnest attention--"you take away
my breath. Solitude has not diminished your energy, at all events. Do?
Why, to be sure, a boy like you can do anything. We must look for an
opening, that is all--but you should have begun before now."

"My father," said Horace, with unconscious bitterness, "has stopped
that. I don't know anything about the world, except this paltry little
world here, of gamekeepers and poachers, and sporting farmers' sons--for
gentlemen, of course, don't associate with me. What are we,
uncle?--nobodies? I can't tell--my father keeps up habits which look
like the relics of a better time--and at the same time I know we're
poor; but _he_ throws no light upon our unhappy circumstances. _He_
keeps me shut up in this horrible house, till I think all sorts of
horrors: that he's a returned convict, or something like that--that our
name's a disgrace. What is it?--of course there must be some cause for
this seclusion--and you must know."

Colonel Sutherland was much embarrassed. He fumbled with his cloak in
the first place to gain time, and then, finding no other resource, fell
back upon the shelter of his deafness.

"I'm a little hard of hearing," said the Colonel. "I partly lost your
last observation--but what's that about the poachers and gamekeepers?
Bad company, Horace!--unfit associates, except in the way of sport, for
any gentleman. I've known lads of good family ruined just by an
inclination that way. Not that they meant ill to begin with; but what's
mere fun at first comes to be liking before long--and a gentleman's son
of course is flattered and courted among them. It's a pernicious thing,
Horace--attend to me!--it's been the ruin of many a man."

"What is ruin, uncle?" shouted Horace, with a wild and bitter smile,
which somehow mingling congenially with the wind and the chill, carried
into the Colonel's mind a singular identification of that landscape and
scene which gained their climax in this moment. He was startled, he
could not explain how. He turned round to look into his nephew's face,
with a sudden consciousness of depths in the heart and in the life of
Horace undecipherable and mysterious to himself.

"My dear boy," he said, with a little tremble in his voice, "ruin is
such a destruction as can be accomplished only by a man himself."

Horace made no answer. His face subsided gradually, out of that
self-revelation, into the assumed good-humour which he had put on for
his uncle's benefit. Colonel Sutherland, however, continued to regard
him with concern and apprehension. The Colonel's mind was not
enlightened up to the pitch of modern times. When his imagination
uncomfortably pictured Horace seated, perhaps, in the alehouse they had
passed, with the gamekeeper or sporting men of the village, it was not
the knowledge of life which the young man might acquire, but the
old-fashioned horror of "bad society," which moved the thoughts of the
uncle, who secretly in his own mind began to attribute something of the
slouching gait and unsatisfactory bearing of his nephew to his
unsuitable companions. He could not give up the subject, but partly in
natural anxiety, and partly to evade the youth's troublesome questions,
recurred to it immediately again.

"I am your oldest relation except your father, Horace," said the
Colonel. "I have some experience in life. You know what the proverb
says: 'A man is known by the company he keeps.'"

"Had he better keep _no_ company?" said Horace; "very possibly; but then
I can't help being young, poor devil that I am. I can't make a woman of
myself, or be a child all my life. I must have something out of my
prison--and you are not the man to blame me, uncle. The fellows you
blame are those who have society in their favour. As for those country
blockheads, whom I see in the woods or in the alehouses, do you think I
care for them? Do _you_ care for a set of dancing dogs or a wandering
monkey? You laugh at them. If you have nothing else to think of, they
amuse you for the moment. I despise the louts!--they are no more than
bears on exhibition to me!"

Once more Colonel Sutherland looked at his young companion. It was not
in his kindly human heart, which despised nobody, to like this manner of
expression; but somehow the force with which it was uttered, and the
implied superiority of tone, had a certain effect on the simple-hearted
old man. He still retained his uneasiness, his want of comprehension;
but he began to change his ideas of Horace, and to think him
intellectual and clever--not a youth dangerously falling into "bad
company," but a man whose talents were lost to the world for want of
"opportunities." He fixed his gaze anxiously upon his nephew, and longed
for the candid eyes which told all Susan's sentiments and emotions; but
that doubtful face said nothing of itself. There might be "talent," but
there was no candour in the countenance of Horace--what the lips might
say, was the only index to what the head conceived or the heart felt.
Colonel Sutherland turned away from him again with a little sigh. He was
interested, his curiosity was awakened, and his paternal anxieties in
full exercise; but somehow under all his heart whispered hesitations and
inarticulate warnings to him. He had no experience in this unknown
development of human nature. His own instincts said as much. But a man
does not always give attention to those instinctive intimations. Colonel
Sutherland was accustomed to believe that he had rather a natural gift
for the guidance of young men--his sympathies with youth were warm--his
heart young--his kindness unbounded. Many a youth ere now, charmed by
the natural benignity and freshness of his character, had opened his
soul to the old Colonel, and given to him that full, youthful confidence
seldom bestowed by halves, which harsher fathers had failed to
gain--with great advantage to themselves; for the old man was wise, as
old men come to be who are not clever, but only humble, candid,
religious, fearing God, and slow to make themselves judges of men. The
habit of counsel, of assistance, of kindly attention, and regard to the
self-revelations of his young companions, was accordingly strong upon
Colonel Sutherland--yet, though he would scarcely acknowledge it to
himself, a certain conviction of being out of his depths, and in a world
altogether new to him--among elements which he was unable to handle--was
present with him now.

"I am glad you have no inclination towards such society," he said, in
his perplexed tone; "but, Horace, my boy, even for sport you must not
continue it. It sticks to a man in spite of himself; and, indeed, the
young fellows now are very different from what they were in my time. I
don't bid you despise your fellow-creatures--there's a long distance
between despising them and preferring their society--a man of your
condition should do neither the one nor the other, as you will learn
when you come to know life."

"What is my condition, uncle?" asked Horace, suddenly, interrupting the
slow and hesitating general sentiments, which were the only things which
the perplexed Colonel could find ready to his hand in this embarrassing
case. It is to be feared that Colonel Sutherland heard this question,
which was asked in a high tone, for his face became gradually flushed
over with a painful heat and colour; but once more he put his hand to
his ear.

"Yes; what are your own inclinations?--that is really the question,
Horace--if we knew that, we could look out for you. There are many
openings now to honourable ambition; but what do you wish yourself for
your manner of life?"

"Uncle," said Horace, with a force which _would_ be heard, "I have no
inclinations, thanks to my manner of life hitherto--I have only one
wish, and that is, to escape from Marchmain. Get me away from that
wretched house. I don't care if I turn a shoe-black or a scavenger--get
me away from here!"

The Colonel once more looked at his nephew, but with less respect--"On
these terms, could you not get yourself away? You are not confined by
locks and bars," said Colonel Sutherland, disapprovingly; "why have you
no inclinations? That dear child yonder, who has nobody in the world to
speak to, has kept her heart as fresh as a May flower."

"Susan?" said Horace, growing red; "you don't compare me with
Susan?--Susan's a girl--she's content--she's very well off, so far as I
can see--she's in her natural vocation. Would you have me put on
petticoats and sit down to patchwork?--As well do that as compare a man
with a girl!"

"Susan," said the Colonel, with a little _hauteur_ and heat which became
him, "is the only woman of the family. You are not aware, I daresay, of
the indulgences and pleasures that are natural to girls of her years. I
don't wonder so much either that you think of yourself first--but why
have you no inclinations?--she has, and you think yourself her superior,
I perceive."

"Don't be displeased, uncle," said Horace, changing his tone, and
suffering only a little impatience, to testify to the fury with which he
heard himself reproved. "You know better than I do, that women are tame
creatures, and content themselves easily in their own sphere, when they
don't know any better. Susan has leisure to form little plans and
fancies, I believe. I have no such thing--the pain of years has brought
me to one point of desperation. I know nothing of the world: I don't
know what I am--my position--my prospects--my birth, are all a mist to
me. My mind is not sufficiently disengaged to form projects; therefore I
say I have no inclinations--the air stifles me--I must get out into the
world, where there is room to breathe!"

"Then, why," said the Colonel, "have you not gone away before?"

Horace was silenced--he fumed with silent rage within himself, wounded
in the tenderest point of his self-love and pride--it was, perhaps, the
only suggestion which could have made him feel a pang of humiliation. It
was one which Susan herself, in her simple and practical intelligence,
had made more than once. Why had he borne and brooded over his
wretchedness? Why had he not gone away?

"Many young men," said Colonel Sutherland, "have left home of their own
accord on a less argument than that of desperation. I don't mean to say
I approve of it--but--there are some things that one could not advise,
which, at the same time, being done, cut a difficulty which might be
hard to solve. I say all this, my dear boy," added the Colonel, moved by
Horace's gloomy face, "to show you that it is foolish to use such strong
expressions: if your _desperation_ had been so great as to deprive you
of all choice or inclination, depend upon it you would have gone away."

And having delivered himself of this kindly bit of logic, totally
inapplicable as it was to the person whom he addressed, and attributing
the silence of his nephew to the natural confusion of a young man
detected in the use of undue heroical expressions, the Colonel was
himself again.

"And this, I suppose, is my resting-place for the night," he said, as a
church-spire and the roofs of a village became dimly visible before them
at the end of the road. "I will remain here three or four days, and
during that time, Horace, you must find out your inclinations, my boy,
and let us discuss them and see what is to be done. You must stay and
dine with me in the first place, and be with me as much as possible
while I am here--that is to say, unless your father makes any positive
claim upon you during the time."

"Positive claim! I wish you had dined with us one day, uncle, to see
what these claims are!" cried Horace, with a laugh of bitterness; but
the Colonel, who had been thinking of something else for the moment,
inclined his ear towards him with a little start and a smile, before
which bitterness fled. Horace could no more comprehend his uncle than
his uncle could understand him. This smile discomforted him
strangely--he could not stand against that kind prompt attention, the
ear so solicitous to catch what he said, and the face so guileless and
benign. The young man was of a crafty intelligence, and could have
detected wiles--but this sunshiny simplicity put him out. It went deep
into the primitive truth, sincerity, and honesty of nature--things which
Horace Scarsdale had small acquaintance with in the secret spring and
fountain of his life.




CHAPTER IX.


That evening was an epoch in the life of Horace. The people in the
little country inn to which he took his uncle were not unacquainted with
the young man. For a year or two past, ever since the bitter
independence of manhood had begun to possess him, he had spent much of
his waste unoccupied time in this and the other humble houses of
entertainment of the district. With a _sensation_ of superiority, which
he owed principally to his natural temper--for there was in reality very
little distinction of breeding or character between himself and the
society he frequented--he held a scornful dictatorial place among the
humbler _convives_ of the villages, and observed and amused himself with
the peculiarities he saw, very much as if he had been a man of the
world, trained to that odious criticism which is dignified by being
called "the study of mankind." The coarse enjoyments of the public-house
company did not tempt him--he threw his violent decisions into the hum
of drowsy talk when it suited him, and at other times looked on, noting,
with contemptuous amusement, the dull jollity of the place. His father's
singular solitude imposed a certain respect upon the imagination of the
district; and between Horace and the country lads around there remained
always that inexplainable, undefinable difference which, independent of
education, wealth, and every tangible advantage, separates those who are
born in different classes of society, especially in rural places. He had
accordingly a strange kind of popularity in the district--not the
popularity of common love and esteem, but an attraction perhaps more
remarkable; his careless rudeness, his bitter humour, the harsh
philosophy which contrasted with his youth and inexperience, gave him a
certain singular hold upon the imagination of his companions. The very
certainty that he did not care a single straw for them attached the
little crowd to his footsteps. Dominant and imperious self-regard, like
all other regnant qualities, has a wonderful influence upon the common
mind. No other person within the immediate knowledge of this rural
community assumed the same tone, or showed the same spirit--and the
vehement and forcible language, more refined than their own, the
utterance of a gentleman, which Horace had acquired involuntarily, the
arrogant sentiments he expressed, the unconcealed consciousness of
superiority which belonged to him, united to impose a certain allegiance
upon the inexperienced minds, which found him unique and singular, the
sole development known to them of a kind of intelligence and a manner
of man widely differing from their own.

But this night everything was changed. The landlady of the inn, amazed
into a flutter of perturbation, appeared herself, at the astounding
information that young Mr. Horry, as he was called, had arrived with a
gentleman. The good woman supposed it must be his mysterious father, and
hastened with all the speed of curiosity to receive them--but lost in
amazement to find "the gentleman" a stranger, who required the best
accommodation of her house for a few days, and desired to dine as soon
as that was practicable--found it only possible to curtsey and retire,
more curious than ever, without being able to show her previous
acquaintance and familiarity with Mr. Horry, who turned his face with an
arrogant blank of unrecognition full upon her, and added to his uncle's
orders a request that some one might be sent to Marchmain immediately
for the carpet-bag.

"Something's agoing to happen," said the landlady, as she returned to
her own domain. "A strange gentleman as wants the best o' everything--an
ould sodger lord with musstaches--egh, lad!--a lord I'll warrant, at the
very least o' him--and I'll lay you a sixpence he's coom to set a'
things straight; for yonder's Mr. Horry, he looks me in the face as
broad as I look at you, and says, says he, 'Send a man to Marchmain for
a carpet-bag immediantly,' as if he never set eyes on me in his born
days afore. Like him! I would ne'er goo starving to his door in hopes o'
meat."

Great preparations ensued for the hasty dinner, which was to be ready in
an hour; but even the landlady's conviction that her guest could not be
less than a lord was not sufficient to work impossibilities. While it
was getting ready, Colonel Sutherland and Horace sat together over the
new kindled fire. The best room of the inn, which did not receive a
guest twice in a year, was a dingy parlour hung with old portraits of
famous horses, winners of the cups of antiquity, with a county map, and
a print of George IV. to vary the embellishments, and two small windows
looking out upon the village street. The Colonel placed himself as close
as possible to the fire, not without dreadful apprehensions of the
rheumatism, which already sent flying twinges into his spare limbs, and
made him wince; and thought with a little natural indignation of his
repelled kindness, and the cold reception which had forced him to seek
this place, and substituted the accommodation of a poor little country
inn for the hospitality he had expected. Silence and these
recollections, and the startling twinges of his rheumatism, changed the
expression of his face almost into sternness, and seemed to develop in
him another phase of character. Horace watched him in the doubtful
light, more and more puzzled. The indulgent, tender kindness and
forbearance of the fatherly old man had disappeared with the animation
of their talk and intercourse--the whole face had a loftier and more
rigid expression. Horace, drawing back his chair out of the firelight,
gazed and pondered with knitted brows. He began to think more elaborate
approaches were necessary, and plans better laid. He had not found it
possible hitherto to get much information from this kind old uncle
touching the family secret, if there was one. Was Colonel Sutherland a
kind old uncle merely? Horace began to suspect he must be something
more, and that the task of persuading him and winning him over to his
own interests might not be so very easy after all.

The Colonel sat long in meditation, as if he were in full consideration
of the whole knotty subject; when he made a little stir in his chair as
if about to speak, a sudden burst of anxiety ran over Horace. "I
wonder," said the Colonel, with the gravest face, "how long it is since
a fire was lighted in this room before. Speak of England, Horace! I
don't believe there is anything so dismal from Berwick to John o' Groats
as that moor of yours, and no attempt at cultivation or improvement, so
far as I can perceive. You should see our high farming in Lothian! I
have not felt the cold so severe since I came home."

Horace had almost laughed aloud in his sudden relief and contempt. These
were the thoughts, so deeply ruminated, which had brought gravity to
Colonel Sutherland's face. The young man, who now less than ever
comprehended the old man, went to stand at the window, not without a
certain satisfaction in being seen there by the evening frequenters of
the place, who were sure to hear of his companion, and of the different
position he occupied for this night at least; and passed another half
hour of waiting before the dinner appeared, in strange calculations, at
once cunning and foolish--the wiles of a subtle mind, and the
inexperience of a young one--thinking with himself how long his uncle's
simplicity could withstand his attacks--how soon he should be able to
worm all the secrets of the family out of him, and how easily he could
work the old man to do what he would. Then, if such a man as Colonel
Sutherland had reached to a respectable position and command, what might
not such a man as Horace Scarsdale do? The young man's spirits rose--he
imagined himself making a stepping-stone of his uncle, to push his way
into the arena--and then----.

Considering the height and imaginative character of this ambition, which
at the outset gave it a certain refinement, it was astonishing,
notwithstanding, to perceive into what almost vulgar elation his spirits
rose during that dinner. It was no great things of a dinner, being too
ambitious by far for the occasion; but it was perhaps the very first
meal in his life, at least since he came to years of self-knowledge,
which Horace had eaten with freedom and pleasure. He thought of
Marchmain, and the scene in the dining-room at that moment, where Peggy,
in the ordinary course of events, would be about removing the cloth and
setting on the table his father's solitary glass and jug of claret, and
smiled to think of Mr. Scarsdale's silent rage at seeing _his_ vacant
place. He was pleased and flattered by the respectful manner of the
landlord who waited on them, and could not refrain from talking rather
big to his uncle, and assuming a confidence and frankness quite unusual
to him, and foreign to his nature, for the advantage of that individual.
He was too young to conceal this first gratification, and betrayed
himself unawares. Simple and unsuspecting though the Colonel was, he
perceived this. However, it was natural, and instead of a hard laugh at
it, Uncle Edward smiled and grew kinder, and loved Horace better and
trusted him the more for his weakness' sake. They seemed growing friends
gradually and surely--the old man believed they were, and rejoiced in
it, and could not have believed, had anybody told him that the cold
passion of self-regard, to the entire exclusion of warmer feelings,
filled his nephew's heart.

When they were left alone, Horace, a little stimulated by the wine he
had taken, commenced his attack with boldness:--

"Uncle," he said, "you _must_ think of me--you must help me. I have
never been able to speak my mind before to a single individual who could
comprehend or assist me. I _must_ know what are our circumstances. It is
needless to say that my father's past life does not affect me. It does
affect me--everything affects me that I am kept in ignorance of. What
are we?--what is he?--why are we here?"

Horace had hit by chance and unawares upon the means really most likely
to attain his end. Colonel Sutherland could not return anything but a
true answer to a plain and straightforward question; and evasion was so
strange to him that he managed it in the clumsiest manner. He retired on
his deafness in the first place--a defence from which Horace drove him
out triumphantly by a repetition of the question in tones that could not
be mistaken. Then he faltered over it a little, with common-places of
hesitation too palpable to deceive anybody.

"Your true circumstances--your father's past life? Your father's past
life has always been virtuous and honourable," said the Colonel. "What
is he? You ought surely to know better than I do, who have not seen him
for fifteen years. He is, if you wish my opinion, a man of very peculiar
temper. Horace, I do not wonder that you find him rather hard to get on
with sometimes, but he _is_ your father; and therefore, my dear boy,
whatever others may do, impatience and a harsh judgment do not become
you."

Horace shook his head.

"This is not what I want to know. You know it is not," he said, with a
rising colour. "Say no, if you will, but don't treat me like a child.
Look here, uncle: I am assured there is a secret--I know it, no matter
how--tell me what it is."

Horace put the whole force of his voice and mind into the question. He
made it not as one who asks, but as one who demands what he has a right
to know, feeling convinced that his gentle relative could not now evade
him, and had no strength to resist; and with this conviction strong upon
him, the young man stared into the Colonel's eyes, with the thought of
overawing him and compelling his answer thus.

Colonel Sutherland looked at him steadily, withdrew his eyes a moment,
looked again, and at last spoke.

"If you think," said the Colonel, coldly, "that by this persistence and
demand you can persuade any man of honour to betray to you a secret with
which another has entrusted him, you show only your ignorance of
gentlemen and want of belief in your fellow-creatures. If there is a
secret in your family circumstances--though, mind you, I do not admit
that there is--can you suppose that I will tell you anything which it is
your father's desire that you should not know?"

Horace shrunk for a moment in mingled rage and amazement from the tone.
It was inconceivable to him that anybody could feel even an instant's
contempt for him; but the feeling was momentary.

"Then he does desire that I should not know it!" he exclaimed, with a
certain triumph--and set his teeth over the admission, as if this at
least was something gained.

"I did not say so," said the Colonel, with some embarrassment. "I said
if--No, Horace, if you wish to investigate into all the secrets of your
family, go to your father, and ask him--he is the proper judge of what
should or should not be told you. At least, if you don't admit that, he
is at least the most proper person to be asked; and till he has refused
to satisfy you, you have no right to apply to any one else. Take my
advice--be honest and straightforward--it is the shortest way and the
clearest: ask himself."

"Ask himself! Do you know the terms we are on, uncle?" said Horace, with
a smile.

"So much the worse for you both--and long enough _that_ has lasted,
surely," said the Colonel. "The past is no man's, the future is every
man's: I say to you again, _that_ has lasted long enough! Ask himself,
and let the mystery and the strife end together. It is the only honest
way to clear your difficulties up."

Once more Horace smiled--a smile of disappointment and anger--baffled
and furious; while the Colonel went on with his honest, simple advice,
exhorting the young man to candour and openness--he might as well have
exhorted him to be Prime Minister--while Horace, for his part, kept
silent, perceiving, once for all, that whether it was from mere
foolishness, or some principle of character unknown to him, his uncle
was impracticable, and that the only way to find anything out from him
was to lie in wait for the unguarded admissions which, in spite of
himself, might fall from his lips.

"After all," said Colonel Sutherland, when he had concluded his good,
honest advice to his own satisfaction, "what has all this to do with it?
You are tired of inactivity and quiet, as a young man ought to be; you
want to set out upon the world. Of course, your father cannot object to
this; and as for me, all that I can do to forward it I will, heartily.
But, Horace, setting out on the world does not mean anything vague, my
lad. It means doing, or aiming at, some special thing--some _one_
special thing, my dear boy. We can't go out to conquer the world
now-a-days--it must be a profession, or business, or a place, or
something; so I'll tell you what to do. Think it well over--what you
said to me about having no inclinations. Sit down by yourself, and find
out if there is not a special turn one way or other in some corner of
your heart, and let us hear what it is. After that the way will be
clear; we must look for an opening for you, and," added Colonel
Sutherland, after a little pause, and speaking with hesitation, "if you
should then--wish for--my services with your father, why then,
Horace--though we are not the best friends in the world--I'll try my
best."

"Thank you," said Horace, with sullenness, which he tried vainly to
repress--"thank you, uncle. I will do as you say."

The conversation then came to an end, Horace fuming over it secretly as
a failure--and the young man had so high an idea of his own powers, that
the thought galled him deeply. Then, after an unsatisfactory interval of
indefinite conversation, which Horace could not keep up, and which the
Colonel--tired, disheartened, and perplexed--sustained but dully, the
young man got up and bade him "good night." Colonel Sutherland went down
to the door of the inn, half with a simple precaution to see him safely
out of the "temptation" of that "low company" which Horace had owned to
seeking, and half by suggestion of that kindness which could not bear to
see any one discouraged. "Think it well over," urged the Colonel once
more, "and expect me to-morrow; and be cheerful, and keep up your heart,
Horace. There's plenty of room for you in the world, and plenty of force
in yourself. Good night, my dear boy--good night."




CHAPTER X.


When Horace Scarsdale left the lights of the village behind him, and
took his way through the black roads towards Marchmain, he carried with
him a burden of thoughts rather different from those which accompanied
him here. Though his was neither a noble nor a sweet development of
youth, still youth was in him, as in others, heroical and absolute. It
is impossible to reduce to description the kind of fortune he had
planned for himself; for, indeed, he had planned nothing, except a
general self-glorification and domination over the world.

His uncle's advice to him, to ascertain how his likings inclined, and
make choice of some profession or employment precise and definite,
humiliated and offended him unawares. His fancies had not condescended
to any such particularity. He had an impression on his mind, how
acquired he could not tell, that his father wronged him, and that it was
only necessary for him to be aware of their true circumstances to set
him at once beyond the common necessities of life. This conviction,
however, he had never betrayed to any one; and Colonel Sutherland's
recommendation, which implied the restraints of labour and something to
do, was not over-palatable to the young man brought up in idleness.

He was too old to begin the study of a profession, and when he thought
of the laborious days and confined existence of men who have their own
way to make in the world, secret rage and mortification took possession
of Horace. Was this all that remained for him?--was this the life which
he must look forward to?--was there nothing better in the future than
this? He had no desire to choose his means of living, his manner of
work--his thoughts eluded the subject when it was presented to him--it
was easier to brood over a mysterious wrong, and dream of sudden
revelations which should change everything in a moment. At the same
time, his intellect was sufficiently clear to show him that contempt was
likely to follow any exhibition of these feelings of his--he himself, as
he reflected on it, fumed at himself with silent disgust.

Then he had failed to influence Colonel Sutherland as he
expected--everything had failed in the absolute fashion--he could no
longer carry matters, even to himself, with the high hand of dominant
youthful unreason and disregard of things and men:--even things that
pleased him took a definite, particular, and limited form, and came
under conditions which made them distasteful. Already he began to
perceive that the language and manner, which did very well for his
alehouse companions, was not practicable in such society as that of his
uncle; and unaware as yet how to acquire a more successful tone, fell
into deep and angry mortification on the subject. He had not impressed
upon Colonel Sutherland a high idea of his spirit, his energy, and his
intellect, as Horace had intended to do; but had only conveyed the idea
of a presumptuous and ignorant youth to the mind of his uncle. He felt
this with a humiliation out of which he drew no humility. It was not so
easy as he supposed, to see through and dominate over even so simple a
character as that of Colonel Sutherland.

But it did not occur to Horace that his uncle's plain simplicity and
truthfulness was, in fact, the only thing in the world which could not
be dominated over by the most splendid superiority of intellect. He
supposed it was only his own ignorance, and inexperience, and want of
address--deficiencies mortifying enough to acknowledge certainly, but
not so mortifying as the entire incapacity either to comprehend or to
influence. He had time enough to think over all these things, as he made
his way through the lonely, dreary country roads, and across the moor.

This day, and this meeting, and the opening of his close heart even so
far, had flashed into life the smouldering fire in the mind of Horace.
He strode on with long, rapid steps, thinking it scarcely possible that
he could contain himself within the miserable hermitage of Marchmain,
even for a night. He went along pondering schemes to surprise the secret
from his uncle, in spite of this first failure; and, intoxicated by the
first realization of freedom, to imagine himself altogether free, his
own master, triumphing over the world. But among these fancies there
mingled neither a desire nor any attempt to ascertain, as Colonel
Sutherland said, "his own inclinations," or to decide upon what he
should do. He said quite truly, when he reported of himself, that he had
no inclinations which concerned labour or a profession, and even in his
own thoughts he evaded that question. He could think closely, when the
matter was to find out, from his uncle's unsuspicious temper, his
father's secret; but not when the thing to determine was the needful
labour of his own life.

Meanwhile, Susan sat silent in her father's presence, longing for the
return of Horace, picturing him to herself seated opposite to her uncle,
free to say what he would, opening his heart under those genial looks,
bringing home kind thoughts and kind messages, sunned and mellowed by
that unsuspected love which had developed all the wonderful
possibilities of a new life to herself. Even Susan could not sit still
to-night--her patchwork had lost its attraction for her--her thoughts
rose too fast, and were too numerous, to make her ordinary quiet
possible. In spite of herself, and even unawares to herself, she was no
longer the noiseless girl who sat hushed for hours, opposite to that
rigid figure with the little reading-desk and open book. To her own
amazement, she caught herself once humming an incipient tune as she sat
over her work; and after a while found it impossible to sit still, and
moved about with an involuntary restlessness, finding little matters to
arrange in all the corners of the room, chairs to place differently, the
curtains to be drawn closer, the fire to be stirred, something to keep
her in motion, and express, by that only means permitted to her, the
unaccustomed stir and commotion in her own heart. And what was even more
remarkable, Mr. Scarsdale himself seemed to have an instinctive
perception of this, and to be somehow moved in his own calm. A close
observer might have perceived that he no longer travelled by mechanical
accuracy from beginning to end of his page--that the leaves were tamed
less regularly, and that his eyes were fixed upon the upper margin of
his book, sometimes for half an hour together, while he watched, without
looking at her, his daughter's movements, and heard the faint rustle of
her hushed motion about the room. He divined the cause, and knew the
emotion in her heart, with a strange and bitter certainty. He was aware
by intuition that all the affection, and confidence, and filial warmth
which he had never sought, had sprung up in an instant to meet the touch
of another who had not the same natural claim as he; and the forlorn man
grew more forlorn by the knowledge, and perhaps even once for an instant
hesitated whether he should not, at this last moment, open his heart to
his child, his wife's daughter, the only woman of the family. Somehow
these words returned to him unawares. Mr. Scarsdale was not of the kind
of man who is much influenced by women. Sympathy was an offence rather
than a pleasure to him--he had none to bestow and he sought none.
Consolations of affection he scarcely distinguished from intrusions of
impertinence, and there was no soil on which tenderness could grow in
his rocky nature. But if he had little affection, he had a perennial
envy in his heart. He could not bear that another man should obtain
anything which seemed by right to belong to himself. The idea that his
wife's brother had already possessed himself of Susan's heart, more than
he, her father, had done during her whole life, galled him bitterly; so
much, that in that moment of indecision, while he held his book in his
hands as though he would have closed it, the impulse had actually come
upon him to put confidence in Susan, and so win her over, once for all,
to his side, and shut out the less legitimate claimant on her
affection.

The only woman of the family! It was _his_ daughter whom Edward
Sutherland made this claim of affection on--it was a piece of _his_
property which the new comer appropriated; and Mr. Scarsdale had almost
been moved out of himself to secure the filial heart which he cared not
for, yet which it galled him to see claimed by any other. But nature
conquered the sudden thought; he set his book once more steadily open
upon his little desk--he made his heart bitter and hard--a forced and
painful smile came upon his lip; within himself he recalled, half
unawares, some of those words of contemptuous sarcasm against women, by
which some men revenge themselves for some woman's misdeeds. But it made
him colder, harder, more forlorn and solitary, in spite of himself. His
son, whom he had always treated as an enemy, was with his
brother-in-law; his daughter, though here in bodily presence, was with
that intruder also in her heart. _He_ was alone, alone--always alone; a
jealous, envious, morbid rage deepened the shade upon his face; the love
was nothing to him--but he gnashed his teeth to see it enjoyed by
another.

When Horace returned--and they could hear his summons at the door, and
Peggy's tardy opening--he did not come into the dining-room, but went
upstairs at once; sending a message to Susan, to her great
disappointment, that he was tired with his walk from Tillington, and was
going to rest. Mr. Scarsdale did not retire till a much later hour than
usual that night; and when he did, made Susan precede him by a few
minutes, that he might see her shut up in her own room, and prevent all
communication with her brother. He persuaded himself that they were in a
conspiracy against him, and roused his temper with the thought; he spoke
more harshly to Susan than he had ever done before in her recollection,
and sent her to her own room in tears. Tears!--miserable woman's play
of pretended suffering!--at least he was beyond the weakness of being
deceived by it; and he smiled bitterly to himself, as he went to his own
comfortless rest, thinking on the smiles which would greet her uncle.
Unjust fate! unnatural nature!--for these smiles were his, and belonged
to him--yet he could not prevent the kind looks of a stranger from
stealing this property away.

And Susan cried herself to sleep, with hopes and happy anticipations
taking the bitterness out of the tears; and Horace sat in his room,
where he had hastily extinguished his candle on hearing approaching
footsteps--as little inclined to see Susan as his father was that he
should; pondering his wiles for overcoming his uncle. Only last night
the house had been undisturbed in its unchanging life; now everything
was commotion, disturbance, new efforts and hopes, a changed aspect of
existence: and all from the advent of that guileless old soldier, who,
waking in the night with his twinges of rheumatism, his fears that his
bed had not been aired, and his deeper perplexity and pain about his
sister's children, mixed these different troubles altogether, with a
hazy mist of oppression and distress in his mind as he turned his head
towards the wall, and sank into a heavy sleep.




CHAPTER XI.


Colonel Sutherland was out of doors early next morning, as was his wont.
The weather had improved, the sun was shining, the fells rose dewy and
fresh through the air and distance, the whole face of the country was
changed. The Colonel strayed along the country road, with his unusual
burden on his mind, yet making such minute, half-conscious observations
of external nature as were usual to him; pausing to examine the hedges,
to pinch a bud upon a branch, and make involuntary comparison between
the progress of the spring at home and here; noting the primrose-tufts
which began to appear in the hedgeside herbage, soft green leaves still
curled up in their downy roll; and making unconscious memorandums in his
mind of the early notes of birds already to be heard among the branches.
Everything was early this year, he thought to himself, as with a calm
and placid pleasure he enjoyed the air, the light, and the cold yet dewy
and sparkling freshness of the morning. In the calm of his age this old
man had recovered the sweet sensations and susceptibilities of
childhood; life with its passions and struggles was over for him, or
seemed so; all was well with his boys; and the many and sharp sorrows of
his manhood had left upon him that feeling of happiness in the mere
freedom from acute and immediate pain, which only those who have
suffered deeply can feel. The sunshine warmed and cheered him to the
heart. It was true that trouble, anxiety, and doubt were in that
innocent and tender soul; a strong desire to help and deliver his young
relatives, with still no perception of the means for doing so; but this
was no urgent distress, enough to break in upon that sacramental morning
hour. There might be difficulty, but everything was hopeful; and the
Colonel wandered along the lonely rural road, where the wet grass
sparkled in the sunshine, and the buds on the hawthorn-hedge basked with
a secret growth and invisible expansion in the tender warmth and light;
and in his age, and the quiet of his soul, was glad as they.

As he approached the corner of an intersecting road, voices came to the
ear of the Colonel, or rather one voice, which seemed familiar to him.
The speaker was addressing some one who made little reply; and Colonel
Sutherland heard, to his great astonishment, a glowing description of
the advantages and pleasures of a soldier's life in India, splendidly
set forth by the odd, familiar accents of this voice, as he approached.
Half amused, half amazed, he listened--the words being, evidently, not
of any private importance, and delivered in a tone too loud for
confidential communications. He thought to himself that it must be some
old soldier beguiling the innocence of some rustic lad, whom want of
employment or youthful disappointment had prompted to try the expedient
of "soldiering," and went forward with a wrinkle on his forehead, but a
smile on his lip--divided between sympathy for the supposed victim, and
a professional reluctance to balk the voluntary recruiter, if the
recruit should chance to be a promising one. But, to his surprise, when
he had gained the corner of the road, instead of a young ploughman or
country bumpkin, his eye fell upon a young man of extremely
prepossessing appearance, with all the look of a gentleman, who listened
with dilated nostrils and eyes fixed upon the distant hills--listened as
a man listens whose thoughts are already too many for him, and who has
but little attention to spare for what is said--but who, nevertheless,
has a serious intention of hearing what is addressed to him. The Colonel
was so much startled by this, that he scarcely observed the other person
present, till an astonished exclamation of his own name, and the sudden
motion of a military obeisance, aroused him. Then the smile returned,
though with a difference, to his lip. The speaker was a sergeant of his
own regiment, a veteran nearly as old as himself, who now stood before
him, between joy and reluctance, eager to make himself known, yet not
perfectly satisfied to be found in this exercise of his vocation; with
confusion in his face, and his mouth full of excuses.

"What, Kennedy!" cried the Colonel; "my good fellow, what brings you
here?"

"It's far enough out of the way, to be sure, Cornel," said the sergeant,
rather sheepishly; "and neyther my oun place, nor like it. Sure it's a
bit of a flirt of a girl's brought me, that's come to be married here."

"Married! What, _you_? You old blockhead!" cried the Colonel, inclining
his deaf ear towards the voice, "what do you want with such nonsense at
your age?"

"Na, Cornel, ne'er a bit of me--the Lord forbid!" said the old soldier;
"but a daughter it is, brought up within five mile of ould Derry, but
seed a lad o' the fells as took her heart; and sure she's all in wan, as
ye may say, the whole stock o' me familly; and according, Cornel, I'm
here."

"And at your old trade, I perceive," said Colonel Sutherland--"hey,
Kennedy?--you will never forget your cockade and bunch of ribbons; but I
rather think you're out a little here."

"Ay, sir, ay--I said as much mysel' wan moment afore. The young master,
Cornel, he's aboove my hand," said the sergeant, promptly; "but youth,
sir, youth will not hearken to a good advice. So I bid to tell him as
he desired; he's all for the cap and the feather, Cornel, and it's not
for an ould sodger to balk a gentleman, in especial as it was
information Mr. Roger sought; and I well rec'klet, Cornel, that ye aye
liked a lad of spirit yoursel'."

"This is a mistake, however," said the young man, hurriedly; "I'm not a
gentleman seeking information. Go on, Kennedy; I want pay and
bread--don't be afraid, sir, there's nobody belonging to me to break
their hearts if I enlist. Let him say out what he has to say."

The Colonel cast kindly eyes upon the young man, and saw his nervous
haste of manner, and the impatient way in which he roused himself out of
his half abstraction to deny the inferences of the sergeant--which,
indeed, were entirely foreign to the address which Kennedy had just been
delivering; and his benevolent heart was interested. "I also am an old
soldier," he said, with his kind stoop forward, and his smile; "perhaps
I am a safer adviser for a young man of your appearance than Kennedy.
Eh? Do you prefer the sergeant? Very well! But you must understand that
the good fellow romances, and that rising from the ranks, even in India,
is not so easy as he would have you suppose. Very true, I have nothing
to do with it; but don't be persuaded to enlist with such an idea. I
wish you good morning, young gentleman. You can come to me, sergeant, at
the inn in an hour or so. I am here only for a few days."

And Colonel Sutherland had turned away, and was once more descending the
road, wondering a little, perhaps, that the young fellow did not eagerly
seek his offered advice on a subject which he knew so much better than
the sergeant, when he heard himself called from behind, and, looking
back, found the youth following. As he came up, the Colonel remarked him
more closely. He was of brown complexion and athletic form, though only
about twenty--already a powerful though so young a man. He was dressed
entirely in black--a somewhat formal suit, which almost suggested the
clerical profession, though, in fact, it meant only mourning, and had a
mingled look in his face of grief and mortification, sincere sorrow, and
a certain affronted, indignant, resentful aspect, which raised a little
curiosity in the mind of the Colonel. He came up with a bold, firm,
straightforward step, which Colonel Sutherland could not help
contrasting unawares with that of Horace, and with the colour varying on
his cheek.

"I ought at least to thank you, sir, for the offer of your advice," he
said hurriedly; then came to a pause; and then, as if vainly seeking for
some explanation of the reason why he rejected it; "I am, however, only
a recruit for the sergeant, not for the Colonel," he added, with sudden
confusion. "It is because of this that I appear churlish and ungrateful
in declining your offer. My dress is a deception. I have no right to be
treated as a gentleman."

"These are strong words," said the Colonel. "I presume, then, that you
have done something by which you forfeit your natural rank?"

A violent colour rushed to the young man's face--"No!--No!--twenty times
No!"--he cried, with a sudden effusion of feeling, half made up of
anger, and half of the grief which lay in wait for him to catch him
unawares; "and will not, if I should starve or die!"

"It seems to me," said Colonel Sutherland, looking round in vain for
Kennedy, who had taken the favourable moment to escape, "that you are in
a very excited condition of mind; if you will take my advice, you will
not do anything in your present state of feeling, and, above all, don't
enlist. Kennedy's story is the common recruiting fable, dressed up to
suit your particular palate. The old fellow cannot forget his old
successes in that way, I suppose. It is as foolish to 'list in haste as
to marry in haste, my young friend. It is a thing much easier to do than
to undo. Keep yourself out of temptation, and consult your friends."

Having said so much, the Colonel gave a slight kindly bow to his
companion, and was about to pass on, but, looking at him again, waited
to see if he had anything to say.

"Is it better to take the plough-stilts than the shilling?" exclaimed
the young man; "you know nothing about me--but you look at my distress
with a kind face. You know the world and life as they really are, and
not as they appear to us here, becalmed on the shores of the sea. I have
no friends to consult, no one to be grieved for me whatever I do. I have
not much wit, and less education; I have only what the brutes
have--strength. What shall I do with it. Is it best to be a ploughman
or a soldier?--I will abide by your decision--which shall it be?"

"Walk down with me to my inn," said Colonel Sutherland, "and tell me who
you are, and how this has happened to you."

The young man turned with an implicit, instantaneous obedience. He made
no preface, no explanation. He had reached to that extreme agitation of
mind in which a listener, interested and friendly, is salvation to the
self-consuming spirit, when that spirit is of the kind which can
disclose itself; as in this case it happened to be.

"My name is Roger Musgrave," he said; "I have been brought up as heir to
my godfather, a man supposed rich. With him I have lived most of my
life--we two. He was more than a father to me: but he is dead, and died
poor. There is nothing left of the supposed inheritance--worse than
that; but that is all that relates to me," he cried, suddenly pausing
with a gasp of restrained grief. "The people here exhaust their kind
feelings to me in reproaches upon him who has left me unprovided for.
False reproaches!--insults to me as much as to him! He is gone, and all
control of me, all love for me, have died in his grave. I have myself to
support, and his honour to reclaim. I ask you how I am to do it
best--must it be as a labourer at home, or as a soldier abroad?"

"But you have given me no reason why your choice should be limited to
these two trades," said Colonel Sutherland; "there are many things
besides which such a young man as yourself can do better than either.
Come, you are very young--you are arbitrary and impatient. The
profession of arms can only carry a man on and forward in time of war.
You are thinking of Napoleon's soldiers, those men who might possibly
carry a marshal's baton in their knapsacks; but you forget that the
first thing required is not the soldiers, but the Napoleon--and things
were never so in the English army, my young friend. Even in times of
war, not one man in a thousand rises from the ranks--no, not even in
India--not in the Company's service. Don't deceive yourself. Don't you
know that even the old women in the village break their hearts when
their sons enlist, and declare that anything would be better? I don't
say _that_. I am a soldier myself; but they are nearer the truth than
you."

"Is it then only the alternative of despair?" cried the young man.

Colonel Sutherland curved his hand over his deaf ear, and begged his
pardon, and had not heard him. The excellent Colonel was at home in his
capacity of adviser: he could understand this lad who came with his
heart on his lips ten times better than he could understand Horace, and
took up his case with lively zeal and interest. He took him to the inn
with himself, and made him sit by while he breakfasted, and grew into
friendship with the young stranger almost against his will. On the
whole, the encounter pleased the Colonel: he made Roger promise to come
to him in the evening, when they could talk over his affairs at leisure,
and warned him with fatherly kindness to do nothing rashly, and to
entertain no further thought of enlistment. Perhaps it was very foolish
of the Colonel to comfort the youth's heart after this rash fashion;
perhaps it was "raising expectations which could never be justified."
The old man never thought of that: he had kindness to give, and good
counsel, and some knowledge of the world. He said to himself that this
was all an old man was good for, and so shook hands with poor Roger
Musgrave as if he had known him all his life, and occupied himself on
the road to Marchmain with contrivances for serving him. It was his
"way"; there are people who have a worse "way" to be met with in this
world.




CHAPTER XII.


Before Colonel Sutherland left the inn on his expedition to Marchmain,
he had another visitor in the sergeant, who took care, however, to make
sure that Musgrave was gone before making his appearance. He was not
unlike the Colonel himself in his outer man; tall, spare, and brown,
with a weather-beaten face and a grizzled moustache, Kennedy had at
least sufficient resemblance to his old Colonel to mark their connection
as comrades in arms. But the sergeant was neither deaf nor to any
remarkable extent benevolent; abstract kindness did not influence him
much: he flattered himself that he "knew what he was about" under all
circumstances, and was somewhat pragmatical and dogmatic on most
matters. His extensive experience and knowledge of the world had made
him the cock of the village for a year or two past, where everybody
believed his big stories, and most people were disposed to indorse his
own opinion of himself. He was from the north of Ireland; a violent
Protestant and Orangeman--tendencies sufficiently innocent in him; but
the place of his birth, mingling a little of the fire and vehemence of
the Milesian with all the obstinacy, dogmatism, and self-opinion of
Scotland, had sufficient influence on his character to be noted. He was
a rigid Presbyterian--one of the pillars of one of those little churches
which, lingering near the border, prove that the national faith of
Scotland has pushed her colonies more effectively into the sister
country than England has been able to do in return; but this did not
prevent Kennedy from making himself the oracle of the village
ale-house, where he might be seen three or four nights a-week,
sometimes in a very lofty and dignified state of haziness, freely
bestowing the most grave advice upon everybody, and disposed to take
rather a melancholy view of the degradation of the times, and of things
in general. But this was the worst that anyone could say against him. He
was fond of his little grandchildren, and was always busy with something
for their amusement; good to his daughter, whom he often helped out of
his own little funds; and in general friendly and serviceable. He
presented himself to his old commander with a little awkwardness, fully
expecting, as it seemed, to be taken to task for his morning's exploits;
and his expectations were not disappointed. Colonel Sutherland was too
much given to advising youth himself to have any patience with the
advice of the sergeant. It was an invasion of his own domain which he
could not forgive.

"I am glad to hear you are so comfortable," said the Colonel, "and that
you manage to live in peace with your son-in-law, which, I confess to
you, I would have thought rather doubtful; for I know you're rather
strong in your opinions--eh! is it your daughter that keeps the peace?"

"Na, Cornel, na," said the sergeant; "I'm no so onexperienced as that;
faothers and moothers are best in their oun place. I have a cot to
mysel', and a' my traps about me--next house to Mary, poor thing!--and
she's kept a' goin' since I've come, and the childer they keep back and
forard; and so far as the husband goes, it never was said, among a'
slanders, that I was ought but a peaceable man--"

"Oh! a very peaceable man," said Colonel Sutherland, with a smile.
"That, to be sure, is the last thing one could think of doubting; but
come, you have your faults, my good fellow--what do you say to me, now,
for such an account as I heard your giving, this morning, to the young
man?"

"Well, Cornel!" exclaimed the culprit, keeping up his boldness, though a
little abashed--

"Well! It does not appear to me to be well at all," said the Colonel;
"how often have I told you, when on recruiting duty, to tell the truth?
You pour a parcel of lies into a poor blockhead's head, and blow up his
pride with thoughts of what's going to happen to him; and you expect,
when he has found out that it's all lies, as he must do, that he will
believe the rest of what you say to him! That's bad enough; but to go
into it _con amore_--I mean for pure love of romancing--when there was
neither necessity nor business in it--I admit to you that's something
that beats me."

"Ay, Cornel, it's easy for the like of you," said Kennedy, "that have
your pensions and commands; but what's a man to say to the poor devils?
Hard service and poor wages, barracks and boiled beef, and sixpence
a-day! Truth's a grand thing for the army, Cornel, but it does not
bring in no recruits; and where's the harm done? If Johnny Raw is
deceived wance in a way, it's soon tooken out on him. At the worst, did
I ever tell a man he could rise to be Cornel but by a steedy life and
doing his duty? Sure, and if he minds himself, he _can_ come to be
sergeant, and that's next best; but the biggest lot of them, Cornel, as
you know as well as me, never try, and get no honour at all, at all, as
may well be proved; for them that strive not, win not on, as I've told
them till I was hoarse myself, many's the day."

"You never wanted an excuse," said the Colonel, shaking his head;
"however, we'll leave the general question; did you ever know a man in
the 100th rise from the ranks?--did you ever hear of a sergeant sent on
a political mission?--and how could you venture to begin the day, you
old sinner, with such a pack of lies?"

"Well, well, Cornel--aisy, sir," said the sergeant; "sure he was a
gentleman, and know'd what was what as well as me!"

Colonel Sutherland laughed in spite of himself at this original excuse,
on seeing which Kennedy recovered his courage, and took a higher tone.

"And if ye'll believe me, the best thing for _him_ yonder is just to
'list, Cornel. If he wance 'lists, friends'll come in and buy his
commission; for sure they are well off and in plenty, Yorkshire
ways--and the disgrace, sir, the disgrace, that's what will make them
draw their purse-strings. I would not desire a prettier man, either for
parade or battle-field. He's a soldier born!"

"They! who are _they_?" said Colonel Sutherland; "he has no friends."

"Maybe, Cornel, maybe--I say little of friends--friendship's neither
here nor there," said the sergeant, waving his hand; "but the faother
and moother I can speak to. Them that heeds not love, heeds shame."

"You are oracular, Sergeant Kennedy," said the Colonel, with a very
little peevishness; "but I tell you the lad told me he had no friends."

"Faother and moother, Cornel, as I say," answered the persistent
sergeant, with a little nod of his dogmatical head.

Colonel Sutherland got up and fell to pacing the room with great
annoyance and agitation. After a little while, being somewhat obstinate
himself, he seized Kennedy by the shoulder and shook him.

"You're deaf!" said the Colonel, with a whimsical, half-angry
transference of his own defect to the other; "you're hard of hearing! I
tell you the lad says he has no friends."

"And I tell you, Cornel, he has faother and moother, if it was my last
word!" said the sergeant once again.

"Your last word!--ay, you will always have the last word," cried Colonel
Sutherland, this time indeed hearing imperfectly; "there must be some
mistake, I suppose. Never mind, we'll inquire into it later. You must
see me again, sergeant--I am going now to my young people. Good morning
to you, my friend--ask for me here to-morrow."

"Are the young gentlemen in these parts, Cornel?" said Kennedy, rising
with a little reluctance; "I said to mysel' the Cornel behooved to have
his own occasions here."

"Not my boys--my niece and nephew, people you never heard of," said the
Colonel, quickly. "Now, my man, good morning--I am pushed for
time--you'll come again to-morrow."

Thus urged, Kennedy had no resource but to obey, which he did, however,
very slowly, running over in his mind immediately all the "gentlemens'
families" of the district, with which he had any acquaintance, in a vain
endeavour to ascertain who could be the niece and nephew of his "old
Cornel." Kennedy, as it happened, had not been at his usual post in the
public room of the little inn on the previous night, and had
consequently no intimation of any dawn of new fortune on Mr. Horry, whom
he knew perfectly well, and at whose hands he had suffered contradiction
enough to give him some interest in the young man's fate. This
information, however, he would have been pretty sure to receive, but
that Colonel Sutherland had already sent for the landlady to give her
his orders for the day.

The Colonel was extremely frugal, almost parsimonious so far as his own
manner of living was concerned, but having set himself to devise some
pleasure for poor Susan, shut up all her life in Marchmain, the
extremest liberality which the circumstances would allow, was not too
much for his inclinations. The only vehicle possessed by the little inn
at Tillington was a double gig, a very homely conveyance, which the
Colonel had already ordered, and in which he proposed to take Susan
"somewhere," bringing her back to lunch with him. The kind old man
entered into the most minute directions about this lunch. He put
elaborate leading questions, in order to ascertain what the cuisine was
capable of, and consulted over puddings and tarts with the zeal of a
connoisseur. A sentimental French _chef_ who would have entered into the
sentiment of the occasion, would have delighted the Colonel. He wanted a
dainty meal of pretty little dishes, sweet and savoury, as much in
honour of Susan, as to please her youthful palate, and endeavoured so
earnestly to impress his wishes upon the homely innkeeper, that the idea
of some secret grandeur belonging to Mr. Horry and his sister impressed
itself more and more deeply upon that good woman's mind. She promised to
do her very best; with the greatest awe and impressment she left the
innocent and too trustful Colonel to study her cookery-book with
devotion, and to conceive impossible triumphs of culinary art. But art,
even in the kitchen, avenges itself upon those who neglect it. Poor Mrs.
Gilsland lost three or four hours of valuable time, and her
temper--which was still more valuable--over trifle which sunk dead into
the bottom of her dish, and cream which would not "whip;" and dratted
the Colonel at the conclusion of it with hearty good will and much
vexation. While the innocent Colonel, secure of having done all that man
could do to procure a satisfactory collation for Susan, drove the
innkeeper's steady old horse across the moorland road, and combated
manfully the vexation which rose stronger and stronger in his mind, as
he recollected the discrepancy between young Musgrave's account of
himself and that given by Kennedy.

The Colonel had a little pride in his own discernment, and could not
bear to be taken in; but besides that, was grieved in his kind old
heart at the thought of finding his new _proteg�_ unworthy; and yet his
manner was so sincere, his face so honest and candid! Would that Horace
had as clear a countenance! Colonel Sutherland touched the horse with
his whip, and went forward with a little start, as if he would rather
escape from that last thought, and so dismissed young Musgrave from his
mind as best he could, and began to think with simple pleasure of Susan
and the unusual holiday which he was bringing to her. He had ascertained
that it was possible this fine morning to drive her to the little
country town, where it was market-day, and where the little stir and
bustle of life would be new to her. The idea of the pleasure she would
have exhilarated himself, as he approached nearer to the house. He meant
to buy her some books, and anything else that might amuse her in her
solitude, and smiled to himself, with a tender and simple satisfaction,
as he tried to anticipate her likings and wishes. Thus thinking, and
thus smiling, he came in sight of the solitary house upon which at the
moment the sun shone.

There it stood in its dark reserve, with the windows buried deep in the
wall, sending no responsive glimmer to the light which shone full upon
the blank gable, and slanted along the front of the house. There was no
projecting point to make a break of shadow in the featureless
brightness, nothing but the dull wall and the cold slate-roof; and all
around the black moor, without a tree, intersected by long deep cuttings
full of black water. Colonel Sutherland pulled up in spite of himself,
both in his pace and his thoughts, and went softly over the remaining
way. Could he hope to penetrate when the very sun was baffled? A chill
of disgust, a throb of impatience, the intolerance of a fresh and
upright nature for this unnatural mystery and gloom, possessed him in
spite of himself. He said to himself that it was contemptible, that he
had no patience with it. It needed all the smiles of Susan looking out
from the window to restore him to his pleasanter thoughts, and to throw
the least light of feasibility upon his simple expedients for softening
and healing the harms of this unnatural life.




CHAPTER XIII.


Susan had been at the window for nearly two hours, though it was still
only eleven o'clock. She said to herself that Uncle Edward would not
certainly come before the middle of the day, but still could not leave
the window in case she might possibly lose the first glimpse of him on
the road. When she had satisfied herself, to her great disappointment,
that the homely country vehicle which she saw approaching contained him,
poor Susan nearly cried with vexation. There was not even anybody in the
gig with him to take charge of it. It appeared that he must only mean to
remain a moment, and Susan withdrew from the window in the first shock
of her disappointment, feeling that Uncle Edward had deceived her, and
that there was no longer anything to be depended on in the world.

At that instant Horace, who had no desire to subject himself to the
inquiries of Susan, and had hitherto kept rather out of her way, entered
the room abruptly.

"Here is my uncle!" he exclaimed. "What! you don't care for him to-day,
don't you? He's no novelty now?--that's famous, certainly! But, do you
hear, Susan, I want something of you. While he's here, make him talk all
you can; ask him about my mother; how they used to live when we were
babies; what happened about the time she died; everything you can think
of. I want to hear what he says, and of course all that's very
interesting to you; you want to know."

"Don't _you_ want to know, Horace?" asked Susan, half alarmed by his
tone, and yet half pleased with the idea that he was becoming
interested about their dead mother, and the life which was connected
with her. She looked at him with dubious, uncertain looks; she did not
know what to make of him. She could not comprehend any secondary or evil
motive which he could have, and yet he did not seem to speak quite
honestly, or in good faith.

"To be sure; why else should I bid you ask?" said Horace, throwing a
book down on the table and seating himself by it, as if he had been
pursuing his morning studies there.

And indeed Susan had said the same thing to herself. She ran to the
window again as the wheels began to approach audibly, and could no
longer feel disappointed when she met Uncle Edward's smile, and saw him
uncover his grey head in the sunshine, in his antique affectionate
gallantry. Susan was quite unaccustomed to the common tokens of respect
which belonged to her womanhood. The salutation made her blush, and yet
pleased her wonderfully; she could no longer believe that her uncle was
coming only to call as if they had been strangers. She stood smiling and
waving her hand to him till he was quite near, and then ran to the door.
John Gilsland's mare was the soberest beast in the district--she stood
still as a statue when the Colonel descended, and looked so perfectly
trustworthy, that he did not hesitate to leave her to herself for a few
minutes. He took both Susan's hands in his and kissed her forehead with
a fatherly grace, then drew her arm into his own to lead her back to the
dining-room. His whole manner, with its protecting, tender, indulgent
kindness for her youth, and its chivalrous respect for her womanhood,
had in it the most exquisite sensation of novelty for Susan. She laughed
to herself secretly, yet with tears coming to her eyes--she felt a new
pride, a tender humility in her own heart. She was flattered, and
touched, and stimulated at the same moment. Wonderful was this love,
this new influence, this unknown soul of life; it might have been more
romantic had it dawned upon her through a young man instead of an old
one--a lover rather than an uncle; but in that case the revelation would
have been very different, and perhaps the revolution scarcely so
complete.

"Call Peggy, my dear child," said Uncle Edward, "and put on your bonnet,
I want you to go with me as far as Kenlisle--not too far for a drive
this fine morning; it is cold to be sure, but bright and pleasant; tell
Peggy you must have on your warmest wraps; tell her I want you to see
something else than the moor, for one day at least--tell her--ah, here
she is herself! Peggy, I want my niece to drive with me to-day to
Kenlisle--will there be any objections, do you think?"

"The master never sets eyes on Miss Susan, from ten o'clock in the day
till six at night," said Peggy. "_He_ can scarce complain, and as for
me I give my consent willing. Ay, honey! you may look, with your eyes
dancing in your head--I said new times was coming. Would you keep the
Colonel waiting? and the mare at the door like a douse wife, taking
great notice on the bits of green grass agrowing amidst of the stones.
There, Colonel, she's off like a hare athwart the moor--the poor child!
from a baby, she's ne'er had a holiday before."

And Peggy hastened upstairs after Susan, who, gazing from one to another
for a moment of bewildered and doubtful delight, had at last burst from
the room, seeing that nobody opposed the extraordinary, delightful
suggestion, to get ready for her drive. When the old woman disappeared
following her, the Colonel turned to Horace, who had listened with a
good deal of discomfiture, resentment, and contempt, unable to
comprehend the bad taste which could contrive pleasures for Susan, to
the neglect of himself. It gave Horace a worse opinion of his uncle
than he had yet entertained. He could scarcely help sneering at him, and
calling him an old woman to his face.

"Will you walk over to Tillington and meet us, Horace?" said Colonel
Sutherland, who, for his part, exhilarated by the sight of Susan's
delight and wonder, was now full of smiles and satisfaction; "I have
ordered some luncheon between two and three, which will leave you time
to bring your sister home. You will come?--you look a little pale, my
boy--you have been thinking too much over-night!"

"It is possible--I have not slept since I saw you, uncle," said the
young man.

"Too much--too much," said Colonel Sutherland, resting his hand kindly
upon his nephew's shoulder. "Important as the question is, I am sorry
you lost your sleep--it is only old people who can do that with safety.
And you have come to a good conclusion, Horace?--that is right!
Already, I am sure you feel the pleasure of decision. But I will not ask
you what you have resolved on now. Eh, Susan?--what, not dressed yet,
you fairy?--what is it now?"

"Oh, uncle!--I only wanted to ask, if you won't be angry," cried Susan,
out of breath, "whether I should be too grand if I wore my shawl?"

The old man's face brightened, and expanded all over with the simplest
pleasure.

"Too grand!--you don't drive with me every day, do you?" he said with a
laugh, as he patted her cheek. "No--I should be quite mortified if I did
not see you in your shawl; but make haste--think of the mare, and in a
winter's day remember there is no daylight to lose."

Susan ran off again with flying feet, and the Colonel turned once more
to his nephew. He could not help recognizing then something of the
amazement, contempt, and derision which filled the mind of Horace. Uncle
Edward was a little struck by his look--perhaps, even a little
offended. He paused unconsciously to defend himself.

"You think that very trivial--eh, Horace?" said the Colonel. "Ah, my
boy! one is heroical when one is young--one feels it grand to be
superior, and despise the smaller matters of life; but at my age one
learns that happiness itself is made up of trivial things."

Horace's eyes fell under his uncle's look; he was half ashamed--not of
his sentiments, but of having betrayed them.

"I am sure it is very good of you to take so much trouble for Susan," he
said, with his uncomprehending, half-resentful voice.

Colonel Sutherland supposed Horace to be jealous, and was a little
pained, but yet acknowledged a certain amount of nature in the feeling.
He had no conception of the true state of the case--of the entire
contempt his nephew felt for himself, and the angry and derisive wonder
with which he perceived the importance given to Susan. It was not
jealousy: Horace only could not comprehend how any man in his senses
could resign _his_ conversation and society for that of his
sister--Susan! a girl! who knew nothing, hoped nothing, desired
nothing--a tame, contented woman! He found it hard to restrain himself
under these circumstances, and called his uncle an old fool and an old
trifler in his secret heart. Then Susan came downstairs, smiling and
happy--her India shawl contrasting, perhaps, rather too strongly with
her simple bonnet and dark merino gown, standing before her uncle to be
admired, and turning round that he might see his present in all possible
aspects. What trifling! what folly! what miserable vanity! But it
pleased the two wonderfully, who stood there making a little sun-bright
group of their own, the old man stooping over the girl, with his tender,
indulgent smile, and the girl looking up to him in her unusual flutter
of happy spirits. Perhaps it is true, after all, that common, every-day
happiness--that dear solace of common life, which comes, when it does
come, without asking--is made up of very trivial things; at all events,
it was much more agreeable to look at them than at Horace, who loured
behind them like a dark cloud, and turned away his head in disgust, and
felt that it was all he could do to keep the sneer of scorn from his
lip. In much the same condition he attended them to the door, and saw
them drive away. Susan, wrapped up and covered over with shawls and
cloaks of every description by her uncle's careful hands, and with
Peggy's great black veil, embroidered with great flowers, like gigantic
beetles, fastened over her bonnet; from the midst of all which unusual
coverings the pretty face, smiling and blushing, radiant with pleasure
and gratitude, looked out in its sweet colour and expression, with a
simplicity of happiness quite beyond Horace's frown to stifle or
prevent. Somehow his sister's face disgusted him that day: he stood
looking after them, suffering his sneer to take form and remain, long
after they were out of sight. He rose over them in his own mind with a
contemptuous superiority, yet felt himself humbled and envious at sight
of the happiness with which he had no sympathy, and which he did not
understand. He did not wish to share it--it was something beneath his
level. Yet the very power of being exhilarated by such trifles, and
finding pleasure so independent of reasonable grounds, filled the young
man with a certain envy, and humiliated his pride. Susan's happiness did
not give him a single throb of pleasure, yet it brightened his uncle's
face into quite a kindred light: it was altogether incomprehensible to
Horace. He took refuge in silent contempt and sneers of unacknowledged
mortification, disdaining the pleasure, yet galled in himself not to
comprehend how it was.




CHAPTER XIV.


Meanwhile Colonel Sutherland and his niece drove along the bare and
exposed moorland road with very different sentiments. Susan could not
feel any cold, could not allow herself to suppose that any landscape
more delightful or weather more entirely satisfactory was to be found
anywhere in the world. She pitied the poor people shut up in a close
carriage, whom they passed at a little distance from Marchmain. She
appealed to her uncle if a gig was not of all other kinds of conveyance
the most delightful. She listened to his stories of travel in India,
with all its elephants and camels, and of the still more miraculous
railway at home, with equal admiration and wonder, as things equally
unlikely to come under her own observation, and enjoyed her present
extraordinary felicity all the more from thinking how unlikely it was to
occur again.

Everything concurred to put Susan in the highest spirits--her freedom,
her kind protector, the novelty of her position, the wondering looks
cast at her from the cottages they passed, the involuntary respect
excited by her companion, the air, the sunshine--even the fine shawl,
though it was entirely covered by her other wrappings and nobody could
see it--all contributed towards the full and joyous satisfaction of her
young mind. She put Peggy's great old-fashioned veil, with its big
beetles, up from her face--she was not afraid of the wind, or of taking
cold, or of anything else in the world; and as the horizon gradually
widened, and the road extended out of the immediate vicinity of her
home, Susan's delight increased. She declared the hills went faster
than they did, and kept continually receding, and every new opening of
the landscape increased her pleasure. The Colonel listened to all her
admiring exclamations with a smiling face; he told her of his own
neighbourhood, a fairer and richer country. He spoke of the visit she
must make him shortly, and of all the places he should take her to. The
wind blew cold in their faces, with by no means a balmy or genial
breath; but then their hearts were so fortified with warm affections and
honest happiness, that the cold did not hurt them. Little by little they
fell into more particular conversation. Colonel Sutherland was
interested and concerned about Horace, anxious to know how to help him;
but he was not and could not be confidential with his nephew, whereas
his heart flew open to Susan as at a touch of magic. He could not help
speaking of everything which moved when he had gained her ear, and had
her to himself alone. He had told her all about young Roger Musgrave
before he was aware, and about Kennedy's story, and his own vexation and
annoyance to find that the young stranger had not dealt quite truly by
him.

"But, uncle!--oh, Peggy knows all about him," said Susan; "Peggy did not
know he had any friends till just the other day. Perhaps he did not know
himself--perhaps--I think, Uncle Edward, I would not believe he was
wrong till he told you of it himself."

"But if he is in the wrong, Susan, _will_ he tell me of it himself?"

"Some people would not," said Susan, gravely, "I know that; but yes,
uncle, oh, yes, I am not afraid."

"Perhaps you know him better than I do, my love," said Uncle Edward,
observing with a little curiosity the expression of Susan's face.

"Yes, I think I saw him once," said Susan. Then she added, with a little
laugh--"I was very much frightened--I am afraid it was very wrong of
him--he was actually fighting, uncle."

"Fighting?--it was certainly very wrong," said the Colonel; "but you
laugh, you wicked little fairy--what was it about?"

"It was not so much fighting either," said Susan--"it was _punishing_.
It was gipsies, uncle--what the people here call muggers, you know. One
of them was driving his little cart along the road with a poor wretched
donkey, lashing it like a savage, and his poor wife came trudging after
him, with her baby tied in a shawl on her back--and twice over he gave
_her_ a cut with his whip, to make her go faster. I could have beaten
him myself--the great beast!" cried Susan. "Roger Musgrave was coming
down the road; and, just as he met the muggers, that fellow pushed his
wife out of the way so rudely, that she fell down, poor creature, and
hurt herself. Mr. Roger had been watching them like me--he came up just
then with a spring, and caught the mugger by his collar and his waist
like this; and, before he had time to say a word, tossed him over the
hedge--_right_ over--where he rolled head-over-heels on the grass. You
should have seen his face when he got up! I clapped my hands--I was so
pleased. And Mr. Roger took off his hat to me," said Susan, after a
little pause, with a rising colour, "as you did, uncle, to-day."

"It was very well done, I don't doubt," said Colonel Sutherland; "but,
my dear child, that was not fighting."

"Oh, no--not that!--but I liked it better than what came after," said
Susan. "The mugger scrambled through the hedge, and swore at Mr. Roger;
and _he_ took off his coat in a moment, and told him not to be a coward,
to flog women and beasts, but to come on--and I was very much
frightened; then the mugger's wife, _she_ came forward and swore too,
and it was all very dreadful. I did not want to see them fight, and ran
into a cottage--I rather think they did not fight at all, for the
mugger was frightened too; but, however, that was the only time I ever
saw Roger Musgrave; the people in the cottage told me who he was, and I
liked him for punishing the man."

"I daresay the fellow punished his wife and the donkey all the more,
when they were out of sight," said the Colonel; "but I confess I should
have done it myself. Very well! I will put down in my books--my little
Susan in favour of young Musgrave versus Sergeant Kennedy against. And
so you only saw him that one time? Do you know anybody at all, you poor
child?--have you ever had a companion in your life?"

"Not a companion," said Susan; "but"--and she looked up in her uncle's
face--"_you_ won't be angry, I know, uncle. Peggy goes to the meeting,
and sometimes in the morning, when papa does not go out, I go with
_her_. It is dreary to go to church all alone."

"So it is," said the sympathetic uncle; "and what then?"

"Then," said Susan, blushing a little more, and looking up shyly in his
face--"I am sure I do not know how we got acquainted. We used to look at
each other, and then we nodded, and then, at last, one day we spoke; and
now, sometimes, we meet when we are out walking, uncle--and once I have
been in their house--only once. I did not mean it--I was there before I
knew what I was about."

"But you have not told me yet who this mysterious person is," said the
Colonel, a little disappointed and troubled, if the truth must be told,
at the thought of some young and no doubt perfectly unsuitable lover who
met his little girl in clandestine walks, and whose house even, the
inexperience of Susan had been persuaded into visiting. He said the
words rather coldly, in spite of himself--he was mortified to find the
virginal quiet of her mind already thus disturbed.

"Uncle, are you displeased?" said Susan, with a little fright and
surprise. "Oh, I never thought _you_ would be angry; for even Peggy
said that to be friends with Letty would be for my good. She is the
minister's daughter at the meeting, and the only child; and she has
learned so much, and knows a hundred things that I know nothing of; and,
uncle, sometimes I want somebody to speak to--oh, so much!"

"My dear child, forgive me! I wish you knew a dozen Letties," cried the
repentant Colonel; "that you should have to blush over an innocent
friendship, my poor dear little girl; but your confusion, Susan, made me
think it something very different. Why should you be ashamed of knowing
Letty? I am very glad to hear it, for my part."

Susan did not answer just immediately. She said to herself, with a
little quickening of her breath:--

"I wonder what was the something very different that Uncle Edward
thought of," and a little inclination to laughter seized the little
girl. Who could tell why? She did not know herself, but felt it all the
same.

"Does Horace spend much of his time with you, Susan?" said Uncle Edward;
"does he tell you what he is thinking about? Do you know that your
brother is tired of an idle life, and wants to be employed, and to make
his own way in the world?"

With that question Susan was brought back to her home, and separated as
if by magic in a moment from all her individual involuntary girlish
happinesses; she shrank a little into herself and felt chilled and
contracted, without knowing how. She could not even be so frank as she
would have been a little while ago--Uncle Edward's love had opened the
eyes of the neglected girl, and developed all at once in her heart the
natural instincts of "the only woman in the family." She could not bear
to convey an unfavourable impression of Horace to her uncle; but,
unskilled in her new craft, she betrayed herself even by her reticences
and reserves.

"I know he wants to go away," she said, faltering a little; "and I am
sure you would not be surprised, if you lived with us only for a
day;--for," added Susan, blushing and correcting herself, "it is very
dull at Marchmain, and boys cannot put up with that as we can. Horace
has always felt it a great deal more than I have."

"I am not surprised," said Colonel Sutherland; "if Marchmain was the
happiest home in the world, still the young man must go away--it is in
his nature. He must make his own way in the world."

"Must he, uncle?" said Susan, looking up with a little surprise into his
face.

"I was only sixteen, my love, when I first went to India," said the
Colonel; "the boys, as you call them, must not stay at home all their
lives--they must do something. My Ned will be on his way to India, if
all is well, in a year or two. The sooner a young man gets into his work
the better--and now Horace would set about it too."

"But he cannot do anything, uncle," said Susan, seriously; "what is he
going to do?"

"Has he never told you?" asked Uncle Edward.

The question seemed to imply blame, and Susan was troubled.

"Horace is not like you, uncle," she said, recovering a little boldness;
"he does not tell me things; he knows a great deal more than I do--he
has almost learned German--and he thinks a great deal more. I am afraid
I do not always understand him when he does speak to me. It is my fault;
so he thinks over everything all the more, and I am afraid sometimes
gets angry in his heart, because no one can understand him at
Marchmain!"

Colonel Sutherland shook his head, but did not say anything. He began to
tell Susan what he did when he was a lad.

"There were a great many of us at home, to be sure," said the Colonel;
"but we were all scattered before the youngest was fifteen--the sisters
married, and the brothers making their own career. They are all dead,
Susan, every one--but you have quantities of cousins, my dear, in India
and elsewhere, whom you never heard of, I daresay. Your Uncle William
was puisne Judge of the Saraflat, John was Resident at Cangalore, both
of them very much respected. I was the youngest but one. I could not
bear the thought that all my brothers were independent but myself. I
gave them no peace at home till I got my cadetship. Unless one has the
good fortune to get an appointment, it is quite as hard work getting on
in India as at home, my dear; and all our influence had been used up for
my elder brothers, and exhausted before it came to my turn. I was but a
subaltern when I married, Susan. Your aunt was--ah, I can't describe
her, my love. I am very happy on the whole and contented, but sometimes
I think on what might have been, and make myself wretched, which is
very sinful, considering how much I have to thank God for. Yes, Susan, I
was a rich man once. I had wife and daughters, and my house full. We had
not very much money, but we were very happy; and now, my dear child, you
are the only woman of the family--that is, _here_."

Susan could not have spoken a word to save her life--she sobbed silently
under her heap of warm wrappings, looking with a wistful, youthful
sympathy into the grave face beside her. The Colonel shed no tears;--he
guided his horse with the same quiet caution as before, turning the
animal aside from a sudden obstacle in the way, with a steady
promptitude, which showed his perfect attention to what he was about,
even in the midst of these recollections; yet he was not looking at the
road, nor at her, nor at anything; but had his eyes fixed on the
far-away horizon, which yet he did not see. Susan sat beside him in
silence, wondering with youthful awe and reverence over the
indescribable yearning, with which some instinct told her this brave old
heart longed for the heaven which held his departed; but she could not
say anything--she would have felt it sacrilege.

However, they shortly approached the town, which recalled Colonel
Sutherland from his graver thoughts. It was a comfortable country town,
pleasantly placed at the opening of a valley, with the gray fells
ranging themselves on either side, and the great gray tower of the old
Abbey church reigning over the little crowd of houses. The market-place
was still busy and bright, though the more serious merchandize of the
morning was over; cosy country-women, in cloth pelisses, made promenades
round the open square, where the best shops in the town displayed their
riches, to see "how things were wore," and make stray purchase of a
kerchief or ribbon; and still the notable housewives of the town bought
vegetables, and rabbits, and country eggs, and chickens, from the
remaining stalls in the market-place. And still heaps of dark-green
vegetables--winter greens and savoys, purple flowers of broccoli, and
tiny red lines of carrots, illustrated some boards, close to the white
eggs and yellow butter, the hapless decapitated poultry, and butter-milk
pails of the others. Susan and her uncle walked through the throng,
attracting no small degree of observation; for there were not many such
cavaliers as Colonel Sutherland in Kenlisle, and very few such shawls as
that one which, relieved of all her other wraps, Susan displayed upon
her shoulders with no small degree of pride. The scene was quite
extraordinary in its animation to her eyes. She looked at the ruddy
winter apples and crisp greens with the most perfect interest. She
longed, with a natural housewifely instinct, to make purchases herself,
to the confusion and amazement of Peggy. She could scarcely conceal her
unbecoming curiosity about the booths of toys and sweetmeats, the cases
of coarse ornaments, brooches, and rings, and ear-rings, which Susan
could not believe to be paltry and worthless. The glamour of her
ignorance brightened everything; and when her eyes, as she looked up
unconsciously, fell upon the gray mass of the Abbey tower withdrawn into
a street which led off from this busy space, Susan felt awed and ashamed
to think of her own vanity and extreme regard for "the things of this
world." But she could not school herself into righteous indifference;
above all, when Uncle Edward, indifferent to her morals, took her into
shop after shop, buying a little parcel of books in one place, some
pretty ribbons in another, a cap for Peggy, which captivated the old man
in a window; and, last of all, patterns and materials for work of
various kinds, canvas and Berlin wool, and an embroidery-frame. This
last purchase raised Susan into a paradisiacal condition, for which it
is to be hoped nobody will despise her. She was not very intellectual,
it is true--it might very well happen that she preferred her needlework
to her book sometimes. She saw herself rendered completely independent,
as she supposed, of _ennui_ and domestic weariness by that ecstatic
parcel. She longed to take it in her arms, and run all the way home with
it, that Peggy might see, and half regretted for a moment the luncheon
at Tillington, which, however, would give her still another hour or two
of her uncle's company. Then Susan looked at that uncle with a great
compunction, thinking of what he had told her; but Colonel Sutherland
was happy in her happiness, delighted to see her so delighted, and
entered with fresh, natural pleasure into the scene for his own part. It
was quite a work of art to pack the gig with all the parcels, and wrap
Susan up again into all her cloaks. Then they went off at a great pace
to Tillington. So far it had been a most successful day.




CHAPTER XV.


Horace had been waiting some time in the little inn before Colonel
Sutherland and Susan arrived. This had not much improved the young man's
temper; but the result of his cogitations on the way here, and while he
waited, had been, that it was necessary to be no longer critical, but
that he must assume the virtue which he had not, and secure his uncle's
assistance in his own way. Horace had settled at last to his own
satisfaction upon his version of his uncle's character. He concluded the
Colonel to be a well-meaning, superficial old man, most at home among
women and children, finding pleasure in trifles, strongly prejudiced in
favour of some old-fashioned virtues, which he recommended not so much
from conviction as from custom. Industry and honesty, and
straightforwardness, a homespun and sober interpretation of all human
laws--Horace decided that his uncle lauded and urged these virtues on
others just as he might recommend cod-liver oil or Morison's pills, and
that he was unable to comprehend anything higher than that old code of
respectability. But granting this, it was all the more wise to humour
and yield to the old man, and permit him to maunder on in his own way.
Horace resolved to profess himself ready and anxious for employment, the
choice of which he meant dutifully to leave to his uncle; and having
thus settled summarily the more important issue, set himself with all
his might to observe and entrap the unsuspicious Colonel in his
confidential and unguarded talk. It suited him a great deal better to do
this, than to consider honestly how he should provide for his own life,
and establish his individual position in the world; and it was
significant of his character that he dismissed the former question at
once, but lingered with inclination and zeal upon the crafts of the
other, laying his ambuscade with all the cunning and precaution
possible.

He sat by the fire in the inn parlour, while the maid and mistress
bustled in and out laying the cloth and preparing for the Colonel's
arrival. Mrs. Gilsland having recovered her temper, and remembering the
embellishments of her master's table, in the days when she professed
herself a cook, had been at pains to gather a handful of laurustinus,
with dim, pinky, half-opened blossoms, to adorn the table, upon which
sparkled the best glass and whitest linen of the establishment. The
worthy woman would fain have insinuated herself into the confidence of
Horace as he sat by the fire, and wanted only the very smallest
encouragement to break forth in praises of the Colonel, and to hint her
fear that they would not see much of the young gentleman at Tillington
now that "his grand friends had turned up at last, and he was nigh coom
to his fortune." But Horace did not give the slightest opening to any
such familiarity. He kept possession of the room with an insolent
unconsciousness of the landlady's presence and her hesitating glances at
him, which enraged and yet awed her. It was Mr. Horry's "way," and this
arrogance imposed upon the village people even while it offended them;
but it was very different from "the Cornel." Mrs. Gilsland, who had been
much disappointed at first to learn that her guest was no lord, and had
not the shadow of a title, was by this time entirely captivated by the
old man, and zealous to serve him; but still she turned to Mr. Horry
with the interest which attaches to mystery. He took no more notice of
her than if she had been a piece of furniture. She was angry but
reverential--there was "a power o' thought" in the young man.

When the gig arrived with the two travellers, Horace hastened to the
door to meet them with a novel amiability. He lifted Susan down, and
gathered her parcels together with a good-nature that astounded her.
They were all equally pleased, it seemed, as they went in together and
met Mrs. Gilsland, curtseying and cordial, ready--half from goodwill and
half from curiosity--to attend Susan herself, and help her to take off
her bonnet. Then Susan carried a passport to respect wherever she went
in that wonderful shawl; the landlady touched it with reverential
ignorance, knowing only that it was "Indae," and ready to believe in any
fabulous estimate of its value. Then, for the first time, Mrs. Gilsland
remembered her unlucky trifle, with, not anger, but a pang of
mortification. The wearer of such a shawl did certainly deserve
something better than apples and custards, to which familiar dainties
she had fallen back in despair. However, the luncheon was so far
satisfactory, that it was eaten in perfect freedom, with a lively flow
of conversation on all sides, which exhilarated even Horace, and raised
Susan into a little paradise. What a difference it made to the common
table, when Uncle Edward sat at the head instead of papa!--what an
extraordinary revolution life would undergo, if the bread of every day
were sweetened by such domestic intercourse as this! While her brother
rose into a certain glow of personal exultation in the freedom he
experienced, Susan, thinking less of herself, and feeling more deeply,
found herself, unawares, surprised by the sudden mortification of a
comparison. Involuntarily tears came into her eyes, and as she grew more
grateful and affectionate towards her uncle, her heart ached more and
more for her father. She saw now all the unnatural misery of their life.
Why was it? But these thoughts did not take possession of the girl--they
only came over her mind in a sudden, painful overflow as the tears came
to her eyes; and then she thought of Horace's instructions to her; and,
moved by strong curiosity and anxiety of her own--of a very different
kind from her brother's--proceeded to obey him.

"Uncle," said Susan, with an honest, enquiring look, "did you see very
much of mamma after she was married? But ah, I forgot--you went to India
so soon."

"I saw her only when I returned, my love," said Uncle Edward--"when you
were a baby, and Horace a bold boy of five--yes, and before that, when I
had to come home on business, when your other uncles in India made me
their commissioner to look after the family affairs. At that time I
lived with my sister; that is five-and-twenty years ago."

"And where did we live then, uncle?" asked Susan. Horace did not say a
word; he did not look at his uncle, but preserved such a total stillness
from all motion, almost from breath, that a suspicious observer must
have been alarmed by it. He was listening not for words only, but for
tones, inflections--all those unconscious betrayals by which people, who
do not suppose themselves watched, naturally disclose a certain amount
of feeling with the facts they tell.

But Uncle Edward did not hear--he stooped over towards his niece, and
put his hand to his ear. Then he laughed, and patted her hand upon the
table. "Nowhere, so far as I am aware," said the Colonel; "there was no
word of you, in those days, for all such important grown-up people as
you are. My sister was little more than a bride; a gay young wife, full
of spirits, pretty, much sought after, and loved everywhere. We were a
large family, you know, and had been accustomed to a good deal of
society at home. She was a happy young creature, and did not deny
herself natural pleasures. Poor Mary!--it did not last very long!"

"Why did it not last very long, uncle?" cried Susan.

"Did you say it never lasts very long, my dear?" said Colonel
Sutherland, who _perhaps_ did not hear exactly what she said. "That is a
very wise observation for you, Susan; and it is quite true to be sure,
for when one begins to have a family, you know, one prefers happiness to
pleasure--so that, after all, what the wiseacres say about the change
from youth to sober age is true; and it isn't true like most things in
this world, for it is by no means a melancholy change. When I came back
fifteen years ago there was a great difference. I think she must have
been ill of her last illness then, though we did not know of it. She had
lost her pleasant spirits, and her pretty colour, and was anxious and
desponding, as sick people grow. That made all the house melancholy. I
daresay Peggy has told you as much as that."

"Oh! Uncle," said Susan, "when Peggy has told me there has always seemed
to be something which she did not tell me. I always fancy something
dreadful had just happened--some misfortune, or something wrong, or--I
cannot tell what--but she never would say any more. Did mamma break her
heart?"

The colour rose in Colonel Sutherland's cheek in spite of himself.
Horace watching him, though he never looked at him, and though at this
present moment he seemed intent on balancing a fork upon his finger, to
the exclusion of all other concerns, found, or fancied he found, a
certain irrepressible resentment mingled with his reluctance to answer.
The Colonel spoke shortly, and with an embarrassed tone:--

"She was leaving her children young, without a mother; she did not know
what might happen to you; she died anxious, troubled about you. I don't
know this for certain, Susan, but I can believe it. It is hard to die in
the middle of life, my dear child--yes, harder than in youth, for one's
children seem to have so much need of one. I have no doubt, before all
was over, the Lord showed her something of his purpose in it, and
comforted her soul; but I don't wonder she seemed heart-broken. We will
not speak any more of this, Susan. Horace is silent, you see, and is not
interested, like you. He is thinking of his own concerns, as is natural
to a young man--and all that is far and long past."

"On the contrary, I am very much interested, uncle," said Horace.

"I have no doubt of it, my dear boy, at a more suitable time. Of course
I don't suppose you to be indifferent about your mother," said the
Colonel; "but I understand your feelings perfectly. It is not selfish
nor egotistic, as you fear, but simply natural; you _must_ think of your
own plans and intentions; you would be to blame if you did not."

If the Colonel _could_ have known how far astray he was! If anything
could have made him comprehend how little place in Horace's thoughts
these same plans and intentions bore, and with what a stealthy
watchfulness his nephew had been "interested" in his own recollections!
But Uncle Edward comprehended his nephew quite as little as his nephew
comprehended him; and the old soldier was not without a little
strategical talent of his own; he found himself getting on dangerous
ground; he feared saying too much, a thing which, if he allowed himself
to get excited, he was only too likely to do--and Horace's plans were a
famous diversion. Disappointed thus again, just at the very point of the
story which seemed most likely to elicit something, Horace could
scarcely be otherwise than sulky; but once more he put force on himself.

"I have decided, uncle," he said--"but only that it is you who must
decide. You know the world, you know life. I am unacquainted with
everything that could guide me. I have made up my mind to leave it in
your hands. I must provide for myself, _it appears_," said Horace,
sliding into these two words an involuntary interjection of bitterness,
in a tone too low for his uncle to hear. "Take it into _your_
consideration, and I will adopt whatever you decide upon. You know a
hundred times better than I."

Colonel Sutherland was partly gratified, partly annoyed, for this was
not at all what he wished. When at that moment the landlord came in to
announce that the gig was at the door again, ready to take the young
people home. Susan went away immediately to get her bonnet: then Uncle
Edward had leisure to express his sentiments:--

"I daresay it is very probable that I know life better than you do," he
said; "but, my boy, I don't know your inclinations, nor your tastes, nor
your particular abilities, half, or a hundred part, so well. I'll
consider the matter as long as you like, but how shall I be able to
determine what you will like best?"

"Uncle, don't be annoyed," cried Horace, starting up--"can _I_ have
inclinations?--do you think it is possible? Do you suppose I don't
understand what it means, all that you have said, and all that you have
not said, about my mother? I would not grieve Susan with such words, but
_I_ know, as well as if you had spoken it, that it was my father who
broke her heart."

"No, no, no!" cried the Colonel, rising likewise, and lifting his hand
in earnest deprecation. "No, it is a mistake--no, you are unjust to him,
Horace! I cannot excuse him to you as I might, but beware how you think
ill of him. There _are_ excuses--there _are_ reasons. Listen to me,
Horace Scarsdale: your father is a man as much to be pitied as blamed."

"And why?" said Horace, with a sceptical smile.

"My dear boy, sometime you will see all these circumstances more
clearly," said the Colonel, a little agitated; "take it for granted in
the meantime, and remember that he is your father--and really this has
little to do with the question after all. You must _like_ something:
_he_ has not been kind, I grant; but even where the most perfect love
exists between parents and children, a father is never all in all,
either for good or evil, to his son."

"No, uncle, but constant hate and enmity may kill the heart out of a
man," said Horace. "I am not a fool; I could learn anything if I set
myself to it: do you decide for me."

"I _will_ then, my dear boy; and you will come to me to-morrow?" said
the Colonel, faltering a little. "Come early, and I will walk back to
Marchmain with you. Here is Susan ready. Are all the parcels safe? And
you have spent a pleasant day, you fairy? Take care, Horace, that she
does not catch cold."

"_Pleasant_ day? Oh, uncle, the very happiest day of all my life!" said
Susan.

The old man led her out well pleased, involuntarily solacing himself,
after her troublesome brother, with the sight of her fresh face. And
Susan's happiest day was quite over when she caught the last glimpse of
his gray, uncovered head bowing to her from the inn-door. Horace had no
kind talk or affectionate cares for his sister. The wind blew cold, and
the evening began to gather damp over the fells. The two young people
fell into perfect silence as they pursued the monotonous road, and there
was no great comfort to be had in the idea of the welcome which waited
them at home.




CHAPTER XVI.


When Horace and Susan had left Tillington, the Colonel wrapt his great
cloak round him, and went out to take a pondering, meditative walk, and
think over all these concerns. This last conversation he felt had rather
complicated his position, and changed a little the posture of affairs.
It was now he who had to take the initiative--he who seemed to be
sending Horace away, and deciding that it was his duty to follow a path
of his own, and make his own career. This idea was the last which had
occurred to him, when he met his nephew's passionate complaints with his
own good, sober, kind advice. Horace had, however, completely turned
the tables upon him. He was no longer engaged to give merely a friendly
assistance to the young man's exertions, to help him by representing the
case to his father, or by using such influence as he possessed to
further his nephew's wishes. Horace had skilfully managed to make it
appear, even to Colonel Sutherland himself, that it was he who had
suggested the necessity for leaving home--that it was he who must decide
the manner of doing so, and that the whole responsibility of the matter
would lie upon his shoulders. This was far from pleasant to the Colonel;
he thought over the whole matter with a very troubled brow: why should
he draw upon himself all the trouble and blame of such a
proceeding?--undertake the painful task of an interview with Mr.
Scarsdale--most likely fail to satisfy Horace himself, and possibly meet
with severer reproach hereafter, when the young man came to know that
secret which he made vain inquiries after now? The Colonel did not
relish his position as he thought over it. It was not of his making. He
had but replied, as his kindly nature could not help doing, by offers of
assistance to the outcry of Horace's impatience; and behold here was the
result.

The very fact that something _did_ exist which he knew, and which Horace
did not know, embarrassed and straitened him further. But, at the same
time, he had promised. Nothing but the agitation into which the young
man had thrown him, by his sudden suggestion that the Colonel meant to
accuse his father with breaking his mother's heart, could have led
Colonel Sutherland to make so rash an engagement. He had no reason to
believe that this was the cause of Mrs. Scarsdale's death. He knew she
had been restrained, overruled, and chidden--but he knew also that to
the end she loved, and made no complaint beside. For his own part, the
circumstances of his sister's death, which followed very quietly upon a
singular misfortune to her husband, had filled Edward Sutherland with
the deepest compassion and sympathy for his brother-in-law; and
accordingly he was more shocked than he could explain by Horace's sudden
supposition, that it was Mr. Scarsdale's unkindness which had killed his
wife; and in the eager anxiety with which he entreated the youth to
believe that this was not the case, he consented unawares to make
himself the arbitrator of Horace's fate--so far, at least, as that could
be determined by its beginning. He had promised--that was indisputable;
yet what right had he to take the first step in such a matter, or to
urge upon a young man, in the very peculiar circumstances of Horace, the
same personal labour which was necessary to his own sons? When the
Colonel had come so far in his thoughts he paused with a sudden effort,
and resolutely turned to the other side of the question.

"Ought I to stand by for fear of responsibility, or for the sake of my
own pride, or for the risk of ingratitude, and see my sister's son sink
into ignorance and debasement, and end in being the autocrat of an
ale-house?" he said to himself, and did all that was possible to change
the current of his own thoughts. But it was not much easier to choose a
profession for Horace, or to fix on what he ought to be. Colonel
Sutherland had come to perceive that he did not understand his nephew,
and that not a single feature of resemblance existed between them. He
marched on upon the road with his steady soldier's step, not perceiving
how far he was going, nor how the night darkened--marching gradually
into a more and more bewildering mist of thought. The village lay
sheltered in a shallow valley, with low slopes ascending on every side
towards a higher level of country, slopes much too gentle and gradual to
have much affinity with the distant fells. Colonel Sutherland had
nearly reached the top of one of these banks, when the toil of the
ascent, which just there was steep, awakened him to a consciousness of
where he was. He might have wandered for miles over the open country,
but for the failure of wind and sensation of fatigue which seized him
upon that brae. When he came to himself, wheeling about suddenly, he saw
the lights of the village twinkling into the twilight a long way beneath
him, and perceived, for the first time, how far he had come.

"The wind being on my back all the time," he said, with a kind of
involuntary apology to himself half-aloud, as he commenced his return.

The Colonel's ears were sharper out of doors than in. He recognized that
somewhere near, somebody had made a sudden start at the sound of his
voice. There was no one to be seen--the Colonel beat the hedgerows with
his stick, and called "Who's there?" with soldierly promptitude. He had
no idea of being attacked from behind, in case a highwayman lurked
behind those bare thorns. After a little interval, during which Colonel
Sutherland continued his examination minutely, a voice gruff but
subdued, answered somewhat peevishly--

"Cornel, it's me."

And the gaunt figure of Kennedy came crushing through a gap of the hedge
to the Colonel's side.

"You!--why, what the deuce are you after here?" said the Colonel, his
extreme amazement forcing that mysterious adjuration from his lips, he
could not tell how.

"Weel, Cornel, watching the sport o' them living craetures," said
Kennedy, with a little hesitation. "I seed the rabbits whisking in and
out as I took my walk, and says I to myself--they're as diverting as
childer, I'll take a look at them. And that's how it was--I'm rael fond
of dumb craetures, Cornel, and there's sich a spirit in thae wild
things."

"Do you mean to tell me, you old humbug, that you could see rabbits, or
any other moving thing, at this time of the night?" said the Colonel.
"If I did not know you to be an Orangeman I would think you were a
Jesuit, Kennedy, with a dispensation for telling lies. Man, do you ever
speak the truth?"

"Oh, ay, Cornel--always when it's to any person's advantage," said
Kennedy; "and as for the Papishers, I hate the very name to my last drop
of blood, as is nat'ral for a man of Derry born. I'm none ashamed of my
lodge, nor my principles nouther. When I was a young lad, Cornel, the
great Castlereagh, sir, he belounged to the same--and as for my eyes, a
better sight, barring for the small print, does not beloung to a man of
my years within twenty mile."

"I've seen the day," said Colonel Sutherland, softening unconsciously
towards his old fellow-soldier, "when neither small print nor
half-light would have bothered either you or me; but we're getting old,
Kennedy, and Providence has given us both rest, and comfort, and leisure
to think before our end comes--a blessing that falls to but few."

"Ay, Cornel, that's just what I say," echoed the ready sergeant; "not
that I would even myself with my commanding officer, but a man that has
seen the world is a great advantage to the young and onexperienced.
Begging your pardon, Cornel, but I knowe your nephew, sir--I knowe Mr.
Horry well."

"And what do you know of him, pray?" cried the Colonel, turning sharp
round upon his companion, who, startled by the sudden movement and
sharpness of the tone, swerved aside a little, and in doing so made
visible for a moment a mysterious something, hitherto concealed with
great skill, which he swung from his further hand.

"Eh?--what was it you were saying, Cornel?" said Kennedy, with
confusion, drawing back his hand. "What do I knowe of him?--a fine young
lad, sir, and very affable when he's in the humour, and a dale of
judgment, and an oncommon reliance on himsel'. Many's the time, Cornel,
he's said 'No' in my face, as bould as a lion, with no more knowledge of
the matter, sir, nor a babe unborn. That's what I cal' courage, Cornel.
Though he comes and goes in a rale friendly manner, there's ne'er a man
in the village will use a freedom with Mr. Horry; but it's poor society
for him, as I have seen many a day; and he said to me wance, says he,
'Sergeant, you're a wise man among a set of fools,' he says--'if it
warn't for you the blockheads would have it all their own way; and as
for me,' says the poor young gentleman, 'I've no business here.' I could
see that, though I little thought he belounged to my honoured Cornel of
the ould Hunderd, and a credit to his relations and al' his friends."

During this speech, Kennedy keeping wary eyes about him, was guarding
the Colonel off with the utmost skill, and contriving that he should
neither get sufficiently in advance or behind to have a chance of
discovering again the burden he carried. However, the sergeant betrayed
himself by a momentary impulse of vanity: he looked round in Colonel
Sutherland's face to read the success of his last compliment, and in
that moment of incaution the Colonel slid a step in advance, and,
thrusting his stick to Kennedy's other side, caught by the feet a hare.
The sergeant made the best of it, finding himself caught. He fixed his
eyes on the Colonel's face after the first start of discovery with a
comical half-defiance, half-deprecation, which, however, the light was
too dim to show.

"You old sinner!--you romancing old humbug!--what do you call that thing
there, eh? That's what takes you behind the hedge in the gloaming, with
your wisdom and your experience! What do you call that thing there?"

"Call it, Cornel?--sure and it's a bit of a leveret, sir," said the
sergeant, twisting it up by the legs with pretended carelessness. "I
picked the poor baste up, that was laid, with its leg broke, upon the
grass."

"And so that's how you take your walks and show your love for the dumb
creatures, you old leasing-maker!" cried the Colonel. "Throw it down
this moment, sir--carry it back to where you got it, or I'll make an
information against you the moment we get to Tillington--I will, by
George!"

"Oh, ay, Cornel, at your pleasure," cried the sergeant; "I'm not the man
to withstand my commanding officer when he takes to swearing. I'll put
it down, lookye, sir, where we stand; or I'll take it back beyant the
hedge, and the first labouring chap as comes by, he'll get the baste,
and link it hoam in his clumsy hand, Cornel, and be spied upon and given
up, and a snare proved to him, and clapped in jail. He'll goo in
innocent, Cornel, and he'll come out wroth and ruined, and all because
my own officer seed an ould sodger pick up a bit of meat that was
useless to any mortal beyant a hedge, and informed on me. And it shall
never be said that William Kennedy transgressed discipline. There it is,
sir--I'm blythe to be quat of it; pitch it from ye furder than I can
see."

The Colonel poised the hare on his stick for a moment, shaking his head,
then laughed aloud, and tossed it at Kennedy's feet.

"There's reason in what you say, you poaching old sinner; keep your
spoil," he said, "but march on, sergeant, and keep out of my sight till
we can take different roads. I don't keep company with stolen game.
There, there, that's enough. I've heard your best excuses already. Good
night, my man; and I advise you, for the sake of the old Hundred, to
have nothing to do after this either with hares or snares."




CHAPTER XVII.


Colonel Sutherland did not find much leisure that night. He had scarcely
returned from his walk, a little indignant and vexed at the conduct of
Kennedy, but less than ever inclined to believe him, when young Musgrave
made his appearance. The Colonel was seated by the fire with his
spectacles on, and the latest newspaper to be had in these regions laid
on the table beside him--but he had not begun to read, having thoughts
enough to keep him occupied. The room, with its dark walls and low roof
and the indistinct prints hung round it, was left in comparative
darkness by the little light of the two candles on the table. The
Colonel himself had his back to the light, and, with his elbows resting
on the arms of the chair, rubbed his hands slowly together, and pondered
in his heart. He had almost forgotten the young stranger in the closer
and nearer interests which moved himself; and what with his thoughts and
his deafness, and his position with his back to the door, did not
perceive the entrance of Roger, who stood undecided and shy when the
door had closed upon him, half inclined in sudden discouragement to turn
back again, and feeling for almost the first time, with a sudden painful
start of consciousness, that he had no claim upon the friendship of this
old man, whose kind interest in him this morning had cheered his forlorn
young heart, but whom, after all, he had seen for the first time this
day. A mind which is elevated by any one of the great primitive
emotions, ceases for the moment to feel those secondary impressions of
surprise and singularity with which in ordinary times we regard any
departure from the ordinary laws of life. Had he been happy, Roger would
have wondered, perhaps would have smiled, at the interest which this
stranger expressed in him; but it had not even astonished his
pre-occupied mind until now: now, as he stood behind the Colonel in the
dim apartment, and saw him sitting thoughtful by the fire, unconscious
of the presence of any visitor, the young man's impulse was to steal
softly out again, and make no claim upon a sympathy which he had no
right to. Yet his heart yearned for the kind look, the paternal voice
which had roused him this morning out of the quick despair of youth. He
approached slowly towards the table: when he reached it the Colonel
turned round with an exclamation of surprised but cordial welcome, and
pointed him to the chair opposite his own, which had been placed in
readiness for his young guest. This little token that he was expected
cheered the young man involuntarily; it was another of those trivial
things which, as Colonel Sutherland said, make up so much of the
happiness of life.

When he saw Roger opposite to him, with his eager, ingenuous face, and a
world of undisguised youthful anxieties and disquietude shining in his
candid eyes, the old man fell into a momentary pause of silence and
embarrassment. It seemed impossible to impute any want of truthfulness
to those honest looks, or even to cast upon them the momentary stain of
a suspicion. And the same young eyes were quick to perceive even this
pause, and remarked immediately that the Colonel was embarrassed, and
did not know how to begin what he had to say. Grief in its immediate
presence does not bring patience--the pride of the young man took alarm
instantly--he half rose, with hasty words barring any apology, and a
declaration of proud humility, that he had no right to trouble Colonel
Sutherland, or to intrude upon his privacy, rising to his lips. Before
he had spoken, the Colonel perceived what he meant, and stopped him.
"Wait a little--hear what I am going to say--sit down," said the old
soldier, laying his hand upon Musgrave's arm; "I cannot have you quarrel
with me so soon--sit down, and let us talk it out."

"Nay, sir, there can be no occasion," cried Musgrave, in his
disappointment and offence, his voice faltering a little; "I have but to
thank you for your kindness this morning, and beg your pardon for
intruding on you now."

"That cannot be," said Colonel Sutherland, with a momentary smile,
"because you come by my own appointment; and, besides, I am very glad to
see you, and you are a very foolish youth to be so impatient. Sit down
quietly--have patience a little, and listen to me."

Roger obeyed, with some haste and reluctance. He was almost overcome by
wounded pride and feeling, and yet he had nothing whatever to ground his
mortification upon, but the Colonel's pause of embarrassment and
confused preliminary tone.

"You thought I hesitated, and did not speak frankly enough," said the
Colonel. "Perhaps it is true, for I had something on my mind. But now I
mean to speak very frankly. My young friend, I believe I can be of but
little service to you, but I can give you my best advice and such
encouragement as an old man owes to a young one; while, on the other
hand, you must be frank with me. After you left me this morning, I was
told you had still parents alive. Is that true?"

"Did you think I had deceived you?" cried Musgrave, quickly.

Mortification and shame and sudden resentment flushed his face. "But you
don't know me, to be sure!" he exclaimed, with a passionate tone of
pain; "and yet, though I don't know you, I care for your opinion. I
have not come to ask anything from you, Colonel Sutherland--I have
already made up my mind what to do; but, at best, you must know that I
have not deceived you. I have a mother, and yet I have not a
mother--that is the only entire bond of nature remaining to me. She made
a second marriage, and gave me up to my godfather so long ago, that I
scarcely remember the time--her husband made my only visit to her so
disagreeable, that I have never repeated it, and I believe never shall.
She has a family of whom I know nothing, and has forgotten and forsaken
me. I appeal to you, then, whether I was not right in saying that I had
no friends?"

"I felt sure it would turn out something of the kind," said the Colonel,
heartily. "What, my boy, are you affronted with me? Come, that is
foolish--sit down and forgive me. Perhaps you think a stranger like
myself has no right to ask such explanations; but I am old, and you are
young--that is, after all, the most primitive principle of authority. I
assure you, though you may not be quite pleased with me at this moment,
I am a much safer counsellor than the sergeant--the old rogue! Draw your
chair to the table, take a glass of wine, and let me hear what you are
going to be about. I heard of an old exploit of yours from my niece,
Susan Scarsdale, to-day."

"From whom?" asked Musgrave, with a little surprise.

"From my niece--you don't know her, I daresay," said the Colonel, whose
object was to put his visitor at ease; "but some one told her your name,
she says. An adventure of yours with a gipsy--do you recollect it--on
some of the roads near Lanwoth Moor?"

"Oh!--the young lady from----" Musgrave paused only in time to prevent
himself saying "the haunted house," which was a name very commonly
appropriated to Marchmain. The young man blushed a little, partly from
the mistake, partly from a very distinct recollection of the flattering
applause with which Susan clapped her hands at his achievement. He
might not have noticed her at all but for that sign of approbation; but
it is pleasant to be approved, especially in a rash and unorthodox
proceeding; and it is true that Roger had taken several occasions to
pass Marchmain after that occurrence, with a lingering inclination to
improve his acquaintance with that face; he never had any success in his
endeavour, but still, under the eyes of Susan's uncle he blushed in
spite of himself. "I recollect it very well," he said.

The Colonel saw his colour rise, and had not the slightest inclination
to pursue the subject.

"Yes, it was very natural, whether it was wise or not," said the
Colonel, with a smile, words which might refer equally well either to
the encounter with the mugger, or the curiosity about Susan, and which
his young companion unconsciously applied to the last. "I remember what
I should have done myself at your age; but you say you have made up your
mind. Will you let me ask how? for I think you might take more leisure
to do that at your age."

"The steed would starve in the meantime," said Musgrave, with a little
unnecessary vehemence. "Yes, I have made up my mind--but only as I had
done before seeing you, sir, this morning. You spoke very wisely, very
kindly. A man who had money, or friends, or skill, or anything in the
world to fall back upon ought to have listened to you. I feel grieved
that you should think, after so much kindness on your part, that I have
not considered your advice. I did consider it, Colonel, believe me, but
I have no alternative--I know nothing that I can be but a soldier. Don't
say anything to me, it will only increase my disgust at myself to be fit
for nothing else; and then, sir," said the young man, attempting to
smile, "there is no necessity for thinking of the barracks and the
sixpence a-day. I will take this other side of the question: young
fellows like me, they say in novels, never did better long ago. I'll be
a defender of my country, a servant of the Queen; a general is no
more."

"My poor boy!" said the Colonel, whom this "other side of the question"
had a pathetic effect upon, "you don't know the life of a common
soldier; and do you mean to tell me that in our days, with all our
progress and civilization, a young man with your advantages is fit for
nothing but this?"

"I might be a gamekeeper," said the youth, with a slight tremble of his
lip, "or I might be an emigrant--the last I should certainly choose if I
had anything to set out upon; but I don't care to run the risk of
blacking shoes or portering at the other side of the world, as the
newspapers say the penniless emigrants are reduced to often enough. No,
Colonel, I should not sit here, opposite you, a poor fellow, who will
never have the right to meet you on equal terms again; but I must 'list,
I have no alternative--I can only be what Providence and my education
have qualified me for. If I am nothing else, I can be honest, at least.
This is the only thing I am good for, and can reach to, therefore I have
given up grumbling about it. And _if_," said Roger, with the fire
blazing out of his eyes for a moment, one glance of youthful hope
through the darkness, "if chance or war should ever put it in a man's
power to rise, then look for me again!"

"My brave fellow!--my excellent lad!" cried the Colonel, "that is the
spirit for a soldier! A regiment of ye would subjugate the world! Give
me your hand, and keep your seat, boy! If you had 'listed already, does
that make you less a gentleman? But is there no help for it, think you?
Must you carry this soul to the ranks? By my word, I grudge it
sorely!--and that is much for an old soldier to say. Have you no
friends--I don't mean relatives--people that have known you in better
days, that would help in this pinch? In my young days the very
neighbours would have been moved to interfere, whether you would or
not. Yes, I believe you're proud; the noble spirit comes very seldom
without its attending demon. But look here, man--a heart that would be
quick to offer help should not be above receiving it. I am but a poor
man myself, or I warrant well you should not escape me, however loth
your grandeur might be. Here's the question; I speak to you boldly, as
your friend, offence or no offence. Had your godfather never a dear
friend that would stand by his heir? Tut! don't interrupt me--if you are
heir to little money, all the more reason you should be heir to the
love. Is there never a man in this country that for the kindness he
bears your late friend, or for affection to you, would hold you his hand
to mount you fair in your saddle, ere you set out on the world? Answer
me plainly and truly, young man--is there no such person in country or
town, within twenty miles of the place where you have lived all your
days?"

Musgrave had changed colour several times during this address, and
evidently hesitated much to answer. After close questioning, the Colonel
at last drew from him that one such friend did exist, but not within
twenty miles, in the person of a county baronet, a very dear friend of
his late godfather, who had, however, been absent from the district for
more than a year, and of whom, during that time, Roger had heard
nothing. He could not tell where he was to be found, and it was with
extreme reluctance that he confessed even his name, which was one
unknown to Colonel Sutherland. Having gone so far, the young man set
himself with all his might to combat the Colonel's idea of asking help
from anybody. He would not--could not--accept a service which he had no
prospect of ever being able to repay. He was determined not to enter the
world weighed down by a burden of obligation. Was it not better to enter
life a common soldier, with only himself to depend upon, he asked
vehemently, than to reach a higher level by the help of another, and
live with the shadow of assistance and patronage upon all his life?

"Would you choose to go through your life without assistance?" said
Colonel Sutherland, calmly, making a note in his pocketbook, and going
on with the conversation without looking up--"would you reject kindness
and friendship, and the hand of your neighbour? Have a care, young
man--the next step to receiving no help is giving none. Would you live
without the charities of life, you foolish boy? And what's to hinder you
entering life with a feeling of obligation? I would like to know a
nobler and a kindlier sentiment than honest manful gratitude. Can you
tell me a better? And how do you know you will never be able to repay
it? Do you debar yourself from ever helping another, when you accept
help yourself? Go away with your nonsense. I trust I am not the man to
advise any youngster against his honour. What do you say--a man is the
best judge for himself? No such thing, boy. Not when the man is twenty.
I will tell you what to do in the meantime--keep quiet for a week or
two, and leave the affair in my hands."

"But you do not know me. I may be deceiving you--telling you
lies--working on your goodnature, for my own advantage," exclaimed
Musgrave, with a voice which, between vexation and gratitude, and the
new hopes which, in spite of himself, began to gain ground upon him, was
almost inaudible.

"Eh?--I'm rather hard of hearing. I did not quite catch what you said,"
said Colonel Sutherland, bending towards him his deaf ear, with that
look of anxious, solicitous kindness and earnest attention which nobody
could resist.

The effect upon poor Roger was almost laughable in its pathos. He turned
red--he turned pale--he could hardly keep the tears out of his boyish
eyes; and, with a voice broken with emotion, shouted out his words so
loud and harsh, that the Colonel started back in alarm and surprise.

"You don't know me--I may be deceiving you!" cried the young man, with a
hurried and abrupt conclusion, singularly like a sob; and so hid his
face in his hands, unable to contain himself, disturbed out of all the
self-possession which thinly veiled the quick susceptibilities of grief.

The Colonel patted him gently on the arm with his kind hand.

"That is true," he said, with the simple wisdom of his pure heart, "very
true--you _might_ be deceiving me--but you _are_ not."




CHAPTER XVIII.


It is possible that Colonel Sutherland might have perhaps experienced a
little annoyance at himself next day, for having so completely taken up
and taken charge of the fortunes of his new _proteg�_. That, however,
did not give him half so much thought and perplexity as the other
question which this morning presented itself to him more immediately,
and demanded a settlement--How to meet, and what to decide upon for
Horace. This was a very different matter from the simple help which he
could offer frankly to the straightforward Musgrave; and all his doubts
of the previous night returned to him with fresh force, as he considered
the subject once more. He had not still an idea upon the matter. His
own thoughts as to the choice of occupations for a young man ran in
rather a circumscribed channel. The first thing which occurred to him
involuntarily was, of course, his own profession; and India naturally
associated itself to the old Indian officer with all hopes of
advancement--but there was something in Mr. Scarsdale's secret, whatever
it might be, which made Colonel Sutherland shake his head. "No, that
would never do," he said to himself; "he must be on the spot whatever
happens."

After that the Colonel thought of the learned professions of Medicine,
and the Church, which his acquaintance with Edinburgh kept foremost in
his mind--and shook his head over these also, concluding his nephew to
be too old to begin an elaborate course of study. Lagging a long way
after these, a faint and vague idea of "business" loomed through mists
upon the Colonel's mind; he was very well aware of all that it is
common to say of British commerce and enterprise--the vast concerns of
our trade, and the princely wealth of our merchants; but,
notwithstanding, knew as little about these great realities as it is
possible for a man brought up in a society innocent of trade, and
occupied all his life with the duties of an exclusive profession, to
know. He had not the slightest idea what it would be proper to do to
introduce a young man into "business." He had no influence to rely upon,
nor friend to turn to for enlightenment upon the matter. He began to
turn over in his mind the long roll of his allies and acquaintance--to
think who he could best apply to; when suddenly finding himself pass in
that review name after name of Scotch lawyers, in all their different
grades, from the "writer" to the advocate, a brilliant idea burst upon
him--the law!--it was evidently of all others the profession which
Horace Scarsdale was best fitted for. How strange that he should not
have thought of it before!

Somewhat reassured by this idea, the Colonel sat down to breakfast with
increased comfort. It was again a drizzly, uncomfortable day--by no
means the kind of day which one would choose to spend away from the
resources and solaces of home, in the dreary little parlour of a country
inn, with the _Fool of Quality_ on the table, and defunct winners of the
Oaks and Derby upon the walls. The Colonel stirred the fire, and
returned to his pink rasher of country bacon with a sigh. He thought of
his cosy sitting-room, warmly-curtained and carpeted, where all the
draughts were carefully extinguished with mats, and list, and sand-bags,
and from the windows of which he could see the noble Forth and the Fife
coast, always bright, attractive, and full of beauty to his eyes. He
thought of his books, companions of his life, and of the _Times_, which
was one of his very few personal indulgences, and which at that very
moment, all fragrant from the press in its post envelope, would be
lying on his table; and the Colonel, munching his bacon with teeth which
were not so perfect as they used to be, shrugged his shoulders as he
glanced out of the low parlour-window upon the wet houses opposite, and
the dim drizzle of rain. If it must be confessed, he thought of his
proposed walk to Marchmain, through five miles of that dreary, damp, and
dismal road, with a shiver, and terrible imaginations of rheumatism; yet
this room and the _Fool of Quality_ were not much more entertaining. And
he could not bear the idea of disappointing Susan, who, the old man was
pleased to think, would be watching for and expecting him. Then he
pleased himself with the thought of carrying Susan home with him, and
making her mistress and housekeeper of the house of his old age. He was
glad to escape from his perplexities about Horace by thinking of Susan.
There was no vexation nor doubt in the remembrance of the candid,
honest, affectionate girl, who answered so warmly to his fatherly
affections. Would her father give her up, even for a time, to her uncle?
Colonel Sutherland, remembering his interview with Mr. Scarsdale, did
not think it was likely; but he was young enough at heart, in spite of
probabilities, to take pleasure in the thought.

He had just finished breakfast, and the room was beginning to brighten
under the influence of a good fire, between which and the _Fool of
Quality_ the Colonel felt more drowsy than he thought it creditable to
be in the morning, when Horace made his appearance. The young man came
in with drops of rain shining all over his rough coat, and with muddy
boots, which he had taken no pains to clean before entering, and which
offended the Colonel's professional and natural fastidiousness. The
rain-drops flew over into his uncle's face as Horace threw off his coat.
The Colonel looked on with a mortified displeasure, wondering over
him;--he could not understand how it happened that so near a relation
of his own should have so little natural grace of manner or perception
of propriety. Accordingly, he looked very grave as he shook hands with
Horace. He could not enter immediately on the more important subject
between them; he could not help criticizing these lesser matters, and
thinking how he could manage to suggest an improvement without wounding
his nephew; for the Colonel, like other people, had his weaknesses, and
in his opinion a disregard of the ordinary proprieties showed a dulness
of heart.

As for Horace, he on his part showed no particular anxiety about the
question of the day--he was more inclined a great deal to draw his uncle
into conversation on general subjects connected with his past life, his
former visits to England, and the intercourse he formerly had with his
sister and her husband. To this conversation Horace himself contributed
a little description of their dinner-table on the previous evening,
which was indeed a very dismal picture, and could scarcely be
exaggerated. The Colonel shook his head over the story with pain and
distress, grieved for the facts, and still more grieved to know that
they rather gained than lost in bitterness by his nephew's recital. This
stimulated him to introduce the real subject-matter of the present
conference.

"It is natural enough, under all the circumstances, and I daresay
advisable as well," said the Colonel, "that you should wish to get away
as soon as possible. Then as to what you are going to do, Horace, I come
to the question under great difficulties. In the first place, when you
leave me to choose for you, it almost appears as if I were the person
sending you away, and not your own desire; and I have no object in
sending you away, you must be aware."

"What does it matter, uncle, how it appears, when we know exactly how
it _is_?" said Horace, with apparent impatience and real craftiness.

"That is very true, and the most sensible thing I have heard you say,"
said the unsuspecting Colonel. "Well then, Horace, my boy, there's
business. I don't know very well how to set about it, but no doubt we
could inquire; and I believe, for a man who desires to get on, there is
nothing equal to that."

"If a man has money to begin with, sir," said Horace. "No, uncle, I
detest buying and selling--_that_ will not do for me."

"Then you detest what many a better man than either you or I has
practised, Horace," said the Colonel, a little affronted. "And there is
my own profession. I have some little influence to serve a friend; but
to be a soldier--a real soldier--I don't mean a man of parades and
barracks, for at present you are not rich enough for that--requires a
strong natural inclination. No--I see your answer--that will not do
either; and indeed I think you're right. Then--I speak to you frankly,
Horace--I would not advise you, for instance, to think of the Church."

"Because I am not good enough," said Horace, feeling his pride wounded
by the suggestion, yet laughing with a contempt of the goodness which
could conform itself to that level; "and also, uncle, because I have no
education and no influence--that of course is impossible."

Colonel Sutherland could not help making an involuntary comparison
between Roger Musgrave's humble declaration of want of wit and want of
teaching, and this confession, which sounded the same in words. But
Horace made his avowal with all the egotistic confidence of a young man
who knew nothing of the world; and having never met his equals, in his
heart thought education a very trivial circumstance, and believed his
talent to be such as should triumph over all disadvantages. The Colonel
gave a little suppressed sigh in his heart, and said to himself that
nothing would show the boy his mistake--nothing but _life_.

"Well then, Horace," he cried, with sudden animation, remembering his
own brilliant idea, "what do you think of the _Law_? So far as I can
see, that is exactly the thing which is best suited to your genius--eh?
My wonder is that it should never have occurred to yourself. What do you
think of that, my boy?--the very thing for you, is it not?"

"The Law?" said Horace--"do you mean to make me an attorney, uncle?"

"I mean that you should make yourself anything that you may prove
yourself to have a talent for," said the Colonel. "What, boy! you must
have _some_ idea as to what you're good for--attorney, solicitor,
advocate--I am not particular for my part, but let it be something. It's
an honourable profession when it's exercised with honour: in my opinion,
it's the thing most suitable to your manner of mind. Eh?--don't you
think so now yourself?"

Horace leaned over the table with his elbows on it, and his chin
supported in his palms. It flashed upon him as he gazed into the air,
and thought with little goodwill over this project, that the
practitioners of the Law were men who knew everybody's secrets; that the
power of the profession lay in its craft, and the skill with which it
laid things together; that to lawyers, of all the different grades,
belonged especially the task of finding out, and of concealing
everything which it was for the interests of the rest of the world to
discover or to hide. This idea sent a little animation into his face; he
began to feel that this might really be congenial to the habits of his
mind, as his uncle said; and, at all events, he might thus be in the way
of discovering those secrets which affected his own life.

"The Law, like every other profession, requires study and time," said
Horace, with, at last, a sincere sigh; "and I have no chance of being
able to wait or to learn, uncle. No! it is impossible--my father will do
nothing for me. If I could be a clerk, or something, and pick up what
information I might," he continued, warming to the idea, as it seemed
more and more impracticable; "but, as for study, what can I do?"

"My dear boy," said the Colonel, warmly, "if you really feel that you
can go into this with all your mind, I will not hesitate to speak to
your father. I believe he has not been kind to you--but no father in the
world will sacrifice the future of his son for the sake of a trifling
sum of money, or a little trouble. No, Horace, you do your father
injustice. If you really can go into this--if you feel yourself ready to
give your whole might to it, and make thus a deliberate choice of your
profession, I feel sure he will not deny you the means. No, my boy--you
are wrong; trust to me; I will see him myself."

"I shall be very glad, uncle, if you will make the experiment," said
Horace; "but I know him better--he will do nothing for me. No!--he'd
rather see me an errand-boy or a street-sweeper, than help me to the
profession of a gentleman. I have known it for years; but still, if you
will take the trouble, and undergo the pain of asking him, of course I
can only be thankful. Try, uncle--I will not be disappointed if you
fail, and you will be satisfied. I can only say try."

"Yes; but my condition of trying is that you are resolved to go into
this, and think it a thing in which you can succeed," said the Colonel,
fixing his eyes anxiously on his nephew's face.

Horace did not look at him in return; but there was an animation and
eagerness unusual to it in his face--he was following out in
imagination, not a young man's vague, ambitious dreams, but a chain of
elaborate researches after the one secret which he could not discover,
and which haunted him night and day. "I do!" he exclaimed, with an
emphasis of sincerity and earnestness which delighted the Colonel, who
seized him by the hand, and promised, over and over again, to leave no
exertion untried which could obtain him his wish. Horace responded to
this with the best appearance of gratitude and cordiality which he could
manage to show, but with, in reality, a great indifference. He had no
hope whatever from his uncle's mediation, and was forming other and
secret plans in his own mind for his own object, which was not the same
as Colonel Sutherland's; for he did not dream of success in the
profession which he was about to choose, or of "scope for his talents,"
or any of those natural ambitions which occurred to the old soldier--but
had entirely concentrated his underground and cavernous thoughts upon
this new and unthought of mode, of carrying his personal inquiries out.

Having settled this matter to his great satisfaction, Colonel Sutherland
walked to the window and contemplated the weather: it had ceased to
rain, but the chill, damp, penetrating atmosphere was as ungenial as
ever; the roads were wretched, and he shuddered involuntarily to think
of that bare and miserable moor. However, the Colonel had already been
three days at Tillington; and did not admire his quarters sufficiently
to remain longer than he could help. Then this interview with his
brother-in-law, being eminently disagreeable, would be well over. He
hesitated, looked wistfully at his good fire, and with melancholy eyes
at the dark sky without; but, at last, taking courage, buttoned on his
great-coat, threw his cloak round him, took his stick in his hand, and
thus defended from cold and violence, took his way once more, Horace by
his side, to Marchmain.




CHAPTER XIX.


THE walk was not more agreeable than Colonel Sutherland foresaw it would
be--the return the old soldier actually failed of courage for. He
directed the gig to be sent for him, and so trudged upon his way without
the dreadful thought of retracing all his steps in an hour or two. When
they reached Marchmain there was no welcome vision of Susan at the
window to solace her uncle's fatigue. When Peggy admitted them it was
with an exclamation of surprise and half-indignation. "To think of
walking such roads, five miles on a day like this!" she cried, as she
bustled into the dining-room after them to refresh the smouldering,
half-dead fire. Peggy was by no means rejoiced that day to see Colonel
Sutherland. To the shame of her housewifery she remembered that she had
nothing in her larder which could be cooked readily for the visitor's
luncheon; and Peggy, like most other women of her years, country-bred,
was overpowered by shame at the idea of having "nothing to offer" to the
chance guest. Susan had gone upstairs, up to a garret room, the highest
of the house, to fetch Peggy some apples which were stowed there; and as
she was too high up to be able to hear the arrival of her uncle, Horace
went to seek her. Peggy gazed after him, pausing in her cares for the
fire, with a singular vexation.

"If that lad would but tell the truth--and all the truth," said Peggy;
"but he wunnot, Cornel--it's somegate in his blood. I warrant he never
told you a word how Miss Susan begged and prayed him to say you were
never to think to come; that you would catch cold and wet, and do
yoursel' an injury, as it was just like her to say, the thoughtful
thing. Na, says I to myself, as I saw him march away with his shut-up
face, the Cornel'll come or no come as his ain will bids, but Mr. Horace
has no mind to stop him; yet if ye'll believe me, he never said a word,
but let Miss Susan believe he would tell her messages every one."

"Never mind," said Colonel Sutherland--who, however, did mind a good
deal, as people generally do who use that expression--and who could not
help thinking that Susan's messages, had he ever received them, would
have turned the scale and kept him under cover that miserable day.
"Never mind, Peggy; I ought to take it as a compliment that Horace likes
my society so much. I wish I could carry my niece home with me, poor
child--eh? do you think her father would be likely to consent?"

"Eh, Mr. Edward, run not the risk of asking!" cried Peggy; "I'm no the
person to speak an evil word of him, no me--but he's unhappy himself, as
how do you think he can be other?--and he will not have happiness come
near his house. Eh, Cornel, honey, if ye could but beguile him to open
his heart! I knowed him a boy, and I knowed him a young man, and I
knowed him in the mistress's time, but, sir, though he had his faults,
and I would not deny them, all the days of his life, you would not
reckonise him now; and all along o' that weary ould man!"

"Hush, Peggy! we must not blame those that are gone," said the gentle
Colonel; "they are in other hands than ours; but it has been a
melancholy business altogether. Horace, do you know, wishes to leave
home and begin the world for himself."

"And the sooner the better, Cornel!" cried Peggy; "the lad will be clean
ruined, root and branch, if he bides here. I would give all the pennies
I've gathered all my life to see him safe out of that door, though he's
a strange lad, is Mr. Horace. Hoosht, they're coming--listen, Cornel,"
said Peggy, stretching up to the Colonel's ear, that she might whisper
this last communication--"Don't you be afeard about Miss Susan. I've
that confidence in the Lord, I believe the poor chyild will fall to your
hands, Mr. Edward, when the time comes; but, Lord bless you, Cornel,
she's no more like her brother nor the tares is like the corn. Her
heart's as sweet as a rose--nothing in this world can kill the good
that's in that unfortinate infant, but Death itself. Hoosht, here they
are coming!--she's just the delight of an ould woman's eyes--ay, there
she is!"

The Colonel heard this speech very imperfectly, understanding just
enough of it to know that Susan was commended, and nodding his kind head
in pleased acquiescence; but when Peggy ended her oration by crying
"There she is!" Uncle Edward turned round to greet his niece, who came
running up to him out of breath. Susan was sorry, shocked, surprised,
and delighted--but underneath all her flutter the Colonel, whose vision
was quick when those whom he loved were concerned, saw at a glance that
her eyes were red, and that even her joy in seeing him was made
half-hysterical by some other sentiment lying under it, which she did
not wish him to see. This contradiction of feeling, new and unusual to
her, made Susan unlike herself. Her manner was hasty and agitated--she
laughed as if to keep herself from crying. Colonel Sutherland looked at
her with silent distress and sympathy. What new development of trouble
had appeared now?

"Why did you come?" cried Susan. "I wanted Horace to carry a note, and
he would not; but he promised to tell you what I said. And your
rheumatism, uncle--I am so distressed to think you should have come all
this way for me."

"But suppose I did not come all this way for you?" said Colonel
Sutherland. "Don't you think my visit is too important to be all for a
little girl? No, my love, I should have come for you whether or not--but
to-day, I mean, if possible, to see your father."

Peggy had left the room, and Horace had not yet entered it: the two were
alone together.

"To see papa!" cried Susan, with a look of dismay, clinging suddenly to
her uncle's arm, and looking up in his face. "Oh, uncle, not to-day!"

"And why not to-day, my dear child?" said the Colonel, tenderly; "what
has happened to-day? You have been crying, Susan. Can you tell why that
was?"

With his kind eyes searching into her face, and his tender arm
supporting her, Susan could not keep up her feint of good spirits; she
faltered, cast down her eyes, tried to speak, and then fell unawares
into a passion of youthful tears--hot, angry, indignant, rebellious
tears--the first overflow of personal mortification, injury, and wounded
feeling--tears too warm and too plentiful to blight or kill. The Colonel
soothed her and bent over her with alarm and anxiety--he was almost too
much interested to be a good judge of the depth of her suffering, and
for the first moment thought it much more serious than it was.

"Papa called me into the study to-day; he said that you--I mean he said
that I was careless of him, and did not do what I ought," said Susan,
who had evidently changed her mind, and substituted these words for some
others injurious to her uncle. "He said I loved you better in three days
than I had loved him for all my life. Oh, uncle, can I help it?--is it
my fault?--for nobody until now ever loved me!"

"Hush, my dear child!--is that all?" said Colonel Sutherland. "Come,
come, do not cry--I daresay you were thinking of something else at
breakfast, and forgot what you were about--perhaps Letty. He will soon
forgive you, my love. Sometimes I have a row with my Ned when he is at
home. Don't cry, my dear child."

"Ah, uncle, but you don't understand it," cried poor Susan, rather
disappointed to have her sorrow undervalued; "he wanted me
not--not"--and here with a great burst the truth came out--"not to keep
your presents--nor to see you--nor to write to you--nor anything: he
said he would not permit it; he said I belonged to him, and so I think
he believes. I do, uncle," cried Susan, with fire and indignation, "like
a table or a chair!"

"Hush, my child! I wonder why he objects to me, Susan," said the
Colonel, with a little grieved astonishment. "And what did you say?"

"I said I would not, uncle--I could not help it!" cried Susan, with
another burst of tears. "I never disobeyed him in my life before; but I
was very obstinate and stubborn. I know I was. I said I _would not_ do
what he told me. I can't! I will not! I will stay in Marchmain, and
never seek to go away. I will do everything else he tells me. I will
work like Peggy, if he pleases; but I _will_ write to you, uncle, and
see you whenever I can, and love you always. Oh! uncle, uncle, do not
you be angry with me too!"

"I!" said Uncle Edward, his voice faltering, "my poor dear,
child!--I!--if I only could carry you home with me, Susan! It is hard to
think I have given you more, instead of less to suffer. Ah, Susan, if I
could but take you home with me!"

Susan dried her eyes, comforted by the words. "I must not hope for that,
uncle," she said, with more composure; "and indeed I could not leave
papa, either. He is very unhappy, I am sure. If I only knew what to do
for him! And I don't want him to think me stubborn and undutiful. He is
angry, and disturbed, and strange this morning. I never saw him so
before. Do not speak to him to-day."

"Would it be better to-morrow?" said Colonel Sutherland. "No, Susan,
especially after what you told me. I must not stay here longer than I
can help, and I must see your father before I go; it is about Horace, my
love. I have promised to speak of his wishes. I did not know," cried
Colonel Sutherland, with a little mortification, "that I should hurt his
cause by pleading it; but I ought to see him at anyrate. No, I cannot
submit to this without any appeal. I have lived in his house, and eaten
his bread, and had never a moment's dispute with him. It is impossible;
there must be some mistake."

And Colonel Sutherland went to the window, and stood looking out, with
his eyebrows puckered, and his hands behind him; while Susan, drying her
eyes again, went to stir the neglected fire. Everything was cold,
meagre, uncomfortable, and the poor girl's restless curiosity, eager to
prove her devotion to himself, yet glancing now and then with terror at
the door, as if she feared her father's appearance, and a scene of
strife, was not lost upon the Colonel. He stood for some time in
silence, considering the whole matter, vexed, and mortified, and
indignant, yet feeling more of honest pain for the position of the
household, and for unfortunate recluse himself, than offence in his own
person. Then, without saying anything to Susan, the old soldier marched
silently towards the study-door. It was necessary now, to say what had
to be said, at once.




CHAPTER XX.


Mr. Scarsdale was alone in the study, where he passed his recluse life.
The fire burned low in the grate, the red curtains hung half over the
window, the atmosphere was close and stifling. He sat in his usual seat,
with the invariable book before him. But though it was hardly possible
for him to be more pale, there was something in the colour of his face,
in the rigidity of his attitude, which betrayed a smothered passion and
excitement exceeding his wont. When Colonel Sutherland knocked at the
door, he got up with a kind of convulsive haste, stepped towards it at
one hasty stride, and opened it. He thought it might be Susan, returned
to make her submission. When he saw his brother-in-law, Mr. Scarsdale
gazed at him with undisguised amazement and a sullen rage. He stood
facing the Colonel, holding the door, but without inviting or even
permitting him to enter. "I have something important to say to you,"
said the old soldier--"permit me to come in. I shall not detain you."
Then the recluse stepped back suddenly, opening the door wide, but
without uttering a word. Colonel Sutherland went in, and the door was
closed upon him; they stood opposite each other, looking in each other's
faces. The Colonel, with a grieved surprise and appeal in his look, the
other with his head bent, and nothing but sullen, smothered passion in
_his_ face. Two men more unlike never stood together in this world. For
the first moment not a word passed between them, but their looks, full
of human motion and painful life, made the strangest contrast in the
silence, with the motionless, dreary quiet of this stifling room.

After this pause, natural wonder and impatience seized the Colonel; he
could not resist the impulse of trying to right himself--to right his
brother-in-law--to recover if possible a natural position. "Robert!" he
exclaimed, suddenly, with unpremeditated warmth and emotion, "why is
this?--what have I done to you?--is there any reason why you cannot
receive me as of old?"

"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Scarsdale, with a formal inclination of
his head. "My life and all my habits differ very widely from yours. I
have long made a rule against admitting strangers into my house. My
circumstances are peculiar, as you are aware--perhaps my dispositions
are peculiar too."

"But, for heaven's sake!" cried the Colonel, who found this repulse not
so decisive as he had feared--"why shut out _me_?"

Once more the solitary man bowed, with a sarcastic respect. "Again, I
beg your pardon; but it does not follow," said Mr. Scarsdale, with a
smile, which would have been insulting, but that it trembled with
unreasonable passion, "that a man's own favourable opinion of himself is
shared by all the world."

The Colonel looked at him with a hasty, astonished glance, a look of
compassion and surprise, which wounded the pride of his companion to the
quick.

"Well, then," cried the master of Marchmain, "I decline to receive
you--your society is disagreeable to me. Is not that enough?"

"That is perfectly enough," said Colonel Sutherland; "now, I have only
my commission to discharge, and I am grieved I should have made so
unfavourable a beginning. I come to you on behalf of your son."

"Of my son!--oh! and of my daughter also, I presume! You would wish me
to bring her 'out,' and give parties for her--perhaps you would like her
to have a season in London?" said Scarsdale, with his trembling lip,
and the forced smile of his passion--"is there anything else I can do
for you?--for, as it happens, I choose to take Susan into my own hands."

"I say nothing of Susan," said the Colonel, gravely; "if you choose to
debar the poor child from all the pleasures of her youth, it is not for
me to interfere. She is in God's hands, who will guide her better than
either you or I. I come to you from your son. Horace is a man grown,
very nearly of an independent age, clever, ambitious, and at that time
of life when youths would fain see the world and act for themselves; do
you think it right to keep him here without occupation or training, in
the most precious years of his life? I come to you with a humble
entreaty from the young man, that you will give him your permission and
help to set forth upon the world for himself."

"That is admirable!" said Mr. Scarsdale--"my permission and help? This
is the first time I have heard of the faintest desire on his
part;--nay, I do not believe that he does desire it--you have made it up
among you; and no doubt you have settled the manner as well as the fact.
What profession, pray, does my clever son mean to devote himself to?"

"He wishes to study law," said the Colonel, laconically.

"Law?--to read for the bar, I presume?" said the father; "to have
chambers in the Temple, and the pleasures of _his_ youth. It is vastly
well, Colonel Sutherland--I admire your project greatly--he has my
_permission_ by all means; as for my _help_, I do not need to inform you
what kind of claim this young man has upon me. Is it likely I should
take my straitened means, from my own comfort and my daughter's, to
support _him_ in luxury and idleness?--is it probable, do you think,
that I will make a sacrifice for him? Can you look me honestly in the
face and ask it of me?"

"I trust so," said the Colonel, with a little sadness. "Scarsdale, we
are both fathers--we ought to be able to understand each other; is it
necessary to weigh the nature of claims, the probabilities of temper,
when one appeals to a father for the future life of his son?"

"My son's future life," said Mr. Scarsdale, vindictively, "is quite
independent of me. Had there been any nature left in our mutual position
things might have been different. No! my son has no need to betake
himself to a profession--he is quite above the necessity. Should I
accelerate the time when he shall come to his fortune? Should I beg your
prayers--for I remember you are pious--that he may enter speedily upon
his inheritance? I thank you. I do not profess to be quite so
disinterested. No, let him wait!--let him take his share of the evils of
mankind. Must _I_ deny myself to smooth his path for him, and give him
roses for my thorns? It would be the conduct of a fool. No, I repeat he
has no need for a profession--let him wait! I support him--is it not
enough?"

"Too much!" cried Colonel Sutherland; "you must perceive that it would
be ten times better for him to support himself, to labour for himself,
instead of embittering his life in this forced idleness here. Why should
he be a burden on you at all, at his years? Though he does not
ultimately require a profession, to have one would be his salvation now.
You are a hale and healthy man, in spite of all you do to yourself--you
have twenty years to live before you attain the limited age of man. Can
you think of this unfortunate boy living here as he lives now, in utter
ignorance of the fortune which waits him, till he is forty? Think of it,
I implore you! It has lasted long enough--too long, Scarsdale. Think, if
you have human bowels, human mercy in you, of the extraordinary fate to
which you destine your only son. Suppose him growing into maturity, into
full manhood, to years in which you had the world at your feet and
children at your knees; yet kept in darkness, kept in bitterness, idle,
solitary, able to think of nothing but of the injury that has been done
to him; until, all at once, you are struck down in extreme desolate old
age--and wealth, which is no longer anything to him, wealth which will
disgust him, falls into his hands. What! you turn away--you will not
have that event even mentioned? What are you thinking of? Is a miserable
heap of money of more importance to you than the welfare of your son?"

"Upon my word," said Mr. Scarsdale, turning away with a violent colour
on his face, and an exclamation of disgust, "I see no reason in the
world why I should study the welfare, as you call it, of my son."

"You do not--and you can say so?" cried the Colonel, in loud and stern
astonishment.

"I do not, and I can say so, and without raising my voice," said the
other, with a sneer. "My son, I beg to tell you once again, is provided
for. I give him food and clothing--he has nothing else to hope or to
expect from me."

"This is all then that you have to say?" said Colonel Sutherland; "you
will not assist him to make his life honourable and useful? Will you
explain to him why you decline doing so?--will you tell him that his
future is so secured, that a profession is unnecessary to him? Do the
boy some justice--let there be a natural explanation between you. You
cannot expect him to go on in this way for years. Could you wish it? I
beseech you, either tell him how matters stand, or help him to carry out
his most lawful and virtuous wish! Will you do one or the other? I
beseech you, tell me!"

"I tell you no!" said Mr. Scarsdale. "Let the dog wait! I will neither
put myself in his power, nor help him to the best means of spying out my
secret. No! Have I spoken distinctly?--he shall have neither confidence
nor assistance from me!"

"Is it possible?" cried the Colonel, driven to an extremity of mingled
wonder, indignation, and pity; "for the sake of your own exasperated
feelings, _can_ you make up your mind to revenge yourself, by ruining
this unhappy lad, your only son, for ever?"

"I beg your pardon--this unhappy lad is very well off," said his
extraordinary father; "so well off, that I certainly do not find myself
called upon to do any more for him--although," said Mr. Scarsdale, with
a glance of bitterness upon the kind, anxious face which bent towards
him, "I am aware that to help a man who does not require help is
understood to be the way of the world."

The Colonel's weather-beaten face flushed high with angry colour; he was
surprised and grieved and wounded to his heart, but he had still and
always this advantage over his adversary, that the unkindest insinuation
which Scarsdale could make made his brother-in-law only the more sorry
for him, and wrought more grief than passion in his mind. After the
first moment he looked wistfully into the face of his former friend,
with a compassionate and troubled amazement, which, little though the
Colonel intended it, roused his companion to fury. "How you must be
changed!" he said, sadly, "to be able to say such words to me;" and
Colonel Sutherland sighed as he spoke, with the hopeless patience of a
man who sees no means of bringing good out of evil. The sigh, the tone,
and the look wound up the recluse into the utmost rage; he made a wild
imperative gesture and exclamation--for his voice was choked with
fury--and opened the door violently. It was thus that Colonel
Sutherland's appeal and hopes for Horace concluded; he left the study
without another word.




CHAPTER XXI.


"Yes, Susan, I am going away presently, and I fear I shall not see you
again either," said Colonel Sutherland, with a cheerfulness which he was
far from feeling--"that is, not _this_ time, my love; but there is
plenty of time, if it be the Lord's will, Susan. You are very young, and
I am not very old. We are tough, we old Indians; we wear a long time,
and we shall meet, my dear child, I don't doubt, many happy days."

Susan looked up to him with inquiring eyes--with eyes, indeed, so full
of inquiry that he thought she must have spoken, and put his hand to his
ear. "No, uncle, I did not say anything," cried Susan, touched by that
gesture almost out of her self-possession. The poor girl turned away
her head and rubbed her eyes with her trembling fingers, to send back
the tears. When might eyes so tender shine in that forlorn solitude
again? It was impossible to look at the old man, with his solicitous
kindness, his anxious look of attention, and even the infirmity which
threw a tenderness and humility so individual and characteristic upon
his whole bearing, in the thought of, perhaps, never seeing him again,
without emotion. It was to Susan as if the sunshine was departing. He
might go away, she might never see him again, but nothing could
obliterate the effect of that three days visit; nothing in the world
could make Susan what she was when this week began. She did not know how
it was, but the fact was indisputable; her undisturbed and unsusceptible
content was over for ever. Was it good for Susan? She did not ask the
question, but rubbed back the tears, and stood close to her uncle,
intent upon hearing the last words which he might have to say, and
vowing to herself that she would not grieve him by crying--not if she
should faint or die the moment he was gone.

Such resolutions are hard to keep. When the Colonel laid his kind hand
upon her head, Susan trembled over her whole frame. Her unshed
tears--the youthful guilty anger provoked by her father, which still
palpitated in her heart--which the poor child could not overcome, yet
felt to be wrong; and the unusual agitation of this crowd of diverse
feelings, very nearly overcome her. Her cheeks grew crimson, her lips
and her eyelids trembled, yet she controlled herself. And Uncle Edward
was still making light of the injury to himself--still accepting his
repulse as something natural and spontaneous; it moved her to an
indignation wild, impetuous, and unlike her character; but there was no
blame on the Colonel's lips.

"Some time or other you will come to my little house, and see the
country where your mother was born," said Uncle Edward; "we shall not
know what to make of you when we get you there--you will be queen and
princess, and do what you please with us. Yes, I hope after a time your
father will consent to it, my love. He is rather angry just now, but
time will soften that down. And remember, Susan, you must make the best
and not the worst of everything. Horace does that last, you know, and
'one wise body's enough in a house,' as we say in Scotland; you must be
the foolish one, my little Susan, and always hope; everything will turn
out well, under the blessing of God."

"I hope so, uncle," said Susan, with an involuntary sob.

"Perhaps, my dear child, I ought to say you must obey your father, and
not write to me," said Uncle Edward--"but I am not quite virtuous enough
for that; only always do it honestly, Susan--never conceal it from
him--and stop if it should make you unhappy, or you find it out to be
wrong in your own conscience. However, I shall write to you in any
case. My boy Ned will want to come and see you, I fear, before he leaves
the country. You must always remember that you are of great importance
to us, Susan, though we have not the first claim on you. You are the
only woman in the family; you represent all those who are gone, to me,
my little girl. Hush! do not cry--you must be very strong and
courageous, for all our sakes."

"I am not crying!" cried Susan, with a gasp of fervent resolution,
though she could scarcely articulate the words.

"That is right, my darling," said the Colonel. "Now, don't let us think
any more about it, Susan. We shall hear from each other constantly, and
some time or other I'll show you Inveresk, and Edinburgh, and your
mother's country; and in the meantime, you will be cheerful and brave
like yourself. Now tell Peggy to bring me some bread and cheese, my
love--I am going to be grand to-day; my carriage is coming for me
presently. Where is Horace? I must see him before I go--call him here,
Susan, and order me my bread and cheese."

Susan was very glad, as her uncle suspected, to run out of the room for
a moment, and deliver herself of the sob with which she was choking.
When she was gone, Colonel Sutherland looked sadly round him upon the
dreary apartment, to which the agitation of this day had given a more
than usually neglected and miserable appearance. He shook his head as he
glanced round upon those meagre walls, and out to that bare moor, which
was the only refuge for the eye. He thought it a terrible prison for a
girl of seventeen, unsweetened by any love or society. He thought that
even the departure of Horace, though he was not much of a companion to
his sister, would aggravate her solitude; and involuntarily the old man
thought of his own bright apartments at Inveresk, and wondered, with a
natural sigh, over the strange problems of Providence. Had Susan been a
child of his own, saved to him from among the many dead, what a
different lot had been hers!--but here was this flower blossoming in
the desert, where no one cared for its presence--and _his_ hearth was
solitary. He did not repine or complain--ingratitude had no place in his
tender Christian soul, but he sighed and wondered at the bottom of his
heart.

In a few minutes Horace joined him. Horace did not care to form the
third of a party which included his uncle and his sister. Their
friendship annoyed him, he could not tell how; it was an offence to
Horace that they seemed to understand one another so entirely; far
superior as he thought himself, he was conscious that neither the one
nor the other was intelligible to him. He came, however, with a little
excitement on hearing that the Colonel had been with his father,
expecting little, yet curious, as he always was about everything, done
and said, by his perennial and lifelong antagonist. When he entered the
room Colonel Sutherland held out his hand to him with an affectionate
sympathy, which he accepted with astonishment, and not without a passing
sneer in his mind at the idea of being consoled, either for such a
supposititious disappointment, or in such a manner. It was with a
feeling very different from a young man's anxiety to know his fate, or
expectation of a decision which should influence his life, that he
waited to hear what his uncle had to say.

"I am sorry to tell you, Horace, you have judged more correctly than I
did," said the Colonel, with hesitation; "I find, to my great
disappointment, that your father is not disposed to assist you, my dear
boy. I don't know what to say about it--it appears that he has taken
some erroneous idea into his mind about myself. I'm afraid the advocate
hurt the cause, Horace. If some one else spoke to him, perhaps--; but
however that might be, to my great concern and astonishment, he has
quite refused me!"

"Don't trouble yourself about it, uncle; I knew how it would be," said
Horace, his eyes lighting up with the unnatural contention which had
pervaded his life. "It was not the advocate, but the cause which was
hopeless. What did he say?"

"He said--some things which had much better remained unsaid. He was
affronted with me," said Colonel Sutherland; "but he gives his
_permission_, Horace--not assistance, remember, but still
permission--that is always something; he seems to have no _objection_
that you should follow your own course, and do what you can for
yourself."

"That is very kind of him," said Horace, with a smile; "but I rather
think I never should have asked his leave, but for your hopes of help
from him, which I never shared. I suppose he was amazed at the idea that
I should expect anything from him. I daresay he appealed to you why he
should take his own narrow means to support an idle vagabond like me.
Ah! he did!--I could have sworn he would!"

"Nay, Horace," said the Colonel, who had been struck unawares by the
correctness of his nephew's guess; "what is the use of imagining unkind
words, which most likely were neither spoken nor intended? The fact is
simple--your father does not think a profession is essential to you; he
thinks that--that you will most probably have enough without. In short,
he does not feel called upon to assist you; but at the same time,
remember, Horace, he puts no obstacle in the way. All is not lost yet,
my boy: I must try whether I can do anything. I am not rich, I have
little to spare, but I have friends, and there are some people who might
be interested in you. Wait a little, Horace--leave it to me, and we will
see what can be done. I would not be discouraged; there are more ways
than one of doing everything in this world."

"You may trust to _me_, uncle, that I certainly will not give up my own
intention because my father declines to assist it--everything is safe
enough so far," said Horace; "as for anything great, you know, study and
that sort of thing, I give that up as impossible--I did so from the
first. I will never be a great lawyer, uncle; but I daresay I'll learn
enough for my own ends."

"Your own ends!--I don't understand you, Horace," cried the Colonel,
somewhat alarmed at the expression of his nephew's face, and for perhaps
the first time in his life suspecting something of double meaning in the
words he heard.

"Have I not to work for my own living?--to support myself, uncle?" cried
Horace, turning round upon him with a bitter emphasis.

"Very well, my lad, what then?" said Colonel Sutherland, with
dignity--"is there anything very terrible in that? The best men in the
world have had to work for their living. I am sorry for you that you
cannot get the freedom of using your powers, and proper advantages for
their cultivation; but I assure you, Horace, I am _not_ sorry for you on
the ground that you must support yourself."

"To be sure not," said Horace, with a little secret mortification; "but
it is therefore I say that I will learn law enough for my own ends."

Once more the Colonel looked at him doubtfully, pondering the peculiar
and unnecessary emphasis with which the young man pronounced these
words. Colonel Sutherland perceived, in spite of his unsuspicious
nature, that there was a gleam in the eye, and a sudden animation in the
manner of Horace, which referred to something different from the calm
means of sustenance, or the knowledge sufficient to secure it. Something
vindictive and eager was in his look. The Colonel probably thought it
better not to inquire too closely into it, for he turned away from
Horace with a sigh.

Perhaps it was a relief to them all when the gig arrived at last, and
Colonel Sutherland bade farewell to Marchmain. The old man was troubled
because he trusted his niece, and knew that she would not deceive his
expectations; and he was troubled because he could _not_ trust his
nephew, and did not feel at all warranted in undertaking for him. While
Horace, for his part, brooded with renewed anger, though he professed
to expect it, over his father's refusal of assistance, and was tired of
amusing Colonel Sutherland by a show of good humour, all the more when
his uncle seemed unlikely to be of much service to him; and the
difficulty with which Susan kept her composure, and the unusual tumult
of personal feeling in which the poor child felt herself, made the
continued effort almost too much for her. The gig arrived at last. The
Colonel said his last good-bye, and drove away from the inhospitable
door which he had seen for the first time three days ago, leaving Susan,
Horace, and Peggy outside, watching his departure, and waving farewells
to him; and leaving, besides that external demonstration, a revolution
in the house, and, for good or for evil, the germs, to these two young
people, of a new world.




CHAPTER XXII.


The Colonel drove away, out of sight of Marchmain and its moor, with
thoughts many and troubled. This visit, which he had undertaken with so
much simplicity of intention, had already thrown a disturbing influence
into his life; he went away, bearing on his own very heart and
conscience the burden of an unmanageable boy, and a girl neglected and
suffering. An unmanageable boy! The Colonel summed up his
non-comprehension of the character of Horace in these uncomplimentary
words, and it was his first experience of the kind. He had never learned
to doubt the honest common-places about youthful openness and candour
which good hearts, like his own, receive and repeat so authoritatively.
He could have laid down rules to any one, with a little mild dogmatism,
and a world of kindness, for the management of "the young;" and would
have told you, with affectionate complaisance, and not without an idea
that judicious training had much to do with it, that his Addiscombe
cadet had never given him a moment's anxiety. That was very true of
honest Ned, to whom nature had given, not her fairy wealth of genius,
but something safer; her gift of competency, if one may use the
expression--a sincere, straightforward, sagacious soul--a judgment wise
without knowing it, and true by instinct, to which craft or concealment
were things impossible. Colonel Sutherland, "with his experience," as he
said, did not believe in the youthful mystics, the Manfreds and Werters.
He smiled in his kindly superiority and said, "Youth at bottom was very
consistent in its inconsistencies, and very manageable if you took pains
enough, and knew the right way." The Colonel was a little mortified,
accordingly, to be obliged to conclude that he knew very little of
Horace, and that his nephew baffled him. It put him out in his
calculations--it spread a certain doubt over the whole fair face of
nature, and left an ache in the old man's unsuspicious heart. He could
not persuade himself to condemn, and therefore troubled his mind with
the idea that he could not possibly understand.

It was early evening when the little vehicle reached the top of the
slope from which the road descended to the village; and the twinkling
lights in the shallow vale beneath, the hum of sound, the twilight calm
through which the Colonel, whose eyes were equal to any practicable
distance, though "small print" somewhat troubled them, recognized the
different points of his morning and evening walks--filled the old man
with a strange sensation of familiarity and friendship. Already, though
he had been here so short a time, he knew the place, remembered the
hedge-rows and the trees, could tell where was the best point of view,
was able to distinguish from a distance the principal houses in the
village, and could even recollect where the green primrose leaves lay
warmest, and were likely to be first unrolled and spread into the light
by the spring sun. Somehow, unawares to himself, the kind old man, with
his warm natural sympathy, had established a certain connection with
this unknown place. Here was Kennedy, his old companion-in-arms; here
was young Musgrave, whom the Colonel seemed to have somehow adopted, in
spite of himself, as the type of what Horace should have been, and in
whom he had interested himself with an inexplainable rapidity and
rashness which appeared very odd when he thought of it, though it was
extremely natural. He recollected now that this second _proteg�_ must be
looked after and seen this evening. The Colonel had become quite a man
of affairs since he came to Tillington. All this time, occupied as he
was by his own thoughts, the drive had been a very silent one--so much
so, that honest John Gilsland, who had driven the gig himself in hopes
of an opportunity of displaying his wisdom to "the Cornel," had been
much disappointed of his expectations. John was supposed to play second
fiddle in his own house; the "missis" had not so much respect for his
talents and sagacity as became a wife, and the good man proportionately
esteemed the chances of letting loose his opinions out of doors; and was
especially anxious that "the Cornel" should not leave Tillington without
being aware of his host's superiority. The honest fellow had been
maundering on for some time about the houses which they passed before
some chance words caught the Colonel's attention. He turned round rather
sharply with the sudden "Eh!" of a mind pre-occupied. John Gilsland
started so much, that he startled the mare, who tossed her head and
winced, and showed inclinations "to mak' a boult of it," as her master
said. This occurred, as it happened, near the spot where the Colonel had
discovered Kennedy and his hare on the previous night. He raised
himself with a little alarm, and peered into the darkness over the
bushes, doubting that some concealed movement of the old poacher must
have been the occasion of the mare's start. However, there was nothing
to be seen behind the hedge, and John Gilsland recommenced his
monologue, to which the Colonel now gave his ear, with a flattering
attention which won his landlord's heart.

"As far as you can see--not that that's so far as might be wushed at
this hour o' the nicht," said John, "was th' ould Mr. Musgrave's land,
Cornel. Yon'er's the house, sir, amidst of a bit of wood--guid tim'er
and ould, and a credit to the place. D'ye see the pair bit dribble o'
smoke, Cornel?--th' ould chimneys puffed i' another fashion when the
Squire was to the fore. There wasn't six days i' the twelve-month but
there was coompany at the Grange, and a sight of fine folks wance or
twicest in the year, like in September and the shooting saison. But ye
cannot both eat your cake and have your cake, Cornel. There's this coom
of it, that the siller's a' puffed away; and the young heir, poor lad,
he's left destitute; and the more's the pity, for a more affable
gentleman than Mr. Roger never carried a gun. That's him that coom to
see yourself, sir, the last nicht--ye would be a friend o' his family,
it's like?--for he's no of this parish born."

"Was the young man related to the Squire?--his godfather, I know--but
they seem to be of the same name," said the Colonel; "he is a fine young
fellow--he will have many friends, I presume, in the families
hereabout."

"Ye see, Cornel," said John Gilsland, dropping the reins upon the mare's
neck, and suffering her to fall into almost a walking pace, as he saw
himself at last appreciated, "it makes an uncommon difference when a man
gets shot of his siller. There was a time when Mr. Roger was foremost
favourite mony's the place; but wan house ye see, there's a parcel o'
young ladies, and what if wan o' them took a fancy to him? They're
tender-hearted, them girls--they're just as like as no to fa' in love
with a man, for the reason that's he's misfortinate. I've seen a young
lad myself that lost a' he had, and was prosecooted by the women for
ne'er anither reason that I could see. Then anither place you see
there's a regiment o' sons, and my leddy wants a' the influence she can
wun, fair means or foul, for her owen prodgedy; and another place,
they've little enough themsels, and cannot afford to keep friends with
wan that has not a penny--and that's how it stands, Cornel, on the
whole. If he had th' ould Squire's estate, he'd ha' loads o' friends."

"Poor fellow!" said the Colonel, shrugging his shoulders, half with
compassion, half with disgust--he was not very well acquainted with this
phase of human nature. Nobody had ever suspected him of being rich, and
he remembered, with a half smile, quickly followed by a sigh, the
gleeful opposition to established authority, with which young Edward
Sutherland, ensign or lieutenant, returned to the charge, when repulsed
by a prudent mamma from the vicinity of her daughters. But he soon
reverted with ready sympathy to the woes of the disinherited. "This
Squire must have been a very imprudent man," he said, "or a very
heartless one. Had he no regrets to leave the young man penniless?"

"Hoosht, Cornel!--Mr. Roger, sir, he's wild if a man dare whisper a
word. He's broke with his acquaintance that he had, and the common sort
o' folks, sir, that were sorry for him, and ready to make friends if he
wushed--he's quarrelled with half the county, Cornel, because this wan
and the tither said their mind o' th' Squire. He wull not have a
reproach of him, not a word. He took even mysel' down as fast, I thought
the nose was off my face, for saying, in an innocent way, that th'
Squire was very free with his money when he had it, and so was seen on
him. I would not say, but it's all the better of him, to stand up for
wan as cannot stand up for himself no more. And I ne'er knew a man as
was deceived in Mr. Roger, Cornel--he's hasty, but he's true. He'll
gang in o' the auld wives' cots, and give the children pennies, but
never put an affront on a lass, or refused satisfaction to a man, as far
as ever I heard, all his born days."

"I am glad to know it," said the Colonel, with a little shiver,--"but we
are surely making very slow progress. What's happened to the mare? She
surely forgets that this is the road to her own stable. Eh?--a beast of
her good sense seldom does that."

"She's fresh, sir, fresh--she minds no more for her own stable nor I do,
Cornel. She's good for twenty mile and more, if there was the occasion,"
said John, caressing the animal with the end of his whip, but prudently
increasing her pace.

"And, by-the-bye, I have a question to ask you--Sir John Armitage? What
sort of a place has he?--is it near?--is he rich?--and where do you
think he is to be found?" said the Cornel rapidly, as they approached
near Tillington.

Once more the mare, much against her will, slackened her pace. "Ye see,
Sir John Armitage, Cornel," said John, raising his hand in explanatory
action, "he's wan of the great squires o' th' county. He wasn't born
tull't, as ye may say. He was an army gentleman, sir, such like as
yourself, and th' ould Sir John was as far off as his second cousin, a
dissolute man, without neither chick nor child. This wan, he's grey and
onmarried likewise--the title will gang, as it came, slantlike, to a
nevvy or a cousin. It's the park, Cornel, a grand mansion as is his
sait--but a desolate place, and him no more enjoyment in't nor me. Sir?
The mare? Oh ay, she's jogging on."

"It's rather cold for this pace, it appears to me," said the Colonel,
whose face, so much of it as was visible out of the cloak, was blue with
cold. "Hey? Halt then! Do you mean to upset us? What's the matter with
the beast now?"

"Na, Cornel, she's gane fast and she's gane slow, and nouther
pleases--it's none of her blame, puir brute," said John, with affected
humility. "I give her a taste o' the whip, and ye say I'll upset ye. Me!
I'm the safest driver in ten mile; and as for my mare--there she is--she
kens her gate hoam."

Where accordingly they arrived in a few minutes, and where the Colonel
got down frozen, and limped into the little parlour, where the blazing
fire comforted his eyes. But having been frozen stiff in the first part
of the road, and then jolted almost to pieces in the concluding gallop,
it was some time before his numb fingers had vigour enough to unloose
his cloak, and his lips to speak. The landlady brought in wine, pushed
it aside with a mild feminine imprecation upon the "cauld stuff," and
came back presently with a steaming goblet of brandy and water. The
Colonel was the most temperate of men, and had not had his dinner; but
the siren seduced him--and the first words he uttered, when the frost in
his throat began to melt, was an inquiry, which startled Mrs. Gilsland
out of her propriety, for an "Army List," if such a thing was to be had.

"An 'Army List!'--eyeh, Cornel, what's that?" said the good woman in
dismay.

"Are there any old officers about Tillington, Mrs. Gilsland? An 'Army
List' is simply a list of the army," said the urbane Colonel. "Do you
think you can manage to borrow one for half-an-hour from anybody in the
village--eh? Consult with your husband, it is of importance to me."

"Him, Cornel? What does he know?" said the landlady. "Officers,
na--unless it was th' Ould Hundred, begging your pardon, Cornel, for
he's nothing but a sergeant; but that's the byname he goes by in my
house."

"The Old Hundred? I'm an Old Hundred man myself," said the Colonel,
laughing. "Kennedy, is it? No, he will not do, the old humbug--I suspect
he tells the lads a parcel of lies about the regiment, and brings
discredit on as fine a body of men as there is in the service. Eh?--is
the sergeant a great man among ye here?"

"Oh, Cornel!" cried Mrs. Gilsland, "I'll go down to you on my bended
knees if you'll say to my Sam, sir, what you say to me. He's wild for
the sodgerin', is that lad! and th' Ould Hunderd he lays it on till him
as if it was Paradise!--and an only son, Cornel, and a great help in the
business, and if he 'lists, and go to the bad, what will I do?"

"But if he 'lists, he need not go to the bad," said the Colonel. "I'll
speak to him if you like; but in the meantime, my 'Army List'? Is there
nobody in Tillington who has a son an officer? Nobody who----"

"Bless my soul, what am I thinking on? To be sure, there's the Rectory!"
cried the landlady, rushing out of the room in the fervour of her
discovery. And the Cornel heard her immediately commission her son, who
seemed to be at a distance, at the top of her voice, to run this moment
to the Rectory, and ask if there was such a thing about the house as a
list of all the regiments and officers, for a gentleman that was an
officer himself, and a Cornel, and that was staying at the "Tillington
Arms." "And thou'll take it in thyself, Sam," shouted the good woman,
"with thy best manners, and never tarry on the road. The Cornel wants to
speak to thee himself. Now, mind what I say!--he's something to tell 'ee
lad, will put 'ee out o' conceit with th' Ould Hunderd--run, as if thou
hadst wings to thy heels!"

The Colonel, sitting by his fire, gradually thawing, laughed to himself,
and shrugged his shoulders as he heard this adjuration. Was he to be
elected _impromptu_ adviser of all the adventurous youth of Tillington?
He sat in his chair, by the fire, wondering whether the 'Army List'
could be had--whether Sir John Armitage would turn out to be Armitage of
the 59th--and chuckling quietly over the Sergeant's nickname, until, in
the warmth and the silence, the old soldier nodded over cheerily into a
half-hour's sleep.

END OF VOL. I.

R. BORN, PRINTER, GLOUCESTER STREET, REGENT'S PARK.

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       *       *       *       *       *

Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:

Hory=> Horry {pg 136, 137}

betrayed bimself=> betrayed himself {pg 250}







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