A Reconstructed Marriage

He looked at her with eyes sad and suffering, and answered: "Neither you nor I, Isabel, can gainsay those words. They describe only too truly our father's position. He was amiable, and he was unhappy."

"But, Robert, the insinuation is, that mother was to blame for our father's unhappiness."

"She was. Such accusations are best unanswered. If we do not talk life into them, they will die in a few days."

To those who did not know Robert Campbell, he seemed at this time indifferent and unfeeling. In reality he was consumed by the two passions that had taken possession of him – the finding of his wife and son, and the making of money to keep up the search for them. He spent his days at the works, his evenings were devoted to interviewing his detectives, writing them instructions, or reading their reports. Shabby-looking men, in various disguises, haunted the hall and library of Traquair House, and every single one of them gave Mrs. Campbell a fresh and separate attack of anger. They were naturally against her, they believed everything wrong said of her, they talked slyly to the servants, and would scarcely answer her questions; they trespassed on her rights, and disobeyed her orders; and if she made a complaint of their behavior to her son, he looked at her indignantly and walked silently away. Speech, which had been her great weapon, and her great enjoyment, lost its power against the smouldering anger in her son's heart, and the speechless insolence of his "spying men."

Very soon after his sorrow had found him out he locked every drawer and closet in the rooms that had been Theodora's. It was a necessary action, but he had a bitter heartache in its performance. The carefully folded garments, with their faint scent of lavender, held so many memories of the woman he longed to see. The knots of pale ribbons, the neckwear of soft lace! Oh, how could such things hurt him so cruelly? In one drawer of her desk he found the stationery she had begged her own money to buy. She had not even taken the postage stamps. That circumstance set him thinking. She was leaving England, or she would have taken the stamps – perhaps not – they might have been left for the very purpose of inducing this belief. Who could tell?

Meantime nothing in the life of Traquair House changed or stopped, because Robert Campbell's life had been snapped into two parts. Mrs. Campbell soon recovered her pride and self-confidence. She told all her callers she "had received measureless sympathy, and as for her enemies, and what they said, she just washed her hands of them – poor, beggarly scribblers, and such like."

Isabel's behavior was a nearer and more constant annoyance. She spent the most of her time in her own room with maps and guidebooks and writing, and the pleasure she derived from these sources was a pleasure inconceivable to her mother. "You are past reckoning with, Isabel," she said fretfully one day, "what on earth are you busy about?"

"I am planning routes of travel, mother, putting down every place to stop at, what hotel to go to, what is worth seeing, and so on. I have four routes laid out already. I am hoping some day, when I have made all clear, you will go with me."

"Me! Me go with you! Not while I have one of my five senses left me."

"I shall surely go some day. I might have been travelling ere now, but I disliked to leave you alone, after this trouble about Dora."

"There is no trouble about Dora, none at all. The running away o' the creature is a great satisfaction to me. I hate both her and her child."

"Robert is breaking his heart about them."

"And neglecting his business, and spending more money than he is making, looking for them. I might break my heart, too, but thanks be! I have more sense. Did I tell you the Crawford girls are coming to stay a week or two? I thought they would be a bit company to you. I suppose they can have the room next yours."

"Christina's room! Oh, mother, I wish you would put them somewhere else. You have a spare room."

"It is o'er near my own room. And they are apt to come home at night full o' chat and giggle, and get me wakened up and maybe put by all sleep for that night. What is wrong with the room next yours?"

"I don't like any one using Christina's room – and they will keep me awake."

"Nobody takes the least thought for my comfort."

"Why did you ask the Crawfords? You know Robert hates them."

"Robert is forgetting how to behave decently. He will at least have to be civil to the Crawfords, and that is a thing he has ceased to be either to you or me."

"Robert and I understand each other. He gives me a look, and I give him one. We do not require to speak."

"I wonder how I ever came to breed such unfeeling, unsocial children. If I get 'yes' or 'no' from your brother now, it is the whole of his conversation; and as for yourself, Isabel, you are at that wearisome reading or writing the livelong day. I'll need the Crawfords, or some one, to talk to me, or I'll forget how to speak. Now where will I sleep them?"

"I suppose in poor Christina's room."

"Poor Christina! Yes, indeed! I have no manner o' doubt it is 'poor Christina' by this time."

"Mother! mother! do not spae sorrow to your own child. I can't bear it. I think she is very happy indeed. If she was not, she would have sent me word. It is poor Isabel, and it is happy Christina."

"Your way be it."

The next day the Crawfords came, and were installed in Christina's room. Mrs. Campbell was in one of her gayest moods, and she said to Isabel: "I am not going to live in a Trappist monastery, because Robert is too sulky to open his mouth to me. I'll be glad to hear the girls clacking and chattering, and whiles laughing a bit. God knows, we need not make life any gloomier than it is."

For two or three days, the Crawfords had the run of the house. Robert went away, "on another wild goose chase" his mother said, just before they arrived; and his mother's words were evidently true, for he came home with every sign of disappointment about him. He looked so unhappy, that Isabel, meeting him in the hall, said: "I am sorry, brother, very sorry."

"I know you are," he answered. "It was a false hope – nothing in it."

"I would stop looking."

"You are right. I will give it up."

He went into the dining-room with Isabel, said good-evening to his mother, and bowed civilly to her guests. The dinner proceeded in a polite, noiseless manner, until the end of the second course. Then Robert lifted his eyes, and they fell upon Jean Crawford's hand. The next moment he had risen and was at her side.

"Give me the ring upon your right hand," he said in a voice that held as much passion as a voice could hold and be intelligible.

"Why, Cousin Robert!"

"I want that ring!"

"Aunt Margaret said – "

"Give me the ring. It is not yours. How dare you wear it?"

"I was bringing it back! Oh, Aunt Margaret!"

"Robert, I am ashamed of you!"

"Mother, I want Theodora's ring – the ring stolen from my wife years ago. I must have it – I must, I must!"

"Don't cry, Jean. Give him his ring. I'll give you a far handsomer one."

Then the woman threw it down on the table, and Robert lifted it and left the room.

Isabel sat until the tearful, protesting meal was over, and then she did the most remarkable thing – she went to her brother. He was sitting looking at the ring, recalling its history. He remembered going into Kendal one Saturday night, just after its receipt, and memory showed him again Theodora's delight and excitement, her wonder over its beauty, and her pride in her pupils' affection. He could see her lovely face, her shining eyes, he could feel her soft kiss, and the caress of her hand in his. Oh, what a miracle of love and beauty she was to him that night! He told Isabel all about it, and then he spoke of its theft, and of his frequent promises and failures to recover it for her.

"But, brother," said Isabel, "you have now quite unexpectedly got it back. It is a good omen. Some day, when you are not looking for such a thing, you will get its owner back, you will put it on her finger. I feel sure of it."

"I was a brute, Isabel."

"You were a coward. You were afraid of mother."

"No man ever had so many opportunities for happiness as Theodora offered me. I scorned them all. Why was I so blind, so unjust, so cruel? I am miserable, and deserve to be miserable. We can go to hell before we die, Isabel."

"Yes, we can, but we send ourselves there. 'If I make my bed in hell,' said the great seer and singer. It is always I that makes that bed, never God, never any other human being." And it was Robert Campbell, he himself, and no other, who had made his bed in that forlorn circle of hell, where men who have lost their Great Opportunity, weep and wail over their forfeited happiness. Poor Isabel, she remembered, and longed to remind her brother, that even there God was with him, waiting to be gracious, ready to help! But she was too cowardly, she did not like to give religious advice; she was only a woman – he would wonder at her. So she went away, and did not deliver the gracious message, and felt poor and mean because of her fear and her faithlessness.

This conversation, however, made a decided change in Robert Campbell's life. It had always been believed by the family, that Isabel, unknown to herself, had a certain occult, prophesying power; frequently she had proved that with her insight was foresight. So, though Robert said nothing to her when she told him the getting back of the ring was a good omen, he believed her and derived a singular peace and confidence from the prediction. At that very hour, he virtually put a stop to all inquiries, and to all search; he resolved to leave to those behind him the bringing back of his wife, and their reconciliation.

Carrying out this resolve compelled him to take account of the money he had spent in the quest for Theodora and his son, and the total gave him a shock. It had been an absolutely fruitless waste of money, and he had a fiery impetuous determination to restore to his estate the full amount. To this object he devoted himself, and if a man is willing to lose his heart and soul in money-making, he is sure to succeed.

So the weeks and the months passed, and he turned himself, body and soul, into gold and tried to forget. The loss of his wife and child became a something that had happened long ago – an event sorrowful, and far off. For there was nothing to keep their memory alive. No one mentioned their names, and the very rooms they had inhabited, had lost all remembrance of them. They were simply empty rooms now, for every particle of the lovely and loving lives that had once informed them, had been withdrawn.

Nearly two years had passed since Christina married, nearly as long since Theodora and David disappeared, and the big, silent Traquair House was a desolate place. Mrs. Campbell had no one but her servants to dispute with, for though Isabel's seclusion was constantly more marked, Robert would not listen to a word against his sister. She had been sorry for him, and forespoken good for him; he stood staunchly by all she did.

"Do you know that she is going away this spring, into all sorts of wild and savage countries, and among pagans and papists, and worse – if there is worse; with nothing but a woman nearly as old as myself to lean on. I wonder at your allowing such nonsense."

"Isabel knows what she is doing. She is going with Lady Mary Grafton. They will have their maids, and a first-class courier. I think she is doing right."

"And I shall be left here, all alone?"

"Do you count me a nonentity?"

"You are very near it, as far as I am concerned."

"I am alone, too. Will you remember that? You know whose fault it is." Then he rose and left her, and Mrs. Campbell was conscious of a secret wish that the good old quarrelsome days would come back, even though it were Theodora and David who brought them.

A few days after this conversation Robert had business in the city, and after it was finished, he walked leisurely down Buchanan Street. It was a fine spring morning, and there was a glint of sunshine tempering the fresh west breeze. Passing McLaren's, he saw a lady get out of a cab, and go into the shop. He followed her, and gently laid his hand on her shoulder, saying:

"Christina, sister!"

"Oh, Robert, Robert!" and she laughed, and cried, and clasped his hands.

"Come with me to my club," he said, "and we will have lunch and a good talk. You must have a deal to tell me."

"I have, I have! My cab is at the door. Will it do for you? You used to hate cabs." She laughed again and her laugh went to his heart, so he petted her hand, and said she was looking white and thin, and what was the matter?

"I had a little daughter only six weeks ago, the sweetest darling you ever saw, Robert. And I have a beautiful wee laddie, called Robert – called after you – he is nearly a year old."

"Then I must go with you and see my namesake."

"Do you really mean that?"

"I intend to give you this afternoon."

"I am so glad – so happy."

Then they were at the Club House, and Robert took her to a pleasant parlor and ordered a royal lunch, and a bottle of wine.

"We must drink the little chap's health," he said. "And now tell me, Christina, are you happy?"

"Yes, I am happy. I have some little anxieties about Jamie, but love makes all easy – and Jamie loves me and the children, and does his best for us. A man cannot do more than that, can he?"

"Have you ever regretted your treatment of Sir Thomas Wynton?"

"Never once! Wynton treated me handsomely, but you see, I loved Jamie. You understand, Robert?"

"Yes."

"I heard about Theodora, of course. It was hard on you, but I do not blame Theodora. Since I was a mother, I have wondered she bore David's treatment as long as she did. I would not."

When lunch was over, they drove to Christina's home, and Robert laughed at its location. "Why, you are barely a mile from Traquair House," he said. "How was it we never found you out?"

"Perhaps you did not care about finding me out."

"Perhaps. Yet I know Isabel never went out without looking for you, and she has put many advertisements in the papers."

"Well, I was neither lost nor stolen, Robert, so I never read advertisements." She laughed in her old mocking way. "But I longed for Isabel, and have hard work to keep away from her."

There was just time for Robert to see his namesake, and give him a gold token, and admire the baby in its mother's arms, and the mother with the baby in her arms, when there was the sound of a latch-key in the door, and then a gay whistle. "Here comes Jamie," cried Christina, all her face aglow with love and expectation. Jamie was a personality you felt as soon as he entered the house. Robert looked anxiously for his appearance; but he was not prepared for the young man who entered. He was so handsome. Not Robert Burns himself had a more winning face, or more charming manners. He came into the room laughing, and when he saw Robert, went straight to him with outstretched hand. "Glad to see you, Campbell," he said heartily, and Robert felt he was glad. "You will take dinner with us?" he asked, and Robert said he would. Then he brought cigars, and began to discuss with Robert a subject which was at that time very interesting to the city. Robert found him clever and amusing, and he had a way of illustrating all his points with stories so apt, and so amusing, you felt sure he invented them as needed.

They had a modest, cheerful dinner, after which Jamie played the fiddle and sang as Robert had never dreamed it was possible to fiddle and sing; and he fell completely under the man's charm. For he made fiddle strings of Robert's heart strings, with his wild Gathering Calls, his National Songs, and Strathspeys. It was impossible not to love the man, and whatever liking and admiration Robert Campbell had to give, he gave unresistingly that night to James Rathey. He went away reluctantly, though he had stayed some time after dinner, and when he clasped the beautiful hand of the violinist he held it a moment, and said: "You have made me happy for a few hours. I thank you! I shall not forget."

All the way home he was revolving a plan in his mind, which he was resolved to bring to perfection. With this object in view, he looked into the dining-room when he reached home, hoping to find Isabel there. But Mrs. Campbell was sitting alone with a newspaper in her hand. She looked bored and forsaken, and he was sorry for her. "Where is Isabel?" he asked.

"Where she always is, except at eating-times – in her room."

"I want to see her."

"Will not your mother do?"

"Not just yet. I may want you in a short time."

"And then I may not come. You are going to ask Isabel, whether it is prudent to tell me something, or not."

"Will you let Isabel know, or shall I send McNab?"

"I will tell her myself."

Then Robert went to his own parlor, and in a few minutes Isabel came to him. He took her hand, and seated her at his side. "Isabel," he said, "I have found Christina. I have had lunch and dinner with her. I have met James Rathey."

"Oh, Robert!"

"He is the most delightful of men. They are as happy as they can be."

Then Isabel began to cry softly. "Oh, Robert, Robert! Such good news! Tell me all about them!" she exclaimed. And Robert told her all that Christina had said, and all that Jamie had said. He described Christina's and Rathey's appearance, he told her about the babies, he even made a few remarks about the floor and the furniture.

"I must go and see her the first thing in the morning, Robert."

"How soon will you start on your travels, Isabel?"

"In ten days, if Lady Mary is better."

"Is she sick?"

"I heard this morning she had an attack of measles – very peculiar in a woman of her age."

"I don't know, I'm sure. What I want is, that Christina should come into my rooms. I am going to give her all the furniture in them – everything-everything except some clothing. While you are away, she will be company for mother, who seems pitifully lonely."

"That is mother's fault, Robert. These empty rooms ought to be – "

"I know. There is no use speaking of it. All that hope is over. Do you think you can persuade Christina to come home?"

"She would have some submissions to make to mother – will she make them?"

"I think so. Go and ask her."

"I will see her in the morning."

In the morning there was a joyful meeting between the sisters, and Christina was delighted with Robert's plan. She had often longed for the large rooms, the wide stairways and corridors of Traquair House. She hated small rooms, and common stairs, and cabs, and remembered longingly the days when the Campbell carriage was at her beck and call. She liked plenty of servants, and her own maid and nurse would be added to the staff in Traquair House. She would be relieved of all housekeeping cares, and of the oversight of the table, a duty she particularly disliked. Besides these considerations, she could again take her proper place in society. Robert would be certain to do something for Jamie, and then she would have her income for dress and social demands.

"It will be delightful, Isabel," she said. "Just what I wish, and Jamie will win round mother directly – he has that way with all women."

"Then come home about five this afternoon, and bring the babies with you, especially Margaret."

"Isabel, you mean?"

"No, no! You must call her Margaret. As Margaret she will open mother's heart to you."

About five that afternoon, Mrs. Campbell came into the big, empty dining-room. She was dressed for dinner, but there were no signs of the meal. She looked cross and forlorn, and began to grumble to herself, as she impatiently stirred the fire into a blaze. "It is too bad of Isabel," she muttered; "she cares for nothing but her own way. I am left to look after everything – house, callers, what not – and there is a ring at the door now! I hope Jepson heard it."

The next moment the room door was thrown open, and Christina, in a flurry of beautiful silk and fur, fell on her knees by her mother's side. She clasped her mother's hands in her own, and said softly: "Forgive Christina, mother. I have brought my little Margaret for your blessing. Oh, yes, you will bless her. And Christina is really sorry, and longs so much for her mother and her home – dear mother, forgive me?"

At the beginning of her entreaty, Mrs. Campbell had tried to take her hands from between her daughter's, but at the close they lay passive until she raised one, stroked Christina's face, and bid her rise. Then Christina took the little child, and laid it in its grandmother's arms, saying:

"Little Margaret asks you to forgive and love us, mother," – and little Margaret won the day.

"May I stay dinner, mother, and talk to you?"

"Go up to your own room, and take off your hat and wrapping. You may leave the bairns with me. Yon is a bonnie wee lad, what is his name?"

"Robert Traquair."

"A wise like name! Bring him here, lassie – and what is your name?"

"Janet, ma'am."

"Weel, Janet, you may now take the boy-bairn to the kitchen, and show him to Mistress McNab, and tell her she will hae company to provide for. I'll keep the bit lassie mysel', till her mother is ready for her."

At six o'clock, as arranged, Robert came home and joined his mother and sisters, and they were all talking happily together, when Jamie Rathey entered. Robert met him with a hearty welcome, and Jepson coming in at that moment, to superintend the setting of the table, was told by Robert to lay service for two extra. And as Christina predicted, when the evening was over Jamie had fairly conquered the usually impossible Mrs. Campbell. He had waited on his mother-in-law as if he was her lover, he had told pleasant stories, and sang merry songs, and above all assured her, she was "the only mother he knew, who could bring up daughters able to make the state of marriage an earthly Paradise"; and with a charming smile he wished "that she had fifty daughters, so that Glasgow might boast of fifty perfect wives, and happy husbands."

Robert watched him, and listened to him, and wondered that a man of his tact and social genius, did not get on in the world; and after the Ratheys and their children had departed he said: "Christina has not done as badly as we believed, mother. What do you think of James?"

"The man is well enough – as a man," she answered with a sudden cooling of heart temperature, "but what about his capacities? Is he a good provider? Can he get hold of the wherewithal for a family's necessities?"

"He is on the Roll of Attorneys now, but it is hard for a young man to get a law business – it takes time. He is sure to make his mark, but I do not suppose he makes his office rent yet."

"I thought so."

"He is clever."

"Very. And if he is as clever with his fiddle as his tongue, I would be astonished if he made office rent."

"Why?"

"Because God has given to some men wisdom and understanding, and to other men He has given the art o' playing on the fiddle. But if a man is wanting law, he does not want a song, and he is naturally suspicious of the lawyer who mixes the two."

"I shall get him installed as attorney on some of the civic boards, and that will give him an opportunity to show himself as a lawyer. And, mother, I have given Christina the use of my rooms, and the furniture is hers now. I have given her it just as it stands – everything, except some clothing. When Isabel goes away, I thought you would be very lonely, and Christina and the babies will make things more cheerful for you."

"I might have been asked, if it would be agreeable?"

"I only met Christina yesterday. I went home with her, and I want her to have a better home – her old home, and you to look after her."

"Well, a mother's duty never ends, and I was never one to shirk duty. The rooms are all right – but as for the cooking and the kitchen – "

"Tut, tut, mother! You will look after the table as you have always done."

"There will be four more adults to provide for, not to speak o' the bairns' feeding and washing."

"James is able to pay whatever you think right. I will insure that to you. And, mother, it will be a joy to see you busy about the house again, ordering the meals, and keeping the servant girls up to mark."