Donal Grant

"Why will you not, Arctura?" he asked reproachfully: "do you not feel well?"

"I am quite well," she answered.

"It is such a lovely day!" he pleaded.

"I am not in the mood. There are other things in the world besides riding, and I have been wasting my time—riding too much. I have learnt next to nothing since Larkie came."

"Oh, bother! what have you to do with learning! Health is the first thing."

"I don't think so—and learning is good for the health. Besides, I would not be a mere animal for perfect health!"

"Let me help you then with your studies."

"Thank you," she answered, laughing a little, "but I have a good master already! We, that is Davie and I, are reading Greek and mathematics with Mr. Grant."

Forgue's face flushed.

"I ought to know as much of both as he does!" he said.

"Ought perhaps! But you know you do not."

"I know enough to be your tutor."

"Yes, but I know enough not to be your pupil!"

"What do you mean?"

"That you can't teach."

"How do you know that?"

"Because you do not love either Greek or mathematics, and no one who does not love can teach." "That is nonsense! If I don't love Greek enough to teach it, I love you enough to teach you," said Forgue.

"You are my riding-master," said Arctura; "Mr. Grant is my master in Greek."

Forgue strangled an imprecation on Mr. Grant, and tried to laugh, but there was not a laugh inside him.

"Then you won't ride to-day?" he said.

"I think not," replied Arctura.

She ought to have said she would not. It is a pity to let doubt alight on decision. Her reply re-opened the whole question.

"I cannot see what should induce you to allow that fellow the honour of reading with you!" said Forgue. "He's a long-winded, pedantic, ill-bred lout!"

"Mr. Grant is my friend!" said Arctura, and raising her head looked him in the eyes.

"Take my word for it, you are mistaken in him," he said.

"I neither value nor ask your opinion of him," returned Arctura. "I merely acquaint you with the fact that he is my friend."

"Here's the devil and all to pay!" thought Forgue.

"I beg your pardon," he said: "you do not know him as I do!"

"Not?—and with so much better opportunity of judging!"

"He has never played the dominie with you!" said Forgue foolishly.

"Indeed he has!"

"He has! Confound his insolence! How?"

"He won't let me study as I want.—How has he interfered with you?"

"We won't quarrel about him," rejoined Forgue, attempting a tone of gaiety, but instantly growing serious. "We who ought to be so much to each other—"

Something told him he had already gone too far.

"I do not know what you mean—or rather, I am not willing to think I know what you mean," said Arctura. "After what took place—"

In her turn she ceased: he had said nothing!

"Jealous!" concluded Forgue; "—a good sign!"

"I see he has been talking against me!" he said.

"If you mean Mr. Grant, you mistake. He never, so far as I remember, once mentioned you to me."

"I know better!"

"You are rude. He never spoke of it; but I have seen enough with my own eyes—"

"If you mean that silly fancy—why, Arctura!—you know it was but a boyish folly!"

"And since then you have grown a man!—How many months has it taken?"

"I assure you, on the word of a gentleman, there is nothing in it now. It is all over, and I am heartily ashamed of it."

A pause of a few seconds followed: it seemed as many minutes, and unbearable.

"You will come out with me?" said Forgue: she might be relenting, though she did not look like it!

"No," she said; "I will not."

"Well," he returned, with simulated coolness, "this is rather cavalier treatment, I must say!—To throw a man over who has loved you so long—and for the sake of a lesson in Greek!"

"How long, pray, have you loved me?" said Arctura, growing angry. "I was willing to be friendly with you, so much so that I am sorry it is no longer possible!"

"You punish me pretty sharply, my lady, for a trifle of which I told you I was ashamed!" said Forgue, biting his lip. "It was the merest—"

"I do not wish to hear anything about it!" said Arctura sternly. Then, afraid she had been unkind, she added in altered tone: "You had better go and have a gallop. You may have Larkie if you like."

He turned and left the room. She only meant to pique him, he said to himself. She had been cherishing her displeasure, and now she had had her revenge would feel better and be sorry next! It was a very good morning's work after all! It was absurd to think she preferred a Greek lesson from a clown to a ride with lord Forgue! Was not she too a Graeme!

Partly to make reconciliation the easier, partly because the horse was superior to his own, he would ride Larkie!

But his reasoning was not so satisfactory to him as to put him in a good temper, and poor Larkie had to suffer for his ill-humour. His least movement that displeased him put him in a rage, and he rode him so foolishly as well as tyrannically that he brought him home quite lame, thus putting an end for a time to all hope of riding again with Arctura.

Instead of going and telling her what he had done, he sent for the farrier, and gave orders that the mishap should not be mentioned.

A week passed, and then another; and as he could say nothing about riding, he was in a measure self-banished from Arctura's company. A furious jealousy began to master him. He scorned to give place to it because of the insult to himself if he allowed a true ground for it. But it gradually gained power. This country bumpkin, this cow-herd, this man of spelling-books and grammars, to come between his cousin and him! Of course he was not so silly as imagine for a moment she cared for him!—that she would disgrace herself by falling in love with a fellow just loosed from the plough-tail! She was a Graeme, and could never be a traitor to her blood! If only he had not been such an infernal fool! A vulgar little thing without an idea in her head! So unpleasant—so disgusting at last with her love-making! Nothing pleased her but hugging and kissing!—That was how he spoke to himself of the girl he had been in love with!

Damn that schoolmaster! She would never fall in love with him, but he might prevent her from falling in love with another! No attractions could make way against certain prepossessions! The girl had a fancy for being a saint, and the lout burned incense to her! So much he gathered from Davie. His father must get rid of the fellow! If he thought he was doing so well with Davie, why not send the two away together till things were settled?

But the earl thought it would be better to win Donal. He counselled him that every Grant was lord Seafield's cousin, and every highlander an implacable enemy where his pride was hurt. His lordship did not reflect that, if what he said were true of Donal, he must have left the castle long ago. There was but one thing would have made it impossible for Donal to remain—interference, namely, between him and his pupil.

Forgue did not argue with his father. He had given that up. At the same time, if he had told all that had passed between him and Donal, the earl would have confessed he had advised an impossibility.

Forgue took a step in a very different direction: he began to draw to himself the good graces of Miss Carmichael: he did not know how little she could serve him. Without being consciously insincere, she flattered him, and speedily gained his confidence. Well descended on the mother-side, she had grown up fit, her father said, to adorn any society: with a keen appreciation of the claims and dignities of the aristocracy, she was well able to flatter the prejudices she honoured and shared in. Careful not to say a word against his cousin, she made him feel more and more that his chief danger lay in the influence of Donal. She fanned thus his hatred of the man who first came between him and his wrath; next, between him and his "love;" and last, between him and his fortunes.

If only Davie would fall ill, and require change of air! But Davie was always in splendid health!

Now that he saw himself in such danger of failing, he fancied himself far more in love with Arctura than he was. And as he got familiarized with the idea of his illegitimacy, although he would not assent to it, he made less and less of it—which would have been a proof to any other than himself that he believed it. In further sign of the same, he made no inquiry into the matter—did not once even question his father about it. If it was true, he did not want to know it: he would treat his lack of proof as ignorance, and act as with the innocence of ignorance! A fellow must take for granted what was commonly believed! At last, and the last was not long in arriving, he almost ceased to trouble himself about it.

His father laughed at his fear of failure with Arctura, but at times contemplated the thing as an awful possibility—not that he loved Forgue much. The only way fathers in sight of the grave can fancy themselves holding on to the things they must leave, is in their children; but lord Morven had a stronger and better reason for his unrighteousness: in a troubled, self-reproachful way, he loved the memory of their mother, and through her cared even for Forgue more than he knew. They were also his own as much as if he had been legally married to her! For the relation in which they stood to society, he cared little so long as it continued undiscovered. He enjoyed the idea of stealing a march on society, and seeing the sons he had left at such a disadvantage behind him, ruffling it, in spite of absurd law, with the foolish best. From the grave he would so have his foot on the neck of his enemy Law!—he was one of the many who can rejoice in even a stolen victory. Nor would he ever have been the fool to let the truth fly, except under the reaction of evil drugs, and the rush of fierce wrath at the threatened ruin of his cherished scheme.

Arctura thenceforth avoided her cousin as much as she could—only remembering that the house was hers, and she must not make him feel he was not welcome to use it. They met at meals, and she tried to behave as if nothing unpleasant had happened and things were as before he went away.

"You are very cruel, Arctura," he said one morning he met her in the terrace avenue.

"Cruel?" returned Arctura coldly; "I am not cruel. I would not willingly hurt anyone."

"You hurt me much; you give me not a morsel, not a crumb of your society!"

"Percy," said Arctura, "if you will be content to be my cousin, we shall get on well enough; but if you are set on what cannot be—once for all, believe me, it is of no use. You care for none of the things I live for! I feel as if we belonged to different worlds, so little have we in common. You may think me hard, but it is better we should understand each other. If you imagine that, because I have the property, you have a claim on me, be sure I will never acknowledge it. I would a thousand times rather you had the property and I were in my grave!"

"I will be anything, do anything, learn anything you please!" cried Forgue, his heart aching with disappointment.

"I know what such submission is worth!" said Arctura. "I should be everything till we were married, and then nothing! You dissemble, you hide even from yourself, but you are not hard to read."

Perhaps she would not have spoken just so severely, had she not been that morning unusually annoyed with his behaviour to Donal, and at the same time specially pleased with the calm, unconsciously dignified way in which Donal took it, casting it from him as the rock throws aside the sea-wave: it did not concern him! The dull world has got the wrong phrase: it is he who resents an affront who pockets it! he who takes no notice, lets it lie in the dirt.

CHAPTER LXVIII.

LARKIE

It was a lovely day in spring.

"Please, Mr. Grant," said Davie, "may I have a holiday?"

Donal looked at him with a little wonder: the boy had never before made such a request! But he answered him at once.

"Yes, certainly, Davie. But I should like to know what you want it for."

"Arkie wants very much to have a ride to-day. She says Larkie—I gave him his name, to rime with Arkie—she says Larkie will forget her, and she does not wish to go out with Forgue, so she wants me to go with her on my pony."

"You will take good care of her, Davie?"

"I will take care of her, but you need not be anxious about us, Mr. Grant. Arkie is a splendid rider, and much pluckier than she used to be!"

Donal did, however—he could not have said why—feel a little anxiety. He repressed it as unfaithfulness, but it kept returning. He could not go with them—there was no horse for him, and to go on foot, would, he feared, spoil their ride. He was so much afraid also of presuming on lady Arctura's regard for him, that he would have shrunk from offering had it been more feasible. He got a book, and strolled into the park, not even going to see them off: Forgue might be about the stable, and make things unpleasant!

Had Forgue been about the stable, he would, I think, have somehow managed to prevent the ride, for Larkie, though much better, was not yet cured of his lameness. Arctura did not know he had been lame, or that he had therefore been very little exercised, and was now rather wild, with a pastern-joint far from equal to his spirit. There was but a boy about the stable, who either did not understand, or was afraid to speak: she rode in a danger of which she knew nothing. The consequence was that, jumping the merest little ditch in a field outside the park, they had a fall. The horse got up and trotted limping to the stable; his mistress lay where she fell. Davie, wild with misery, galloped home. From the height of the park Donal saw him tearing along, and knew something was amiss. He ran, got over the wall, found the pony's track, and following it, came where Arctura lay.

There was a little clear water in the ditch: he wet his handkerchief, and bathed her face. She came to herself, opened her eyes with a faint smile, and tried to raise herself, but fell back helpless, and closed her eyes again.

"I believe I am hurt!" she murmured. "I think Larkie must have fallen!"

Donal would have carried her, but she moaned so, that he gave up the idea at once. Davie was gone for help; it would be better to wait! He pulled off his coat and laid it over her, then kneeling, raised her head a little from the damp ground upon his arm. She let him do as he pleased, but did not open her eyes.

They had not long to wait. Several came running, among them lord Forgue. He fell beside his cousin on his knees, and took her hand in his. She neither moved nor spoke. As instead of doing anything he merely persisted in claiming her attention, Donal saw it was for him to give orders.

"My lady is much hurt," he said: "one of you go at once for the doctor; the others bring a hand-barrow—I know there is one about the place. Lay the squab of a sofa on it, and make haste. Let mistress Brookes know."

"Mind your own business," said Forgue.

"Do as Mr. Grant tells you," said lady Arctura, without opening her eyes.

The men departed running. Forgue rose from his knees, and walked slowly to a little distance, where he stood gnawing his lip.

"My lord," said Donal, "please run and fetch a little brandy for her ladyship. She has fainted."

What could Forgue do but obey! He started at once, and with tolerable speed. Then Arctura opened her eyes, and smiled.

"Are you suffering much, my lady?" asked Donal.

"A good deal," she answered, "but I don't mind it.—Thank you for not leaving me.—It is no more than I can bear, only bad when I try to move."

"They will not be long now," he said.

Again she closed her eyes, and was silent. Donal watched the sweet face, which a cloud of suffering would every now and then cross, and lifted up his heart to the saviour of men.

He saw them coming with the extemporized litter, behind them mistress Brookes, with Forgue and one of the maids.

When she came up, she addressed herself in silence to Donal. He told her he feared her ladyship's spine was hurt, After his direction she put her hands under her and the maid took her feet, while he, placing his other arm under her shoulders, and gently rising, raised her body. Being all strong and gentle, they managed the moving well, and laid her slowly on the litter. Except a moan or two, and a gathering of the brows, she gave no sign of suffering; nothing to be called a cry escaped her.

Donal at the head and a groom at the foot, lifted the litter, and with ordered step, started for the house. Once or twice she opened her eyes and looked up at Donal, then, as if satisfied, closed them again. Before they reach the house the doctor met them, for they had to walk slowly.

Forgue came behind in a devilish humour. He knew that first his ill usage of Larkie, and then his preventing anything being said about it, must have been the cause of the accident; but he felt with some satisfaction—for self simply makes devils of us—that if she had not refused to go out with him, it would not have happened; he would not have allowed her to mount Larkie. "Served her right!" he caught himself saying once, and was ashamed—but presently said it again. Self is as full of worms as it can hold; God deliver us from it!

CHAPTER LXIX.

THE SICK-CHAMBER

She was carried to her room and laid on her bed. The doctor requested Mrs. Brookes and Donal to remain, and dismissed the rest, then proceeded to examine her. There were no bones broken, he said, but she must be kept very quiet. The windows must be darkened, and she must if possible sleep. She gave Donal a faint smile, and a pitiful glance, but did not speak. As he was following the doctor from the room, she made a sign to Mrs. Brookes with her eyes that she wanted to speak to him.

He came, and bent over to hear, for she spoke very feebly.

"You will come and see me, Mr. Grant?"

"I will, indeed, my lady."

"Every day?"

"Yes, most certainly," he replied.

She smiled, and so dismissed him. He went with his heart full.

A little way from the door stood Forgue, waiting for him to come out. He had sent the doctor to his father. Donal passed him with a bend of the head. He followed him to the schoolroom.

"It is time this farce was over, Grant!" he said.

"Farce, my lord!" repeated Donal indignantly.

"These attentions to my lady."

"I have paid her no more attention than I would your lordship, had you required it," answered Donal sternly.

"That would have been convenient doubtless! But there has been enough of humbug, and now for an end to it! Ever since you came here, you have been at work on the mind of that inexperienced girl—with your damned religion!—for what end you know best! and now you've half killed her by persuading her to go out with you instead of me! The brute was lame and not fit to ride! Any fool might have seen that!"

"I had nothing to do with her going, my lord. She asked Davie to go with her, and he had a holiday on purpose."

"All very fine, but—"

"My lord, I have told you the truth, but not to justify myself: you must be aware your opinion is of no value in my eyes! But tell me one thing, my lord: if my lady's horse was lame, how was it she did not know? You did!"

Forgue thought Donal knew more than he did, and was taken aback.

"It is time the place was clear of you!" he said.

"I am your father's servant, not yours," answered Donal, "and do not trouble myself as to your pleasure concerning me. But I think it is only fair to warn you that, though you cannot hurt me, nothing but honesty can take you out of my power."

Forgue turned on his heel, went to his father, and told him he knew now that Donal was prejudicing the mind of lady Arctura against him; but not until it came in the course of the conversation, did he mention the accident she had had.

The earl professed himself greatly shocked, got up with something almost like alacrity from his sofa, and went down to inquire after his niece. He would have compelled Mrs. Brookes to admit him, but she was determined her lady should not be waked from a sleep invaluable to her, for the sake of receiving his condolements, and he had to return to his room without gaining anything.

If she were to go, the property would be his, and he could will it as he pleased—that was, if she left no will. He sent for his son and cautioned him over and over to do nothing to offend her, but wait: what might come, who could tell! It might prove a serious affair!

Forgue tried to feel shocked at the coolness of his father's speculation, but allowed that, if she was determined not to receive him as her husband, the next best thing, in the exigence of affairs, would certainly be that she should leave a world for whose uses she was ill fitted, and go where she would be happier. The things she would then have no farther need of, would be welcome to those to whom by right they belonged more really than to her! She was a pleasant thing to look upon, and if she had loved him he would rather have had the property with than without her; but there was this advantage, he would be left free to choose!

Lady Arctura lay suffering, feverish, and restless. Mrs. Brookes would let no one sit up with her but herself. The earl would have sent for "a suitable nurse!" a friend of his in London would find one! but she would not hear of it. And before the night was over she had greater reason still for refusing to yield her post: it was evident her young mistress was more occupied with Donal Grant than with the pain she was suffering! In her delirium she was constantly desiring his presence. "I know he can help me," she would say; "he is a shepherd, like the Lord himself!" And mistress Brookes, though by no means devoid of the prejudices of the rank with which her life had been so much associated, could not but allow that a nobler life must be possible with one like Donal Grant than with one like lord Forgue.

In the middle of the night Arctura became so unquiet, that her nurse, calling the maid she had in a room near, flew like a bird to Donal, and asked him to come down. He had but partially undressed, thinking his help might be wanted, and was down almost as soon as she. Ere he came, however, she had dismissed the maid.

Donal went to the bedside. Arctura was moaning and starting, sometimes opening her eyes, but distinguishing nothing. Her hand lay on the counterpane: he laid his upon it. She gave a sigh as of one relieved; a smile came flickering over her face, and she lay still for some time. Donal sat down beside her, and watched. The moment he saw her begin to be restless or look distressed, he laid his hand upon hers; she was immediately quiet, and lay for a time as if she knew herself safe. When she seemed about to wake, he withdrew.

So things went on for many nights. Donal slept instead of working when his duties with Davie were over, and lay at night in the corridor, wrapt in his plaid. For even after Arctura began to recover, her nights were sorely troubled, and her restoration would have been much retarded, had not Donal been near to make her feel she was not abandoned to the terrors she passed through.

One night the earl, wandering about in the anomalous condition of neither ghost nor genuine mortal, came suddenly upon what he took for a huge animal in wait to devour. He was not terrified, for he was accustomed to such things, and thought at first it was not of this world: he had no doubt of the reality of his visions, even when he knew they were invisible to others, and even in his waking moments had begun to believe in them as much as in the things then evident to him—or rather, perhaps, to disbelieve equally in both. He approached to see what it was, and stood staring down upon the mass. Gently it rose and confronted him—if confronting that may be called where the face remained so undefined—for Donal took care to keep his plaid over his head: he had hope in the probable condition of the earl! He turned from him and walked away.

CHAPTER LXX.

A PLOT

But his lordship had his suspicions, and took measures to confirm or set them at rest—with the result that he concluded Donal madly in love with his niece, and unable, while she was ill, to rest anywhere but, with the devotion of a savage, outside her door: if he did not take precautions, the lout would oust the lord! Ever since Donal spoke so plainly against his self-indulgence, he had not merely hated but feared the country lad. He recognized that Donal feared nothing, had no respect of persons, would speak out before the world. He was doubtful also whether he had not allowed him to know more than it was well he should know. It was time to get rid of him—only it must be done cautiously, with the appearance of a good understanding! If he had him out of the house before she was able to see him again, that would do! And if in the meantime she should die, all would be well! His distrust, once roused, went farther than that of his son. He had not the same confidence in blue blood; he knew a few things more than Forgue—believed it quite possible that the daughter of a long descent of lords and ladies should fall in love with a shepherd-lad. And as no one could tell what might have to be done if the legal owner of the property persisted in refusing her hand to the rightful owner of it, the fellow might be seriously in the way!