CHAPTER VI.

Alas! I do confess I thought all hearts were true, As I did see the whole bright world--how fair! For linked in happy fancies were the twain-- This beautiful--that pure-- And like the mountains of this noble land Did Love and Faith and Honour stedfastly Lift their high heads to the bright sun that crowned them, As I thought, in my sight. I do confess me--if it was a sin, Behold these tears--for bitterly awaking, I found I had but dreamed.

The parlour of Greenshaw was exceedingly bright when I entered it that night--brighter in reality, for they were rejoicing over Walter’s return--and brighter still in contrast with the scene I had left.

“Here he is at last,” cried Walter Johnstone, starting up to shake hands with me as I entered. “Why, have you been seeing ghosts, Adam? One would think that we were the rustics and he the townsman, Charlie.”

“You were always a contemplative man, Mossgray,” said Edward Maxwell, greeting me warmly; “but take care--if you do not tremble for the consequences of a prescription from me, I do, I can tell you.”

Edward’s manner was more manly than usual. In my yearning for something to make up for the fatal loss I had sustained, I caught at this eagerly. Perhaps I had neglected him hitherto. I resolved to do so no longer.

I tried to seat myself so as to shut out Charlie from the light of that countenance, which made me forget even _his_ unworthiness. I grudged him the slightest word from Lilias--I fancied how the pure soul within her would withdraw itself in lofty indignation, did she know him as I did.

“Mossgray,” said Walter, “have you any message for your friend Hew Murray? Maxwell is going to follow his example, do you know.”

“How?” I asked.

“Oh, that famous appointment we have heard so much of has come at last,” said Edward. “The ---- regiment are to have the benefit of my learned services, and they are lying at some heathenish place not far from Hew’s head-quarters. The name I have learned to write after a day’s practice--but the pronunciation--come now, Walter, be merciful--don’t make me desperate by forcing these dislocated syllables over my lips--at least not in Miss Johnstone’s presence.”

“Oh, never mind Miss Johnstone--Lilie is not such an epicure in sounds,” said Walter. “Come along, Mixy. After all, man, I believe you don’t know the true secret so well as I do. A professed lady’s man should never be ladylike himself. What do you say, Mossgray? Do you hear me, Charlie--am I not right?”

Mixy was our familiar contraction of Edward’s respectable surname--we were rather proud of our ingenuity in manufacturing a diminutive which suited name and profession alike so well; and he took it with wonderful good humour. To-night however he seemed displeased a little. I did not wonder; for who could endure to be exposed to ridicule in the presence of Lilias?

“You’re right in the abstract, Wat,” answered Charlie, with perfect coolness: “but wrong in this particular instance. To think of giving counsel to Mixy in such matters--why, Mixy’s irresistible!”

Edward coloured and laughed.

“There now, Charlie, that will do. Don’t believe them, I beg, Miss Johnstone; it’s mere malice, I assure you.”

“Take care, Lilie,” said Walter, “he wants to put you off your guard. Ask Mossgray, if you don’t believe me.”

I coloured more deeply than Edward--this was carrying the joke too far--that Lilias, in her unapproachable purity and loftiness, should be so addressed was a kind of sacrilege. I started in jealous eagerness to save her name from the careless _badinage_ which was profanity to me.

“All this has nothing to do with Hew Murray,” I said hastily, and I felt my cheek burn as I turned away from Charlie. “Are you to be in Bombay, Edward?--are you to be near Hew?”

“Yes, Bombay is my first destination,” said Edward. “I shall seek him out of course--and I suppose I must go in a month or two, so you may prepare your remembrances, Adam.”

“And will you be long away, Mr Maxwell?” said Lilias, softly.

I bent forward at the sound of her voice. I always did--but this night, for the first time, I felt myself grow hot and angry when I saw Edward’s head also inclined towards the speaker, and his face brighten to answer her.

“Many years, I fear, Miss Johnstone--many sad years--if I ever do see Fendie again.”

I thought the low fall of his voice was affectation. Then I repented me--I was exquisitely uncomfortable; doing them all injustice except herself and Charlie--my pure and beautiful star whom no imperfection could cast a shadow on, and the untrue, detected man whom I had called my friend. To these, in their extremes of honour and humiliation, I could not fail to do perfect justice.

“Come, don’t be sentimental,” said Johnstone. “You’ll come home, Mixy--not the least fear of you--and build a thing with pagodas, and a verandah, and call it by an outlandish name, and end your history like a fairy tale. Hew, poor fellow--I am afraid _his_ chance of seeing Fendie again is worse than yours.”

“How is that?” I exclaimed. “Has anything happened, Walter? Have you heard of anything adverse to the Murrays?”

“The poor old man has ruined himself,” said Walter. “I am afraid he must lose everything--but to be sure that is not a thing to be discussed so publicly.”

I turned round and looked Charlie Graeme in the face. He lifted his coward eyes to me for a moment in quick self-consciousness, but they fell before mine. This then was the pitiful reason--I turned indignantly away. I could scarcely bear to look at him again.

We all rose to leave Greenshaw together. Walter accompanied us to Fendie. I put my arm through his hurriedly, and kept him behind, while Charlie and Edward went on before us. I was eager to question him about Murrayshaugh, and eager to escape from the society of my cousin.

“If it is no breach of confidence, Walter,” I said, “I would be glad if you could tell me, what this is that seems to threaten Murrayshaugh?”

“It is no breach of confidence now,” said Johnstone, “for I fear it must very soon be public enough. Murrayshaugh undertook a heavy responsibility long ago for some old friend, Adam; and many years since this friend died, and the whole burden of the debt fell upon Mr Murray, so that only the unusual forbearance of the creditor kept him from being ruined. But now the original creditor, who knew the circumstances, is also dead, and his heir will have no mercy, so that the old man I fear must give up everything. I am afraid, Adam, they will think of me very unfavourably--but that my partner happened, before I joined him, to be their creditor’s agent, is of course no fault of mine. It annoys me though, often; I wish you would just mention that when you write to Hew--not that any sensible person would blame me of course--but only there’s an uncomfortable feeling.”

“Hew will understand,” said I, “but of course I will do what you ask me, Walter; and Murrayshaugh will lose all--did you say all?--and can nothing be done to help him?”

“Nothing but paying the money,” said the man of business by my side, “and it’s a very heavy sum, what with costs and interest, and other such devourers of impoverished means--and besides, Murrayshaugh is too proud to receive a favour, Adam, even from you. He would rather lose everything, you know. I confess, harsh and repulsive as he has always been, there will be something wanting in the countryside if that proud old man does not decay peacefully here, like any other ruined tower--but he would take assistance as an insult--you know he would.”

I did know it, and went on sadly, thinking of the desolate household, and scarcely remembering my companion’s presence.

“And by the by, Mossgray,” said Walter abruptly, “you might mention that--about my partner being this man’s agent--to Miss Murray; not that she will care of course--but just--one does not like to be unjustly blamed.”

“Lucy does not know,” said I, “but I will tell her, Walter, since you wish it. Poor Lucy!--I mean,” I added, as I saw his keen eye shoot from me to Charlie, who walked before us, with an intelligent glance, “I mean it will be so great a trial to her to leave Murrayshaugh.”

Johnstone did not speak. I felt that this was not known to me only, and I remembered bitterly then, that on _her_ the scorn would lie, the stigma of being slighted and deserted; and that scarcely either man or woman would think the worse of him--him, the faithless coward who had thus failed in need.

I scarcely recollect how Charlie and I managed our brief intercourse after that, but it was a very great relief to me when he departed next day. For the first time since we knew each other, Charlie went into Fendie to take his departure alone, with no one to bid him farewell. I believe he felt in some degree the emphasis of the broken custom. I almost believe he would have been glad then to undo what he had done--but the die was cast--it was too late.

A few days after, I went to Murrayshaugh, anxious, if I could manage it indirectly, to see Lucy, and yet afraid to meet her. It was a chill day for summer, with a clouded sky and a loud boisterous breeze tossing the long willow boughs into a sort of fantastic unearthly mirth, which moved me, much as the unseemly merry-making of a mourner might have done. Lucy was sitting in a favourite corner of hers, at the end of the terrace, reading--at least she had a book in her hand. As I approached the stile, and little bridge, over the Murrayshaugh burn, under cover of the eldritch willow branches, she perceived me, and observing that I hesitated to enter, beckoned me to her. I obeyed at once.

I do not think she was paler that day than she had always been, but there was a grave composure about her face which made her seem so. Whatever struggle there had been it was over--and I remember a consciousness of something clear and chill about her, such as one feels in the air after a storm--an atmosphere in which everything stands out in bold relief, disclosing all its points and angles against the distinct far-distant sky. Yet Lucy was no less benign--no less gentle than she had always been.

“I wanted to see you, Adam,” she said. “I will write to Hew to-day--have you anything to say to him?”

“No,” said I, stammering and hesitating, for I felt painfully the great event, the era in our lives which had become known to me since I saw her last. “No, Lucy--except what Hew does not need to be told, I hope--that I constantly think of him as of my most dear friend, and that scarcely anything in the world would delight me so much as to see him again.”

“I will tell him,” said Lucy; “one likes to hear such things sometimes, Adam, even when one is in no doubt of them--and I will tell him any other pleasant thing you know, to make amends for the sad news I must send him--for I am afraid that is certain now, Adam, which I said before was only possible--we must leave Murrayshaugh.”

“Is there no way of averting this calamity?” I exclaimed.

“You know my father, Adam,” said Lucy, “he does not trust me as he might do; but I have almost been acting as a spy these few days, and there is no hope I see; for one of the few trials that can really shake his iron nature is this of leaving home, and if there was any hope of averting it, he would try all means before he yielded.”

“Lucy,” said I, “help me to present my petition to your father--beg him to remember how greatly I am indebted to you all, and entreat him to consider me thus far as his son. If what I have will do, why should he not take it, Lucy? I am a young man--I am ashamed of my own indolence--I will go and seek my fortune like Hew, and will be far happier so than as I am. Lucy--”

“Hush, Adam,” said Lucy, stopping me, as I eagerly pleaded with her, “you must not think of this. I cannot suffer you to say another word, and you know my father with his harsh pride would not be indebted even to his own son for such assistance. No, no, he will bear his own burden alone, and so must I--that it is not easy or light is a lesser matter--we must bear our own lot; but, Adam, I am glad you have said this--I am glad,” said Lucy slowly, a gush of sudden tears coming to her eyes, which seemed to flow back again, and did not fall. “I am glad you would have _done_ it, Adam. I will mind it when I am heavy again, and sinking--and I will tell Hew.”

“But, Lucy, listen to me,” I exclaimed. “May I not speak to Murrayshaugh? may I not ask your father?”

“Not unless you wish to make him desperate, Adam. Nay, do not look impatient. To satisfy you, I will mention it to him myself, and even urge it if I can. I know what the issue will be, but I will do you this justice, Adam--are you content?”

I was compelled to be so. I hardly could have dared myself, under any circumstances, to offer pecuniary assistance to Murrayshaugh.

We parted very soon. Lucy did not make the slightest allusion to Charlie--there was not even a hint or inference which I could fancy pointed to him. She was very composed--so much so, as to make it evident to me, who knew her well, that there had indeed been some grievous troubling of those quiet waters, before so dead a stillness fell upon them--but no one who knew her or observed her less could have seen any trace of a crisis past, or a great struggle completed, in the grave composure of her manner. Whatever memorials of the storm there might be within, there were none without.

I thought when I left her of an ascending road leading westward from Fendie, which, when you look along its line at night, seems to go off so abrupt and chill into the clear cold sky beyond, that its solitary wayfarers mysteriously disappear there, into the luminous blank of heaven, and you watch them with a feeling of desolate loneliness, as they glide in silence away. I thought of Lucy on that road alone--since then, whenever I recall her memory, I have fancied I saw her slight figure there, travelling away steadily into the cold horizon, unwavering and alone.