"It's a bonny, bonny sang," said Malcolm; "but I canna say I a'thegither like it."

"Why not?" asked Mr Graham, with an inquiring smile.

"Because the ocean sudna mak a mou' at the puir earth burnie that cudna help what ran intill 't."

"It took it in though, and made it clean, for all the pain it couldn't help either."

"Weel, gien ye luik at it that gait!" said Malcolm.

In the evening his grandfather came to see him, and sat down by his bedside, full of a tender anxiety which he was soon able to alleviate.

"Wownded in ta hand and in ta foot!" said the seer: "what can it mean? It must mean something, Malcolm, my son."

"Weel, daddy, we maun jist bide till we see," said Malcolm cheerfully.

A little talk followed, in the course of which it came into Malcolm's head to tell his grandfather the dream he had had so much of the first night he had slept in that room—but more for the sake of something to talk about that would interest one who believed in all kinds of prefigurations, than for any other reason.

Duncan sat moodily silent for some time, and then, with a great heave of his broad chest, lifted up his head, like one who had formed a resolution, and said:

"The hour has come. She has long peen afrait to meet it, put it has come, and Allister will meet it.—She 'll not pe your cran'father, my son."

He spoke the words with perfect composure, but as soon as they were uttered, burst into a wail, and sobbed like a child.

"Ye'll be my ain father than?" said Malcolm.

"No, no, my son. She'll not pe anything that's your own at aal!"

And the tears flowed down his channelled cheeks.

For one moment Malcolm was silent, utterly bewildered. But he must comfort the old man first, and think about what he had said afterwards.

"Ye're my ain daddy, whatever ye are!" he said. "Tell me a' aboot it, daddy."

"She 'll tell you all she 'll pe knowing, my son, and she nefer told a lie efen to a Cawmill."

He began his story in haste, as if anxious to have it over, but had to pause often from fresh outbursts of grief. It contained nothing more of the essential than I have already recorded, and Malcolm was perplexed to think why what he had known all the time should affect him so much in the telling. But when he ended with the bitter cry—"And now you'll pe loving her no more, my poy: my chilt, my Malcolm!" he understood it.

"Daddy! daddy!" he cried, throwing his arms round his neck and kissing him, "I lo'e ye better nor ever. An' weel I may!"

"But how can you, when you 've cot none of ta plood in you, my son?" persisted Duncan.

"I hae as muckle as ever I had, daddy."

"Yes, put you 'll tidn't know."

"But ye did, daddy."

"Yes, and inteet she cannot tell why she 'll pe loving you so much herself aal ta time!"

"Weel, daddy, gien ye cud lo'e me sae weel, kennin' me nae bluid's bluid o' yer ain—I canna help it: I maun lo'e ye mair nor ever, noo' at I ken 't tu.—Daddy, daddy, I had nae claim upo' ye, an' ye hae been father an' gran'father an' a' to me!"

"What could she do, Malcolm, my poy? Ta chilt had no one, and she had no one, and so it wass. You must pe her own poy after all! And she 'll not pe wondering put.—It might pe.—Yes, inteed not!"

His voice sank to the murmurs of a half uttered soliloquy, and as he murmured he stroked Malcolm's cheek.

"What are ye efter noo daddy?" asked Malcolm.

The only sign that Duncan heard the question was the complete silence that followed. When Malcolm repeated it, he said something in Gaelic, but finished the sentence thus, apparently unaware of the change of language:

"—only how else should she pe lovin you so much, Malcolm, my son?"

"I ken what Maister Graham would say, daddy," rejoined Malcolm, at a half guess.

"What would he say, my son? He's a coot man, your Maister Graham. —It could not pe without ta sem fathers, and ta sem chief."

"He wad say it was 'cause we war a' o' ae bluid—'cause we had a' ae father."

"Oh yes, no toubt! We aal come from ta same first paarents; put tat will be a fery long way off, pefore ta clans cot tokether. It 'll not pe holding fery well now, my son. Tat waas pefore ta Cawmills."

"That's no what Maister Graham would mean, daddy," said Malcolm. "He would mean that God was the father o' 's a', and sae we cudna help lo'in' ane anither."

"No; tat cannot pe right, Malcolm; for then we should haf to love eferybody. Now she loves you, my son, and she hates Cawmill of Clenlyon. She loves Mistress Partan when she'll not pe too rude to her, and she hates tat Mistress Catanach. She's a paad woman, 'tat she'll pe certain sure, though she'll nefor saw her to speak to her. She'll haf claaws to her poosoms."

"Weel, daddy, there was naething ither to gar ye lo'e me. I was jist a helpless human bein', an' sae for that, an' nae ither rizzon, ye tuik a' that fash wi' me! An' for mysel', I'm deid sure I cudna lo'e ye better gien ye war twise my gran'father."

"He's her own poy!" cried the piper, much comforted; and his hand sought his head, and lighted gently upon it. "Put, maype," he went on, "she might not haf loved you so much if she hadn't peen tinking sometimes—"

He checked himself. Malcolm's questions brought no conclusion to the sentence, and a long silence followed.

"Supposin' I was to turn oot a Cawmill?" said Malcolm, at length.

The hand that was fondling his curls withdrew as if a serpent had bit it, and Duncan rose from his chair.

"Wass it her own son to pe speaking such an efil thing?" he said, in a tone of injured and sad expostulation.

"For onything ye ken, daddy—ye canna tell but it mith be."

"Ton't preathe it, my son!" cried Duncan in a voice of agony, as if he saw unfolding a fearful game the arch enemy had been playing for his soul. "Put it cannot pe," he resumed instantly, "for ten how should she pe loving you, my son?"

"'Cause ye was in for that afore ye kent wha the puir beastie was."

"Ta tarling chilt! she could not haf loved him if he had peen a Cawmill. Her soul would haf chumped pack from him as from ta snake in ta tree. Ta hate in her heart to ta plood of ta Cawmill, would have killed ta chilt of ta Cawmill plood. No, Malcolm! no, my son!"

"Ye wadna hae me believe, daddy, that gien ye had kent by mark o' hiv (hoof) an' horn, that the cratur they laid i' yer lap was a Cawmill—ye wad hae risen up, an' lootin it lie whaur it fell?"

"No, Malcolm; I would haf put my foot upon it, as I would on ta young fiper in ta heather."

"Gien I was to turn oot ane o' that ill race, ye wad hate me, than, daddy—efter a'! Ochone, daddy! Ye wad be weel pleased to think hoo ye stack yer durk throu' the ill han' o' me, an' wadna rist till ye had it throu' the waur hert.—I doobt I had better up an' awa', daddy, for wha' kens what ye mayna du to me?"

Malcolm made a movement to rise, and Duncan's quick ears understood it. He sat down again by his bedside and threw his arms over him.

"Lie town, lie town, my poy. If you ket up, tat will pe you are a Cawmill. No, no, my son! You are ferry cruel to your own old daddy. She would pe too much sorry for her poy to hate him. It will pe so treadful to pe a Cawmill! No, no, my poy! She would take you to her poosom, and tat would trive ta Cawmill out of you. Put ton't speak of it any more, my son, for it cannot pe.—She must co now, for her pipes will pe waiting for her."

Malcolm feared he had ventured too far, for never before had his grandfather left him except for work. But the possibility he had started might do something to soften the dire endurance of his hatred.

His thoughts turned to the new darkness let in upon his history and prospects. All at once the cry of the mad laird rang in his mind's ear: "I dinna ken whaur I cam frae!"

Duncan's revelation brought with it nothing to be done—hardly anything to be thought—merely room for most shadowy, most unfounded conjecture—nay, not conjecture—nothing but the vaguest of castle building! In merry mood, he would henceforth be the son of some mighty man, with a boundless future of sunshine opening before him; in sad mood, the son of some strolling gipsy or worse—his very origin better forgotten—a disgrace to the existence for his share in which he had hitherto been peacefully thankful.

Like a lurking phantom shroud, the sad mood leaped from the field of his speculation, and wrapped him in its folds: sure enough he was but a beggar's brat—How henceforth was he to look Lady Florimel in the face? Humble as he had believed his origin, he had hitherto been proud of it: with such a high minded sire as he deemed his own, how could he be other? But now! Nevermore could he look one of his old companions in the face! They were all honourable men; he a base born foundling!

He would tell Mr Graham of course; but what could Mr Graham say to it? The fact remained. He must leave Portlossie.

His mind went on brooding, speculating, devising. The evening sunk into the night, but he never knew he was in the dark until the housekeeper brought him a light. After a cup of tea, his thoughts found pleasanter paths. One thing was certain: he must lay himself out, as he had never done before, to make Duncan MacPhail happy. With this one thing clear to both heart and mind, he fell fast asleep.



CHAPTER XLIII: THE WIZARD'S CHAMBER

He woke in the dark, with that strange feeling of bewilderment which accompanies the consciousness of having been waked: is it that the brain wakes before the mind, and like a servant unexpectedly summoned, does not know what to do with its master from home? or is it that the master wakes first, and the servant is too sleepy to answer his call? Quickly coming to himself, however, he sought the cause of the perturbation now slowly ebbing. But the dark into which he stared could tell nothing; therefore he abandoned his eyes, took his station in his ears, and thence sent out his messengers. But neither, for some moments, could the scouts of hearing come upon any sign.

At length, something seemed doubtfully to touch the sense-the faintest suspicion of a noise in the next room—the wizard's chamber: it was enough to set Malcolm on the floor.

Forgetting his wounded foot and lighting upon it, the agony it caused him dropped him at once on his hands and knees, and in this posture he crept into the passage. As soon as his head was outside his own door, he saw a faint gleam of light coming from beneath that of the next room. Advancing noiselessly, and softly feeling for the latch, his hand encountered a bunch of keys depending from the lock, but happily did not set them jingling. As softly, he lifted the latch, when, almost of itself, the door opened a couple of inches, and, with bated breath, he saw the back of a figure he could not mistake—that of Mrs Catanach. She was stooping by the side of a tent bed much like his own, fumbling with the bottom hem of one of the check curtains, which she was holding towards the light of a lantern on a chair. Suddenly she turned her face to the door, as if apprehending a presence; as suddenly, he closed it, and turned the key in the lock. To do so he had to use considerable force, and concluded its grating sound had been what waked him.

Having thus secured the prowler, he crept back to his room, considering what he should do next. The speedy result of his cogitations was, that he indued his nether garments, though with difficulty from the size of his foot, thrust his head and arms through a jersey, and set out on hands and knees for an awkward crawl to Lord Lossie's bedroom.

It was a painful journey, especially down the two spiral stone stairs, which led to the first floor where he lay. As he went, Malcolm resolved, in order to avoid rousing needless observers, to enter the room, if possible, before waking the marquis.

The door opened noiselessly. A night light, afloat in a crystal cup, revealed the bed, and his master asleep, with one arm lying on the crimson quilt. He crept in, closed the door behind him, advanced halfway to the bed, and in a low voice called the marquis.

Lord Lossie started up on his elbow, and without a moment's consideration seized one of a brace of pistols which lay on a table by his side, and fired. The ball went with a sharp thud into the thick mahogany door.

"My lord! my lord!" cried Malcolm, "it's only me!"

"And who the devil are you?" returned the marquis, snatching up the second pistol.

"Malcolm, yer ain henchman, my lord."

"Damn you! what are you about then? Get up. What are you after there—crawling like a thief?"

As he spoke he leaped from the bed, and seized Malcolm by the back of the neck.

"It's a mercy I wasna mair like an honest man," said Malcolm, "or that bullet wad hae been throu' the hams o' me. Yer lordship's a wheen ower rash."

"Rash! you rascal!" cried Lord Lossie; "when a fellow comes into my room on his hands and knees in the middle of the night! Get up, and tell me what you are after, or, by Jove! I'll break every bone in your body."

A kick from his bare foot in Malcolm's ribs fitly closed the sentence.

"Ye are ower rash, my lord!" persisted Malcolm. "I canna get up. I hae a fit the size o' a sma' buoy!"

"Speak, then, you rascal!" said his lordship, loosening his hold, and retreating a few steps, with the pistol cocked in his hand.

"Dinna ye think it wad be better to lock the door, for fear the shot sud bring ony o' the fowk?" suggested Malcolm, as he rose to his knees and leaned his hands on a chair.

"You're bent on murdering me—are you then?" said the marquis, beginning to come to himself and see the ludicrousness of the situation.

"Gien I had been that, my lord, I wadna hae waukent ye up first."

"Well, what the devil is it all about?—You needn't think any of the men will come. They're a pack of the greatest cowards ever breathed."

"Weel, my lord, I hae gruppit her at last, an' I bude to come an tell ye.''

"Leave your beastly gibberish. You can speak what at least resembles English when you like."

"Weel, my lord, I hae her unner lock an' keye."

"Who, in the name of Satan?"

"Mistress Catanach, my lord!"

"Damn her eyes! What's she to me that I should be waked out of a good sleep for her?"

"That's what I wad fain yer lordship kent: I dinna."

"None of your riddles! Explain yourself;—and make haste; I want to go to bed again."

"'Deed, yer lordship maun jist pit on yer claes, an' come wi'."

"Where to?"

"To the warlock's chaumer, my lord—whaur that ill wuman remains 'in durance vile,' as Spenser wad say—but no sae vile's hersel', I doobt."

Thus arrived at length, with a clear road before him, at the opening of his case, Malcolm told in few words what had fallen out. As he went on, the marquis grew interested, and by the time he had finished, had got himself into dressing gown and slippers.

"Wadna ye tak yer pistol?" suggested Malcolm slyly.

"What! to meet a woman?" said his lordship.

"Ow na! but wha kens there michtna be anither murderer aboot? There micht be twa in ae nicht."

Impertinent as was Malcolm's humour, his master did not take it amiss: he lighted a candle, told him to lead the way, and took his revenge by making joke after joke upon him as he crawled along. With the upper regions of his house the marquis was as little acquainted, as with those of his nature, and required a guide.

Arrived at length at the wizard's chamber, they listened at the door for a moment, but heard nothing; neither was there any light visible at its lines of junction. Malcolm turned the key, and the marquis stood close behind, ready to enter. But the moment the door was unlocked, it was pulled open violently, and Mrs Catanach, looking too high to see Malcolm who was on his knees, aimed a good blow at the face she did see, in the hope, no doubt, of thus making her escape. But it fell short, being countered by Malcolm's head in the softest part of her person, with the result of a clear entrance. The marquis burst out laughing, and stepped into the room with a rough joke. Malcolm remained in the doorway.

"My lord," said Mrs Catanach, gathering herself together, and rising little the worse, save in temper, for the treatment he had commented upon, "I have a word for your lordship's own ear."

"Your right to be there does stand in need of explanation," said the marquis.

She walked up to him with confidence.

"You shall have an explanation, my lord," she said, "such as shall be my full quittance for intrusion even at this untimely hour of the night."

"Say on then," returned his lordship.

"Send that boy away then, my lord."

"I prefer having him stay," said the marquis.

"Not a word shall cross my lips till he's gone," persisted Mrs Catanach. "I know him too well! Awa' wi' ye, ye deil's buckie!" she continued, turning to Malcolm; "I ken mair aboot ye nor ye ken aboot yersel', an' deil hae't I ken o' guid to you or yours! But I s' gar ye lauch o' the wrang side o' your mou' yet, my man."

Malcolm, who had seated himself on the threshold, only laughed and looked reference to his master.

"Your lordship was never in the way of being frightened at a woman," said Mrs Catanach, with an ugly expression of insinuation.

The marquis shrugged his shoulders.

"That depends," he said. Then turning to Malcolm, "Go along," he added; "only keep within call. I may want you."

"Nane o' yer hearkenin' at the keye hole, though, or I s' lug mark ye, ye—!" said Mrs Catanach, finishing the sentence none the more mildly that she did it only in her heart.

"I wadna hae ye believe a' 'at she says, my lord," said Malcolm, with a significant smile, as he turned to creep away.

He closed the door behind him, and lest Mrs Catanach should repossess herself of the key, drew it from the lock, and, removing a few yards, sat down in the passage by his own door. A good many minutes passed, during which he heard not a sound.

At length the door opened, and his lordship came out. Malcolm looked up, and saw the light of the candle the marquis carried, reflected from a face like that of a corpse. Different as they were, Malcolm could not help thinking of the only dead face he had ever seen. It terrified him for the moment in which it passed without looking at him.

"My lord!" said Malcolm gently.

His master made no reply.

"My lord!" cried Malcolm, hurriedly pursuing him with his voice, "am I to lea' the keyes wi' yon hurdon, and lat her open what doors she likes?"

"Go to bed," said the marquis angrily, "and leave the woman alone;" with which words he turned into the adjoining passage, and disappeared.

Mrs Catanach had not come out of the wizard's chamber, and for a moment Malcolm felt strongly tempted to lock her in once more. But he reflected that he had no right to do so after what his lordship had said—else, he declared to himself, he would have given her at least as good a fright as she seemed to have given his master, to whom he had no doubt she had been telling some horrible lies. He withdrew, therefore, into his room—to lie pondering again for a wakeful while.

This horrible woman claimed then to know more concerning him than his so called grandfather, and, from her profession; it was likely enough; but information from her was hopeless—at least until her own evil time came; and then, how was any one to believe what she might choose to say? So long, however, as she did not claim him for her own, she could, he thought, do him no hurt he would be afraid to meet.

But what could she be about in that room still? She might have gone, though, without the fall of her soft fat foot once betraying her!

Again he got out of bed, and crept to the wizard's door, and listened. But all was still. He tried to open it, but could not: Mrs Catanach was doubtless spending the night there, and perhaps at that moment lay, evil conscience and all, fast asleep in the tent bed. He withdrew once more, wondering whether she was aware that he occupied the next room; and, having, for the first time, taken care to fasten his own door, got into bed, finally this time, and fell asleep.



CHAPTER XLIV: THE HERMIT

Malcolm had flattered himself that he would at least be able to visit his grandfather the next day; but, instead of that, he did not even make an attempt to rise—head as well as foot aching so much, that he felt unfit for the least exertion—a phase of being he had never hitherto known. Mrs Courthope insisted on advice, and the result was that a whole week passed before he was allowed to leave his room.

In the meantime, a whisper awoke and passed from mouth to mouth in all directions through the little burgh—whence arising only one could tell, for even her mouthpiece, Miss Horn's Jean, was such a mere tool in the midwife's hands, that she never doubted but Mrs Catanach was, as she said, only telling the tale as it was told to her. Mrs Catanach, moreover, absolutely certain that no threats would render Jean capable of holding her tongue, had so impressed upon her the terrible consequences of repeating what she had told her, that, the moment the echo of her own utterances began to return to her own ears, she began to profess an utter disbelief in the whole matter—the precise result Mrs Catanach had foreseen and intended: now she lay unsuspected behind Jean, as behind a wall whose door was built up; for she had so graduated her threats, gathering the fullest and vaguest terrors of her supernatural powers about her name, that while Jean dared, with many misgivings, to tamper with the secret itself she dared not once mention Mrs Catanach in connection with it. For Mrs Catanach herself, she never alluded to the subject, and indeed when it was mentioned in her hearing pretended to avoid it; but at the same time she took good care that her silence should be not only eloquent, but discreetly so, that is, implying neither more nor less than she wished to be believed.

The whisper, in its first germinal sprout, was merely that Malcolm was not a MacPhail; and even in its second stage it only amounted to this, that neither was he the grandson of old Duncan.

In the third stage of its development, it became the assertion that Malcolm was the son of somebody of consequence; and in the fourth, that a certain person, not yet named, lay under shrewd suspicion.

The fifth and final form it took was, that Malcolm was the son of Mrs Stewart of Gersefell, who had been led to believe that he died within a few days of his birth, whereas he had in fact been carried off and committed to the care of Duncan MacPhail, who drew a secret annual stipend of no small amount in consequence—whence indeed his well known riches!

Concerning this final form of the whisper, a few of the women of the burgh believed or thought or fancied they remembered both the birth and reported death of the child in question—also certain rumours afloat at the time, which cast an air of probability over the new reading of his fate. In circles more remote from authentic sources, the general reports met with remarkable embellishments, but the framework of the rumour—what I may call the bones of it —remained undisputed.

From Mrs Catanach's behaviour, every one believed that she knew all about the affair, but no one had a suspicion that she was the hidden fountain and prime mover of the report—so far to the contrary was it that people generally anticipated a frightful result for her when the truth came to be known, for that Mrs Stewart would follow her with all the vengeance of a bereaved tigress. Some indeed there were who fancied that the mother, if not in full complicity with the midwife, had at least given her consent to the arrangement; but these were not a little shaken in their opinion when at length Mrs Stewart herself began to figure more immediately in the affair, and it was witnessed that she had herself begun to search into the report. Certain it was that she had dashed into the town in a carriage and pair—the horses covered with foam—and had hurried, quite raised-like, from house to house, prosecuting inquiries. It was said that, finding at length, after much labour that she could arrive at no certainty even as to the first promulgator of the assertion, she had a terrible fit of crying, and professed herself unable, much as she would have wished it, to believe a word of the report: it was far too good news to be true; no such luck ever fell to her share—and so on. That she did not go near Duncan MacPhail was accounted for by the reflection, that, on the supposition itself, he was of the opposite party, and the truth was not to be looked for from him.

At length it came to be known that, strongly urged, and battling with a repugnance all but invincible, she had gone to see Mrs Catanach, and had issued absolutely radiant with joy, declaring that she was now absolutely satisfied, and, as soon as she had communicated with the young man himself, would, without compromising any one, take what legal steps might be necessary to his recognition as her son.

Although, however, these things had been going on all the week that Malcolm was confined to his room, they had not reached this last point until after he was out again, and mean time not a whisper of them had come to his or Duncan's ears. Had they been still in the Seaton, one or other of the travelling ripples of talk must have found them; but Duncan had come and gone between his cottage and Malcolm's bedside, without a single downy feather from the still widening flap of the wings of Fame ever dropping on him; and the only persons who visited Malcolm besides were the Doctor—too discreet in his office to mix himself up with gossip; Mr Graham, to whom nobody, except it had been Miss Horn, whom he had not seen for a fortnight, would have dreamed of mentioning such a subject; and Mrs Courthope—not only discreet like the doctor, but shy of such discourse as any reference to the rumour must usher in its train.

At length he was sufficiently recovered to walk to his grandfather's cottage; but only now for the first time had he a notion of how far bodily condition can reach in the oppression and overclouding of the spiritual atmosphere.

"Gien I be like this," he said to himself, "what maun the weather be like aneth yon hump o' the laird's!"

Now also for the first time he understood what Mr Graham had meant when he told him that he only was a strong man who was strong in weakness; he only a brave man who, inhabiting trembling, yet faced his foe; he only a true man who, tempted by good, yet abstained.

Duncan received him with delight, made him sit in his own old chair, got him a cup of tea, and waited upon him with the tenderness of a woman. While he drank his tea, Malcolm recounted his last adventure in connection with the wizard's chamber.

"Tat will be ta ped she 'll saw in her feeshon," said Duncan, whose very eyes seemed to listen to the tale.

When Malcolm came to Mrs Catanach's assertion that she knew more of him than he did himself—

"Then she peliefs ta voman does, my poy. We are aall poth of us in ta efil voman's power," said Duncan sadly.

"Never a hair, daddy!" cried Malcolm. "A' pooer 's i' the han's o' ane, that's no her maister. Ken she what she likes, she canna pairt you an' me, daddy."

"God forpid!" responded Duncan. "But we must pe on our kard."

Close by the cottage stood an ivy grown bridge, of old leading the king's highway across the burn to the Auld Toon, but now leading only to the flower garden. Eager for the open air of which he had been so long deprived, and hoping he might meet the marquis or Lady Florimel, Malcolm would have had his grandfather to accompany him thither; but Duncan declined, for he had not yet attended to the lamps; and Malcolm therefore went alone.

He was slowly wandering, where never wind blew, betwixt rows of stately hollyhocks, on which his eyes fed, while his ears were filled with the sweet noises of a little fountain, issuing from the upturned beak of a marble swan, which a marble urchin sought in vain to check by squeezing the long throat of the bird, when the sounds of its many toned fall in the granite basin seemed suddenly centupled on every side, and Malcolm found himself caught in a tremendous shower. Prudent enough to avoid getting wet in the present state of his health, he made for an arbour he saw near by, on the steep side of the valley—one he had never before happened to notice.

Now it chanced that Lord Lossie himself was in the garden, and, caught also by the rain while feeding some pet goldfishes in a pond, betook himself to the same summer house, following Malcolm.

Entering the arbour, Malcolm was about to seat himself until the shower should be over, when, perceiving a mossy arched entrance to a gloomy recess in the rock behind, he went to peep into it, curious to see what sort of a place it was.

Now the foolish whim of a past generation had, in the farthest corner of the recess, and sideways from. the door, seated the figure of a hermit, whose jointed limbs were so furnished with springs and so connected with the stone that floored the entrance, that as soon as a foot pressed the threshold, he rose, advanced a step, and held out his hand.

The moment, therefore, Malcolm stepped in, up rose a pale, hollow cheeked, emaciated man, with eyes that stared glassily, made a long skeleton like stride towards him, and held out a huge bony hand, rather, as it seemed, with the intent of clutching, than of greeting, him. An unaccountable horror seized him; with a gasp which had nearly become a cry, he staggered backwards out of the cave. It seemed to add to his horror that the man did not follow—remained lurking in the obscurity behind. In the arbour Malcolm turned— turned to flee!—though why, or from what, he had scarce an idea.

But when he turned he encountered the marquis, who was just entering the arbour.

"Well, MacPhail," he said kindly, "I'm glad—"

But his glance became fixed in a stare; he changed colour, and did not finish his sentence.

"I beg yer lordship's pardon," said Malcolm, wondering through all his perturbation at the look he had brought on his master's face; "I didna ken ye was at han'."

"What the devil makes you look like that?" said the marquis, plainly with an effort to recover himself.

Malcolm gave a hurried glance over his shoulder.

"Ah! I see!" said his lordship, with a mechanical kind of smile, very unlike his usual one; "—you've never been in there before?"

"No, my lord."

"And you got a fright?"

"Ken ye wha's that, in there, my lord?"

"You booby! It's nothing but a dummy—with springs, and—and —all damned tomfoolery!"

While he spoke his mouth twitched oddly, but instead of his bursting into the laugh of enjoyment natural to him at the discomfiture of another, his mouth kept on twitching and his eyes staring.

"Ye maun hae seen him yersel' ower my shouther, my lord," hinted Malcolm.

"I saw your face, and that was enough to—" But the marquis did not finish the sentence.

"Weel, 'cep it was the oonnaiteral luik o' the thing—no human, an' yet sae dooms like it—I can not account for the grue or the trimmle 'at cam ower me, my lord, I never fan' onything like it i' my life afore. An' even noo 'at I unnerstan' what it is, I kenna what wad gar me luik the boody (bogie) i' the face again."

"Go in at once," said the marquis fiercely.

Malcolm looked him full in the eyes.

"Ye mean what ye say, my lord?"

"Yes, by God!" said the marquis, with an expression I can describe only as of almost savage solemnity.

Malcolm stood silent for one moment.

"Do you think I'll have a man about me that has no more courage than —than—a woman!" said his master, concluding with an effort.

"I was jist turnin' ower an auld question, my lord—whether it be lawfu' to obey a tyrant. But it's na worth stan'in' oot upo'. I s' gang."

He turned to the arch, placed a hand on each side of it, and leaned forward with outstretched neck, peeped cautiously in, as if it were the den of a wild beast. The moment he saw the figure—seated on a stool—he was seized with the same unaccountable agitation, and drew back shivering.

"Go in," shouted the marquis.

Most Britons would count obedience to such a command slavish; but Malcolm's idea of liberty differed so far from that of most Britons, that he felt, if now he refused to obey the marquis, he might be a slave for ever; for he had already learned to recognize and abhor that slavery which is not the less the root of all other slaveries that it remains occult in proportion to its potency—self slavery: he must and would conquer this whim, antipathy, or whatever the loathing might be: it was a grand chance given him of proving his will supreme—that is himself a free man! He drew himself up, with a full breath, and stepped within the arch. Up rose the horror again, jerked itself towards him with a clank, and held out its hand. Malcolm seized it with such a gripe that its fingers came off in his grasp.

"Will that du, my lord?" he said calmly, turning a face rigid with hidden conflict, and gleaming white, from the framework of the arch, upon his master, whose eyes seemed to devour him.

"Come out," said the marquis, in a voice that seemed to belong to some one else.

"I hae blaudit yer playock, my lord," said Malcolm ruefully, as he stepped from the cave and held out the fingers.

Lord Lossie turned and left the arbour.

Had Malcolm followed his inclination, he would have fled from it, but he mastered himself still, and walked quietly out. The marquis was pacing, with downbent head and hasty strides, up the garden: Malcolm turned the other way.

The shower was over, and the sun was drawing out millions of mimic suns from the drops that hung, for a moment ere they fell, from flower and bush and great tree. But Malcolm saw nothing. Perplexed with himself and more perplexed yet with the behaviour of his master, he went back to his grandfather's cottage, and, as soon as he came in, recounted to him the whole occurrence.

"He had a feeshon," said the bard, with wide eyes. "He comes of a race that sees."

"What cud the veesion hae been, daddy?"

"Tat she knows not, for ta feeshon tid not come to her," said the piper solemnly.

Had the marquis had his vision in London, he would have gone straight to his study, as he called it, not without a sense of the absurdity involved, opened a certain cabinet, and drawn out a certain hidden drawer; being at Lossie, he walked up the glen of the burn to the bare hill, overlooking the House, the royal burgh, the great sea, and his own lands lying far and wide around him. But all the time he saw nothing of these—he saw but the low white forehead of his vision, a mouth of sweetness, and hazel eyes that looked into his very soul.

Malcolm walked back to the House, clomb the narrow duct of an ancient stone stair that went screwing like a great auger through the pile from top to bottom, sought the wide lonely garret, flung himself upon his bed, and from his pillow gazed through the little dormer window on the pale blue skies flecked with cold white clouds, while in his mind's eye he saw the foliage beneath burning in the flames of slow decay, diverse as if each of the seven in the prismatic chord had chosen and seared its own: the first nor'easter that drove the flocks of Neptune on the sands, would sweep its ashes away. Life, he said to himself, was but a poor gray kind of thing after all. The peacock summer had folded its gorgeous train, and the soul within him had lost its purple and green, its gold and blue. He never thought of asking how much of the sadness was owing to bodily conditions with which he was little acquainted, and to compelled idleness in one accustomed to an active life. But if he had, the sorrowful probabilities of life would have seemed just the same. And indeed he might have argued that, to be subject to any evil from a cause inadequate, only involves an absurdity that embitters the pain by its mockery. He had yet to learn what faith can do, in the revelation of the Moodless, for the subjugation of mood to will.

As he lay thus weighed upon rather than pondering, his eye fell on the bunch of keys which he had taken from the door of the wizard's chamber, and he wondered that Mrs Courthope had not seen and taken them—apparently had not missed them. And the chamber doomed to perpetual desertion lying all the time open to any stray foot! Once more at least, he must go and turn the key in the lock.

As he went the desire awoke to look again into the chamber, for that night he had had neither light nor time enough to gain other than the vaguest impression of it.

But for no lifting of the latch would the door open.—How could the woman—witch she must be—have locked it? He proceeded to unlock it. He tried one key, then another. He went over the whole bunch. Mystery upon mystery!—not one of them would turn. Bethinking himself, he began to try them the other way, and soon found one to throw the bolt on. He turned it in the contrary direction, and it threw the bolt off: still the door remained immovable! It must then —awful thought!—be fast on the inside! Was the woman's body lying there behind those check curtains? Would it lie there until it vanished, like that of the wizard,—vanished utterly—bones and all, to a little dust, which one day a housemaid might sweep up in a pan?

On the other hand, if she had got shut in, would she not have made noise enough to be heard?—he had been day and night in the next room! But it was not a spring lock, and how could that have happened? Or would she not have been missed, and inquiry made after her? Only such an inquiry might well have never turned in the direction of Lossie House, and he might never have heard of it, if it had.

Anyhow he must do something; and the first rational movement would clearly be to find out quietly for himself whether the woman was actually missing or not.

Tired as he was he set out at once for the burgh, and the first person he saw was Mrs Catanach standing on her doorstep and shading her eyes with her hand, as she looked away out to the horizon over the roofs of the Seaton. He went no farther.

In the evening he found an opportunity of telling his master how the room was strangely closed; but his lordship pooh poohed, and said something must have gone wrong with the clumsy old lock.

With vague foresight, Malcolm took its key from the bunch, and, watching his opportunity, unseen hung the rest on their proper nail in the housekeeper's room. Then, having made sure that the door of the wizard's chamber was locked, he laid the key away in his own chest.



CHAPTER XLV: MR CAIRNS AND THE MARQUIS

The religious movement amongst the fisher folk was still going on. Their meeting was now held often during the week, and at the same hour on the Sunday as other people met at church. Nor was it any wonder that, having participated in the fervour which pervaded their gatherings in the cave, they should have come to feel the so called divine service in the churches of their respective parishes a dull, cold, lifeless, and therefore unhelpful ordinance, and at length regarding it as composed of beggarly elements, breathing of bondage, to fill the Baillies' Barn three times every Sunday—a reverential and eager congregation.

Now, had they confined their prayers and exhortations to those which, from an ecclesiastical point of view, constitute the unholy days of the week, Mr Cairns would have neither condescended nor presumed to take any notice of them; but when the bird's eye view from his pulpit began to show patches of bare board where human forms had wont to appear; and when these plague spots had not only lasted through successive Sundays, but had begun to spread more rapidly, he began to think it time to put a stop to such fanatical aberrations—the result of pride and spiritual presumption— hostile towards God, and rebellious towards their lawful rulers and instructors.

For what an absurdity it was that the spirit of truth should have anything to communicate to illiterate and vulgar persons except through the mouths of those to whom had been committed the dispensation of the means of grace! Whatever wind might blow, except from their bellows, was, to Mr Cairns at least, not even of doubtful origin. Indeed the priests of every religion, taken in class, have been the slowest to recognize the wind of the spirit, and the quickest to tell whence the blowing came and whither it went—even should it have blown first on their side of the hedge. And how could it be otherwise? How should they recognize as a revival the motions of life unfelt in their own hearts, where it was most required? What could they know of doubts and fears, terrors and humiliations, agonies of prayer, ecstasies of relief, and thanksgiving, who regarded their high calling as a profession, with social claims and ecclesiastical rights; and even as such had so little respect for it that they talked of it themselves as the cloth? How could such a man as Mr Cairns, looking down from the height of his great soberness and the dignity of possessing the oracles and the ordinances, do other than contemn the enthusiasms and excitements of ignorant repentance? How could such as he recognize in the babble of babes the slightest indication of the revealing of truths hid from the wise and prudent; especially since their rejoicing also was that of babes, hence carnal, and accompanied by all the weaknesses and some of the vices which it had required the utmost energy of the prince of apostles to purge from one at least of the early churches?

He might, however, have sought some foundation for a true judgment, in a personal knowledge of their doctrine and collective behaviour; but, instead of going to hear what the babblers had to say, and thus satisfying himself whether the leaders of the movement spoke the words of truth and soberness, or of discord and denial— whether their teaching and their prayers were on the side of order and law, or tending to sedition—he turned a ready ear to all the reports afloat concerning them, and, misjudging them utterly, made up his mind to use all lawful means for putting an end to their devotions and exhortations. One fact he either had not heard or made no account of—that the public houses in the villages whence these assemblies were chiefly gathered, had already come to be all but deserted.

Alone, then, and unsupported by one of his brethren of the Presbytery, even of those who suffered like himself, he repaired to Lossie House, and laid before the marquis the whole matter from his point of view—that the tabernacles of the Lord were deserted for dens and caves of the earth; that fellows so void of learning as not to be able to put a sentence together, or talk decent English, (a censure at which Lord Lossie smiled, for his ears were accustomed to a different quality of English from that which now invaded them) took upon themselves to expound the Scriptures; that they taught antinomianism, (for which assertion, it must be confessed, there was some apparent ground) and were at the same time suspected of Arminianism and Anabaptism: that, in a word, they were a terrible disgrace to the godly and hitherto sober minded parishes in which the sect, if it might be dignified with even such a name, had sprung up.

The marquis listened with much indifference, and some impatience: what did he or any other gentleman care about such things? Besides, he had a friendly feeling towards the fisher folk, and a decided disinclination to meddle with their liberty, either of action or utterance.*

*[Ill, from all artistic points of view, as such a note comes in, I must, for reasons paramount to artistic considerations, remind my readers, that not only is the date of my story half a century or so back, but, dealing with principles, has hardly anything to do with actual events, and nothing at all with persons. The local skeleton of the story alone is taken from the real, and I had not a model, not to say an original, for one of the characters in it —except indeed Mrs Catanach's dog.]

"But what have I to do with it, Mr Cairns?" he said, when the stream of the parson's utterance had at length ceased to flow. "I am not a theologian; and if I were, I do not see how that even would give me a right to interfere."

"In such times of insubordination as these, my lord," said Mr Cairns, "when every cadger thinks himself as good as an earl, it is more than desirable that not a single foothold should be lost. There must be a general election soon, my lord. Besides, these men abuse your lordship's late hospitality, declaring it has had the worst possible influence on the morals of the people."

A shadow of truth rendered this assertion the worse misrepresentation: no blame to the marquis had even been hinted at; the speakers had only animadverted on the fishermen who had got drunk on the occasion.

"Still," said the marquis, smiling, for the reported libel did not wound him very deeply, "what ground of right have I to interfere?"

"The shore is your property, my lord—every rock and every buckie (spiral shell) upon it; the caves are your own—every stone and pebble of them: you can prohibit all such assemblies."

"And what good would that do? They would only curse me, and go somewhere else."

"Where could they go, where the same law wouldn't hold, my lord? The coast is yours for miles and miles on both sides."

"I don't know that it should be."

"Why not, my lord? It has belonged to your family from time immemorial, and will belong to it, I trust, while the moon endureth."

"They used to say," said the marquis thoughtfully, as if he were recalling something he had heard long ago, "that the earth was the Lord's."

"This part of it is Lord Lossie's," said Mr Cairns, combining the jocular with the complimentary in one irreverence; but, as if to atone for the freedom he had taken—"The Deity has committed it to the great ones of the earth to rule for him," he added, with a devout obeisance to the delegate.

Lord Lossie laughed inwardly.

"You can even turn them out of their houses, if you please, my lord," he superadded.

"God forbid!" said the marquis.

"A threat—the merest hint of such a measure is all that would be necessary."

"But are you certain of the truth of these accusations?"

"My lord!"

"Of course you believe them, or you would not repeat them, but it does not follow that they are fact."

"They are matter of common report, my lord. What I have stated is in every one's mouth."

"But you have not yourself heard any of their sermons, or what do they call them?"

"No, my lord," said Mr Cairns, holding up his white hands in repudiation of the idea; "it would scarcely accord with my position to act the spy."

"So, to keep yourself immaculate, you take all against them for granted! I have no such scruples, however. I will go and see, or rather hear, what they are about: after that I shall be in a position to judge."

"Your lordship's presence will put them on their guard."

"If the mere sight of me is a check," returned the marquis, "extreme measures will hardly be necessary."

He spoke definitively, and made a slight movement, which his visitor accepted as his dismissal. He laughed aloud when the door closed, for the spirit of what the Germans call Schadenfreude was never far from his elbow, and he rejoiced in the parson's discomfiture. It was in virtue of his simplicity, precluding discomfiture, that Malcolm could hold his own with him so well. For him he now sent.

"Well, MacPhail," he said kindly, as the youth entered, "how is that foot of yours getting on?"

"Brawly, my lord; there's naething muckle the maitter wi' hit or me aither, noo 'at we're up. But I was jist nearhan' deid o' ower muckle bed."

"Had n't you better come down out of that cockloft?" said the marquis, dropping his eyes.

"Na, my lord; I dinna care aboot pairtin' wi' my neebour yet."

"What neighbour?"

"Ow, the auld warlock, or whatever it may be 'at hauds a reemish (romage) there."

"What! is he troublesome next?

"Ow, na! I'm no thinkin' 't; but 'deed I dinna ken, my lord!" said Malcolm.

"What do you mean, then?"

"Gien yer lordship wad aloo me to force yon door, I wad be better able to tell ye."

"Then the old man is not quiet?"

"There's something no quaiet."

"Nonsense! It's all your imagination—depend on it."

"I dinna think it."

"What do you think, then? You're not afraid of ghosts, surely?"

"No muckle. I hae naething mair upo' my conscience nor I can bide i' the deidest o' the nicht."

"Then you think ghosts come of a bad conscience? A kind of moral delirium tremens—eh?"

"I dinna ken, my lord; but that's the only kin' o' ghaist I wad be fleyed at—at least 'at I wad rin frae. I wad a heap raither hae a ghaist i' my hoose nor ane far'er benn. An ill man, or wuman, like Mistress Catanach, for enstance, 'at's a'boady, 'cep' what o' her 's deevil,"

"Nonsense!" said the marquis, angrily; but Malcolm went on:

"—maun be jist fu' o' ghaists! An' for onything I ken, that 'll be what maks ghaists o' themsel's efter they 're deid, settin' them waukin', as they ca' 't. It's full waur nor bein' possessed wi' deevils, an' maun be a hantle mair ooncoamfortable.—But I wad hae yon door opent, my lord."

"Nonsense!" exclaimed the marquis once more, and shrugged his shoulders. "You must leave that room. If I hear anything more about noises, or that sort of rubbish, I shall insist upon it.—I sent for you now, however, to ask you about these clandestine meetings of the fisher folk."

"Clandestine, my lord? There's no clam aboot them, but the clams upo' the rocks."

The marquis was not etymologist enough to understand Malcolm's poor pun, and doubtless thought it worse than it was.

"I don't want any fooling," he said. "Of course you know these people?"

"Ilka man, wuman, an' bairn o' them," answered Malcolm.

"And what sort are they?"

"Siclike as ye micht expec'."

"That's not a very luminous answer."

"Weel, they're nae waur nor ither fowk, to begin wi'; an' gien this hauds, they'll be better nor mony."

"What sort are their leaders?"

"Guid, respectable fowk, my lord."

"Then there's not much harm in them?"

"There's nane but what they wad fain be rid o'. I canna say as muckle for a' 'at hings on to them. There's o' them, nae doobt, wha wad fain win to h'aven ohn left their sins ahin' them; but they get nae encouragement frae Maister MacLeod. Blue Peter, 'at gangs oot wi' 's i' yer lordship's boat—he's ane o' their best men— though he never gangs ayont prayin', I'm tauld."

"Which is far enough, surely," said his lordship, who, belonging to the Episcopal church, had a different idea concerning the relative dignities of preaching and praying.

"Ay, for a body's sel', surely; but maybe no aye eneuch for ither fowk," answered Malcolm, always ready after his clumsy fashion.

"Have you been to any of these meetings?"

"I was at the first twa, my lord."

"Why not more?"

"I didna care muckle aboot them, an' I hae aye plenty to du. Besides, I can get mair oot o' Maister Graham wi' twa words o' a question nor the haill crew o' them could tell me atween this an' eternity."

"Well, I am going to trust you," said the marquis slowly, with an air of question rather than of statement.

"Ye may du that, my lord."

"You mean I may with safety?"

"I div mean that same, my lord."

"You can hold your tongue then?"

"I can, an' I wull my lord," said Malcolm; but added in haste, "— 'cept it interfere wi' ony foregane agreement or nat'ral obligation."

It must be borne in mind that Malcolm was in the habit of discussing all sorts of questions with Mr Graham: some of the formulae wrought out between them he had made himself thoroughly master of.

"By Jupiter!" exclaimed the marquis, with a pause of amusement. "Well," he went on, "I suppose I must take you on your own terms. —They've been asking me to put a stop to these conventicles."

"Wha has, my lord?"

"That's my business."

"Lat it be nae ither body's, my lord."

"That's my intention. I told him I would go and myself."

"Jist like yer lordship!"

"What do you mean by that?"

"I was aye sure ye was for fair play, my lord."

"It's little enough I've ever had," said the marquis.

"Sae lang's we gie plenty, my lord, it maitters less hoo muckle we get. A'body likes to get it."

"That doctrine won't carry you far, my lad."

"Far eneuch, gien 't cairry me throu', my lord."

"How absolute the knave is!" said his lordship good humouredly. "— Well, but," he resumed, "—about these fishermen: I'm only afraid Mr Cairns was right."

"What said he, my lord?"

"That, when they saw me there, they would fit their words to my ears."

"I ken them better nor ony black coat atween Cromarty an' Peterheid; an' I can tell yer lordship there winna be ae word o' differ for your bein' there."

"If only I could be there and not there both at once! There's no other sure mode of testing your assertion. What a pity the only thorough way should be an impossible one!"

"To a' practical purpose, it's easy eneuch, my lord. Jist gang ohn be seen the first nicht, an' the neist gang in a co'ch an' fower. Syne compaur."

"Quite satisfactory, no doubt, if I could bring myself to do it; but, though I said I would, I don't like to interfere so far even as to go at all."

"At ony public meetin', my lord, ye hae as guid a richt to be present, as the puirest body i' the lan'. An' forbye that, as lord o' the place, ye hae a richt to ken what's gaein' on: I dinna ken hoo far the richt o' interferin' gangs; that's anither thing a'thegither."

"I see you're a thorough going rebel yourself."

"Naething o' the kind, my lord. I'm only sae far o' yer lordship's min' 'at I like fair play—gien a body could only be aye richt sure what was fair play!"

"Yes, there's the very point!—certainly, at least, when the question comes to be of eavesdropping—not to mention that I could never condescend to play the spy."

"What a body has a richt to hear, he may hear as he likes—either shawin' himsel' or hidin' himsel'. An' it 's the only plan 'at 's fair to them, my lord. It 's no 's gien yer lordship was lyin' in wait to du them a mischeef: ye want raither to du them a kin'ness, an' tak their pairt."

"I don't know that, Malcolm. It depends."

"It's plain yer lordship's prejudeezed i' their fawvour. Ony. gait I 'm sartin it's fair play ye want; an' I canna for the life o' me see a hair o' wrang i' yer lordship's gaein' in a cogue, as auld Tammy Dyster ca's 't; for, at the warst, ye cud only interdick them, an' that ye cud du a' the same, whether ye gaed or no. An', gien ye be sae wulled, I can tak you an' my leddy whaur ye 'll hear ilka word 'at 's uttered, an' no a body get a glimp o' ye, mair nor gien ye was sittin' at yer ain fireside as ye are the noo."

"That does make a difference!" said the marquis, a great part of whose unwillingness arose from the dread of discovery. "It would be very amusing."

"I'll no promise ye that," returned Malcolm. "I dinna ken aboot that.—There's jist ae objection hooever: ye wad hae to gang a guid hoor afore they begoud to gaither.—An' there 's aye laadies aboot the place sin' they turned it intill a kirk!" he added thoughtfully. "But," he resumed, "we cud manage them."

"How?"

"I wad get my gran'father to strik' up wi' a spring upo' the pipes, o' the other side o' the bored craig—or lat aff a shot of the sweevil: they wad a' rin to see, an' i' the meantime we cud lan' ye frae the cutter. We wad hae ye in an' oot o' sicht in a moment —Blue Peter an' me—as quaiet as gien ye war ghaists, an' the hoor midnicht."

The marquis was persuaded, but objected to the cutter. They would walk there, he said. So it was arranged that Malcolm should take him and Lady Florimel to the Baillies' Barn the very next time the fishermen had a meeting.



CHAPTER XLVI: THE BAILLIES' BARN

Lady Florimel was delighted at the prospect of such an adventure. The evening arrived. An hour before the time appointed for the meeting, the three issued from the tunnel, and passed along the landward side of the dune, towards the promontory. There sat the piper on the swivel, ready to sound a pibroch the moment they should have reached the shelter of the bored craig—his signal being Malcolm's whistle. The plan answered perfectly. In a few minutes, all the children within hearing were gathered about Duncan—a rarer sight to them than heretofore—and the way was clear to enter unseen.

It was already dusk, and the cave was quite dark, but Malcolm lighted a candle, and, with a little difficulty, got them up into the wider part of the cleft, where he had arranged comfortable seats with plaids and cushions. As soon as they were placed, he extinguished the light.

"I wish you would tell us another story, Malcolm," said Lady Florimel.

"Do," said the marquis "the place is not consecrated yet."

"Did ye ever hear the tale o' the auld warlock, my leddy?" asked Malcolm. "Only my lord kens 't!" he added.

"I don't," said Lady Florimel.

"It's great nonsense," said the marquis.

"Do let us have it, papa."

"Very well. I don't mind hearing it again." He wanted to see how Malcolm would embellish it.

"It seems to me," said Malcolm, "that this ane aboot Lossie Hoose' an' yon ane aboot Colonsay Castel, are verra likly but twa stalks frae the same rute. Ony gate, this ane aboot the warlock maun be the auldest o' the twa. Ye s' hae 't sic 's I hae 't mysel'. Mistress Coorthoup taul' 't to me."

It was after his own more picturesque fashion, however, that he recounted the tale of Lord Gernon.

As the last words left his lips, Lady Florimel gave a startled cry, seized him by the arm, and crept close to him. The marquis jumped to his feet, knocked his head against the rock, uttered an oath, and sat down again.

"What ails ye, my leddy!" said Malcolm. "There's naething here to hurt ye."

"I saw a face," she said, "a white face!"

"Whaur?"

"Beyond you a little way—near the ground," she answered, in a tremulous whisper.

"It's as dark's pick!" said Malcolm, as if thinking it to himself. —He knew well enough that it must be the laird or Phemy, but he was anxious the marquis should not learn the secret of the laird's refuge.

"I saw a face anyhow," said Florimel. "It gleamed white for one moment, and then vanished."

"I wonner ye didna cry oot waur, my leddy," said Malcolm, peering into the darkness.

"I was too frightened. It looked so ghastly!—not more than a foot from the ground."

"Cud it hae been a flash, like, frae yer ain een ?"

"No I am sure it was a face."

"How much is there of this cursed hole?" asked the marquis; rubbing the top of his head.

"A heap," answered Malcolm. "The grun' gangs down like a brae ahin' 's, intil a—"

"You don't mean right behind us?" cried the marquis.

"Nae jist doss, my lord. We're sittin' i' the mou' o' 't, like, wi' the thrapple (throat) o' 't ahin' 's, an' a muckle stamach ayont that."

"I hope there's no danger," said the marquis.

"Nane 'at I ken o'."

"No water at the bottom ?"

"Nane, my lord—that is, naething but a bonny spring i' the rock side."

"Come away, papa!" cried Florimel. "I don't like it. I've had enough of this kind of thing."

"Nonsense!" said the marquis, still rubbing his head.

"Ye wad spile a', my leddy! It's ower late, forbye," said Malcolm; "I hear a fut."

He rose and peeped out, but drew back instantly, saying in a whisper:

"It's Mistress Catanach wi' a lantren! Haud yer tongue, my bonny leddy; ye ken weel she's no mowse. Dinna try to leuk, my lord; she micht get a glimp o' ye—she's terrible gleg. I hae been hearin' mair yet aboot her. Yer lordship 's ill to convence, but depen' upo' 't, whaurever that woman is, there there's mischeef! Whaur she taks a scunner at a body, she hates like the verra deevil. She winna aye lat them ken 't, but taks time to du her ill turns. An' it 's no that only, but gien she gets a haud o' onything agane anybody, she 'll save 't up upo' the chance o' their giein' her some offence afore they dee. She never lowses haud o' the tail o' a thing, an' at her ain proaper time, she 's in her natur' bun' to mak the warst use o' 't."

Malcolm was anxious both to keep them still, and to turn aside any further inquiry as to the face Florimel had seen. Again he peeped out.

"What is she efter noo? She 's comin' this gait," he went on, in a succession of whispers, turning his head back over his shoulder when he spoke. "Gien she thoucht ther was a hole i' the perris she didna ken a' the oots an' ins o', it wad baud her ohn sleepit.— Weesht! weesht! here she comes!" he concluded, after a listening pause, in the silence of which he could hear her step approaching.

He stretched out his neck over the ledge, and saw her coming straight for the back of the cave, looking right before her with slow moving, keen, wicked eyes. It was impossible to say what made them look wicked: neither in form, colour, motion, nor light, were they ugly—yet in everyone of these they looked wicked, as her lantern, which, being of horn, she had opened for more light, now and then, as it swung in her hand, shone upon her pale, pulpy, evil countenance.

"Gien she tries to come up, I'll hae to caw her doon," he said to himself, "an' I dinna like it, for she 's a wuman efter a', though a deevilich kin' o' a ane; but there's my leddy! I hae broucht her intill 't, an' I maun see her safe oot o' 't!"

But if Mrs. Catanach was bent on an exploration, she was for the time prevented from prosecuting it by the approach of the first of the worshippers, whose voices they now plainly heard. She retreated towards the middle of the cave, and sat down in a dark corner, closing her lantern and hiding it with the skirt of her long cloak. Presently a good many entered at once, some carrying lanterns, and most of them tallow candles, which they quickly lighted and disposed about the walls. The rest of the congregation, with its leaders, came trooping in so fast, that in ten minutes or so the service began.

As soon as the singing commenced, Malcolm whispered to Lady Florimel, "Was 't a man's face or a lassie's ye saw, my leddy?"

"A man's face—the same we saw in the storm," she answered, and Malcolm felt her shudder as she spoke.

"It 's naething but the mad laird," he said. "He 's better nor hairmless. Dinna say a word to yer father my leddy. I dinna like to say that, but I 'll tell ye a' what for efterhin'."

But Florimel, knowing that her father had a horror of lunatics, was willing enough to be silent.

No sooner was her terror thus assuaged, than the oddities of the singing laid hold upon her, stirring up a most tyrannous impulse to laughter. The prayer that followed made it worse. In itself the prayer was perfectly reverent, and yet, for dread of irreverence, I must not attempt a representation of the forms of its embodiment, or the manner of its utterance.

So uncontrollable did her inclination to merriment become, that she found at last the only way to keep from bursting into loud laughter was to slacken the curb, and go off at a canter—I mean, to laugh freely but gently. This so infected her father, that he straightway accompanied her, but with more noise. Malcolm sat in misery, from the fear not so much of discovery, though that would be awkward enough, as of the loss to the laird of his best refuge. But when he reflected, he doubted much whether it was even now a safe one; and, anyhow, knew it would be as vain to remonstrate as to try to stop the noise of a brook by casting pebbles into it.

When it came to the sermon, however, things went better; for MacLeod was the preacher,—an eloquent man after his kind, in virtue of the genuine earnestness of which he was full. If his anxiety for others appeared to be rather to save them from the consequences of their sins, his main desire for himself certainly was to be delivered from evil; the growth of his spiritual nature, while it rendered him more and more dissatisfied with himself, had long left behind all fear save of doing wrong. His sermon this evening was founded on the text: "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God." He spoke fervently and persuasively; nor, although his tone and accent were odd, and his Celtic modes and phrases to those Saxon ears outlandish, did these peculiarities in the least injure the influence of the man. Even from Florimel was the demon of laughter driven; and the marquis, although not a single notion of what the man intended passed through the doors of his understanding, sat quiet, and disapproved of nothing. Possibly, had he been alone as he listened, he too, like one of old, might have heard, in the dark cave, the still small voice of a presence urging him forth to the light; but, as it was, the whole utterance passed without a single word or phrase or sentence having roused a thought, or suggested a doubt, or moved a question, or hinted an objection or a need of explanation. That the people present should interest themselves in such things, only set before him the folly of mankind. The text and the preacher both kept telling him that such as he could by no possibility have the slightest notion what such things were; but not the less did he, as if he knew all about them, wonder how the deluded fisher folk could sit and listen. The more tired he grew, the more angry he got with the parson who had sent him there with his foolery: and the more convinced that the men who prayed and preached were as honest as they were silly; and that the thing to die of itself had only to be let alone. He heard the Amen of the benediction with a sigh of relief, and rose at once— cautiously this time.

"Ye maunna gang yet, my lord," said Malcolm. "They maun be a' oot first."

"I don't care who sees me," protested the weary man.

"But yer lordship wadna like to be descriet scram'lin' doon efter the back like the bear in Robinson Crusoe!"

The marquis grumbled, and yielded impatiently.

At length Malcolm, concluding from the silence that the meeting had thoroughly skailed, peeped cautiously out to make sure. But after a moment, he drew back, saying in a regretful whisper,

"I 'm sorry ye canna gang yet, my lord. There's some half a dizzen o' ill luikin' chields, cairds (gipsies), I 'm thinkin', or maybe waur, congregat doon there, an' it 's my opinion they're efter nae guid, my lord."

"How do you know that?"

"Ony body wad ken that, 'at got a glimp o' them."

"Let me look."

"Na, my lord; ye dinna understan' the lie o' the stanes eneuch to haud oot o' sicht."

"How long do you mean to keep us here?" asked the marquis impatiently.

"Till it's safe to gang, my lord. For onything I ken, they may be efter comin' up here. They may be used to the place—though I dinna think it."

"In that case we must go down at once. We must not let them find us here."

"They wad tak 's ane by ane as we gaed doon, my lord, an' we wadna hae a chance. Think o' my leddy there!"

Florimel heard all, but with the courage of her race.

"This is a fine position you have brought us into, MacPhail!" said his master, now thoroughly uneasy for his daughter's sake.

"Nae waur nor I 'll tak ye oot o', gien ye lippen to me, my lord, an' no speyk a word."

"If you tell them who papa is," said Florimel, "they won't do us any harm, surely!"

"I 'm nane sae sure o' that. They micht want to ripe 's pooches (search his pockets), an' my lord wad ill stan' that, I 'm thinkin'! Na, na. Jist stan' ye back, my lord an' my leddy, an' dinna speyk a word. I s' sattle them. They're sic villains, there nae terms to be hauden wi' them."

His lordship was far from satisfied; but a light shining up into the crevice at the moment, gave powerful support to Malcolm's authority: he took Florimel's hand and drew her a little farther from the mouth of the cave.

"Don't you wish we had Demon with us?" whispered the girl.

"I was thinking how I never went without a dagger in Venice," said the marquis, "and never once had occasion to use it. Now I haven't even a penknife about me! It looks very awkward."

"Please don't talk like that," said Florimel. "Can't you trust Malcolm, papa?"

"Oh, yes; perfectly!" he answered; but the tone was hardly up to the words.

They could see the dim figure of Malcolm, outlined in fits of the approaching light, all but filling the narrow entrance, as he bent forward to listen. Presently he laid himself down, leaning on his left elbow, with his right shoulder only a little above the level of the passage. The light came nearer, and they heard the sound of scrambling on the rock, but no voice; then for one moment the light shone clear upon the roof of the cleft; the next, came the sound of a dull blow, the light vanished, and the noise of a heavy fall came from beneath.

"Ane o' them, my lord," said Malcolm, in a sharp whisper, over his shoulder.

A confusion of voices arose.

"You booby!" said one. "You climb like a calf. I'll go next."

Evidently they thought he had slipped and fallen, and he was unable to set them right. Malcolm heard them drag him out of the way.

The second ascended more rapidly, and met his fate the sooner. As he delivered the blow, Malcolm recognized one of the laird's assailants, and was now perfectly at his ease.

"Twa o' them, my lord," he said. "Gien we had ane mair doon, we cud manage the lave."

The second, however, had not lost his speech, and amidst the confused talk that followed, Malcolm heard the words: "Rin doon to the coble for the gun," and, immediately after, the sound of feet hurrying from the cave. He rose quietly, leaped into the midst of them, came down upon one, and struck out right and left. Two ran, and three lay where they were.

"Gien ane o' ye muv han' or fit, I'll brain him wi' 's ain stick," he cried, as he wrenched a cudgel from the grasp of one of them. Then catching up a lantern, and hurrying behind the projecting rock —"Haste ye, an' come," he shouted. "The w'y 's clear, but only for a meenute."

Florimel appeared, and Malcolm got her down.

"Mind that fellow," cried the marquis from above.

Malcolm turned quickly, and saw the gleam of a knife in the grasp of his old enemy, who had risen, and crept behind him to the recess. He flung the lantern in his face, following it with a blow in which were concentrated all the weight and energy of his frame. The man went down again heavily, and Malcolm instantly trampled all their lanterns to pieces.

"Noo," he said to himself, "they winna ken but it 's the laird an' Phemy wi' me!"

Then turning, and taking Florimel by the arm, he hurried her out of the cave, followed by the marquis.

They emerged in the liquid darkness of a starry night. Lady Florimel clung to both her father and Malcolm. It was a rough way for some little distance, but at length they reached the hard wet sand, and the marquis would have stopped to take breath; but Malcolm was uneasy, and hurried them on.

"What are you frightened at now?" asked his lordship.

"Naething," answered Malcolm, adding to himself however, "I 'm fleyt at naethin'—I 'm fleyt for the laird."

As they approached the tunnel, he fell behind.

"Why don't you come on?" said his lordship.

"I 'm gaein' back noo 'at ye 're safe," said Malcolm.

"Going back! What for?" asked the marquis.

"I maun see what thae villains are up till," answered Malcolm.

"Not alone, surely!" exclaimed the marquis. "At least get some of your people to go with you."

"There 's nae time, my lord. Dinna be fleyt for me: I s' tak care o' mysel'."

He was already yards away, running at full speed. The marquis shouted after him, but Malcolm would not hear.

When he reached the Baillies' Barn once more, all was still. He groped his way in and found his own lantern where they had been sitting, and having lighted it, descended and followed the windings of the cavern a long way, but saw nothing of the laird or Phemy. Coming at length to a spot where he heard the rushing of a stream, he found he could go no farther: the roof of the cave had fallen, and blocked up the way with huge masses of stone and earth. He had come a good distance certainly, but by no means so far as Phemy's imagination had represented the reach of the cavern. He might however have missed a turn, he thought.

The sound he heard was that of the Lossie Burn, flowing along in the starlight through the grounds of the House. Of this he satisfied himself afterwards; and then it seemed to him not unlikely that in ancient times the river had found its way to the sea along the cave, for throughout its length the action of water was plainly visible. But perhaps the sea itself had used to go roaring along the great duct: Malcolm was no geologist, and could not tell.



CHAPTER XLVII: MRS STEWART'S CLAIM

The weather became unsettled with the approach of winter, and the marquis had a boat house built at the west end of the Seaton: there the little cutter was laid up, well wrapt in tarpaulins, like a butterfly returned to the golden coffin of her internatal chrysalis. A great part of his resulting leisure, Malcolm spent with Mr Graham, to whom he had, as a matter of course, unfolded the trouble caused him by Duncan's communication.

The more thoughtful a man is, and the more conscious of what is going on within himself, the more interest will he take in what he can know of his progenitors, to the remotest generations; and a regard to ancestral honours, however contemptible the forms which the appropriation of them often assumes, is a plant rooted in the deepest soil of humanity. The high souled labourer will yield to none in his respect for the dignity of his origin, and Malcolm had been as proud of the humble descent he supposed his own, as Lord Lossie was of his mighty ancestry. Malcolm had indeed a loftier sense of resulting dignity than his master.

He reverenced Duncan both for his uprightness and for a certain grandeur of spirit, which, however ridiculous to the common eye, would have been glorious in the eyes of the chivalry of old; he looked up to him with admiration because of his gifts in poetry and music; and loved him endlessly for his unfailing goodness and tenderness to himself. Even the hatred of the grand old man had an element of unselfishness in its retroaction, of power in its persistency, and of greatness in its absolute contempt of compromise. At the same time he was the only human being to whom Malcolm's heart had gone forth as to his own; and now, with the knowledge of yet deeper cause for loving him, he had to part with the sense of a filial relation to him! And this involved more; for so thoroughly had the old man come to regard the boy as his offspring, that he had nourished in him his own pride of family; and it added a sting of mortification to Malcolm's sorrow, that the greatness of the legendary descent in which he had believed, and the honourableness of the mournful history with which his thoughts of himself had been so closely associated, were swept from him utterly. Nor was this all even yet: in losing these he had had, as it were, to let go his hold, not of his clan merely, but of his race: every link of kin that bound him to humanity had melted away from his grasp. Suddenly he would become aware that his heart was sinking within him, and questioning it why, would learn anew that he was alone in the world, a being without parents, without sister or brother, with none to whom he might look in the lovely confidence of a right bequeathed by some common mother, near or afar. He had waked into being, but all around him was dark, for there was no window, that is, no kindred eye, by which the light of the world whence he had come, entering might console him.

But a gulf of blackness was about to open at his feet, against which the darkness he now lamented would show purple and gray.

One afternoon, as he passed through the Seaton from the harbour, to have a look at the cutter, he heard the Partaness calling after him.

"Weel, ye're a sicht for sair een—noo 'at ye're like to turn oot something worth luikin' at!" she cried, as he approached with his usual friendly smile.

"What du ye mean by that, Mistress Findlay?" asked Malcolm, carelessly adding: "Is yer man in?"

"Ay!" she went on, without heeding either question; "ye'll be gran' set up noo! Ye'll no be hain' 'a fine day' to fling at yer auld freen's, the puir fisher fowk, or lang! Weel! it's the w'y o' the warl! Hech, sirs!"

"What on earth 's set ye aff like that Mrs Findlay?" said Malcolm. "It's nae sic a feerious (furious) gran' thing to be my lord's skipper—or henchman, as my daddy wad hae 't—surely! It's a heap gran'er like to be a free fisherman, wi' a boat o' yer ain, like the Partan."

"Hoots! Nane o' yer clavers! Ye ken weel eneuch what I mean—as weel 's ilka ither creatit sowl o' Portlossie. An' gien ye dinna chowse to lat on aboot it till an auld freen' cause she's naething but a fisherwife, it's dune ye mair skaith a'ready nor I thocht it wad to the lang last, Ma'colm—for it 's yer ain name I s' ca' ye yet, gien ye war ten times a laird!—didna I gie ye the breist whan ye cud du naething i' the wardle but sowk?—An' weel ye sowkit, puir innocent 'at ye was!"

"As sure's we're baith alive," asseverated Malcolm, "I ken nae mair nor a sawtit herrin' what ye're drivin' at."

"Tell me 'at ye dinna ken what a' the queentry kens—an' hit aboot yer ain sel'!" screamed the Partaness.

"I tell ye I ken naething; an' gien ye dinna tell me what ye're efter direckly, I s' haud awa' to Mistress Allison—she 'll tell me."

This was a threat sufficiently prevailing.

"It's no in natur'!" she cried. "Here's Mistress Stewart o' the Gersefell been cawin' (driving) like mad aboot the place, in her cairriage an' hoo mony horse I dinna ken, declarin', ay, sweirin', they tell me, 'at ane cowmonly ca'd Ma'colm MacPhail is neither mair nor less nor the son born o' her ain boady in honest wadlock! —an' tell me ye ken naething aboot it! What are ye stan'in' like that for—as gray mou'd 's a deein' skate?"

For the first time in his life, Malcolm, young and strong as he was, felt sick. Sea and sky grew dim before him, and the earth seemed to reel under him. "I dinna believe 't," he faltered—and turned away.

"Ye dinna believe what I tell ye!" screeched the wrathful Partaness. "Ye daur to say the word!"

But Malcolm did not care to reply. He wandered away, half unconscious of where he was, his head hanging, and his eyes creeping over the ground. The words of the woman kept ringing in his ears; but ever and anon, behind them as it were in the depth of his soul, he heard the voice of the mad laird, with its one lamentation: "I dinna ken whaur I cam' frae." Finding himself at length at Mr Graham's door, he wondered how he had got there.

It was Saturday afternoon, and the master was in the churchyard. Startled by Malcolm's look, he gazed at him in grave silent enquiry.

"Hae ye h'ard the ill news, sir?" said the youth.

"No; I'm sorry to hear there is any."

"They tell me Mistress Stewart's rinnin' aboot the toon claimin' me!"

"Claiming you!—How do you mean?"

"For her ain!"

"Not for her son?"

"Ay, sir—that 's what they say. But ye haena h'ard o' 't?"

"Not a word."

"Then I believe it's a' havers!" cried Malcolm energetically. "It was sair eneuch upo' me a'ready to ken less o' whaur I cam frae than the puir laird himsel'; but to come frae whaur he cam frae, was a thocht ower sair!"

"You don't surely despise the poor fellow so much as to scorn to have the same parents with him!" said Mr Graham.

"The verra contrar', sir. But a wuman wha wad sae misguide the son o' her ain body, an' for naething but that, as she had broucht him furth, sic he was!—it 's no to be lichtly believed nor lichtly endured. I s' awa' to Miss Horn an' see whether she 's h'ard ony sic leeing clashes."

But as Malcolm uttered her name, his heart sank within him, for their talk the night he had sought her hospitality for the laird, came back to his memory, burning like an acrid poison.

"You can't do better," said Mr Graham. "The report itself may be false—or true, and the lady mistaken."

"She'll hae to pruv 't weel afore I say haud," rejoined Malcolm.

"And suppose she does?"

"In that case," said Malcolm, with a composure almost ghastly, "a man maun tak what mither it pleases God to gie him. But faith! she winna du wi' me as wi' the puir laird. Gien she taks me up, she'll repent 'at she didna lat me lie. She'll be as little pleased wi' the tane o' her sons as the tither—I can tell her, ohn propheseed!"

"But think what you might do between mother and son," suggested the master, willing to reconcile him to the possible worst.

"It's ower late for that," he answered. "The puir man's thairms (fiddle-strings) are a' hingin' lowse, an' there's no grip eneuch i' the pegs to set them up again. He wad but think I had gane ower to the enemy, an' haud oot o' my gait as eident (diligently) as he hauds oot o' hers. Na, it wad du naething for him. Gien 't warna for what I see in him, I wad hae a gran' rebutter to her claim; for hoo cud ony wuman's ain son hae sic a scunner at her as I hae i' my hert an' brain an' verra stamach? Gien she war my ain mither, there bude to be some nait'ral drawin's atween 's, a body wad think. But it winna haud, for there's the laird! The verra name o' mither gars him steik his lugs an' rin."

"Still, if she be your mother, it's for better for worse as much as if she had been your own choice."

"I kenna weel hoo it cud be for waur," said Malcolm, who did not yet, even from his recollection of the things Miss Horn had said, comprehend what worst threatened him.

"It does seem strange," said the master thoughtfully, after a pause, "that some women should be allowed to be mothers that through them sons and daughters of God should come into the world—thief babies, say! human parasites, with no choice but feed on the social body!"

"I wonner what God thinks aboot it a'! It gars a body spier whether he cares or no," said Malcolm gloomily.

"It does," responded Mr Graham solemnly.

"Div ye alloo that, sir?" returned Malcolm aghast. "That soon's as gien a'thing war rushin' thegither back to the auld chaos."

"I should not be surprised," continued the master, apparently heedless of Malcolm's consternation, "if the day should come when well meaning men, excellent in the commonplace, but of dwarfed imagination, refused to believe in a God on the ground of apparent injustice in the very frame and constitution of things. Such would argue, that there might be either an omnipotent being who did not care, or a good being who could not help; but that there could not be a being both all good and omnipotent, for such would never have suffered things to be as they are."

"What wad the clergy say to hear ye, sir?" said Malcolm, himself almost trembling at the words of his master.

"Nothing to the purpose, I fear. They would never face the question. I know what they would do if they could,—burn me, as their spiritual ancestor, Calvin, would have done—whose shoe latchet they are yet not worthy to unloose. But mind, my boy, you've not heard me speak my thought on the matter at all."

"But wadna 't be better to believe in twa Gods nor nane ava'?" propounded Malcolm; "ane a' guid, duin' the best for 's he cud, the ither a' ill, but as pooerfu' as the guid ane—an' forever an' aye a fecht atween them, whiles ane gettin' the warst o' 't, an whiles the ither? It wad quaiet yer hert ony gait, an' the battle o' Armageddon wad gang on as gran' 's ever."

"Two Gods there could not be," said Mr Graham. "Of the two beings supposed, the evil one must be called devil were he ten times the more powerful."

"Wi' a' my hert!" responded Malcolm.

"But I agree with you," the master went on, that "Manicheism is unspeakably better than atheism, and unthinkably better than believing in an unjust God. But I am not driven to such a theory."

"Hae ye ane o' yer ain 'at 'll fit, sir?"

"If I knew of a theory in which was never an uncompleted arch or turret, in whose circling wall was never a ragged breach, that theory I should know but to avoid: such gaps are the eternal windows through which the dawn shall look in. A complete theory is a vault of stone around the theorist—whose very being yet depends on room to grow."

"Weel, I wad like to hear what ye hae agane Manicheism!"

"The main objection of theologians would be, I presume, that it did not present a God perfect in power as in goodness; but I think it a far more objectionable point that it presents evil as possessing power in itself. My chief objection, however, would be a far deeper one—namely, that its good being cannot be absolutely good; for, if he knew himself unable to insure the well being of his creatures, if he could not avoid exposing them to such foreign attack, had he a right to create them? Would he have chosen such a doubtful existence for one whom he meant to love absolutely?—Either, then, he did not love like a God, or he would not have created."

"He micht ken himsel' sure to win i' the lang rin."

"Grant the same to the God of the Bible, and we come back to where we were before."

"Does that satisfee yersel', Maister Graham?" asked Malcolm, looking deep into the eyes of his teacher.

"Not at all," answered the master.

"Does onything?"

"Yes: but I will not say more on the subject now. The time may come when I shall have to speak that which I have learned, but it is not yet. All I will say now is, that I am at peace concerning the question. Indeed, so utterly do I feel myself the offspring of the One, that it would be enough for my peace now—I don't say it would have been always—to know my mind troubled on a matter: what troubled me would trouble God: my trouble at the seeming wrong must have its being in the right existent in him. In him, supposing I could find none I should yet say there must lie a lucent, harmonious, eternal, not merely consoling, but absolutely satisfying solution."

"Winna ye tell me a' 'at 's in yer hert aboot it, sir?"

"Not now, my boy. You have got one thing to mind now—before all other things—namely, that you give this woman—whatever she be—fair play: if she be your mother, as such you must take her, that is, as such you must treat her."

"Ye 're richt, sir," returned Malcolm, and rose.

"Come back to me," said Mr Graham, "with whatever news you gather."

"I will, sir," answered Malcolm, and went to find Miss Horn. He was shown into the little parlour, which, for all the grander things he had been amongst of late, had lost nothing of its first charm. There sat Miss Horn.

"Sit doon, Ma'colm," she said gruffly.

"Hae ye h'ard onything, mem?" asked Malcolm, standing.

"Ower muckle," answered Miss Horn, with all but a scowl. "Ye been ower to Gersefell, I reckon."

"Forbid it!" answered Malcolm. "Never till this hoor—or at maist it's nae twa sin' I h'ard the first cheep o' 't, an' that was frae Meg Partan. To nae human sowl hae I made mention o' 't yet 'cep' Maister Graham: to him I gaed direck."

"Ye cudna hae dune better," said the grim woman, with relaxing visage.

"An' here I am the noo, straucht frae him, to beg o' you, Miss Horn, to tell me the trowth o' the maitter."

"What ken I aboot it?" she returned angrily. "What sud I ken?"

"Ye micht ken whether the wuman's been sayin' 't or no."

"Wha has ony doobt aboot that?"

"Mistress Stewart has been sayin' she's my mither, than?"

"Ay—what for no?" returned Miss Horn, with a piercing glower at the youth.

"Guid forfen'!" exclaimed Malcolm.

"Say ye that, laddie?" cried Miss Horn, and, starting up, she grasped his arm and stood gazing in his face.

"What ither sud I say?" rejoined Malcolm, surprised.

"God be laudit!" exclaimed Miss Horn. "The limmer may say 'at she likes noo."

"Ye dinna believe 't than, mem?" cried Malcolm. "Tell me ye dinna, an' haud me ohn curst like a cadger."

"I dinna believe ae word o' 't, laddie," answered Miss Horn eagerly. "Wha cud believe sic a fine laad come o' sic a fause mither?"

"She micht be ony body's mither, an' fause tu," said Malcolm gloomily.

"That's true laddie; and the mair mither the fauser! There's a warl' o' witness i' your face 'at gien she be yer mither, the markis, an no puir honest hen peckit John Stewart, was the father o' ye.— The Lord forgie' me! what am I sayin'!" adjected Miss Horn, with a cry of self accusation, when she saw the pallor that overspread the countenance of the youth, and his head drop upon his bosom: the last arrow had sunk to the feather. "It's a' havers, ony gait," she quickly resumed. "I div not believe ye hae ae drap o' her bluid i' the body o' ye, man. But," she hurried on, as if eager to obliterate the scoring impression of her late words—"that she's been sayin' 't, there can be no mainner o' doot. I saw her mysel' rinnin' aboot the toon, frae ane till anither, wi' her lang hair doon the lang back o' her, an' fleein' i' the win', like a body dementit. The only question is, whether or no she believes 't hersel'."

"What cud gar her say 't gien she didna believe 't?"

"Fowk says she expecs that w'y to get a grip o' things oot o' the han's o' the puir laird's trustees: ye wad be a son o' her ain, cawpable o' mainagin' them. But ye dinna tell me she's never been at yersel' aboot it?"

"Never a blink o' the ee has passed atween's sin' that day I gaed till Gersefell, as I tellt ye, wi' a letter frae the markis. I thoucht I was ower mony for her than: I wonner she daur be at me again."

"She 's daurt her God er' noo, an' may weel daur you.—But what says yer gran'father till 't, no?"

"He hasna hard a chuckie's cheep o' 't."

"What are we haverin' at than! Canna he sattle the maitter aff han'?"

Miss Horn eyed him keenly as she spoke.

"He kens nae mair aboot whaur I come frae, mem, nor your Jean, wha 's hearkenin' at the keyhole this verra meenute."

The quick ear of Malcolm had caught a slight sound of the handle, whose proximity to the keyhole was no doubt often troublesome to Jean.

Miss Horn seemed to reach the door with one spring. Jean was ascending the last step of the stair with a message on her lips concerning butter and eggs. Miss Horn received it, and went back to Malcolm.

"Na; Jean wadna du that," she said quietly.

But she was wrong, for, hearing Malcolm's words, Jean had retreated one step down the stair, and turned.

"But what's this ye tell me aboot yer gran'father, honest man." Miss Horn continued.

"Duncan MacPhail's nae bluid o' mine—the mair's the pity!" said Malcolm sadly—and told her all he knew.

Miss Horn's visage went through wonderful changes as he spoke.

"Weel, it is a mercy I hae nae feelin's!" she said when he had done.

"Ony wuman can lay a claim till me 'at likes, ye see," said Malcolm.

"She may lay 'at she likes, but it's no ilka egg laid has a chuckie intill 't," answered Miss Horn sententiously. "Jist ye gang hame to auld Duncan, an' tell him to turn the thing ower in 's min' till he's able to sweir to the verra nicht he fan' the bairn in 's lap. But no ae word maun he say to leevin' sowl aboot it afore it's requiret o' 'im."

"I wad be the son o' the puirest fisher wife i' the Seaton raither nor hers," said Malcolm gloomily.

"An' it shaws ye better bred," said Miss Horn. "But she'll be at ye or lang—an' tak ye tent what ye say. Dinna flee in her face; lat her jaw awa', an' mark her words. She may lat a streak o' licht oot o' her dirk lantren oonawaurs."

Malcolm returned to Mr Graham. They agreed there was nothing for it but to wait. He went next to his grandfather and gave him Miss Horn's message. The old man fell a thinking, but could not be certain even of the year in which he had left his home. The clouds hung very black around Malcolm's horizon.

Since the adventure in the Baillies' Barn, Lady Florimel had been on a visit in Morayshire: she heard nothing of the report until she returned.

"So you're a gentleman after all, Malcolm!" she said, the next time she saw him.

The expression in her eyes appeared to him different from any he had encountered there before. The blood rushed to his face; he dropped his head, and saying merely, "It maun be a' as it maun," pursued the occupation of the moment.

But her words sent a new wind blowing into the fog. A gentleman she had said! Gentlemen married ladies! Could it be that a glory it was madness to dream of, was yet a possibility? One moment, and his honest heart recoiled from the thought: not even for Lady Florimel could he consent to be the son of that woman! Yet the thought, especially in Lady Florimel's presence, would return, would linger, would whisper, would tempt.

In Florimel's mind also, a small demon of romance was at work. Uncorrupted as yet by social influences, it would not have seemed to her absurd that an heiress of rank should marry a poor country gentleman; but the thought of marriage never entered her head: she only felt that the discovery justified a nearer approach from both sides. She had nothing, not even a flirtation in view. Flirt she might, likely enough, but she did not foremean it.

Had Malcolm been a schemer, he would have tried to make something of his position. But even the growth of his love for his young mistress was held in check by the fear of what that love tempted him to desire.

Lady Florimel had by this time got so used to his tone and dialect, hearing it on all sides of her, that its quaintness had ceased to affect her, and its coarseness had begun to influence her repulsively. There were still to be found in Scotland old fashioned gentlefolk speaking the language of the country with purity and refinement; but Florimel had never met any of them, or she might possibly have been a little less repelled by Malcolm's speech.

Within a day or two of her return, Mrs Stewart called at Lossie House, and had a long talk with her, in the course of which she found no difficulty in gaining her to promise her influence with Malcolm. From his behaviour on the occasion of their sole interview, she stood in a vague awe of him, and indeed could not recall it without a feeling of rebuke—a feeling which must either turn her aside from her purpose or render her the more anxious to secure his favour. Hence it came that she had not yet sought him: she would have the certainty first that he was kindly disposed towards her claim—a thing she would never have doubted but for the glimpse she had had of him.

One Saturday afternoon, about this time, Mr Stewart put his head in at the door of the schoolroom, as he had done so often already, and seeing the master seated alone at his desk, walked in, saying once more, with a polite bow, "I dinna ken whaur I cam frae: I want to come to the school."

Mr Graham assured him of welcome as cordially as if it had been the first time he came with the request, and yet again offered him a chair; but the laird as usual declined it, and walked down the room to find a seat with his companion scholars. He stopped midway, however, and returned to the desk, where, standing on tiptoe, he whispered in the master's ear: "I canna come upo' the door." Then turning away again, he crept dejectedly to a seat where some of the girls had made room for him. There he took a slate, and began drawing what might seem an attempt at a door; but ever as he drew he blotted out, and nothing that could be called a door was the result. Meantime, Mr Graham was pondering at intervals what he had said.

School being over, the laird was modestly leaving with the rest, when the master gently called him, and requested the favour of a moment more of his company. As soon as they were alone, he took a Bible from his desk, and read the words:

"I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture."

Without comment, he closed the book, and put it away. Mr Stewart stood staring up at him for a moment, then turned, and gently murmuring, "I canna win at the door," walked from the schoolhouse.

It was refuge the poor fellow sought—whether from temporal or spiritual foes will matter little to him who believes that the only shelter from the one is the only shelter from the other also.



CHAPTER XLVIII: THE BAILLIES' BARN AGAIN

It began to be whispered about Portlossie, that the marquis had been present at one of the fishermen's meetings—a report which variously affected the minds of those in the habit of composing them. Some regarded it as an act of espial, and much foolish talk arose about the covenanters and persecution and martyrdom. Others, especially the less worthy of those capable of public utterance, who were by this time, in virtue of that sole gift, gaining an influence of which they were altogether unworthy, attributed it to the spreading renown of the preaching and praying members of the community, and each longed for an opportunity of exercising his individual gift upon the conscience of the marquis. The soberer portion took it for an act of mere curiosity, unlikely to be repeated.

Malcolm saw that the only way of setting things right was that the marquis should go again—openly, but it was with much difficulty that he persuaded him to present himself in the assembly. Again accompanied by his daughter and Malcolm, he did, however, once more cross the links to the Baillies' Barn. Being early they had a choice of seats, and Florimel placed herself beside a pretty young woman of gentle and troubled countenance, who sat leaning against the side of the cavern.

The preacher on this occasion was the sickly young student—more pale and haggard than ever, and halfway nearer the grave since his first sermon. He still set himself to frighten the sheep into the fold by wolfish cries; but it must be allowed that, in this sermon at least, his representations of the miseries of the lost were not by any means so gross as those usually favoured by preachers of his kind. His imagination was sensitive enough to be roused by the words of Scripture themselves, and was not dependent for stimulus upon those of Virgil, Dante, or Milton. Having taken for his text the fourteenth verse of the fifty-ninth psalm, "And at evening let them return; and let them make a noise like a dog, and go round about the city," he dwelt first upon the condition and character of the eastern dog as contrasted with those of our dogs; pointing out to his hearers, that so far from being valued for use or beauty or rarity, they were, except swine, of all animals the most despised by the Jews—the vile outcasts of the border land separating animals domestic and ferine—filthy, dangerous, and hated; then associating with his text that passage in the Revelation, "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city; for without are dogs," he propounded, or rather asserted, that it described one variety of the many punishments of the wicked, showing at least a portion of them condemned to rush howling for ever about the walls of the New Jerusalem, haunting the gates they durst not enter.