Stand Fast, Craig-Royston! (Volume III). William Black

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СКАЧАТЬ it was better they should see each other no more. He remembered how she had drawn up her head in maidenly pride – in indignation, almost: his relatives might be at peace: they had nothing to fear from her. And here was the little brooch – with its tiny white dove, that was to rest on her bosom, as if bringing a message of love and safety – all ready for her; but her place was empty; she had gone from him, and perhaps for ever. The very waiters in the restaurants, when he went there all alone, ventured to express a little discreet surprise, and make enquiries: he could say nothing. He had the sandal-wood necklace, to be sure; and sometimes he wore it over his heart; and on the way home, through the dark thoroughfares, at times a faint touch of the perfume reached his nostrils – but there was no Maisrie by his side. And then again, a sudden, marvellous vision would come before him: of Maisrie, her hair blown by the winds, her eyes piteous and full of tears, her eyebrows and lashes wet with the flying spray; and she would say 'Kiss me, Vincent, kiss me!' as if she had already resolved to go, and knew that this was to be a last, despairing farewell.

      The days passed; and ever he continued his diligent search, for he knew that these two had but little money, and guessed that they had not departed on any far travel, especially at this time of the year. He went down to Scotland, and made enquiries among the Edinburgh newspaper offices – without avail. He advertised in several of the London daily journals: there was no reply. He told the head-waiter at the Restaurant Mentavisti, that if Mr. Bethune and his granddaughter – who were well-known to all in the place – should make their appearance any evening, and if he, the headwaiter, could manage to send some one to follow them home and ascertain their address, that would mean a couple of sovereigns in his pocket; but the opportunity never presented itself. And meanwhile this young man, taking no care of himself, and fretting from morning till evening, and often all the sleepless night through as well, was gradually losing his colour, and becoming like the ghost of his own natural self.

      Christmas came. Harland Harris and Vincent went down to pass the holidays with Mrs. Ellison, at Brighton; and for the same purpose Lord Musselburgh returned to the Bedford Hotel. The four of them dined together on Christmas evening. It was not a very boisterous party, considering that the pragmatical and pedantic voice of the man of wealth was heard discoursing on such light and fanciful themes as the payment of returning officers' expenses, the equalisation of the death duties, and the establishment of state-assisted intermediate schools; but Musselburgh threw in a little jest now and again, to mitigate the ponderosity of the harangue. Vincent was almost silent. Since coming down from London, he had not said a single word to any one of them about Mr. Bethune or his granddaughter: no doubt they would have told him – and perhaps rejoiced to tell him – that he had been betrayed. But Mrs. Ellison, sitting there, and watching more than listening, was concerned about the looks of her boy, as she called him; and before she left the table, she took up her glass, and said —

      "I am going to ask you two gentlemen to drink a toast – and it is the health of the coming member for Mendover. And I'm going to ask him to pull himself together, and show some good spirits; for there's nothing a constituency likes so much as a merry and good-humoured candidate."

      It was clear moonlight that night: Vin's room faced the sea. Hour after hour he sate at the window, looking on the wide, grey plain and the faint blue-grey skies; and getting no good of either; for the far-searching doves of his thoughts came back to him without a twig of hope in their bill. The whole world seemed empty – and silent. He began to recall the time in which he used to think – or to fear – that some day a vast and solitary sea would come between Maisrie and himself; it was something he had dreamed or imagined; but this was altogether different now – this blank ignorance of where she might be was a far more terrible thing. He went over the different places he had heard her mention – Omaha, Chicago, Boston, Toronto, Montreal, Quebec: they only seemed to make the world the wider – to remove her further away from him, and interpose a veil between. She had vanished like a vision; and yet it was but the other day that he had found her clinging tight to his arm, her beautiful brown hair blown wet about her face, her eyes with love shining through her tears, her lips – when he kissed them – salt with the flying spray. And no longer – after that first and sudden outburst of indignant wrath – did he accuse her of any faithlessness or treachery: rather it was himself whom he reproached. Had he not promised, at the very moment when she had made her maiden confession to him, and spoken to him as a girl speaks once only in her life, had he not promised that always and always he would say to himself 'Wherever Maisrie is – wherever she may be – she loves me, and is thinking of me?' This was the Mizpah set up between those two; and he had vowed his vow. What her going away might mean he could not tell; but at all events it was not permitted him to doubt – he dared not doubt – her love.

      As for these repeated allegations that old George Bethune was nothing less than a mendicant impostor, what did that matter to him? Even if these charges could be substantiated, how was that to affect Maisrie or himself? No association could sully that pure soul. Perhaps it was the case that Mr. Bethune was not over-scrupulous and careful about money matters; many otherwise excellent persons had been of like habit. The band of private inquiry agents had amongst them discovered that the old man had allowed Vincent to pay the bill at the various restaurants they frequented. Well, that was true. Among the vague insinuations and assumptions that had been pieced together to form an indictment, here was one bit of solid fact. And what of it? Of what importance were those few trumpery shillings? It was of little moment which paid: here was an arrangement, become a habit, that had a certain convenience. And Vincent was proud to set against that, or against any conclusions that might be drawn from that, the incident of old George Bethune's stopping the poor woman in Hyde Park, and handing over to her all he possessed – sovereigns, shillings, and pence – so that he did not even leave himself the wherewithal to buy a biscuit for his mid-day meal. Perhaps there were more sides to George Bethune's character than were likely to occur to the imagination of Messrs. Harland Harris, Morris, and Company?

      The white moon sailed slowly over to the west; the house was still; the night outside silent; but there was no peace for him at all. If only he could get to see Maisrie – for the briefest moment – that he might demand the reason of her sudden flight! Was it some over-strung sensitiveness of spirit? Did she fear that no one would understand this carelessness of her grandfather about money-matters; and that she might be suspected of complicity, of acquiescence, in certain doubtful ways? Was that the cause of her strange sadness, her resignation, her hopelessness? Was that why she had spoken of her 'degradation' – why she had declared she could never be his wife – why she had begged him piteously to go away, and leave this bygone friendship to be a memory and nothing more? 'Can you not understand, Vincent!' she had said to him, in heart-breaking accents, as though she could not bring herself to the brutality of plainer speech. Well, he understood this at all events: that in whatever circumstances Maisrie Bethune may have been placed, no contamination had touched her; white as the white moonlight out there was that pure soul; he had read her eyes.

      The next morning Lord Musselburgh was out walking in the King's Road with the fair young widow who hoped soon to be re-transformed into a wife.

      "That friend of yours down at Mendover," said she, – "what is his name? – Gosford? – well, he seems an unconscionable time dying. I wish he'd hurry up with his Chiltern Hundreds and put an end to himself at once. That is what is wanted for Vin – the novelty and excitement of finding himself in the House of Commons. Supposing Mr. Gosford were to resign at once, how soon could Vin be returned? There's some procedure, isn't there? – the High Sheriff or somebody, issues a writ, or something – ?"

      "I really cannot say," her companion answered blandly. "I belong to a sphere in which such violent convulsions are unknown."

      "At all events, Parliament will meet about the middle of February?" she demanded.

      "I presume so," was the careless answer.

      "I wish the middle of February were here now, and Vin all securely returned," said she. "I suppose that even in the case of a small borough like Mendover, one's constituents can keep one pretty busy? They will watch how you vote, СКАЧАТЬ