Название: The Laird of Norlaw; A Scottish Story
Автор: Маргарет Олифант
Издательство: Public Domain
Жанр: Зарубежная классика
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Cosmo Livingstone, wild with a boy’s passion, and stupefied with grief, had sprung up to the driving-seat of the hearse while this discussion proceeded; and lashing the half-loosed horses, had urged them forward with a violent and unseemly speed, which threw down on either side the men who were at their heads, and dispersed the crowd in momentary alarm. The frightened animals dashed forward wildly for a few steps, but speedily brought up in their unaccustomed career by the shouts and pursuit of the attendants, carried the melancholy vehicle down the slope and paused, snorting, at the edge of the stream, through which, the boy, half mad with excitement, would have driven them. Perhaps the wild gallop of the hearse, though only for so short a distance, horrified the bystanders more than the real interruption. One of the funeral guests seized Cosmo in his strong arms, and lifted him down like a child; the others led the panting horses back at the reverential pace which became the solemn burden they were bearing; and after that outbreak of passion, the question was settled without further discussion. Patrick Livingstone, his eyes swollen and heavy with burning tears, which he could not shed, led the way, while the bearers once more carried to his vacant room all that remained of Norlaw.
The mass of the funeral guests paused only long enough to maintain some degree of quietness and decency; they dispersed with natural good feeling, without aggravating the unfortunate family with condolence or observation. Huntley, with the minister and the principal farmer of the district, Mr. Blackadder, of Tyneside, who happened to be also an old and steady friend of their father, stood at a little distance with the officer, investigating the detainer which kept the dead out of his grave; the melancholy empty hearse and dismal coaches crept off slowly along the high road; and Cosmo, trembling in every limb with the violence of his excitement, stood speechless at the door, gazing after them, falling, in the quick revulsion of his temperament, from unnatural passion into utter and prostrate despondency. The poor boy scarcely knew who it was that drew him into the house, and spoke those words of comfort which relieved his overcharged heart by tears. It was pretty Katie Logan, crying herself, and scarcely able to speak, who had been sent down from the widow’s room, by Mrs. Blackadder, to find out what the commotion was; and who, struck with horror and amazement, as at a sacrilege, was terrified to go up again, to break the tender, proud heart of Norlaw’s mourning wife, with such terrible news.
Presently the mournful little party came in to the east room, which still stood as they had left it, with the funeral bread and wine upon the table. Patrick came to join them immediately, and the two lads bent their heads together over the paper: a thousand pounds, borrowed by a hundred at a time from Mr. Huntley, of Melmar, over and above the mortgages which that gentleman held on the better part of the lands of Norlaw. The boys read it with a passion of indignation and shame in their hearts; their father’s affairs, on his funeral day, publicly “exposed” to all the countryside; their private distress and painful prospects, and his unthrift and weakness made the talk of every gossip in the country. Huntley and Patrick drew a hard breath, and clasped each other’s hands with the grip of desperation. But Norlaw lay unburied on his death-bed; they could not bury him till this money was paid; it was an appalling sum to people in their class, already deeply impoverished, and in the first tingle of this distressing blow, they saw no light either on one side or the other, and could not tell what to do.
“But I can not understand,” said Dr. Logan, who was a man limited and literal, although a most pious minister and the father of his people; “I can not understand how law can sanction what even nature holds up her hand against. The dead—man! how dare ye step in with your worldly arrests and warrants, when the Lord has been before you? how dare ye put your bit baton across the grave, where a righteous man should have been laid this day?”
“I have to do my duty,” said the immovable Elliot, “how daur ye, is naething to me. I must do according to my instructions—and ye ken, doctor, it’s but a man’s body can be apprehended ony time. Neither you nor me can lay grips on his soul.”
“Hush, mocker!” cried the distressed clergyman; “but what is to be done? Mr. Blackadder, these bairns can not get this money but with time and toil. If that will do any good, I’ll go immediately to Me’mar myself.”
“Never,” cried Huntley; “never—any thing but that. I’ll sell myself for a slave before I’ll take a favor from my father’s enemy.”
“It’s in Whitelaw’s hands, the writer in Melrose. I’ll ride down there and ask about it,” said Blackadder; “whisht, Huntley! the minister’s presence should learn you better—and every honest man can but pity and scorn ane that makes war with the dead; I’ll ride round to Whitelaw. My wife’s a sensible woman—she’ll break it softly to your mother—and see you do nothing to make it worse. I suppose, Elliot, when I come back I’ll find you here.”
“Ay, sir, I’m safe enough,” said the officer significantly, as “Tyneside” rose to leave the room. Huntley went with him silently to the stable, where his horse stood still saddled.
“I see what’s in your eye,” said Blackadder, in a whisper; “take heart and do it; trust not a man more than is needful, and dinna be violent. I’ll be back before dark, but I may not chance to speak to you again. Do what’s in your heart.”
Huntley wrung the friendly hand held out to him, and went in without a word. His old restless activity seemed to have returned to him, and there was a kindling fire in his hazel eyes which meant some purpose.
Good Dr. Logan took the lad’s hands, and poured comfort and kindness into his ears; but Huntley could scarcely pause to listen. It was not strange—and it seemed almost hard to bid the youth have patience when the vulgar law—stubborn and immovable—the law of money and merchandise, kept joint possession with death of this melancholy house.
CHAPTER VII
Huntley could not see his mother after this outrage became known to her. The widow resented it with all a woman’s horror and passion, and with all the shame of a Scottish matron, jealous, above all things, of privacy and “respect.” Pretty Katie Logan sat at her feet crying in inarticulate and unreasoning sympathy, which was better for the Mistress than all the wisdom and consolation with which good Mrs. Blackadder endeavored to support her. In the kitchen, Jenny and her mother cried too, the latter telling doleful stories of similar circumstances which she had known; but Marget went about with a burning cheek, watching “the laddies” with a jealous tenderness, which no one but their mother could have surpassed, eager to read their looks and anticipate their meaning. It was a sultry, oppressive day, hot and cloudy, threatening a thunder storm; and it is impossible to describe the still heavier oppression of distress and excitement in this closed-up and gloomy house. When Marget went out to the byre, late in the afternoon, several hours after these occurrences, Huntley came to her secretly by a back way. What he said roused the spirit of a hero in Marget’s frame. She put aside her pail on the instant, smoothed down her new black gown over her petticoat, and threw a shawl across her head.
“This moment, laddie—this instant—ye may trust me!” cried Marget, with a sob; and before Huntley, passing round behind the offices, came in sight of the high road, his messenger had already disappeared on the way to Kirkbride.
Then Huntley drew his cap over his eyes, threw round him a gray shepherd’s plaid, as a partial disguise, and set out in the opposite direction. Before he reached his journey’s end, the sweeping deluge of a thunder storm came down upon those uplands, in white sheets of falling water. The lad did not pause to take shelter, scarcely to take breath, but pushed on till he reached some scattered cottages, where the men were just returning from their day’s work. At that time the rain and the western sun, through the thickness of the thunder cloud, made a gorgeous, lurid, unearthly glow, like what it might make through СКАЧАТЬ