MARQUISE OF LOSSIE'S ADVENTURES: Malcolm & The Marquis's Secret. George MacDonald
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Название: MARQUISE OF LOSSIE'S ADVENTURES: Malcolm & The Marquis's Secret
Автор: George MacDonald
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Языкознание
isbn: 9788075837776
isbn:
Florimel gave him her handkerchief, and Malcolm took his leave, saying.—"I'll be up i' the coorse o' a half hoor at farthest."
The humble devotion and absolute service of the youth, resembling that of a noble dog, however unlikely to move admiration in Lady Florimel's heart, could not fail to give her a quiet and welcome pleasure. He was an inferior who could be depended upon, and his worship was acceptable. Not a fear of his attentions becoming troublesome ever crossed her mind. The wider and more impassable the distinctions of rank, the more possible they make it for artificial minds to enter into simply human relations; the easier for the oneness of the race to assert itself, in the offering and acceptance of a devoted service. There is more of the genuine human in the relationship between some men and their servants, than between those men and their own sons.
With eyes intent, and keen as those of a gazehound, Malcolm retraced every step, up to the grated door. But no volume was to be seen. Turning from the door of the tunnel, for which he had no Sesame, he climbed to the foot of the wall that crossed it above, and with a bound, a clutch at the top, a pull and a scramble, was in the high road in a moment. From the road to the links was an easy drop, where, starting from the grated door, he retraced their path from the dune. Lady Florimel had dropped the book when she rose, and Malcolm found it lying on the sand, little the worse. He wrapped it in its owner's handkerchief, and set out for the gate at the mouth of the river.
As he came up to it, the keeper, an ill conditioned snarling fellow, who, in the phrase of the Seaton folk, "rade on the riggin (ridge) o' 's authority," rushed out of the lodge, and just as Malcolm was entering, shoved the gate in his face.
"Ye comena in wi'oot the leave o' me," he cried, with a vengeful expression.
"What's that for?" said Malcolm, who had already interposed his great boot, so that the spring bolt could not reach its catch.
"There s' nae lan' loupin' rascals come in here," said Bykes, setting his shoulder to the gate.
That instant he went staggering back to the wall of the lodge, with the gate after him.
"Stick to the wa' there," said Malcolm, as he strode in.
The keeper pursued him with frantic abuse, but he never turned his head. Arrived at the House, he committed the volume to the cook, with a brief account of where he had picked it up, begging her to inquire whether it belonged to the House. The cook sent a maid with it to Lady Florimel, and Malcolm waited until she returned—with thanks and a half crown. He took the money, and returned by the upper gate through the town.
CHAPTER XVII:
THE ACCUSATION
The next morning, soon after their early breakfast, the gate keeper stood in the door of Duncan MacPhail's cottage, with a verbal summons for Malcolm to appear before his lordship.
"An' I'm no to lowse sicht o' ye till ye hae put in yer appearance," he added; "sae gien ye dinna come peaceable, I maun gar ye."
"Whaur's yer warrant?" asked Malcolm coolly.
"Ye wad hae the impidence to deman' my warrant, ye young sorner!" cried Bykes indignantly. "Come yer wa's, my man, or I s' gar ye smairt for 't"
"Haud a quaiet sough, an' gang hame for yer warrant," said Malcolm. "It's lyin' there, doobtless, or ye wadna hae daured to shaw yer face on sic an eeran'."
Duncan, who was dozing in his chair, awoke at the sound of high words. His jealous affection perceived at once that Malcolm was being insulted. He sprang to his feet, stepped swiftly to the wall, caught down his broadsword, and rushed to the door, making the huge weapon quiver and whir about his head as if it had been a slip of tin plate.
"Where is ta rascal?" he shouted. "She'll cut him town! Show her ta lowlan' thief! She'll cut him town! Who'll be insulting her Malcolm?"
But Bykes, at first sight of the weapon, had vanished in dismay.
"Hoot toot, daddy," said Malcolm, taking him by the arm; "there's naebody here. The puir cratur couldna bide the sough o' the claymore. He fled like the autumn wind over the stubble. There's Ossian for't."
"Ta Lord pe praised!" cried Duncan. "She'll be confounded her foes. But what would ta rascal pe wanting, my son?"
Leading him back to his chair, Malcolm told him as much as he knew of the matter.
"Ton't you co for a warrant," said Duncan. "If my lort marquis will pe senting for you as one chentleman sends for another, then you co."
Within an hour Bykes reappeared, accompanied by one of the gamekeepers—an Englishman. The moment he heard the door open, Duncan caught again at his broadsword.
"We want you, my young man," said the gamekeeper, standing on the threshold, with Bykes peeping over his shoulder, in an attitude indicating one foot already lifted to run.
"What for?"
"That's as may appear."
"Whaur's yer warrant?"
"There."
"Lay 't doon o' the table, an' gang back to the door, till I get a sklent at it," said Malcolm. "Ye're an honest man, Wull—but I wadna lippen a snuff mull 'at had mair nor ae pinch intill 't wi' yon cooard cratur ahin' ye."
He was afraid of the possible consequences of his grandfather's indignation.
The gamekeeper did at once as he was requested, evidently both amused with the bearing of the two men and admiring it. Having glanced at the paper, Malcolm put it in his pocket, and whispering a word to his grandfather, walked away with his captors.
As they went to the House, Bykes was full of threats of which he sought to enhance the awfulness by the indefiniteness; but Will told Malcolm as much as he knew of the matter—namely, that the head gamekeeper, having lost some dozen of his sitting pheasants, had enjoined a strict watch; and that Bykes having caught sight of Malcolm in the very act of getting over the wall, had gone and given information against him.
No one about the premises except Bykes would have been capable of harbouring suspicion of Malcolm; and the head gamekeeper had not the slightest; but, knowing that his lordship found little enough to amuse him, and anticipating some laughter from the confronting of two such opposite characters, he had gone to the marquis with Byke's report,—and this was the result. His lordship was not a magistrate, and the so called warrant was merely a somewhat sternly worded expression of his desire that Malcolm should appear and answer to the charge.
The accused was led into a vaulted chamber opening from the hall—a genuine portion, to judge from its deep low arched recesses, the emergence of truncated portions of two or three groins, and the thickness of its walls, of the old monastery. Close by the door ascended a right angled modern staircase.
Lord Lossie entered, and took his seat in a great chair in one of the recesses.
"So, you young jackanapes!" he said, half angry, and half amused, "you decline to come, when I send for you, without a magistrate's warrant, forsooth! It looks СКАЧАТЬ