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"I would not have thought it. You, so proper and respectable, making a feast for three young men, who played the heart out of you with their violins!"
"Poor Donald has not a violin of his own, yet he plays better than Matthew or the orchestra lad. How it comes I cannot tell, but he does, and there's no 'ifs' or 'ands' about it."
"Are violins dear things, Aunt?"
"Too dear for Donald to buy, and he dare not ask his father for money to buy a violin. Yes, Marion, violins cost a lot of money."
"You say I have some money of my own."
"What by that? You shall not ware it on a violin. Donald's violin will come its own road, and that will not be out of your purse. There's the clock striking twelve. Whatever are we doing here? I must have lost my senses to be keeping you."
"Don't mind an hour or two, Aunt. This has been the most wonderful night to me. You have spoken of my mother. I have had an invitation to Lady Cramer's. I have heard that I am, in a small way, an heiress. I have learned all about the trouble between Father and Donald. I have made out the list for a far finer wardrobe than I ever expected to own. I am sorry this wonderful day is over."
"But it is over, and it is now Tuesday. It will be Saturday before we can be ready for Cramer Brae. You must stay here until your new frocks are fitted, and that will make us Saturday. Now sleep well, for I shall have you called at seven sharp."
As Mrs. Caird anticipated, it was Saturday afternoon when they arrived at Cramer Brae. The Cramer carriage was waiting to take them to the Little House, which was more than a mile inland. It stood on the Brae at the foot of the hills, and was shielded on the east and west by large beech trees. The hills were behind, the sea in front of it, and when the wind was lulled, or from the south, the roar and the beat of its waves were distinctly heard.
It was a long, low house. The leaded, diamond-shaped windows opened like doors on their hinges, and flower boxes, drooping vines and blooms were on every sill. Gardens and lawns, with a little paddock for the ponies to run in, covered the six acres of land surrounding it. Marion was delighted. "Here we shall be so happy, Aunt," she cried in a voice full of sweet inflections, for she was thanking God in her heart for bringing her to such a beautiful spot.
Aileen and Kitty met them at the door and tea was waiting in the small dining-room. There was a low bowl of pansies in the center of the table, which was set with cream Wedgwood and silver of the date of Queen Anne. Every necessity and every luxury for the hour were there, and a wonderful peace brooded over all things.
Marion was enchanted. "This place must be like Heaven," she said; and Mrs. Caird answered, "I hope you are right. I cannot imagine any circumstances much pleasanter. We may thank God even for this cup of young Pekoe and thick cream, and delicate bread and fresh butter. They are just a part of the whole blessing. I have heard of a great English writer who thought that among many higher pleasures we should not miss the homely delicacies of our earthly table. I hope we shall not. I would like a little of earth in heaven; it might be as good to us as is a little of heaven on earth. Why not? All God's gifts are blessed, if we bless Him for them."
"I wonder if Father and Donald will have a good tea?"
"I'll warrant you. Maggie knows all your father's ways and likings – queer and otherwise. He would want a bit of broiled fish, or the like of it. I don't think you or I would care for hot meat now."
"What could be nicer than this cold, tender chicken?"
"Nothing, but men are keen for something hot. They don't feel as if they were fed, wanting the taste and smell of fresh-cooked flesh – of one kind or another."
"Donald promised me he would keep straight with Father, if possible."
"Whiles it is not possible to do that – but he made me the same promise, and he'll keep it, if his father will let him."
"Father is not at all quarrelsome, Aunt."
"Isn't he, dear? I'm very glad to hear it."
"You ought to know, Aunt; you have lived with him for – "
"Nearly eighteen years, and I am not settled in my mind yet on that subject."
"If people attack Father's creed, it is right for him to be angry. Donald ought to have kept his opinions to himself."
"That is the hardest kind of work, Marion. I know, for I've been trying to do it ever since you were born. Yes, Marion, I have, and it is hard work to-day."
"What makes you try it, Aunt?"
"The same reason as stirs Donald up."
"Calvinism?"
"Just Calvinism."
"But you are a Calvinist?"
"Not I! No, indeed! But when I came here to take care of Donald and yourself I promised Jessy Caird never to bring that subject to dispute. I knew, if I did, I would have to leave you, and I thought more of you two children than of any creed in Christendom."
"What creed do you like, Aunt?"
"I was christened and confirmed in the English Church and I love it with a great love; but I'm loving Donald and you far better —and her that's gone– and, if the Syrian was to be forgiven for worshiping out of his own temple for his Master's sake, I think Mother Church will forgive me for loving two motherless children more than her liturgy."
"Did Father never ask you if you would like to go to St. Mary's and hear your own prayers? They are very fine prayers. I have heard them, for when I was at school Miss Lamont took us sometimes on Sunday afternoons to the English Church."
"You are right, but I would not name Miss Lamont's freedom before your father. I never talk on this subject to him; if I did, we would be passing disagreeable words in ten minutes. For your sakes, I go cheerfully to the Calvinistic kirk every Sabbath, and nobody but your father and myself has known that my soul was Armenian, and hated a Calvinist even in its most charitable hours."
"What is an Armenian?"
"St. Paul was an Armenian, and St. Augustine, and Luther, and John Wesley, and all the millions that follow their teaching. I am not ashamed of my faith. I am going to heaven in the best of good company. But what for are we talking this happy hour of Calvinism? We ought to let weary dogs lie, and there are few wearier ones than Calvinism."
"I like to talk of it, Aunt. I want to know all about it."
"Then talk to the Minister. Here are mountains and trees and flowers of every kind. Here are birds singing as if they never would grow old, and winds streaming out of the hills cool as living waters, and wafting into us scents that tell the soul they come from heaven. Oh, my dear Marion, let us enjoy God's good gifts and be thankful."
"Are you going to unpack the trunks to-night, Aunt?"
"No. Aileen and Kitty would have a conscience ache if we did anything not necessary so near the Sabbath Day. We must respect their feelings. Aileen is very strict in her religion. I am tired, and am going to lie down for an hour, and you can wander about and please yourself. Go into the garden. I wouldn't wonder if you had a few pleasant surprises."
So Marion went into the garden, leaving the old house until she had a whole day to give it. She went among the rose trellises first. The roses were just budding – gold and pink and white. What a wonder of roses there would be in a week or two! The pansy beds were another marvel. Such pansies she had never before seen, for they represented all that the highest culture could do for size and coloring. Sweet old-fashioned flowers and flowering shrubs like lad's love were everywhere, and a little green carpet of camomile was spread in the center of the place for the fairies. Not far from it was a great bed of lavender and thyme, a special gift to the honeybees, who lived in the pretty antique straw skeps near it. Heavily laden with honey, hundreds of bees were flying slowly home to them, and the misty air was full of an odor from the hives that stirred something at the very roots of her being. She stood lost in thought before the skeps and the returning bees, and as she drew great breaths of the scented air she whispered to herself, "Where and when have I seen this very picture before?"
Until the twilight deepened and a gray mist from the sea blended with it she sat thinking of many things. Life had been so vivid to her during the past week. She felt as if she had never lived before, and it was not until all was shadowy and indistinct that she remembered her aunt had warned her to come into the house before the dew fell and the sea mist rolled inland.
Turning hurriedly, she was about to obey this order when she heard footsteps on the flagged sidewalk running along the front of the house. She stood still and listened. Perhaps it was Donald. No, the steps were not like Donald's, they were firmer and faster, and had a military ring in them. She was standing under a large silver-leafed birch tree, and not visible from the sidewalk, yet, by stepping a little further into its shadow, she thought she could satisfy her curiosity. However, she could see nothing but a tall figure, hastening through the gathering gloom and looking neither to the right nor to the left. But for the footsteps, the figure passed silently and swiftly as a bird through the gray mist. Its sudden appearance and disappearance impressed her powerfully, and then there came again to her that singular sense of a past familiarity. "I have stood in a garden watching that figure before. Where was it? Who is he?"
She was disturbed by the recurrence of the influence, and she went with rapid steps into the house. Mrs. Caird was coming to meet her. "Marion," she said, "I have slept past my intentions. Where have you been? It is too late for you to be outside. Come into the house and shut the door."
"I was walking in the garden. You told me to do so."
"Go now to the parlor and sit down. I will be with you directly."
But Marion knew that her aunt's "directly" had an elastic quality. It might be half an hour, it might be much more. So she took a book of poems from a bookcase hanging against the wall, saying to herself as she did so: "Miss Lamont told me to commit to memory as much good poetry as I could, because there came hours in every life when a verse learned, perhaps twenty years before, would have its message and come back to us. I suppose just as the bees and the man came back to me. I don't remember where from."
In less than an hour Mrs. Caird came into the parlor with a glass of milk in her hand. "Drink it, Marion," she said, "and then go to your sleep. You have surely worn the day threadbare by this time."
"I was learning a few lines until you came to me. I want to tell you something. When it was nearly dark, and I was coming to the house, a man passed here."
"I shouldn't wonder."
"I thought at first it might be Donald."
"You need not look for Donald. I have told you that before."
"He was very tall. He walked like a soldier, and passed through the mist like a darker shadow. He gave me a queer feeling."
"Which way did he go?"
"Straight past the house. When his feet touched the brae I lost his footsteps. I saw him but a moment or two. He passed so quickly. It was like a dream. I wonder who he was?"
"Most likely the young Lord. Your father told me he might be at Cramer Hall. He hoped not, but thought it more than possible. It will be the right thing for him to keep shadowy and dreamlike. From what I have heard of the young Lord, he is not proper company for any nice girl. The old Lord – God rest his soul – was a very saint in his religion and a wonderful scholar. Your father thought much of him, and he was never weary of your father's company, and he left him, also, a good testimony of his friendship in his will."
"Then Father should not infer ill of his son."
"Marion, men may be perfectly fit and proper for each other's company, and very unfit for a nice girl to talk with. The young man has been six or seven years in a regiment, but now that he has come to the estate and title I dare say he will resign. He has to look after his stepmother and the land, for I judge that she is but a young, canary-headed, thoughtless creature."
"Who said he wasn't good company for a nice girl?"
"The Minister himself said it, and to me he said it. So, Marion, if you should meet him, which I'm thinking is particularly likely, you must act according to my report. 'He isn't proper company for a good girl,' that is what the Minister said."
"Perhaps he is not a Calvinist," and Marion smiled, and Mrs. Caird tried not to smile.
"I don't want any complications," she continued, "so don't dream of him, don't think of him, and don't have any queer feelings about him. Your father will not have things go contrary to his plans, if he can help it, and Lord Richard Cramer is not in his plans."
"I know who is, Aunt, but he is not in my plans."
"What are you talking about?"
"About Allan Reid. Oh, I know Father's plan. Allan is making love to me whenever he can get a chance. And, if I go down town, I'm meeting him round every corner. I know how Donald came to get into Reid and McBryne's office."
"If you know so much, why were you keeping so quiet about things?"
"You were always telling me to keep my own counsel and share secrets with nobody."
"I was not including myself in that order."
"Father cannot bend either Donald's or my life to his wish."
"It is your life-long happiness and welfare he is planning for."
"God will order my life. That will content me. And God would not want me to marry Allan Reid, with his long neck and weak eyes, because I could never love him, and I suppose you ought to love the man you marry."
"I believe it is thought necessary by some people. Allan will have lots of money, and in good time walk to the head of the biggest shipping business in Glasgow. He is a religious young man, always in kirk when kirktime comes, and I hear that he is also the cleverest of men in a matter of business. He'll be the richest shipper in Glasgow some day."
"I shall never marry for money. Never! Never!"
"You'll never marry for money, won't you? Let me tell you, it is a far better way of marrying, in general, than comes of vows and kisses and all such gentle shepherding."
"For all that, 'I will marry my own true love.'"
"When he comes, young lady."
"When he comes! I think he will not be long in coming now."
"Go away to your sleep. You're just dreaming with your eyes open. Good night, dear."
"Good night; and 'I will marry my own true love,'" and, with the lilt on her lips, she went singing to her room.
Mrs. Caird sat down, completely perplexed. "Here's a nice state of affairs!" she mused. "I said but a few words about the young Lord, and, out of a woman's pure contradiction, she instantly made a graven image of him, and set him up in her mind to worship. She was ready, though she never saw him, to defend him against her father's judgment. I could see that plainly. What kind of a girl is this? Never a thought of love did I give Andrew Caird until he said in so many words, 'Jessy, will you be my wife?' Time enough then to begin the worshiping. Well, Ian is going to have his hands and heart full with these two children, and I'll be getting the blame of it. And, of course, I shall stand by both of them. I kissed that promise on my dying sister's lips, and I wouldn't break it for Lords, nor Commons, nor the General Assembly of the Kirk added to them. I shall stand by both! There's no harm in Donald's opinions. I hold the same myself, and, what's more, I always shall hold them. Fire couldn't burn them out of me. As for Marion, if she wants to build her a little romance, why should I hinder? The girl shall have her dream, if it pleases her." Then she slowly went upstairs to her room, and the Little House was still as a resting wheel.
CHAPTER II
LORD RICHARD CRAMER
"Souls see each other at a glance, as two drops of rain might look into each other, if they had life."
"The cause of love can never be assigned,
It is not in the face, but in the mind."
It was the Sabbath, and all its surroundings were steeped in that wonderful Sabbath stillness that not even great cities are without. The servants had put on with their kirk gowns the quiet movements they kept for this day, and, as they noiselessly prepared the breakfast, they talked softly to each other in monosyllables. Marion was used to this formality, and indeed was herself involuntarily affected by it. She stood hesitating on the doorsteps about a walk in the garden. Her feet longed for the soft lawns and the flowery paths, but she had not escaped the Sabbath thraldom of her house and native city.
"It might be wrong," she mused, "perhaps I ought to go to God's house and honor Him before all else. I must ask Aunt Jessy."
In a few minutes she heard her aunt coming downstairs. Evidently Mrs. Caird had forgotten that it was the Sabbath; she took the steps quickly, with some noise, too, and her face was happy; indeed, she looked ready to laugh.
"This is a heavenly place!" she said cheerfully, "and here comes Kitty with breakfast. There's no wonder you stand at the open door, Marion. Look at that little summerhouse. It is covered with jasmine stars. If you saw an angel resting in it, you would not be astonished."
"I was longing to walk in the garden."
"And why not?"
"It is the Sabbath."
"All days are Sabbath to the grateful heart."
"Yes, but this is the Kirk Day, and I was wondering how we were to get there. Aileen says it is near two miles away. I can walk two miles, but you – "
"I can walk as well as you can, but I'm not going to try it. I'm not going to the Kirk at all to-day – walking or riding."
"Not going to Kirk, Aunt!"
"No. I have made up my mind to have one long, sweet, quiet day, and to keep it with none present but God. As soon as I opened my eyes this morning I heard larks singing up to the very gate of heaven. I saw one rise from the brae just outside. I'll warrant you his nest was there. Marion, he was worshiping before any of our Glasgow burghers were out of their beds. I sent a prayer up with his song. God bless the bird!"
"What will Father say?"
"Just what he wants to say. I'll not hinder him. When you have eaten your breakfast go into the garden and say a prayer among the flowers. You'll be in one of God's own kirks. Open all your heart to Him."
"And you?"
"I'll be mostly in my room. It is long, long years since I had a Sunday that rested me. I have made up my soul and my heart to have one this day."
