Inchbracken Part 22

'Ye ill-tongued limmer! Hoo daur ye even me to the like?'

'Ou ay! Ye're rael heigh, are na ye? But ye gaed fleechin' to Miss Mary for a' that, to get the bairn awa frae me, an' ye said ye'd tent her for half-a-crown. I'm thinkin' she'd no hae fared ower weel, the bonny lamb, gin ye'd hae gotten yer way. Ye'd hae shotten't by, wi'

ait meal brue, an' drank the sweet milk yersel'!'

'An' gin I did speer Miss Brown for the bairn, was there ony wrang kenned anent it than? An' what for suld I no? Wad it no hae been weel for the bairn gin I had gotten my way! I hae raised twal o' my ain, an' I'm granny to naar twa score. But you! ye ne'er had but ane, an'

ye kenned na hoo to guide it--made sae puir a job o't the Lord ne'er chanced ye wi' anither.'

'The Lord forgie ye! ye ill-tongued witch,' cried Eppie, while her br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes overflowed. The image of her long-lost darling rose before her in all its winsome beauty, and she gathered up the baby in her lap, more closely to her motherly breast, and pressed it fondly for the sake of the one that was gone.

'An' sae gin ye hae the merry-begotten brat, an' the siller, ye maun e'en tak the disdain as weel. I'm blythe for mysel' noo, 'at the half-crowns didna come my gate. There war nane but decent men's bairns e'er lay in thae arms.' She stretched her spider-like tentacles, while the contents of her basket gave a warning rattle, 'An' that minds me I maun do my errand wi' the young man--I winna ca' him a minister, for the gown suld be strippet frae his shouthers; an' that's what it will be afore lang.'

'My certie! An' ye'se gang nae sic gate,' cried Eppie, rising and preparing to block the way. 'The minister's lyin' sair sick, an' he maunna be fashed wi' a randie auld tinkler wife's daft blathers. Set ye down! Though I winna say ye're walcome, an' I'se fesh Miss Brown.'

Miss Brown was fetched accordingly, she had overheard high words, and entered in some surprise.

'Mrs. Howden,' she said holding out her hand, 'so you have come at last to ask for the minister. The people seem to have cast us off altogether. Since he has been sick scarcely one has come to enquire for him.'

'Aweel, Miss Mary, an' it's no juist that has brocht me, ill doin' ye ken maun bring ill feelin'. Whan folk sees the abomination o'

desolation sittin' in the holy place, as the Scripter micht word it, an the steward o' the Kirk's mysteries gien ower to the l.u.s.ts o' the flesh, the douce Christi'n folk beut to hand awa. Touch not, taste not, haunel not, ye ken what the word says. An' I hae been thinkin', seein' hoo things hae come round, ye'll be best to tak tent o' yer bits o' dishes yersel', gin Eppie there can gar it gree wi' her walk an' conversation as a Christi'n wumman to mind that ill-faured scart o' a bairn, I see na at she may na keep yer teapat as weel!' So saying she lifted the cover of her basket, and proceeded to lay out the cups and saucers on the dresser.

Mary was too much astonished to say anything. She was glad to see the ware once more brought within reach of use, seeing that hitherto it had been a mere embellishment to the gla.s.s cupboard in the corner of Luckie Howden's cabin, a testimony to her piety and helpfulness to the church; but the cause and the manner of the rest.i.tution were beyond her comprehension. She glanced at Eppie for some explanation, but Eppie sat with lips compressed in determined silence, a flame of scarlet indignation burning on either cheek.

Luckie Howden went on arranging and counting the pieces of crockery.

'Twall cups an' twall sacers, four bread plates, an' twa bowls. Ye'll find that a' richt, Miss Brown. An' here's the bits o' siller things,'

producing the teapot, over which she pa.s.sed her hand with a regretful stroking motion, 'It's gotten neither clure nor dint i' my haunds. A'

siller say ye? An' weel I wat it's bonny. Aiblins it's no sae bricht an' glintin' as it ance was. "Yer goold an' yer siller are become dim, yer garments are moth-eaten," that's what the Prophet Ezekil said til back-slidin' Isril lang syne, an' it's true yet! Wae's me, Miss Brown!

'at the white raiment o' yer puir wanderin' brither, 'at we ance thocht sae clean an' white, suld be spotted wi' the flesh after a'!

But what's been dune i' the secret chaumer sall be proclaimed on the house heads afore lang. My certie! but he's been the lad to draw iniquity wi' cart ropes! an' to sin wi' the high haund! But it's a'

fand out at last, he'll be peuten til open shame, an' be nae mair a steward o' the gospel mysteries in Glen Effick!'

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Ye'll find that a' richt, Miss Brown." Page 190.]

'I don't understand one word you say, Mrs. Howden,' cried Mary in open-eyed amazement. 'If our things are in your way you are perfectly right to bring them back, and it will not inconvenience us in the least to have them here. It was kind in you to give them house-room when we came to live in the village, and we are obliged to you for having taken such good care of them. But I don't understand what ground of offence my brother can have given you, or why you should speak of him in such extraordinary language.'

'I'm thinkin' ye'll hae to thole waur langidge nor that afore a's o'er, Miss Brown. An' aiblins ye ken mair nor ye wad like to let-on.

I'm no yer judge, but we hae scripter for't, 'at refuges o' lees winna stand.'

'Think shame, woman!' cried Eppie, unable altogether to keep silence, though she still restrained herself, fearful of provoking a tempest and disturbing the sick man.

'An' what wad I think shame for? It's the ill doer 'at fears the ill word. I hae cleared my skirts this day. I shack the stour frae my very feet, an' I'm dune wi' the De'il an' a' his warks!' And shaking out the folds of her red cloak, with a stamp of either foot, she hobbled away.

'What does she mean, Eppie? And whatever it is, the rest of the people must think it too--Don't deny it, Eppie! you know all about it. I have seen so much as that in your face for several days. What is it?'

'It's naething ony sensible body wad heed. Just a wheen senseless havers. Ne'er fash yer thoomb, Miss Mary! It'll a' blaw ower.'

Miss Mary was resolute, however, and would be told. She sat herself down on a stool beside Eppie, and between coaxing and sheer pertinacity she at last prevailed on the old woman to speak. They sat together for some time with their heads very close, conversing in whispers.

'Oh how could any one believe so monstrous an invention?' she cried at last, her face suffused with crimson, while she kissed the sleeping baby, the innocent cause of so much confusion, and returned to her brother's room.

CHAPTER XXV.

_SOPHIA'S ANSWER_.

Thursday morning was the opening of a great day in Glen Effick. The foundation stone of the new Church was to be laid, and from the most distant corners of Kilrundle parish the people came streaming in across the braes, more numerously even than for the Sunday meeting.

The Session had at last come to an agreement with Widow Forester for half of her kaleyard on which to build their Church. The foundation was already dug, and every owner of a horse and cart had agreed to contribute so many days' labour towards delivering the materials on the ground. And now the work was to be inaugurated with preaching and prayer, that it might be brought to a speedy and prosperous issue. The good people having neither oil nor wine to bestow in cementing the stones, had resolved to pour forth a copious oblation of words devout and stirring, and to celebrate their triumph over Laird and Law in true democratic fas.h.i.+on, by a general gathering and unstinted speechification.

The hot stillness of September days had pa.s.sed away, and the fresh cool brightness of October had succeeded. In low-lying hollows the first h.o.a.r-frost of the season was melting into dew before the approaching noon, and straggling flecks of cloud swam merrily overhead in the breezy sky. The crimson of the moors was withering somewhat into rusty brown, but the birch along the watercourses had ripened into sprays of gold, while the distant hills stood out against the sky in violet and blue. The trooping wors.h.i.+ppers displayed all their Sunday bravery of apparel, but the solemnity of their Sabbath demeanour they had felt at liberty to leave behind. The children ran hither and thither shouting their loudest, while the seniors chatted cheerily as they went, carrying their dinners in heavy baskets between them, and resolved to make the most of the day's 'ploy.'

Along the village street the people trickled in a continuous stream, and by and by Ebenezer Prittie and Peter Malloch put up the shutters on their respective shops. Donald Maclachlan shut up the smithy, and Angus Eldrecht, the wheel-wright, closed his yard, and stepped off with their wives to the meeting place on the brae-side, where Mr.

Dowlas and a reverend brother of the presbytery were already in the tent waiting to conduct the exercises.

Mrs. Sangster, with her daughter, was on the ground betimes, discussing with unwonted affability the terrible scandal to the elders and more prominent people near her. She occupied, of course, the beadle's special chairs, and as the time to commence the service drew near, she beckoned to her Stephen Boague and his wife, and seated them beside herself and daughter. It was a public recognition of their exemplary character she considered, which would fully reward the woman for her hospitality the day she was lost in the mist, and was quite inexpensive besides. When Mary Brown presently appeared, the good woman would fain have yielded up to her her accustomed seat under the matronly wing of the congregation's only lady; but Mrs. Sangster requested that she would not move. 'I could not countenance Mr. Brown or his family,' she said, 'under the circ.u.mstances.' So the poor woman had to remain; but she no longer felt promotion in her place of honour, and all her acquaintances looked askance, and wondered at her 'upsettin' impidence.' Mrs. Sangster was too busy with her 'spy-gla.s.s'

and psalm-book to see the approach of Mary, who coloured with resentment at what, since Eppie's explanation, she now perfectly understood, and looked about for another seat. The Laird had been watching his wife's proceedings with cynical amus.e.m.e.nt, he now came forward and removed his daughter to the elder's bench, setting the chair she had been occupying beside her, and seating Mary upon it, while he took his own stand beside them.

Mrs. Sangster's spy-gla.s.s dropped upon her book; amazement and indignation paralyzed her, which was fortunate, or she might have exhibited a tantrum, even in that sacred a.s.sembly. She! that congregation's Deborah without a Barak, as a fawning preacher had once described her at family prayers, to be thus flouted before them all!

And the wholesome discipline she had meant to exercise in support of the public morals to be turned round upon herself! and this, too, by her own husband! the man bound to protect, honour, and obey her! For _of course_ he was bound so to do, whatever Saint Paul, or any other old bachelor who knew nothing about it, might say. Was she not the more advanced Christian? and in right of her higher standing in '_The Kingdom_' ent.i.tled to instruct, advise, and reprove those on a lower level. Oh! how should she punish him and bring him to book? There was the difficulty. Scolding would not do. She had tried that before, and it did not succeed. He was apt to laugh in her face, and sometimes even to scold back in return, in an altogether dreadful and appalling way--for an elder--if she persisted; and then nothing, not even her unfailing Christian meekness could secure her the last word, which was her due as a lady. She thought of putting him on low diet for a while.--'And it would serve that monkey Sophia right, too, for sympathising with her father. See how contentedly she cottons up to Mary Brown!' thought she. But she did not like bad dinners herself, and it would come out if she had a sweetbread quietly in her own room.

Besides, she had attempted a penitential regimen of cold mutton once before, and it had not ministered to his spiritual needs; on the contrary, he had broken out in a way that was simply dreadful, and had threatened her with a housekeeper if she could not keep a better table. Her crosses were indeed many and grievous, and she might have grown weak and hysterical in reviewing them, but that other cares and anxieties demanded her present attention. Surely there was something rubbing up against her in a familiar and unbecoming way. She turned, looked, and almost leaped into Mrs. Boague's lap. Stephen's largest collie was t.i.tillating his spine by pus.h.i.+ng it up and down against her new plum-coloured silk gown.

'Haud steady, mem! The folk 'ull see ye, an' ye're nae licht wecht forby!' whispered Mrs. Boague. 'Ne'er mind the dugs, an' they winna fash wi' _you_. An' de'il a yelp or snap wull they gie, sae lang as ye dinna staund on their tails.'

Touseler, finding his scratching-post withdrawn, stretched himself on the ground to sleep out the sermon, and Mrs. Sangster resumed her chair. Her tranquility was of short duration. First would come a tug at her parasol, accompanied by a strangled yelp, as a puppy having swallowed the ta.s.sel would struggle to escape, like a trout on a fish-hook; and next it would be her shawl. A dirty little finger would be found tracing the flowing lines of its elegant embroidery, or the corner would be pulled down, that the critics squatting on the sward might more conveniently scrutinize the elaborate design.

When Sophia's chair was removed it had left an open spot in the crowd, to Mrs. Sangster's left, and as nature abhors a vacuum, the unplaced material of her party had flowed in to fill it. She looked down on a confused knot of dog and child life, heads and tails, legs and arms swaying and kicking to and fro in silent happiness. Had a quadruped or a biped given tongue in the 'House of G.o.d,' there would have been whipping behind the first big boulder-stone on the home-going, and they had all felt the weight of Stephen's hand at sometime, so were wary; but so long as silence was kept, and they remained beside the shepherd and his wife, they might kick, roll, and be happy as they pleased.

Poor Mrs. Sangster's attention was fully occupied in protecting her dress from the busy fingers of the little boys and girls, and in seeing that the dogs did not make a coverlet of her skirts; and she vowed never again to 'take notice' of people from the 'lower orders,'

who so little appreciated the honour she did them, and made themselves so utterly abominable with their ill-reared dogs and children. She lost all the good of their sermons as she told the reverend orators that evening at supper, and was far too concerned for what might befall her own draperies, to give much heed to the Rev. aemelius Geddie's description of the curtains of fine linen and badger skins, blue and scarlet, prepared for the Tabernacle in the wilderness, and his tender appeal to the women of Glen Effick to go and do likewise.

Mr. Dowlas described the building of Solomon's Temple, its joists of cedar covered with plates of pure gold, the chapiters, the pomegranates, and the wreathen-work, the brazen pillars and the vessels of pure gold. He interspersed these with spiritual interpretations and mystical images drawn from the Prophets, till the hearers were brought under a general vague impression of splendour and solemnity, they could not have explained wherefore; but they all agreed that it was a 'graund discoorse,' and 'very refres.h.i.+ng,' and that they had entered on a high, n.o.ble and arduous work, in proposing to build themselves a little meeting house; and that, though propriety forbade their saying so, the Divine Head of the Church was greatly beholden to them, and that they might look, as their certain due, for large amounts of blessing, spiritual and temporal, to requite their exertions in church-building, as well as that heroic penny-a-week to the Sustentation Fund.

Like other fine things, the sermon came to an end at last, and after psalms and benediction, it was announced that they would proceed in procession to the site of their future church, where reports of the different committees would be received, and addresses given, after which the foundation stone would be laid with prayer and praise.

The congregation then broke up, and in the confusion Sophia got the opportunity she had been desiring of a quiet word with Mary.

Circ.u.mstances had befriended her wonderfully she thought, when her father had brought her away from her mother, and placed her beside Mary Brown. She had always been fond of Mary, but now she felt a sisterly drawing towards her which she had not known before. Mary was her junior by about a year, but was quicker and earlier to mature, and this had sometimes made Sophia feel a rawness in herself, and a general slowness and obtuseness by comparison, in a way approaching as near to jealousy as her somewhat stolid and easy-going disposition was capable of experiencing. But as Mary neither a.s.sumed nor probably was aware of any advantage, this feeling in great measure slept; and now, when Sophia's development had advanced as with a bound, under the stirrings of awakening emotion, the latent grudge was altogether overborne. She sat up very close to her and pressed her softly. Mary was surprised. Demonstration of the faintest kind was something new in Sophia, and altogether unexpected. Her heart was sore at the unkindness of the paris.h.i.+oners to her brother, and their haste to adopt unwarrantable and improbable suspicion against him; and that Mrs. Sangster; who had a.s.sumed to play the role of mother to her in her lonely position, should turn and publicly visit the imaginary misdeeds of her brother on her head, had been very grievous. She a.s.sumed that Sophia meant to signify her disbelief in the idle rumours afloat, and, accepting the proffered sympathy, she returned the friendly pressure with grateful warmth. The two read from the same bible and psalm-book, and sat so close that the Laird was able to find room on the bench beside his daughter, just as he was beginning to think a two hours' stand rather a heavy penalty for interfering with his wife's absurdity.

'Mary!' whispered Sophia, when the a.s.semblage was breaking up, 'I want you to tell your brother that I received his letter. Whoever told him that I am engaged is altogether mistaken. n.o.body ever asked me to--be engaged, and there is no one who could have any right to do so. I would have answered his letter, but mamma forbade me; she even says I must not come and see you, while some report or other, I don't know what it is, is going about. So I have been waiting for an opportunity to speak to you. Mamma says papa does not believe the report, so--'

here the words died away and the colour deepened on her cheeks--'but papa does not know of his letter to me.' Mary leant forward to bestow a kiss, but Sophia started back under a sharp prod from the parasol of her mother, who was eagerly reaching over the shoulders of the intervening crowd.

'Sophia Sangster! what are you lingering there for? Don't you see everybody is on the move? Come to your mother's side, your proper place, this moment.'

It was not a happy half-hour for Sophia that followed. The maternal plumage was sadly ruffled, and in the 'preening' that ensued to readjust the feathers mental as well as physical (for the silk gown was rumpled as much as the self-complacency was disturbed), not a few stray pecks fell to her portion. That her husband should have carried away her own girl from her side was almost intolerable; only, till she could devise a way to punish him which she had not yet discovered, she must bear that; but the girl had acquiesced without sign of reluctance or remonstrance, had consented to be separated from her own mother with perfect equanimity, and in spite of all that had pa.s.sed, had seemed entirely comfortable beside Mary Brown, notwithstanding the maternal taboo. She had had little leisure for observation. Her gown, her shawl, the children, the sheep-dogs had made constant demands on her attention, and when she looked for succour to the shepherd and his wife, they were drinking in the sumptuous splendours of Solomon's temple, and had no thought for the turbulent little Bethel at their feet. Once however she had found time to glance across and was disgusted to see Sophia and Mary singing amicably from one book and evidently on the best of terms.

'You're a saft f.e.c.kless tawpie, Sophia Sangster!' she enunciated with much emphasis, as she and her daughter were carried along in the stream of the procession. 'It seems to me sometimes that you have no more sense than a sookin' turkey!' Mrs. Sangster rather prided herself on her English, which she considered equal to that of any body on her side of London or Inverness. These were the two seats of perfect speech she considered; but failing them Auchlippie could hold its own against Edinburgh, St. Andrews, or anywhere else, and was decidedly a better model than her son Peter since he had adopted a Lancas.h.i.+re brogue. Nevertheless when she became 'excited' (_i.e_. angry), she admitted that she had to fall back on the pith and vigour of her native Doric with its unlimited capacity for picturesque vituperation.