Part 6 (1/2)

”But you ought to hae told the laird. It was vera ill-considered. It was his affair more than yours. I like the thing you did, Colin, but I hate the way you did it. One shouldna be selfish even in a good wark.”

”It was the laird's own fault; he would not let me explain.”

”Colin, are you married?”

”Yes. I married a Boston lady. I have a son three years old. My wife was in Texas with me. She had a large fortune of her own.”

”You are a maist respectable man, Colin, but I dinna like it at all.

What are you doing wi' your time? This grand house costs something.”

”I am an artist--a successful one, if that is not also against me.”

”Your father would think sae. Oh, my dear lad, you hae gane far astray from the old Crawford ways.”

”I cannot help that, dominie. I must live according to my light. I am sorry about father.”

Then the dominie in the most forcible manner painted the old laird's hopes and cruel disappointments. There were tears in Colin's eyes as he reasoned with him. And at this point his own son came into the room. Perhaps for the first time Colin looked at the lad as the future heir of Crawford. A strange thrill of family and national pride stirred his heart. He threw the little fellow shoulder high, and in that moment regretted that he had flung away the child's chance of being Earl of Crawford. He understood then something of the anger and suffering his father had endured, and he put the boy down very solemnly. For if Colin was anything, he was just; if his father had been his bitterest enemy, he would, at this moment, have acknowledged his own aggravation.

Then Mrs. Crawford came in. She had heard all about the dominie, and she met him like a daughter. Colin had kept his word. This fair, sunny-haired, blue-eyed woman was the wife he had dreamed about; and Tallisker told him he had at any rate done right in that matter. ”The bonnie little Republican,” as he called her, queened it over the dominie from the first hour of their acquaintance.

He stayed a week in London, and during it visited Colin's studio. He went there at Colin's urgent request, but with evident reluctance. A studio to the simple dominie had almost the same worldly flavor as a theatre. He had many misgivings as they went down Pall Mall, but he was soon rea.s.sured. There was a singular air of repose and quiet in the large, cool room. And the first picture he cast his eyes upon reconciled him to Colin's most un-Crawford-like taste.

It was ”The Farewell of the Emigrant Clan.” The dominie's knees shook, and he turned pale with emotion. How had Colin reproduced that scene, and not only reproduced but idealized it! There were the gray sea and the gray sky, and the gray granite boulder rocks on which the chief stood, the waiting s.h.i.+ps, and the loaded boats, and he himself in the prow of the foremost one. He almost felt the dear old hymn thrilling through the still room. In some way, too, Colin had grasped the grandest points of his father's character. In this picture the man's splendid physical beauty seemed in some mysterious way to give a.s.surance of an equally splendid spiritual nature.

”If this is making pictures, Colin, I'll no say but what you could paint a sermon, my dear lad. I hae ne'er seen a picture before.” Then he turned to another, and his swarthy face glowed with an intense emotion. There was a sudden sense of tightening in his throat, and he put his hand up and slowly raised his hat. It was Prince Charlie entering Edinburgh. The handsome, unfortunate youth rode bareheaded amid the Gordons and the Murrays and a hundred Highland n.o.blemen. The women had their children shoulder high to see him, the citizens, bonnets up, were pressing up to his bridle-rein. It stirred Tallisker like a peal of trumpets. With the tears streaming down his glowing face, he cried out,

”How daur ye, sir! You are just the warst rebel between the seas! King George ought to hang you up at Carlisle-gate. And this is painting!

This is artist's wark! And you choose your subjects wisely, Colin: it is a gift the angels might be proud o'.” He lingered long in the room, and when he left it, ”Prince Charlie” and the ”Clan's Farewell” were his own. They were to go back with him to the manse at Crawford.

CHAPTER IX.

It was, upon the whole, a wonderful week to Tallisker; he returned home with the determination that the laird must recall his banished.

He had tried to induce Colin to condone all past grievances, but Colin had, perhaps wisely, said that he could not go back upon a momentary impulse. The laird must know all, and accept him just as he was. He had once been requested not to come home unless he came prepared to enter into political life. He had refused the alternative then, and he should refuse it again. The laird must understand these things, or the quarrel would probably be renewed, perhaps aggravated.

And Tallisker thought that, in this respect, Colin was right. He would at any rate hide nothing from the laird, he should know all; and really he thought he ought to be very grateful that the ”all” was so much better than might have been.

The laird was not glad. A son brought down to eat the husk of evil ways, poor, sick, suppliant, would have found a far readier welcome.

He would gladly have gone to meet Colin, even while he was yet a great way off, only he wanted Colin to be weary and footsore and utterly dependent on his love. He heard with a grim silence Tallisker's description of the house in Regent's Place, with its flowers and books, its statues, pictures, and conservatory. When Tallisker told him of the condition of the Crawfords in Canada, he was greatly moved.

He was interested and pleased with the Texan struggle. He knew nothing of Texas, had never heard of the country, but Mexicans, Spaniards, and the Inquisition were one in his mind.

”That at least was Crawford-like,” he said warmly, when told of Colin's part in the struggle.

But the subsequent settlement of the clan there hurt him terribly. ”He should hae told me. He shouldna hae minded what I said in such a case.

I had a right to know. Colin has used me vera hardly about this. Has he not, Tallisker?”

”Yes, laird, Colin was vera wrong there. He knows it now.”