Part 57 (1/2)
”DEAR GERTRUDE,” he wrote, ”I gather from your note that it is true you are going to be married. I had heard some time ago, so your letter was no great shock to me; and what I have suffered--well, that can be of no interest to you now, and it will do me no good to recall it. As to your message, I would forgive you freely; but how can I forget? Can you forget? Do you remember the red rose? But that is all over now, I suppose; and I should not wonder if I were after all, to be able to obey you, and to forget very thoroughly--not that alone, but everything else. For I have been rather ill of late--more through sleeplessness than any other cause, I think; and they say I must go for a long sea-voyage; and the mother and Janet both say I should be more at home in the old _Umpire_, with Hamish and Christina, and my own people round me, than in a steamer; and so I may not hear of you again until you are separated from me forever. But I write now to ask you if you would like your letters returned, and one or two keepsakes, and the photographs.
I would not like them to fall into other hands; and sometimes I feel so sick at heart that I doubt whether I shall ever again get back to Dare. There are some flowers, too; but I would ask to be allowed to keep them, if you have no objection; and the sketch of Ulva, that you made on the deck of the _Umpire_, when we were coming back from Iona, I would like to keep that, if you have no objection. And I remain your faithful friend,
”KEITH MACLEOD.”
Now, at the moment he was writing this letter, Lady Macleod and her niece were together; the old lady at her spinning-wheel, the younger one sewing; and Janet Macleod was saying,--
”Oh, auntie, I am so glad Keith is going away now in the yacht! and you must not be vexed at all or troubled if he stays a long time; for what else can make him well again? Why, you know that he has not been Keith at all of late,--he is quite another man--I do not think any one would recognize him. And surely there can be no better cure for sleeplessness than the rough work of the yachting; and you know Keith will take his share, in despite of Hamish; and if he goes away to the South, they will have watches, and he will take his watch with the others, and his turn at the helm. Oh, you will see the change when he comes back to us!”
The old lady's eyes had slowly filled with tears.
”And do you think it is sleeplessness, Janet,” said she, ”that is the matter with our Keith? Ah, but you know better than that, Janet.”
Janet Macleod's face grew suddenly red; but she said, hastily,--
”Why, auntie, have I not heard him walking up and down all the night, whether it was in his own room or in the library? And then he is out before any one is up: oh yes, I know that when you cannot sleep the face grows white and the eyes grow tired. And he has not been himself at all--going away like that from every one, and having nothing to say, and going away by himself over the moors. And it was the night before last he came back from Kinloch, and he was wet through, and he only lay down on the bed, as Hamish told me, and would have slept there all the night, but for Hamish. And do you not think that was to get sleep at last that he had been walking so far, and coming through the shallows of Loch Scridain, too? Ah, but you will see the difference, auntie, when he comes back on board the _Umpire_, and we will go down to the sh.o.r.e, and we will be glad to see him that day.”
”Oh yes, Janet,” the old lady said, and the tears were running down her face, ”but you know--you know. And if he had married you, Janet, and stayed at home at Dare, there would have been none of all this trouble.
And now--what is there now? It is the young English lady that has broken his heart; and he is no longer a son to me, and he is no longer your cousin, Janet; but a broken-hearted man, that does not care for anything. And you are very kind, Janet; and you would not say any harm of any one. But I am his mother--I--I--well, if the woman was to come here this day, do you think I would not speak? It was a bad day for us all that he went away--instead of marrying you, Janet.”
”But you know that could never have been, auntie,” said the gentle-eyed cousin, though there was some conscious flush of pride in her cheeks. ”I could never have married Keith.”
”But why, Janet?”
”You have no right to ask me, auntie. But he and I--we did not care for each other--I mean, we never could have been married. I hope you will not speak about that any more, auntie.”
”And some day they will take me, too, away from Dare,” said the old dame, and the spinning-wheel was left unheeded; ”and I cannot go into the grave with my five brave lads--for where are they all now, Janet?--in Arizona one, in Africa one, and two in the Crimea, and my brave Hector at Koniggratz. But that is not much; I shall be meeting them all together: and do you not think I shall be glad to see them all together again just as it was in the old days; and they will come to meet me; and they will be glad enough to have the mother with them once again. But, Janet, Janet, how can I go to them? What will I say to them when they ask about Keith--about Keith, my Benjamin, my youngest, my handsome lad?”
The old woman was sobbing bitterly; and Janet went to her and put her arms round her, and said,--
”Why, auntie, you must not think of such things. You will send Keith away in low spirits, if you have not a bright face and a smile for him when he goes away.”
”But you do not know--you do not know,” the old woman said, ”what Keith has done for me. The others--oh yes, they were brave lads; and very proud of their name, too; and they would not disgrace their name, wherever they went; and if they died--that is nothing: for they will be together again now, and what harm is there? But Keith, he was the one that did more than any of them; for he stayed at home for my sake; and when other people were talking about this regiment and that regiment, Keith would not tell me what was sore at his heart; and never once did he say, 'Mother, I must go away like the rest,' though it was in his blood to go away. And what have I done now?--and what am I to say to his brothers when they come to ask me? I will say to them, 'Oh yes, he was the handsomest of all my six lads; and he had the proudest heart, too; but I kept him at home--and what came of it all?' Would it not be better now that he was lying buried in the jungle of the Gold Coast, or at Koniggratz, or in the Crimea?”
”Oh, surely not, auntie! Keith will come back to us soon; and when you see him well and strong again, and when you hear his laugh about the house, surely you will not be wis.h.i.+ng that he was in his grave? Why, what is the matter with you to-day, auntie?”
”The others did not suffer much, Janet, and to three of them, anyway, it was only a bullet, a cry, and then the death sleep of a brave man and the grave of a Macleod. But Keith, Janet--he is my youngest--he is nearer to my heart than any of them: do you not see his face?”
”Yes, auntie,” Janet Macleod said, in a low voice; ”but he will get over that. He will come back to us strong and well.”
”Oh yes, he will come back to us strong and well!” said the old lady, almost wildly, and she rose, and her face was pale. ”But I think it is a good thing for that woman that my other sons are all away now; for they had quick tempers, those lads; and they would not like to see their brother murdered.”
”Murdered, auntie!”
Lady Macleod would have answered in the same wild, pa.s.sionate way; but at this very moment her son entered. She turned quickly; she almost feared to meet the look of this haggard face. But Keith Macleod said, quite cheerfully,--
”Well now, Janet, and will you go round to-day to look at the _Umpire?_ And will you come too, mother? Oh, she is made very smart now; just as if we were all going away to see the Queen.”
”I cannot go to-day, Keith,” said his mother; and she left the room before he had time to notice that she was strangely excited.