Stiff with long travel, cold, weary, and even wet, for the deluging rain dripped through the covering of the crazy old trap, she was landed at the door of The Mains in the murk of the evening, just as the laird descended the front stair from his daughter's room. What he saw was a little, slight woman's figure, covered from head to foot in a black hood and mantle, stepping in out of the dark, and receiving a genteel welcome from his excellent lady.
'Come in, come in,' the lady of The Mains was saying, standing in the hall, in her best silk dress, flanked by a shy daughter or two. 'You are welcome, Mrs. Maclehose—Nancy, it used to be!'
'It must be "Nancy" still, surely!' So sweet a voice it was that spoke, that the sudden contrast to the country lady's hearty tones was like the change from a trumpet to some delicate stringed instrument that thrills upon the ear. It was quite drowned in the laird's jovial welcome which ensued.
'Ay, it's not only "Nancy,"' said he, 'but "Pretty Miss Nancy"—we've not forgotten that, ma'am, not we!'
'Ah, little of that now, Mr. Graham!' and the speaker sighed and smiled; not a very deep sigh, and a very engaging smile. Mrs. Graham had now removed the travelling mantle from her guest's shoulders, and a dainty little figure of a woman stood forth, less considerably than the average height, and slender, but with a full slenderness that gave no hint of angularity or meagreness. Mrs. Maclehose, at eight-and-twenty, was not of the beauté éclatante which the public expects in one who is known to posterity as the idol of a love-poet. Hers was the kind of beauty that did not suit all tastes; for some, her mouth was too big, for others, her eyes made too much play, and these would say that she ogled. It was a fascination that she had rather than beauty, aided by her sweet voice, and soft, flattering ways; and over all there seemed to be a kind of innocent voluptuousness, which allured, even though you resented its allurement. Withal, her little person was daintiness itself; an oval, small face, velvety, soft, dark eyes, lips of a pomegranate redness that parted in bewitching smiles, little hands and dainty feet. Suddenly, beside her, the buxom lady of The Mains seemed coarse and blowsy, and all her rosy daughters to have wondrous clumsy waists, and thick red wrists. Such was Nancy Maclehose, on the very eve of her apotheosis—the 'gloriously amiable fine woman' of the enamoured Burns, the 'Clarinda' of so many a bombastic love-letter, and the 'Nanny' of songs that are sweet for all time.
But 'Clarinda' had not met her 'Sylvander' at this date, and was merely a little grass-widow, in rather doubtful circumstances, and a guest at The Mains. She tuned herself to her company with natural adaptability, and endured with heroism the massive hospitalities of a provincial evening. She was docile with the mistress of the house, and bewitching with its master; went through an introduction to six shy country girls, with a pretty word for each. She praised the china, and envied the silver; vowed no turkey ever tasted half so good, nor home-brewed ginger cordial half so luscious. And she meant it all, though all the time her delicate travel-tired limbs ached for bed, and she felt all the worst shivering premonitions of a bad cold; the chilly strangeness of a new-comer was upon her, and the low-roofed, rambling old house seemed dark and draughty and comfortless. The evening ended with a toddy-bowl, of which the contents forced the tears into her eyes; then the long-suffering guest was ushered into the glories of the best bedroom, and left in peace.
The firelight danced upon the walls, and upon the chintz hangings, with their shiny floral pattern. The best bed yawned for its occupant, but now she seemed in no mood to succumb to its allurements. She pulled a pink wrapper out of her trunk and put it on; and then out of the same receptacle came a certain book, and with this on her knee, and her chair pulled close to the fire, she sank into a fit of musing. The book was a manuscript book, elaborately bound, and fastening with a lock and key. It held verses; the fair reader conned a morsel, then with a pencil added or erased a word, her lips moving the while, and her smooth brow puckered into the frown of composition. Most assuredly the best bedroom at The Mains had never held a poetess before. Her soft mouth smiled to itself, and her great dark eyes flashed and shone in the firelight. The muse apparently was gracious. Presently, however, a sharp sneeze brought the lady's romantic meditations to a prosaic ending.
'As I'm alive,' said the little woman to herself, with a shiver, 'I have an influenza coming—and no wonder!' She got into the high bed and slipped between the glossy linen sheets, but then she could not sleep. The old house slept, but with many creakings to a super-sensitive ear: the whisper of the wind among the eaves and in the ivy, the rattle of a casement, the tinkling fall of ashes on the hearth. Now an owl hooted as it fled through the night, and now a rat scampered in the wall. Then a strange, puzzling noise teased the ear,—a sort of sliddering sound,—she could not guess its origin. It was only Alison's pigeons on the roof, trying to get a foot-hold on the slanting slates, and then slip, slipping down with an angry croon and flutter, to scramble up again, and so da capo.
'Perdition take the night and the noises!' muttered the guest, with a flounce among the sheets. Then she curled herself up, and felt a delicious drowsiness creeping on; but at that very instant came a new and unmistakable disturbance. Somebody in the room overhead began to sob and cry.
CHAPTER VI.