“He is not!” she flashed impetuously. “That was no legal tie. Some foolish chit of a country lass flung herself at him, with the usual result. Any man would have done as he did, but unlike most men, he, out of pity and from a high sense of honor, married her; but it was an irregular marriage, which was speedily annulled by the girl’s father. He is free now, free as ever he was. The girl has given him up, poor fool. I only am the shackled one, a prisoner for life, unless——” An eager light flashed in her deepened eyes.
“Unless Robert Burns elopes with ye!” he finished sarcastically. “I warn ye, Alice, not to play with edged tools;’tis o’er dangerous. Be more careful or others will suspect what I already know.” She smiled disdainfully and shrugged her shapely shoulders.
“Do not force me to open your husband’s eyes!” he retorted, angered by her irritating indifference. She looked at him, her heart filled with sudden fury. How she would like to hit him in the face with her fan, how she hated him and his interference, his unwelcome advice. “Already,” he continued irritably, “you have given that scandalmonger, Eppy McKay, cause to suspect your too warm and ardent affection for Mr. Burns, by openly showing jealousy of Lady Nancy Gordon.”
“I jealous of Nancy Gordon?” she repeated, with airy scorn, walking toward the door of the conservatory. “Huh, not I, uncle; I am not so unconscious of my own charms,” and she drew her magnificent figure up to its full height, then smiled insolently into his perturbed and nervous face. “I thank you for all your advice,” she murmured sweetly as they traversed the long hall, “but remember, hereafter, that I mean to steer my own canoe, whether it leads me into safe waters or through the rapids.” And with a radiant smile upon her sensuous lips she entered the drawing-room, leaning affectionately upon the arm of her outraged but speechless relative. Quietly she took her place by her waiting husband’s side, her dark eyes full of a bewitching and dangerous softness, for her thoughts were on the one guest whose very name had the power to move her so completely.
Never had she appeared so dazzlingly beautiful, as she stood there meeting her friends and acquaintances with a deep ceremonious courtesy for the distinguished ones, a smile and a nod for her intimates, and an air of high-bred insolence and extreme self-satisfaction pervading her whole appearance.
No one was ever bored at the Duchess of Athol’s brilliant “at homes.” One always felt sure of meeting at least three or four justly celebrated personages under her hospitable roof. And to-night society was a-gog, for it was to welcome the farmer-poet, Robert Burns, who had returned from his triumphant tour through the Highlands. Soon the capacious drawing-rooms were crowded. There was the rustle of silk and satin, rare and delicate perfumes shaken out of lace kerchiefs, while the heavy scent of the many bouquets oppressed the warm air to the point of suffocation. There was an interminably monotonous murmur of voices, only broken at rare intervals by a ripple of mild laughter. Over by the large windows that overlooked the terrace stood a group of people gazing earnestly out beyond the gardens at some object, which had arrested their attention, with various degrees of interest.
“Whatever is happening below on Princes Street?” suddenly inquired one of the ladies, nervously clutching the arm of the man nearest her. Eppy McKay was an eccentric maiden lady of questionable age and taste. Of more than ordinary height naturally, she looked a giantess in her powdered wig, which towered fully a foot in the air, and which was decorated profusely with waving plumes, rosettes and jewels. Her lowcut gown of crimson satin, over a petticoat of quilted green silk, was cut extremely low, revealing a vision of skin and bones, powdered to a ghastly whiteness. Her affectations, her simperings, and her poses accorded society much amusement, of which fact she was blissfully unconscious.
“There is a crowd gathered around a carriage, but farther than that I cannot make out,” replied Mr. Mackenzie, the famous author and publisher.
A prolonged shout from below increased the restlessness of the timid Eppy. “Oh, dear!” she gasped. “If it should be an uprising of the Jacobites,” and she looked fearfully into the amused faces of her companions.