Ogilvy coloured, looking very much alarmed, yet not altogether displeased.
‘And what said Mistress Beton?’ he asked anxiously.
His discomposure was so obvious, that it was well for him he had not to do with mischievous Mary Seton, or even with his present companion, had she been in other than a subdued and melancholy frame of mind. In most women the temptation to mockery would have been irresistible, but Mistress Carmichael only replied carelessly—
‘That you were the properest man at Holyrood, and that she thought our gallants of the Court wore the French air more naturally than did the Southrons.’
‘Did she really say so?’ he exclaimed eagerly; ‘and do you believe she meant it? You know her well, Mistress Carmichael; is it not true that she is herself too irresistibly attracted towards the Southron? Do you not think that when hood and jesses are fairly doffed once for all, she will fly her pitch toward the border, aye, and strike her quarry far on the southern side?’
Mary Carmichael followed the direction of his glance to where Mistress Beton stood radiant in her Twelfth-night bravery, and listening with a heightened colour and a well-pleased air to Randolph’s flatteries; but she pitied whilst she marked the suffering that was too apparent in her questioner’s gaze, and replied gently to his thoughts rather than his words—
‘Gratified vanity is one thing, and real preference another. A women oft-times likes that suitor best whom most she seems to avoid. Perhaps for that very reason, perhaps because she is weak at heart and cannot help herself.’
She spoke the last sentence low, and more to herself than to him. She was willing to console him, for the deeper a kind nature is wounded, the more it feels for the sorrows of others. Also, it may be that she found a certain relief in repeating the lesson it had cost her so much pains to learn.
He drew closer to her.
‘Thank you,’ said he, with a beaming look of gratitude. ‘You are a true friend! Believe me, Mistress Carmichael, I am not ungrateful. Can I serve you in any way in return?’