"Oh no," answered Gowrie, throwing down the volume. "It is but a foolish book, called, 'De Conspirationibus adversus Principes,' a collection of famous treasons, all foolishly contrived, and ending in defeat by the conspirators having too many men in their councils."
"Dangerous studies, my lord," replied the clergyman.
"Not for me, my good friend," answered Gowrie, gravely. "But what brings you, my dear sir?"
The conversation then took another turn; but Mr. Cowper, after he had left the earl, mentioned more than once, though doubtless with no bad intentions, the studies in which he had found the young lord engaged.[[5]]
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
Now, reader, for a short recapitulation of events which occupied several weeks. I must be brief, for the stern limits stare me in the face, and the tale must needs, perforce, draw to a conclusion. First, then, with the Earl of Gowrie. In a few days he returned to Trochrie, meeting his mother by the way, and escorting her with kindly care and tenderness. The best apartments in the castle had been prepared for her. The summer was of unusual brightness. The day had been one long lapse of sunny light; and although, when the countess passed the dark portal of the castle, which she had last entered with a gallant husband, since torn from her by a bloody death, a shade of gloom, cast from the cloudy past, fell upon her, yet it passed speedily away, when, with her hand clasped in that of her son, and the beautiful arms of his promised bride around her neck, she stood in the old hall, and looked forward through the perspective glass of hope towards the future.
A month passed away in joys and pleasant sports; Gowrie's household was now completed. The number of his attendants and his tenantry, the friendship of the neighbouring clans, the support of his relation, the Countess of Athol--all rendered the residence at Trochrie perfectly secure against any machinations of his enemies; and fear was banished from the dwelling. The younger brothers of the house of Ruthven appeared at the castle from time to time. His sister Barbara, quiet and nun-like in character, spent the greater part of her time there. An occasional guest partook of their hospitality. The mornings were passed in chasing the deer, or in rides amongst the hills; and the evenings in calmer and more intellectual pleasures. The old countess would sit and listen, as it were entranced, while her son's promised bride sang the exquisite songs of other lands, or while Gowrie himself, with the peculiar charm which is given by high conversational powers, told brief outpointed anecdotes of countries he had visited, or great men whom he had known; and, while she gazed upon the extraordinary loveliness of the one, or the high-toned, manly beauty of the other, she would say to herself, "These two were certainly formed by Heaven to be united," and would add, with a half-doubtful sigh, "and to be happy."
At the end of about a month, suddenly and unexpectedly, they were joined at Trochrie by the earl's younger brother, Alexander. He seemed to shrink from all explanation of the causes of his having quitted the court; and when his mother made some inquiries as to whether the king and he were still friends, replied, "Yes. His majesty parted with me most graciously."
Gowrie asked no questions; but he divined much. He was kind and gentle to his brother, however; and the youth seemed to feel his forbearance deeply, and showed greater reverence and affection than he had ever done before. His faults were those of youth, passion, and indiscretion; but his heart was generous and kind, and experience and example might have made him a great and a good man.
The period of his stay at Trochrie was the happiest, by far the happiest, of Gowrie's life; and it went on increasing in brightness, for the days were rapidly approaching which were to make Julia his.