“There may indeed!” said Donal.
“Still, I should be sorry to offend him more than I cannot help. If he were a man like my father, I should never dream of going against him; I should in fact leave everything to him he cared to attend to. But seeing he is the man he is, it would be absurd. I dare not let him manage my affairs for me much longer. I must understand for myself how things are going.”
“You will not, I hope, arrange anything without the presence of a lawyer! I fear I have less confidence in your uncle than you have!”
Arctura made no reply, and Donal was afraid he had hurt her; but the next moment she looked up with a sad smile, and said,
“Well, poor man! we will not compare our opinions of him: he is my father’s brother, and I shall be glad not to offend him. But my father would have reason to be dissatisfied if I left everything to my uncle as if he had not left everything to me. If he had been another sort of man, my father would surely have left the estate to him!”
At nine o’clock they met in the housekeeper’s room—low-ceiled, large, lined almost round with oak presses, which were mistress Brookes’s delight. She welcomed them as to her own house, and made an excellent hostess.
But Donal would not mix the tumbler of toddy she would have had him take. For one thing he did not like his higher to be operated upon from his lower: it made him feel as if possessed by a not altogether real self. But the root of his objection lay in the teaching of his mother. The things he had learned of his parents were to him his patent of nobility, vouchers that he was honourably descended: of his birth he was as proud as any man. And hence this night he was led to talk of his father and mother, and the things of his childhood. He told Arctura all about the life he had led; how at one time he kept cattle in the fields, at another sheep on the mountains; how it came that he was sent to college, and all the story of sir Gibbie. The night wore on. Arctura listened—did nothing but listen; she was enchanted. And it surprised Donal himself to find how calmly he could now look back upon what had seemed to threaten an everlasting winter of the soul. It was indeed the better thing that Ginevra should be Gibbie’s wife!
A pause had come, and he had fallen into a brooding memory of things gone by, when a sudden succession of quick knocks fell on his ear. He started—strangely affected. Neither of his companions took notice of it, though it was now past one o’clock. It was like a knocking with knuckles against the other side of the wall of the room.
“What can that be?” he said, listening for more.
“H’ard ye never that afore, maister Grant?” said the housekeeper. “I hae grown sae used til ’t my ears hardly tak notice o’ ’t!”