“I should like to tell you all my story, dear Margaret,” I said, conceiving a sudden hope of assistance from one who hovered so near the unseen that she often flitted across the borders. “But would it tire you?”
“Tire me, my child!” she said, with sudden energy. “Did I not carry you in my bosom, till I loved you more than the darling I had lost? Do I not think about you and your fortunes, till, sitting there, you are no nearer to me than when a thousand miles away? You do not know my love to you, Duncan. I have lived upon it when, I daresay, you did not care whether I was alive or dead. But that was all one to my love. When you leave me now, I shall not care much. My thoughts will only return to their old ways. I think the sight of the eyes is sometimes an intrusion between the heart and its love.”
Here was philosophy, or something better, from the lips of an old Highland seeress! For me, I felt it so true, that the joy of hearing her say so turned, by a sudden metamorphosis, into freak. I pretended to rise, and said:
“Then I had better go, nurse. Good-bye.”
She put out her one hand, with a smile that revealed her enjoyment of the poor humour, and said, while she held me fast:
“Nay, nay, my Duncan. A little of the scarce is sometimes dearer to us than much of the better. I shall have plenty of time to think about you when I can’t see you, my boy.” And her philosophy melted away into tears, that filled her two blue eyes.
“I was only joking,” I said.
“Do you need to tell me that?” she rejoined, smiling. “I am not so old as to be stupid yet. But I want to hear your story. I am hungering to hear it.”
“But,” I whispered, “I cannot speak about it before anyone else.”
“I will send Janet away. Janet, I want to talk to Mr. Campbell alone.”