Even the President, with his habitual self-possession, could not conceal his embarrassment at the change in Lady Carse. The light from the window shone upon her face; yet he glanced at the widow, as in doubt whether this could be the right person, before he made his complaints. In the midst of her agitation at the meeting, Lady Carse said to herself that the good man was losing his memory; and, indeed, it was time; for he must be above sixty. She wondered whether it was a sign that her husband might be losing his faculties too: but she feared Duncan Forbes was a good deal the older of the two.
It would have astonished those who did not know Duncan Forbes to see him now. He was a fugitive from the rebels, who might at the moment be burning his house, and impoverishing his tenants; he had been wandering in the mountains for many days, and had spent the last night upon the sea; his clothes were weather-stained, his periwig damp, and his buckles rusted; he was at the moment weary and aching with cold and hunger; he was in the presence of a lady whom he had for years supposed dead and buried; and he was under the shock of seeing a face once full of health and animation now not only wasted, but alive with misery in every fibre: yet he sat on a bench in this island dwelling—in his eyes a hovel—with his gold-headed cane between his knees, talking with all the courtesy, calmness, and measured cheerfulness, which Edinburgh knew so well. Nothing could be better for Lady Carse than his manner. It actually took away the sense of wonder at their meeting, and meeting thus. While he had stood at the threshold, and she heard whom she was to see, her brain had reeled, and her countenance had become such as it might well dismay him to see; but such was the influence of his composure, and of the associations which his presence revived, that she soon appeared in Annie’s eyes a totally altered person. As the two sat at breakfast, Annie saw before her the gentleman and lady complete, in spite of every disguise of dress and circumstance.
At the close of the meal, Annie slipped away to her own house: but it was not long before she was sent for, at the desire, not of Lady Carse, but of the President. He wished her to hear what he had to relate. He told of Mr Hope’s exertions in Edinburgh, and of his having at length ventured upon an illegal proceeding for which only the disturbance of the times could be pleaded in excuse. He had sent out a vessel, containing a few armed men, and Mrs Ruthven, who had undertaken to act as guide to Lady Carse’s residence. It was understood that the captain had set Mrs Ruthven ashore in Lorn, through some disagreement between them; and that the vessel had proceeded as far as Barra, when the captain was so certainly informed that the lady had been removed to the mainland that he turned back; pleading, further, that there was such evident want of sense in Mrs Ruthven, and such contradictory testimony between her and her husband, that he doubted whether any portion of their story was true. It was next believed that a commission of enquiry would be soon sent to this and other islands: but this could not take place until the public tranquillity should be in some degree restored.
“Before that, I shall be dead,” sighed Lady Carse, impatiently.
“There is no need now to wait for the commission,” said the President. “Where I am, all violations of the law must cease. Your captivity is now at an end, except in so far as you are subject to ill health, or, like myself, to winter weather and most wintry fortunes.”
“The day is come, then,” said Annie, through shining tears. “You are now delivered out of the hand of man, and have to wait only God’s pleasure.”
“What matters it,” murmured Lady Carse, “how you call my misfortunes? Here I sit, a shivering exile—”
“So far like myself,” observed the President, moving nearer the scanty fire.
“You have not been heart-sick for years under insufferable wrongs,” declared Lady Carse. “And you have not the grave open at your feet while everything you care for is beckoning to you to come away. You—”