Audrey

by Mary Johnston

MacLean sat down, and drew his wineglass toward Mm. "It is the heat," he said. "Last night, in the store, I felt that I was stifling; and I left it, and lay on the bare ground without. A star shot down the sky, and I wished that a wind as swift and strong would rise and sweep the land out to sea. When the day comes that I die, I wish to die a fierce death. It is best to die in battle, for then the mind is raised, and you taste all life in the moment before you go. If a man achieves not that, then struggle with earth or air or the waves of the sea is desirable. Driving sleet, armies of the snow, night and trackless mountains, the leap of the torrent, swollen lakes where kelpies lie in wait, wind on the sea with the black reef and the charging breakers,—it is well to dash one's force against the force of these, and to die after fighting. But in this cursed land of warmth and ease a man dies like a dog that is old and hath lain winter and summer upon the hearthstone." He drank his wine, and glanced again at Haward. "I did not know that you were here," he said. "Saunderson told me that you were going to Westover."

"I was,—I am," answered Haward briefly. Presently he roused himself from the brown study into which he had fallen.

"'Tis the heat, as you say. It enervates. For my part, I am willing that your wind should arise. But it will not blow to-night. There is not a breath; the river is like glass." He raised the wine to his lips, and drank deeply. "Come," he said, laughing. "What did you at the store to-day? And does Mistress Truelove despair of your conversion to thee and thou, and peace with all mankind? Hast procured an enemy to fill the place I have vacated? I trust he's no scurvy foe."

"I will take your questions in order," answered the other sententiously. "This morning I sold a deal of fine china to a parcel of fine ladies who came by water from Jamestown, and were mightily concerned to know whether your worship was gone to Westover, or had instead (as 't was reported) shut yourself up in Fair View house. And this afternoon came over in a periagua, from the other side, a very young gentleman with money in hand to buy a silver-fringed glove. 'They are sold in pairs,' said I. 'Fellow, I require but one,' said he. 'If Dick Allen, who hath slandered me to Mistress Betty Cocke, dareth to appear at the merrymaking at Colonel Harrison's to-night, his cheek and this glove shall come together!' 'Nathless, you must pay for both,' I told him; and the upshot is that he leaves with me a gold button as earnest that he will bring the remainder of the price before the duel to-morrow. That Quaker maiden of whom you ask hath a soul like the soul of Colna-dona, of whom Murdoch, the harper of Coll, used to sing. She is fair as a flower after winter, and as tender as the rose flush in which swims yonder star. When I am with her, almost she persuades me to think ill of honest hatred, and to pine no longer that it was not I that had the killing of Ewin Mackinnon." He gave a short laugh, and stooping picked up an oak twig from the ground, and with deliberation broke it into many small pieces. "Almost, but not quite," he said. "There was in that feud nothing illusory or fantastic; nothing of the quality that marked, mayhap, another feud of my own making. If I have found that in this latter case I took a wraith and dubbed it my enemy; that, thinking I followed a foe, I followed a friend instead"—He threw away the bits of bark, and straightened himself. "A friend!" he said, drawing his breath. "Save for this Quaker family, I have had no friend for many a year! And I cannot talk to them of honor and warfare and the wide world." His speech was sombre, but in his eyes there was an eagerness not without pathos.

The mood of the Gael chimed with the present mood of the Saxon. As unlike in their natures as their histories, men would have called them; and yet, far away, in dim recesses of the soul, at long distances from the flesh, each recognised the other. And it was an evening, too, in which to take care of other things than the ways and speech of every day. The heat, the hush, and the stillness appeared well-nigh preternatural. A sadness breathed over the earth; all things seemed new and yet old; across the spectral river the dim plains beneath the afterglow took the seeming of battlefields.

"A friend!" said Haward. "There are many men who call themselves my friends. I am melancholy to-day, restless, and divided against myself. I do not know one of my acquaintance whom I would have called to be melancholy with me as I have called you." He leaned across the table and touched MacLean's hand that was somewhat hurriedly fingering the wineglass. "Come!" he said. "Loneliness may haunt the level fields as well as the ways that are rugged and steep. How many times have we held converse since that day I found you in charge of my store? Often enough, I think, for each to know the other's quality. Our lives have been very different, and yet I believe that we are akin. For myself, I should be glad to hold as my friend so gallant though so unfortunate a gentleman." He smiled and made a gesture of courtesy. "Of course Mr. MacLean may very justly not hold me in a like esteem, nor desire a closer relation."

MacLean rose to his feet, and stood gazing across the river at the twilight shore and the clear skies. Presently he turned, and his eyes were wet. He drew his hand across them; then looked curiously at the dew upon it. "I have not done this," he said simply, "since a night at Preston when I wept with rage. In my country we love as we hate, with all the strength that God has given us. The brother of my spirit is to me even as the brother of my flesh.... I used to dream that my hand was at your throat or my sword through your heart, and wake in anger that it was not so ... and now I could love you well."

Haward stood up, and the two men clasped hands. "It is a pact, then," said the Englishman. "By my faith, the world looks not so melancholy gray as it did awhile ago. And here is Juba to say that supper waits. Lay the table for two, Juba. Mr. MacLean will bear me company."

The storekeeper stayed late, the master of Fair View being an accomplished gentleman, a very good talker, and an adept at turning his house for the nonce into the house of his guest. Supper over they went into the library, where their wine was set, and where the Highlander, who was no great reader, gazed respectfully at the wit and wisdom arow before him. "Colonel Byrd hath more volumes at Westover," quoth Haward, "but mine are of the choicer quality." Juba brought a card table, and lit more candles, while his master, unlocking a desk, took from it a number of gold pieces. These he divided into two equal portions: kept one beside him upon the polished table, and, with a fine smile, half humorous, half deprecating, pushed the other across to his guest. With an, imperturbable face MacLean stacked the gold before him, and they fell to piquet, playing briskly, and with occasional application to the Madeira upon the larger table, until ten of the clock. The Highlander, then declaring that he must be no longer away from his post, swept his heap of coins across to swell his opponent's store, and said good-night. Haward went with him to the great door, and watched him stride off through the darkness whistling "The Battle of Harlaw."

That night Haward slept, and the next morning four negroes rowed him up the river to Jamestown. Mr. Jaquelin was gone to Norfolk upon business, but his beautiful wife and sprightly daughters found Mr. Marmaduke Haward altogether charming. "'Twas as good as going to court," they said to one another, when the gentleman, after a two hours' visit, bowed himself out of their drawing-room. The object of their encomiums, going down river in his barge, felt his spirits lighter than they had been for some days. He spoke cheerfully to his negroes, and when the barge passed a couple of fishing-boats he called to the slim brown lads that caught for the plantation to know their luck. At the landing he found the overseer, who walked to the great house with him. The night before Tyburn Will had stolen from the white quarters, and had met a couple of seamen from the Temperance at the crossroads ordinary, which ordinary was going to get into trouble for breaking the law which forbade the harboring of sailors ashore. The three had taken in full lading of kill-devil rum, and Tyburn Will, too drunk to run any farther, had been caught by Hide near Princess Creek, three hours agone. What were the master's orders? Should the rogue go to the court-house whipping post, or should Hide save the trouble of taking him there? In either case, thirty-nine lashes well laid on—