But Harry, just then, had discovered, by a second glance at Cuthbert’s note, that he did not expect to arrive in Stirling till four or five o’clock. “It does not matter, however,” said Harry, “I have something to do in Stirling, and an hour or two is not of much importance. Have a good dinner for us, Agnes—perhaps I may bring out somebody else with me. Now, little ones, jump in—and you need not expect us till five.”
Agnes stood on the steps, very gay and blooming, in a morning dress which she would have thought magnificent Sabbath-day’s apparel six months ago; while Rose, behind her, held up little Harry to kiss his hand to his young father. The window of the dining-room, where they had breakfasted, was open, and Martha stood beside it looking out. She was chiding herself, as she found that all those peaceful days had not yet quite obliterated the old suspicious anxiety which trembled to see Harry depart anywhere alone; and unconsciously she pulled the white jasmine flowers which clustered about the window, and felt their fragrance sicken her, and threw them to the ground. Many a time after, there returned to Martha’s heart the odour of those jasmine flowers.
The high trees gleaming in the golden sunshine, the dewy bits of shade, and then the broad flush of tangible light into which their horse dashed at such an exhilarating pace, made the heart of Harry bound as lightly as did those of the children by his side. In his warm and kindly good-humour Harry even hesitated to set them down at the very shady gate of Blaelodge, which the sunshine never reached even in midsummer, till its latest hour, and gave five minutes to consider the practicability of carrying them with him to Stirling; but it was not practicable—and Harry only paused to lift them out, and bid them hurry home at night to see the strangers, before proceeding himself on his farther way. The influence of the bright summer day entered into his very heart; he looked to his right hand, where lay the silver coils of the Forth, gleaming over fertile fields and through rich foliage; he looked before him, where his young groom steadily driving on, cut in two the far-off mass of Benledi, and lifted his towering head over the mountain—an unconscious innocent Titan—and Harry’s heart ran over like a child’s, and he scarcely could keep himself still for a second, but whistled and sang, and talked to John, till John thought Allenders the merriest and wittiest gentleman in the country side; and John was not much mistaken.
The day passed with the children, as days at school always pass. Violet very quick and very ambitious, resolute not to lose the silver medal inscribed with its glorious “Dux,” which she had worn for a whole week, managed to learn her grammar in some mysterious magical way which the steady Katie Calder could not comprehend; and at last, just as Martha at home began to superintend the toilette which Rose anxiously desired to have plainer than usual to-day, although in spite of her, herself took involuntary pains with it, Katie and Violet gathered up their books, and left Blaelodge. Their road was the highway—a fine one, though not so delightful to Lettie as the narrower bye-lanes about Allenders—but the sun was sufficiently low to leave one side of the path, protected by high hedges and a fine line of elm trees, very shady and cool and pleasant. So they walked along the soft velvet grass, which lined their road, and lingered at the door of the one wayside cottage, and further on gave loving salutation to the cottar’s cow, feeding among the sweet deep herbage, all spangled with wildflowers, and cool with the elm tree’s shadow, which made her milk so rich and fragrant, and herself a household treasure and estate. The little village of Maidlin lay half way between Blaelodge and Allenders, a hamlet of rude labourers’ houses untouched by the hand of improvement, where shrewish hens and sunburnt children swarmed about the doors continually. There had been once a chapel here dedicated to the pensive Magdalen, and an old stone cross still stood in the centre of the village, which—though there now remained no vestige of the chapel—retained the Scoticised name of the Saint.
“There’s Dragon at the cross,” said Katie Calder, who was skipping on in advance, leaving Violet absorbed in a childish reverie behind, “and he’s telling a story to a’ the bairns.”
So saying, Katie, who did not choose to lose the story, ran forward; while Lettie, only half awakened, and walking straight on in an unconscious, abstracted fashion peculiar to herself, had time to be gradually roused before she joined the little group which encircled the Dragon of Allenders.
He, poor old man, leaned against the cross, making a gesture now and then with those strange dangling arms of his which, called forth a burst of laughter, and scattered the little crowd around him for a moment, only to gather them closer the next. He was, indeed, telling a story—a story out of the Arabian Nights, which Violet herself had left in his room.
“Ay, bairns, ye see I’m just ready,” said Dragon, finishing “Sinbad the Sailor,” with a flourish of those long disjointed arms. “Ony divert does to pass the time when ane’s waiting, for ye’re aff-putting monkeys, and might hae been here half an hour since—no to say there’s a grand dinner making at the house, and as many flowers pu’ed as would plenish a poor man’s garden, and Miss Rose dressed like a fairy in a white gown, and ilka ane grander than anither. Whisht, wee laddies! do ye no see the twa missies carrying their ain books hame frae the school, and I maunna stop to tell ony mair stories to you.”
“Come back the morn, Dragon.” “Dinna eat them, Dragon, or chain them up in your den.” “If ye do, I’ll come out and fecht ye!” cried the “laddies” of Maidlin Cross; for those sturdy young sons of the soil, in two distinct factions, gave their fervent admiration to Katie and Violet, and would have been but too happy to do battle for them on any feasible occasion.
“Have they come, Dragon?” asked Lettie. “Has Harry and Mr. Charteris come?”