But he called Hugh back before he reached the door. “You’ll be sure to remember about the Henri Deux?” he said, softly. That was all. And the young man went to the dressing-room, and John, who had just stolen in, lay down on a sofa in the shadow, and sleep and quiet took possession of the room. If Mr. Ochterlony slept, or if he still lay looking at the lamp, seeing his life flit past him like a shadow, giving a sigh to what might have been, and thinking with perhaps a little awakening thrill of expectation of what was so soon to be, nobody could tell. He was as silent as if he slept—almost as silent as if he had been dead.
But Aunt Agatha was not asleep. She was in her room all alone, praying for him, stopping by times to think how different it might have been. She might have been with him then, taking care of him, instead of being so far away; and when she thought of that, the tears stood in her eyes. But it was not her fault. She had nothing to upbraid herself with. She was well aware whose doing it was—poor man, and it was he who was the sufferer now; but she said her prayers for him all the same.
When a few days had passed, the event occurred of which there had never been any doubt. Francis Ochterlony died very peaceably and quietly, leaving not only all of which he died possessed, but his blessing and thanks to the boy who had stood in the place of a son to him. He took no unnecessary time about his dying, and yet he did not do anything hastily to shock people. It was known he was ill, and everybody had the satisfaction of sending to inquire for him, and testifying their respect before he died. Such a thing was indeed seen on one day as seven servants, all men on horseback, sent with messages of inquiry, which was a great gratification to Mrs. Gilsland, and the rest of the servants. “He went off like a lamb at the last,” they all said; and though he was not much like a lamb, there might have been employed a less appropriate image. He made a little sketch with his own hands as to how the Museum was to be arranged, and told Hugh what provision to make for the old servants; and gave him a great many advices, such as he never had taken himself; and was so pleasant and cheery about it, that they scarcely knew the moment when the soft twilight sank into absolute night. He died an old man, full of many an unexpressed philosophy, and yet, somehow, with the sentiment of a young one: like a tree ripe and full of fruit, yet with blossoms still lingering on the topmost branches, as you see on orange-trees—sage and experienced, and yet with something of the virginal and primal state. Perhaps it was not a light price to give for this crowning touch of delicacy and purity—the happiness (so to speak) of his own life and of Aunt Agatha’s. And yet the link between the old lovers, thus fancifully revived, was very sweet and real. And they had not been at all unhappy apart, on the whole, either of them. And it is something to preserve this quintessence of maidenhood and primal freshness to the end of a long life, and leave the visionary perfume of it among a community much given to marrying and giving in marriage. It was thus that Francis Ochterlony died.
Earlston, of course, was all shut up immediately, blinds drawn and shutters closed, and what was more unusual, true tears shed, and a true weight, so long as it lasted, upon the hearts of all the people about. The servants, perhaps, were not quite uninfluenced by the thought that all their legacies, &c., were left in the hands of their new master, who was little more than a boy. And the Cottage, too, was closed, and the inmates went about in a shadowed atmosphere, and were very sorry, and thought a little of Mr. Ochterlony—not all as Aunt Agatha did, who kept her room, and shed many tears; but still he was thought of in the house. It is true that Mary could not help remembering that now her Hugh was no longer a boy, dependent upon anybody’s pleasure, but the master of the house of his fathers—the house his own father was born in; and an important personage. She could not help thinking of this, nor, in spite of herself, feeling her heart swell, and asking herself if it was indeed her Hugh who had come to this promotion. And yet she was very sorry for Mr. Ochterlony’s death. He had been good to her children, always courteous and deferential to herself; and she was sorry for him as a woman is sorry for a man who has nobody belonging to him—sorrier far, in most cases, than the man is for himself. He was dead in his loneliness, and the thought of it brought a quiet moisture to Mary’s eyes; but Hugh was living, and it was he who was the master of all; and it was not in human nature that his mother’s grief should be bitter or profound.
“Hugh is a lucky boy,” said Mrs. Percival; “I think you are all lucky, Mary, you and your children. To come into Earlston with so little waiting, and have everything left in his own hands.”
“I don’t think he will be thinking of that,” said Mary. “He was fond of his uncle; I am sure he will feel his loss.”
“Oh, yes, no doubt; I ought not to have said anything so improper,” said Winnie, with that restrained smile and uncomfortable inference which comes so naturally to some people. She knew nothing and cared nothing about Francis Ochterlony; and she was impatient of what she called Aunt Agatha’s nonsense; and she could not but feel it at once unreasonable and monstrous that anything but the painful state of her own affairs should occupy people in the house she was living in. Yet the fact was that this event had to a certain extent eclipsed Winnie. The anxiety with which everybody looked for a message or letter about Mr. Ochterlony’s state blinded them a little to her worn looks and listless wretchedness. They did not neglect her, nor were they indifferent to her; for, indeed, it would be difficult to be indifferent to a figure which held so prominent a place in the foreground of everything; but still when they were in such a state of suspense about what was happening at Earlston, no doubt Winnie’s affairs were to a certain extent overlooked. It is natural for an old man to die: but it is not natural for a young woman—a woman in the bloom and fulness of life—one who has been, and ought still to be, a great beauty—to be driven by her wrongs out of all that makes life endurable. This was how Winnie reasoned; and she was jealous of the attention given to Mr. Ochterlony as he accomplished the natural act of dying. What was that in comparison with the terrible struggles of life?
But naturally it made a great difference when it was all over, and when Hugh, subdued and very serious, but still another man from the Hugh who the other day was but a boy, came to the Cottage “for a little change,” and to give his mother all the particulars. He came all tender in his natural grief, with eyes ready to glisten, and a voice that sometimes faltered; but, nevertheless, there was something about him which showed that it was he who was Mr. Ochterlony of Earlston now.
CHAPTER XXXI.
