“Then it’s very strange to me—very strange,” said the old lady, looking him in the face, “what pleasure you can find in staying here?”
He laughed—this time an uneasy laugh, and felt himself redden uncomfortably. Why, indeed, should he stay here? To go on Mr. Charles’s errands, to have all sorts of disagreeable offices thrust upon him, to be sent off, perhaps, at a moment’s notice, to be made use of on all hands. This was what his past experience had been, and why should it be different in the future? The old woman’s two black eyes, set deep in their shrivelled sockets, looked knowingly, not unkindly at him, with a gleam of amusement, but also with a certain sympathy. “There does not seem much reason, does there, why I should stay?” he said, and got up and went to the window to look out, avoiding her keen eyes.
“Young man,” said Miss Jean, “I don’t know much about you, and what I know is not the best that might be; but you’re not an ill young man as men go. On the whole, I’m inclined to be on your side. And take you my advice. Don’t make too little of yourself; don’t be at everybody’s call; stand up for yourself, if you would have other folk stand up for you. So far as I’ve seen, your fault is that you’re better than most folk. Don’t be that, that’s the worst of all mistakes.”
“You mean that I am a yielding fool, and cannot say ‘No,’” said Fanshawe; “but that, after all is scarcely the case. There are circumstances, perhaps, if I could tell them to you, that justify me—”
“No circumstances, but a man’s nature account for that kind of conduct,” said Miss Jean, briskly; “but if it’s any comfort to you, I’m inclined to be on your side.”
Whatever comfort there might be in this, Fanshawe had it to console him on his drive. He set out without seeing Marjory. When he found himself driving not too quickly over those long country roads, on the business which was not his, and realised the disagreeable mission he had undertaken, he felt more weak and foolish than even Miss Jean had represented him to himself. For what was all this? To commend himself to Marjory? or because it was his nature and his fate? He was thoroughly discontented with himself. Was he, who was thus driven hither and thither by the will of others, who seemed to have no business of his own in the world, but always and only the business of others—was he the kind of man to step boldly out of his groove, to begin an independent life, to ask any woman to share that existence? Nobody but those who are over-persuadable, ready to be over-borne by the appeals made to them by their more indolent neighbours, and to take upon their shoulders burdens which are none of theirs, can understand how ashamed Fanshawe felt of his own amiability in the business which he had at present in hand—or how disgusted with the piece of work which Mr. Charles had basely thrust upon his shoulders. As he approached Pitcomlie, he realized more and more clearly how disagreeable it was. The sight of the house which had filled so important a chapter in his life made his heart beat. There it was that he had been roused out of the equanimity of his placid, easy-going existence; and what good had that awakening done? None but to make him a dissatisfied instead of a very contented, happy sort of fellow; to show him the evil without opening the way to any remedy; to fill him with longings after the unattainable without conferring upon him the strength necessary to struggle and attain it. Marjory! the whole place was full of her; the cliff, with its velvet coverlet of green sward, round which so often by her side he had taken his “turn;” the sundial by which he seemed to see her seated; the roofless old house, against the grey walls of which he had watched her figure so often, and which formed so fit a background for her; everything was full of Marjory. The presence of her image there made it somehow more easy for him to do what he was going to do. He marched into the well-known drawing-room, almost regardless of the servant who rushed after, pulling on his coat, to announce him. He saw with a certain sharp sense of sarcastic pleasure somebody rise hastily from Mrs. Charles’s side, and retire into a distant corner. Somebody—that sentimental personage called Johnnie, whose presence had once made him furiously jealous. He was ready to laugh now at the sight of this young man, whom he recognised at once with that attraction of jealousy and dislike which is as strong as love. Why was he so pleased to see Johnnie Hepburn start disconcerted from Mrs. Charles’s side? It pleased him to think of telling it to Marjory; the power of discrediting her old admirer in her eyes was quite grateful to him; he was spitefully delighted—there is no other word that can describe his feelings. If Fanshawe had but thought of it, he might have felt himself quite delivered from the danger of being too amiable by this vigorous outburst of dislike and feelings quite un-evangelical. But somehow it did not occur to him to judge his own sentiments in that uncompromising way.
He had a hostile reception; from the moment of his appearance the ladies at Pitcomlie made sure that he was coming on no friendly errand. Verna came in from the cliff through the open window, having caught a glimpse of him; she was very pale, with a scared look which Fanshawe could not understand. They both looked at him with a stare of something like defiance, but took no other notice of his presence. This was very embarrassing at first. He faltered a little as he drew near, being very pervious to incivility, and all the smaller pricks by which the mind can be assailed.
“I have come to execute a commission from Mr. Charles Hay-Heriot,” he said, looking round him almost pitifully for support. Johnnie Hepburn afforded none. He even turned his back and gazed out of one of the windows. He did not stand by a brother in distress. He was too much frightened for the women, if truth must be told.
“Oh, yes; to be sure; and I think we could guess what it was,” said Matilda. “Pray speak out. Don’t be afraid. You need not have too much consideration, or that sort of thing, for me.”
“Indeed, I was told to have every consideration,” said Fanshawe, perplexed. “Mr. Charles——”