A few days after, I went to Murrayshaugh, anxious, if I could manage it indirectly, to see Lucy, and yet afraid to meet her. It was a chill day for summer, with a clouded sky and a loud boisterous breeze tossing the long willow boughs into a sort of fantastic unearthly mirth, which moved me, much as the unseemly merry-making of a mourner might have done. Lucy was sitting in a favourite corner of hers, at the end of the terrace, reading—at least she had a book in her hand. As I approached the stile, and little bridge, over the Murrayshaugh burn, under cover of the eldritch willow branches, she perceived me, and observing that I hesitated to enter, beckoned me to her. I obeyed at once.
I do not think she was paler that day than she had always been, but there was a grave composure about her face which made her seem so. Whatever struggle there had been it was over—and I remember a consciousness of something clear and chill about her, such as one feels in the air after a storm—an atmosphere in which everything stands out in bold relief, disclosing all its points and angles against the distinct far-distant sky. Yet Lucy was no less benign—no less gentle than she had always been.
“I wanted to see you, Adam,” she said. “I will write to Hew to-day—have you anything to say to him?”
“No,” said I, stammering and hesitating, for I felt painfully the great event, the era in our lives which had become known to me since I saw her last. “No, Lucy—except what Hew does not need to be told, I hope—that I constantly think of him as of my most dear friend, and that scarcely anything in the world would delight me so much as to see him again.”
“I will tell him,” said Lucy; “one likes to hear such things sometimes, Adam, even when one is in no doubt of them—and I will tell him any other pleasant thing you know, to make amends for the sad news I must send him—for I am afraid that is certain now, Adam, which I said before was only possible—we must leave Murrayshaugh.”
“Is there no way of averting this calamity?” I exclaimed.
“You know my father, Adam,” said Lucy, “he does not trust me as he might do; but I have almost been acting as a spy these few days, and there is no hope I see; for one of the few trials that can really shake his iron nature is this of leaving home, and if there was any hope of averting it, he would try all means before he yielded.”
“Lucy,” said I, “help me to present my petition to your father—beg him to remember how greatly I am indebted to you all, and entreat him to consider me thus far as his son. If what I have will do, why should he not take it, Lucy? I am a young man—I am ashamed of my own indolence—I will go and seek my fortune like Hew, and will be far happier so than as I am. Lucy—”
“Hush, Adam,” said Lucy, stopping me, as I eagerly pleaded with her, “you must not think of this. I cannot suffer you to say another word, and you know my father with his harsh pride would not be indebted even to his own son for such assistance. No, no, he will bear his own burden alone, and so must I—that it is not easy or light is a lesser matter—we must bear our own lot; but, Adam, I am glad you have said this—I am glad,” said Lucy slowly, a gush of sudden tears coming to her eyes, which seemed to flow back again, and did not fall. “I am glad you would have done it, Adam. I will mind it when I am heavy again, and sinking—and I will tell Hew.”
“But, Lucy, listen to me,” I exclaimed. “May I not speak to Murrayshaugh? may I not ask your father?”