“It must be some mistake, Marjory,” said Anne, “it is impossible any one could do this with the intention of insulting the whole countryside. It must be a mistake.”
“Mistake, indeed!—throw it into the Oran, George, throw it over the water,” cried Miss Falconer, as the groom raised in his arms an immense piece of wood, the last barrier to the passage. “We shall see that by-and-by—come, Anne.”
Marjory mounted the style, and sprang down in the Strathoran grounds on the other side. “Come, Anne, come.”
“Had we not better go the other way?” said Anne. “It is but subjecting ourselves to impertinence, Marjory. Nay, do not look contemptuous. I am not afraid of accompanying you, but I do think that Lewis and Ralph might manage this better than we can.”
Marjory threw back her head with an indignant, impatient motion. “Don’t be a fool, Anne. Come, I am going to the Tower. Lewis and Ralph indeed!”
“Well,” said Anne, “if they could not do it better, it would be at least more suitable. We shall only expose ourselves to impertinence, Marjory. Let us go round the other way.”
“Very well,” said Miss Falconer, turning away; “I will go alone.”
Anne crossed the stile. It was annoying to be forced into any altercation, such as was almost sure to ensue upon their meeting any of the dependents of Lord Gillravidge; at the same time, she could not suffer Marjory to go alone. George lifted a large, empty basket, and followed them, his hot, merry face shining like a beacon as he passed beneath the bare and rustling boughs.
Miss Falconer, with the large basket full, had been visiting a widow, whose only son had met with a severe accident, while engaged in his ordinary labor. The widow had some claim on the household of Falcon’s Craig—some one of those most pleasant and beneficial links of mutual good-will and service which unite country neighborhoods so healthfully, subsisted between the poor family and the great one, and as, on any grand occasion at Falcon’s Craig, the brisk services of Tibbie Hewit, the hapless young mason’s mother, would have been rendered heartily and at once, so the accident was no sooner reported to Miss Falconer, then she set out with her share of the mutual kindliness. We cannot tell what was in the basket, but Tibbie Hewit’s “press” was very much better filled when it went away empty, than when Miss Falconer entered her cottage.
“What a pity I have not my whip,” said Marjory, as, drawing Anne’s arm within her own, they passed on together. “You should have seen that cowardly fellow who stopped little Alice! what a grimace he made when he felt the lash about his shoulders! I say, Anne,”—Miss Falconer’s voice sank lower—”did you see them hiding in the wood?”