“Who is she going to marry, Lewis?” asked Anne, hastily, “it is rather a wish than a guess with me. Marjory does not give confidences of that kind—is it Mr. Lumsden?”
“May all your wishes, sister Anne,” said Lewis, with mock gravity, “be as fully realized. It is the mighty minister of Portoran. Ralph, they say, rebelled, and had a swearing fit when he heard of it, which Marjory promptly checked, however, and sent him down stairs to the congenial society of his horses and grooms. It will be a serious matter for Ralph though, for Marjory, with all her whims, kept things going at Falcon’s Craig.”
“I am very glad to hear it,” said Anne. “It is one of the few marriages that have no drawback; one can feel that Marjory, with her strength and good sense, is safe now, in a pure healthful atmosphere, where she will grow and flourish. I am very glad.”
Lewis and Alice exchanged glances and laughed.
“Lewis,” said Mrs. Catherine, “hold your peace. It becomes the like of you—gallants that have a while to grow before they reach their full stature—to take heed that you meddle only with things within your power of vision. Ay! you are lowering your bit forehead on me, Alison Aytoun; but truly, after all, there are wiser men in this world, to my own certain knowledge, than this gallant that calls himself of Merkland.”
“But Miss Falconer figures very largely in Alice’s reminiscences,” said James, smiling. “To whom shall I apply for an account of her? to you, Mrs. Catherine, or to Lewis.”
“I bid you come yourself and see, James Aytoun,” said Mrs. Catherine. “As for Lewis, he does not know, and therefore it is not likely he can tell; but truly, I think you would be better employed telling my Anne, whom you have set yourself beside, the issue of the plea, that Robert Ferguson and you have been working at so long.”
James obeyed: with signal disgrace and utter discomfiture, Lord Gillravidge’s defence had been overpowered. The road through the Strathoran grounds, by the omnipotent voice of the Court of Session, was proclaimed free as the sunshine to all and sundry, its natural proprietors and heirs. Henceforward the pulling down of barricades was a legal and proper enforcement of the law, and the erection of the same entirely useless, for any other purpose than that of keeping the well-disposed lads of Strathoran in glee and mischief. Mrs. Catherine was victorious, and triumphed moderately in her victory.
“If it were not that I hope in my lifetime to see Archie Sutherland back to his own lands, I would hazard a trial with that English alien, of his title to take their old inheritance from the clansmen whose right it is. You shake your head, James Aytoun—I will uphold it in the face of a whole synod as learned in the law as yourself, that the clansman has the same natural right of possession as his chief; that it comes to him by the same inheritance; that in no way is the laird more certain in his tenure than the humble man, except in so far as he is chief of both land and men, natural protector, ruler and guardian of the same. You forget the ancient right and justice in this drifting unsettled generation. If it were not that you pleaders of the law, have a necessity of spinning out the line of a plea, past the extremity of mortal life, and I hope to see Archie home within the course of mine, I would see that this was tried without delay, let the whole parliament-house of you shake the heads of your wisdom if ye likit.”
“I am afraid,” said James, “we might get the theoretic justice of it approved—but as for any practical result to follow—”