“Losh,” cried Katrin, “if it was naething but haudin’ your tongue! but what I’ve to think of is mair than that. Eh, I’m doing that for Miss Lily I would do for none of my kin, no, nor Dougal himself; and I wish I was just clean out of it, for I’m no fond of secrets—they are uncanny things.”
“Eh, woman! ye wouldna betray them?” Beenie cried.
“Betray them? Am I a person to betray what’s trusted to me? But I wish there were nae secrets in this world. It’s just aye cheating somebody. Ye canna be straichtforward, do what ye will, when ye’ve got other folks’ secrets to keep, let alone them that are your ain.”
“I’m no sae particular,” said Beenie, with a little toss of her head, “and there will be no stress upon ye for long. It’s just the ae step.”
“I have my doubts,” said Katrin, shaking her head.
“Ye have your doubts? And what doubts would ye have? It will a’ be plain when ance it’s done. There are nae mair secrets after that! It’s just as I said, the ae step. Eh me, I could have likit it far better in Sir Robert’s grand house in George Square, and a’ Edinburgh there, and the Principal himself to join their hands thegether, and my bonnie Miss Lily in the white satin, and the auld lady’s grand necklace about her bonnie white neck. But we canna have every thing our ain gate. The Manse parlor is just a’ that can be desired in the circumstances we’re noo in; and when it’s done, it will just be done and naething more to say.”
But Katrin still shook her head. She was a far-seeing woman. “I’m no just sure we will be out of it sae easy as that,” she said.
This talk was not completed at once, but came in on various occasions, a few words here and there, as opportunity secured; and the two women, though both were excited and disturbed, did no doubt enjoy the rôle of conspirator, more or less, and felt that those secret consultations added a zest to life. Beenie, whose lips were sealed in the presence of her mistress, and Katrin, who had to maintain an aspect of absolute calm in the sight of Dougal, could not but feel a consciousness of superiority, which consoled them for much that was uncomfortable. But, indeed, it was exasperatingly easy to deceive Dougal. He suspected nothing; secrets or mysteries had never come his way. Life meant to him his daily work, his daily parritch, the comfort of a crack now and then with his friends, a glass of toddy on an occasion, and the prevailing consciousness of being well done for at all times, with a clean hearthstone, and the parritch and the broth both well boiled and appetizing, more than fell to the lot of ordinary men. If he had known even that Katrin was keeping a secret from him, it is doubtful whether he would have been at all moved. He would have thought it some whigmaleerie of the wife’s, and would have remained perfectly easy in his mind, in the conviction that she would tell him if it was any thing he had to do with, and if not, wha was minding? Nothing that she did or said roused his curiosity to any great degree. There had need to be something more serious than Dougal to account for the little contraction over Katrin’s eyes.
This was, perhaps, more visible, however, after the conversation she had with Mr. Lumsden on the afternoon of New Year’s Day. I cannot tell what he said to her, but there was something in it additional to what he had said on the evening before, when he had told her and Beenie what their parts were to be in the little drama for which he had not yet fully prepared the chief actor of all. Lily waited for him at the window with a heart that beat high in her breast on that frosty morning, when all the stretches of the moor were crisp and white, and every little rowan-tree and bush of withered heather shone like something of frosted silver across the gray surface, tinged with a lower tone of whiteness. Lily saw him almost before he had come within the range of mortal vision, so far off that the road itself could not be seen, and only a faint speck that moved was distinguishable in the chill and frozen silence. The speck moved on, disappeared, came out again till it grew into absolute sight and knowledge, near enough to be recognized from the window, and hastily met at the door with a sweep of flying feet and hands outstretched. “My bonnie Lily! the only flower that’s not frosted!” he said. The change that had taken place between them was made plain by this: that he came quite openly to the door, and that Lily flew to meet him. There was no longer any occasion for the supposed accident of meetings on the moor. How this change came about Lily did not stop to enquire. It was, and that was enough; and she was too happy in it ever to wonder what could have been said or done underneath to make the lover’s appearance now a thing expected, and which it was unnecessary to attempt to conceal.
“It will perhaps be for to-morrow and perhaps for the day after; I am not certain yet,” Ronald said.