Jaacob did not address himself to any one in particular. The news with which Kirkbride was ringing was great news in its way, and a little crowd had collected in the corner, close by the smithy, to discuss it, a crowd composed chiefly of women, chief among whom, in a flush of triumph and importance, stood Marget of Norlaw. Jaacob did not often concern his lofty intelligence with the babble of women, but the little giant was interested in spite of himself, and had a warm corner in his heart for both the heroes who were under present discussion. A lusty blacksmith apprentice puffed at the great bellows within that ruddy cavern, and Jaacob stood at the door, with one or two male gossips lingering near him, which was a salve to his dignity; but Jaacob’s words were not addressed even to his own cronies; they were a spontaneous effusion of observant wisdom, mingled with benevolent regret.
“The man’s in a creel!” cried the indignant Marget—“an officer of yours, Jaacob Bell?—yours, ye objeck! and I would just like to ken wha gave the like of you ony right to ca’ our son by his christened name? Na, sirs, ye’re a’ wrang—it just shows how little folk ken about onything out of their ain road; and canna haud their peace either, or let them speak that have the knowledge. The auld lady—her that was Mary of Melmar—would have given our Huntley baith the land and the bonnie lass, if it had been her will, for she’s a real sensible woman, as it’s turned out, and kens the value of lads like ours. But Huntley Livingstone, he said no. He’s no’ the lad, our Huntley, to be ony wife’s man—and he has his awn yestate, and an aulder name and fame than Melmar. There’s no’ an auld relick in the whole country-side like our auld castle. I’ve heard it from them that ken; and our Huntley would no mair part with the name than wi’ his right hand. Eh! if auld Norlaw, puir man, had but lived to see this day! Our Cosmo is very like his father. He’s just as like to be kent far and near for his poems and his stories as Walter Scott ower yonder at Abbotsford. It’s just like a story in a book itsel’. When he was but a laddie—no’ muckle bigger than bowed Jaacob—he fell in with a bonnie bit wee French lady, in Edinburgh. I mind him telling me—there’s never ony pride about our sons—just as well as if it was yesterday. The callant’s head ran upon naething else—and wha was this but just Miss Deseera! and he’s courted her this mony a year, whaever might oppose; and now he’s won and conquered, and there’s twa weddings to be in Kirkbride, baith in the very same day!”
“In Kirkbride? but, dear woman, Miss Logan’s no’ here,” suggested one of the bystanders.
“Wha’s heeding!” cried Marget, in her triumph, “if ane’s in Kirkbride, and ane in anither kirk, is that onything against the truth I am telling? Sirs, haud a’ your tongues—I’ve carried them a’ in my arms, and told them stories. I’ve stood by them and their mother, just me and no other person, when they were in their sorest trouble; and I would like to hear wha daur say a word, if Norlaw Marget is just wild and out of her wits for aince in her life to see their joy!”
“I never look for discretion at a woman’s hand mysel’,” said bowed Jaacob, though even Jaacob paused a little before he brought the shadow of his cynicism over Marget’s enthusiasm; “they’re easy pleased, puir things, and easy cast down—a man of sense has aye a compassion for the sex—it’s waste o’ time arguing with them. Maybe that’s a reason for lamenting this lad Livingstone. A man, if he’s no’ a’ the stronger, is awfu’ apt to fall to the level of his company—and to think of a promising lad, no’ five-and-twenty, lost amang a haill tribe—wife, mother, mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and gude kens how mony friends forbye—it’s grievous—that’s just what it is; a man goes down, a man comes to the calibre of the woman. For which cause,” said bowed Jaacob, thrusting his cowl on one side of his head, twisting still higher his high shoulder, and fixing a defiant gaze upon the admiring crowd with his one eye; “in spite of mony temptations—for I’ll say that for the women, that they ken a man of sense when they see him—I’m no’, and never will be, a marrying man mysel’!”
“Eh, but Jaacob,” cried a saucy voice, “if you could have gotten her, you might have put up with Miss Roche.”
“Humph—I had a great notion of the lassie,” said Jaacob, loftily; “men at my years get above the delusion of looking for a woman as a companion. It makes nae muckle matter whether she’s ca’ed a foolish woman or a sensible ane; its naething but a question of degree; and when a man finds that out, he has a right to please his e’e. When you hear of me married, it’s a wife of sixteen, that’s what I’ll have gotten; but you see, as for Miss Deeseera, puir thing, she may be breaking her heart, for onything I ken. I’m a man of honor, and Cosmo’s a great friend of mine—I wouldna, for twenty Melmars, come between my friend and his love.”
And amid the laughter which echoed this magnanimous speech, bowed Jaacob retired into the ruddy gloom of the smithy and resumed his hammer, which he played with such manful might and intention upon the glowing iron, that the red light illuminated his whole swarthy face and person, and the red sparks flashed round him like the rays round a saint in an old picture. He was not in the least a saintly individual, but Rembrandt himself could not have found a better study for light and shade.
A little time sufficed to accomplish these momentous changes. The Mistress gave up her trust of Norlaw, the cows and dairies which were the pride of her heart, the bank-book, with its respectable balance, and all the rural wealth of the farmsteading, to her son. And Huntley warned the tenants to whom his mother had let the land that he should resume the farming of it himself at the end of the year, when their terms were out. Every thing about Norlaw began to wear signs of preparation. The Mistress spoke vaguely of going with Patie, the only one of her sons who still “belonged to his mother"—and making a home for him in Glasgow. But Patie was an engineer, involved over head and ears in the Herculean work of the new railways; he was scarcely three months in the year, take them altogether, at the lodging which he called his head quarters—and perhaps, on the whole, he rather discouraged the idea.
“At least, mother, you must wait to welcome Katie,” said this astute and long-headed adviser of the family—and the Mistress, with her strong sense of country breeding and decorum, would not have done less, had it broken her heart. But she rather longed for the interval to be over, and the matter concluded. The Mistress, somehow, could not understand or recognize herself adrift from Norlaw.