“Ah,” said the agent respectfully, “you have had unusual opportunities, Mr. Rowland: and ladies are so fond of picking things up.”
“Yes,” said Rowland, “my wife has wonderful taste—she knows a good thing when she sees it.”
“Which is very far from being a general quality,” said the appreciative agent “Mrs. Rowland, I make no doubt, will turn Rosmore into a beautiful place.”
“It is a beautiful place to begin with,” said the new tenant; “and it would be a strange place that would not be improved when my wife got it into her hands,” he added with a glow of pride. He wanted much to confide to the agent that she was a lady of one of the best English families, and full of every accomplishment; but his better sense restrained him.
What exultation he felt in his bosom as he stood under the white colonnade and gazed at the great Clyde rushing upon the beach at the foot of the knoll, and the steamer crossing (which it did by the influence of some good fairy just at this moment) the shining surface, and all the specks of passengers turning in one direction to catch that glimpse of Rosmore. So many times had he gazed at it so—and now for the first time, in the other sense, here he was looking down upon the landscape from his own door. It was not the satisfied appetite of acquisition—it was something finer and more ethereal—a youthful ideal and boyish sentiment carried through a whole life. He had dreamed of this long before there had been any conscious aim at all in his mind; and now he had actually attained the thing which had so pleased his boyish thoughts. James Rowland took off his hat as he stood under the white colonnade. The agent thought he was saluting somebody in the passing steamer, and murmured, “They’ll not see you; it’s farther off than it looks;” but Rowland was saluting One who always sees, and who does not so often as ought to be receive thanks thus warm and glowing from a grateful heart. “And for Evelyn too, who is the best of all!” he said within himself.
The agent gleaned enough to perceive that Mr. Rowland was exceedingly proud of his wife, and formed an exaggerated, and consequently rather unfavourable opinion of this unknown lady. He thought she must be a connoisseuse with her boat load of curiosities, which indeed, to tell the truth, were things that Rowland had “picked up” himself in many advantageous ways, before he had even seen his wife, and which Evelyn was not acquainted with at all. Mr. Campbell thought she must be a fantastic woman, and would, as he said, transmogrify the good honest old house, and turn it into a curiosity shop, or “chiney” warehouse—which was an idea he did not contemplate with pleasure. However, this was no reason why he should undervalue so rich and so easily pleased a tenant. He made the most ample promises as to what should be done, and the expedition with which everything should be accomplished—and accompanied Rowland to the boat, introducing him to the minister and to various local authorities on the way. “This is Mr. Rowland that has taken Rosmore. Ye’ll likely see a great deal of him, for he means to make his principal residence here.—It’s the great Rowland, the Indian engineer and railway man,” he said aside, but not quite inaudibly, in each new-comer’s ear.
The local potentates looked with admiration and interest at the new-comer. Any possible inmate of Rosmore would have been interesting to the minister, who had not much society in the parish, and had a natural confidence in the social qualities of a man who was so rich. The “merchant” who had long dreamt of a railway up the side of the loch, which would bring Glasgow excursionists in their thousands to Rosmore, gazed with awe on the new inhabitant who had but to look upon a country destitute of means of locomotion, and lo, the iron way was there. Other points of interest abounded in the new inhabitant. He would quicken life in the parish in every way: probably his very name would secure that second delivery of letters for which the whole peninsula had been agitating so long. The steamboat would certainly call summer and winter at the pier, now that the House would be occupied and visitors always coming and going; and the decoration of the church, which was so much wanted, would, the minister thought, be secured now that such a wealthy inhabitant had been added to the resources of the parish. They all gave him a welcome which was as flattering as if he had been a royal prince. “It’s been a distress to us a’ to see the House standing empty so long, and I’m very glad to make Mr. Rowland’s acquaintance. It will be good for us a’ to have a man like him among us.” How did they know what manner of man he was, except that he was rich? But James Rowland did not ask himself that question. In his present mood he was very ready to believe that, as he was delighted to come, so his new neighbours would be delighted to have him there; and he knew as well as they did that it would be a good thing for them to have a rich and liberal new parishioner at hand. He liked the looks of the minister, and the schoolmaster, and the merchant, and he was pleased that they should like him. He walked down to the pier attended by a little train; and it was quite a feather in the cap of Mr. Foggo of Pitarrow, one of the smaller heritors of the parish, that he happened to be going across to the other side, and would consequently travel with the great man. “I’ll talk to him about the kirk and see what he’s willing to give,” said this gentleman, exhilarated by the thought that a good subscription from the newcomer would save a good deal of money to the heritors. “But only don’t be hasty; don’t be rash; don’t let him think that his siller is the first thing we are thinking of,” said the minister. “Gangrel body! what would we be thinking of but his siller,” said the laird. But this, which was the only thing that was not complimentary, was not said aloud.
Thus Rowland was escorted to the boat, the frequent messenger between that solitude and the busy world, while Pitarrow followed, giving way to him as if he had been the Earl himself. The boat already felt as if it partially belonged to him, the crew, too, being all interested and impressed. He looked back from the deck upon the line of the Rosmore woods, and the profile of the house, which showed itself through them, a different view yet a delightful one: and listened with affability while the different places on the loch were pointed out to him. The evening was perfect as the day had been. The light had died off the deep waters of the loch, though it still played upon the hills, and its low rays struck full in the eyes, so to speak, of the white colonnade, bathing the house in a dazzle of light. What a place to come home to, to settle down in, to see from afar as he approached, and recognise as his own! He figured to himself returning from an absence, hastening through the woods, received by Evelyn at the door. What a beautiful dream to be fulfilled at last! What a refuge from all the labours and the tumults of life! He listened vaguely to what Pitarrow was saying, and granted cordially that it would henceforward be his duty to come to the aid of the parish and to help to beautify the church, and would have given him a cheque on the spot, had there been pen and ink handy. But of course he had not taken his cheque-book with him upon that day’s excursion, important as it was.
He got to the railway in this blissful state of mind, uplifted, his feet scarcely touching the ground. And then all at once his face grew sad and set. The light went out of it and a blank came in place of the animated and lively expression. He had done all that he wanted to do for the moment at Rosmore. Now another duty awaited him, a duty he should have turned to first, which was indeed the most important duty of all. Now there was no longer any escape for him: he must see his children, and that without any further delay.