She had sprung up nervously at his first words. She rushed now before him down-stairs—unable to reply, unable to question—as light as a girl of twenty, though three times that age; followed trembling by the other, who was not half so old, nor half so full of life as she.
CHAPTER II.
Before I can fully explain what happened next, and what Lady Eskside saw when she rushed down-stairs, I am obliged to turn back for some hours to the afternoon of this day, and for some miles, to a scene of a very different kind—a scene so opposed to the other in all its circumstances, that it is strange to realise the close connection between them; though the two were so closely linked together as to be incomprehensible, one without the other. The village of Lasswade lies on the Esk, at a lower elevation, and nearer to the sea, than Rosscraig House. It was, at the time I speak of, a much more primitive village than it is now, when so many cottages of gentility have sprung up around as to make it almost a suburb of Edinburgh. It consisted of little more than one street, which straggled off into the country at one end, and at the other dragged itself across the bridge to conclude in a humble postscript of an additional street on the other side of the water. The Esk, which ran through it, was not beautiful at this point. It was somewhat dirty, and encumbered with the overflowings of the village; but yet the groups of clustered houses on either side of the river, framed in by the high wooded banks which you could see rising in the distance on either hand as you stood on the bridge, and with the fresh green fringe of rich and silent country beyond, was a pretty sight. There was no railway near at that time, but a coach ran regularly on all lawful days, from the corner of Princes Street to the Bull Inn in the High Street, and conveyed its few passengers with a regularity and steadiness quite satisfactory to those leisurely people. But the aspect of Lasswade, though considered cheerful and inviting by its Edinburgh visitors, was very dreary on this March afternoon, when the wind blew a hurricane, and the rain now and then came down in torrents. Between these storm-showers there came “blinks” of intermission, when people who loved to see what was going on came forth to their doors, after the fashion of the place; and it was this humble sprinkling of the population which, as many of them remembered later, witnessed the passage through the town of a still humbler visitor, a poor woman who arrived shortly before the darkening in a miserable condition enough. Two small boys accompanied her, wet through, splashed with mud, and crying with weariness, and with the buffets of the wind which blew them off their little legs. The woman was tall, wrapt in an old shawl of that indescribable no-colour of which the vagrant class has a monopoly. Her damp clothes hung limp about her, her poor bonnet, wet and limp like her dress, clung to the dark locks which here and there escaped from its cover. She was a stranger, as her weary and bewildered looks testified, and the children who clung to her on either side seemed to confuse her still more by their whimpering weariness. This melancholy little group came over the bridge in one of the pauses of the storm, when a few people had strayed out to their doors to relieve the ennui of the wet and stormy day by a little gossip at least. Chief among these were Merran Miller, the blacksmith’s wife, a woman too fond of hearing everything that was going on (people said) for the comfort of her house; and the old postman, Simon Simson, whose work was over for the day. When the stranger approached this knot of gossips, and asked the way to Jean Macfarlane’s inn, they all answered at once, glad of an event, with directions on the one hand and remonstrances on the other. Old Simon pointed out the way with officious haste; but Mrs Miller stopped the wayfarer to tender advice.
“My woman,” she said, “I would not go to Jean Macfarlane’s if I were you. You’re wet and cauld, but a wee piece further would make little difference. John Todd at the Loanhead is real respectable, and would give lodgings just as cheap.”
“Hoots, woman! Jean Macfarlane will do her nae harm,” cried old Simon, interrupted in the midst of his instructions.
“It’s no a house for an honest woman,” said the smith’s wife, “or for little bairns, poor things. They maun have travelled far the day to be so wet and so draiglet. Bide a moment and I’ll give them a piece.”
“Where did you say it was?” said the stranger, vacantly, paying no regard to this benevolent offer; and she went on with her children, following the old man’s directions, without waiting for Mrs Miller’s return with the “piece” which she had gone into her house to seek. This of itself was a strange thing to happen with any one so poor and miserable, and impressed the fact of her appearance upon the mind of the smith’s wife, mortified by such a tacit refusal of her kindness. “She maun be a foreigner—or a fool,” said Merran, standing with the rejected piece in her hand, and watching the retreating figures as they approached Jean Macfarlane’s door.
Jean Macfarlane’s house was worse spoken of than any other house in Lasswade. Every disturbance that happened in the tranquil place came from that centre of disorder and lawlessness; and to lodge there, or to propose lodging there, was of itself a tacit acknowledgment of vagrancy, or at least of an absence of that regard for other people’s opinions which is the first step towards respectability. All the disreputable class of travellers who passed through so quiet a place found their way to it by instinct, and recommended others of their own kind. No one was too low for Jean Macfarlane. Pedlars of the lowest class, travelling tinkers, tramps without even that pretence at occupation, frequented her house. She was herself the most dreaded personage in the village: a large, coarsely-handsome woman, loud-voiced and hot-tempered, the most terrible scold and “randy” on all Eskside. The minister, who had once attempted, simple soul, to bring her to reason, had been made to flee before her; and the chief elder of the parish, Mr Mouter himself, was known to be in the habit of walking a mile round rather than pass her door,—a proceeding at which many people scoffed, asking, What was religion if it preserved you so little from the fear of man, or indeed of woman? It may be supposed, then, that the poor woman who openly asked to be directed to Jean Macfarlane’s was as poor and as completely beyond all regard for the prejudices of society as it was possible to be. She went on without pause or hesitation, with an abstracted indifference of demeanour which perhaps was occasioned by mere weariness and discomfort, to the little tavern. The aspect of the house was not encouraging, neither was the reception which the traveller received. It was the last house in the village, dreary always, drearier than ever on this stormy afternoon. In the poor little parlour with its sanded floor, which was the better part of the establishment, two men, in wet coats, steaming from the rain, sat before the fire, talking loudly over their little measure of whisky, while Jean’s voice rang through the house as she went and came, in a continuous and generally angry monologue. The newcomer came up to her timidly, holding back the children, and asked in a low tone for a room with a fire, where she and her children could rest. “A room to yoursel’!” said the mistress of the house; “set you up! are you better than other folk, that ye canna share and share alike? Sirs, this leddy’s mista’en her road. She thinks she’s at the Bull, where there’s plenty o’ parlours and private rooms, and naebody tae gang near them. Here’s a’ the private room you’ll get in my house. Eh, woman, canna ye stop the mouth o’ that girning brat? It’s cauld and weet? I can see that: but it needna deave decent folk. Sit aff from the fire and let the woman in, ye twa drucken brutes o’ men! What do you want there, dribbling and drinking, and spending your wives’ siller? Let the puir bit things get near the fire——”
“Jean, you’re the greatest randy in the parish!” said one of the men, getting up in time to save himself from the ignominious push aside which sent his companion, reeling, out of the way.
“And if I’m a randy, what are ye? drucken beasts that drink a’ night and sit owre the fire a’ day? Ca’ yourselves men!” cried Jean, with the freedom of perfect independence. “You can sit down here, wife, if this will do ye. Eh, what a handless thing that canna warm her wean’s feet, nor even gie’t a clat on the side o’ the head to make it haud its tongue! Ye’re a’ alike, a’ alike. Tea? Lord preserve us! what does the woman want wi’ tea? A wee drap whisky would do ye ten times the good. Will I gie ye what ye want? Oh ay, now you’ve gotten to your English I’ll gie ye what ye want—if ye’ll make thae little deevils stop their clatter, and no look sic a draiglet idiot yoursel’.”