Who Was Lost and Is Found: A Novel

by Mrs. Oliphant

“And wherefore not? it’s not ours to punish. I know nothing about him: but to save Robbie and you, or only to help you, what am I caring? I would put my arm through the place of the bolt, like Katherine Douglas for King James. And why should I not hide a man in trouble? Them that went before us have done that, and more than that, for folk in trouble, many a day.”

“But not for the shedder of blood,” said Mrs Ogilvy.

“They were all shedders of blood,” cried Susie; “there was not one side nor the other with clean hands—and our fore-mothers helped them all, whichever were the ones that were pursued: and so would I any man that stood between you and peace. If he were as bad a man as ever lived, I would help him to get away.”

“We must not go so far as that, Susie. We will hope that nothing will need to be done. Robbie and me, we will just keep very quiet till all this trouble blows over. I have a confidence that it will blow over,” said Mrs Ogilvy, with a shadow in her eyes which belied her words.

“Certainly it will,” cried Susie, with an intensity of assent which, though she knew so little, yet comforted the elder woman’s heart.

And Susie once more left her friend without saying a word of the anxieties which were becoming more and more urgent in her own life. She had not yet been told what was the true state of the case, but many alarms had filled her mind, terrors which she would not acknowledge to herself. It did not seem credible that she should be dethroned from her own household place, which she had filled so long, to make way for a stranger, “a strange woman,” as Susie, like Mrs Ogilvy, said; nor that the children should be taken out of her hands, and her home be no longer hers. But all other apprehensions and alarms had been confusedly deepened and increased, she could scarcely tell how, by the sudden interference of her father in behalf of an old lover long ago rejected, whose repeated proposals had become the jest of the family, a man whom nobody for years had taken seriously. Mr Logan had suddenly taken up his cause, and pressed it hotly and injudiciously, filling Susie with consternation and indignant distress. The minister had naturally employed the most unpalatable arguments. He had bidden her to remember that her time was running short, that she had probably out-stayed her market, that a wooer was not to be found by every dykeside, and that at her age it was no longer possible to pick and choose, but to take what you could get. Exasperated by all this, Susie had rushed to her friend to ask what was the interpretation of it. But the appearance of Robert had driven every other thought out of her mind, and now again, more than ever, his story, the danger he was in, the reason why his return was not published abroad and rejoiced in. To Susie’s simple and straightforward mind this was the only point in the whole matter that was to be deplored. She found no fault with Robbie’s appearance, with his mid-day sleep, with the failure of his career—even with the ill company and dreadful associations of which Mrs Ogilvy’s faltering story had told her. She was ready to wipe all that record out with one tear of tenderness and pity. He had been led away; he had come back. That he had come back was enough to atone for all the rest. But there should be no secret, no concealing of him, no silence as to this great event. She accepted the bond, but it was heavy on her soul, and went home, her mind full of Robert, only vexed and discouraged that she must not speak of Robert, forgetting every other trouble and all the changes that seemed to threaten herself. Me! who is caring about me? Susie said to herself proudly, as Mrs Ogilvy said it. These women scorned fate when it was but themselves that were threatened by it.

When she was gone, Mrs Ogilvy continued for a while to walk quietly up and down the little platform before the door of her peaceful house. She had almost given up her evenings out of doors since Robert’s return, but to-night her heart was soothed, her fears were calmed. Susie could do nothing to clear up the situation. Yet to have unbosomed herself to Susie had done her good. The burden which was so heavy on herself, which was Robbie in his own person, the most intimate of all, did not affect Susie. She was willing to take him back as at the same point where he had dropped from her ken. There was no criticism in her eyes or her mind,—nothing like that dreadful criticism, that anguish of consciousness which perceived all his shortcomings, all the loss that had happened to him in his dismal way through the world, which was in his mother’s mind. That Susie did not perceive these things was a precious balm to Mrs Ogilvy’s wounds. It was her exacting imagination that was in fault, perhaps nothing else or little else. If Susie were pleased, why should she, who ought to be less clear-sighted than Susie, be so far from pleased? Nothing could have so comforted her as did this. She was calmed to the bottom of her heart. Robbie would be very late to-night, she knew; but what harm was there in that, if it was an amusement to him, poor laddie? He had no variety now in his life, he that had been accustomed to so much. She heard Andrew come clanking round from the back-garden with his pails and his watering-pots. She had not assisted at the watering of the flowers, not since the day of Robbie’s return, but she did so this calm evening in the causeless relief of her spirit. “But I would not be so particular,” she said, “Andrew; for it will rain before the morning, or else I am mistaken.” “It’s very easy, mem, to be mistaken in the weather,” said Andrew; “I’ve thought that for a week past.” “That is true; it has been a by-ordinary dry season,” his mistress said. “Just the ruin of the country,” said the man. “Oh,” cried she, “you are never content!”

But she was content that night, or as nearly content as it was possible to be with such a profound disturbance and trouble in her being. She had her chair brought out, and her cushion and footstool, her stocking and her book, as in the old days, which had been so short a time before and yet seemed so far off. It was not so fine a night as it had usually been, she thought then. The light had not that opal tint, that silvery pearl-like radiance. There was a shadow as of a cloud in it, and the sky, though showing no broken lines of vapour, was grey and a little heavy, charged with the rain which seemed gathering after long drought over the longing country. Esk, running low, wanted the rain, and so did the thirsty trees, too great to be watered like the flowers, which had begun to have a dusty look. But in the meantime the evening was warm, very warm and very still, waiting for the opening up of the fountains in the skies. Mrs Ogilvy sat there musing, almost as she had mused of old: only instead of the wistful longing and desire in her heart then, she had now an ever-present ache, the sense of a deep wound, the only partially stilled and always quivering tremor of a great fear. Considering that these things were, however, and could not be put away, she was very calm.

She had been sitting here for some time, reading a little of her book, knitting a great deal of her stocking, which did not interfere with her reading, thinking a great deal, sometimes dropping the knitting into her lap to think the more, to pray a little—one running into the other almost unconsciously—when she suddenly heard behind her a movement in the hedge. It was a high holly hedge, as has been already said, very well trimmed, and impenetrable, almost as high as a man. When a man walked up the slope from the road, only his hat, or if he were a tall man, his head, could be seen over it. The hedge ran round on the right-hand side to the wall of the house, shutting out the garden, which lay on the other slope, as on the left it encircled the little platform, with its grass-plot and flower-borders and modest carriage-drive in front of the Hewan. It was in the garden behind that green wall that the sound was, which a month ago would not have disturbed her, which was probably only Janet going to the well or Andrew putting his watering-cans away. Mrs Ogilvy, however, more easily startled now, looked round quickly, but saw nothing. The light was stealing away, the rain was near; it was that rather than the evening which made the atmosphere so dim. The noise had made her heart beat a little, though she felt sure it was nothing; it made her think of going in, though she could still with a slight effort see to read. It was foolish to be disturbed by such a trifle. She had never been frightened before: a step, a sound at the gate, had been used, before Robert came back, to awaken her to life and expectation, to a constantly disappointed but never extinguished hope. That, however, was all over now: but at this noise and rustle among the bushes, which was not a footstep or like any one coming, her heart stirred in her, like a bird in the dark, with terror. She was frightened for any noise. This was one of the great differences that had arisen in herself.

She turned, however, again, with some resolution, to her former occupations. It was not light enough to see the page with the book lying open on her knee. She took it in her hand, and read a little. It was one of those books which, for my own part, I do not relish, of which you are supposed to be able to read a little bit at a time. She addressed herself to it with more attention than usual, in order to dissipate her own foolish thrill of excitement and the disturbance within her. She read the words carefully, but I fear that, as is usual in such cases, the meaning did not enter very clearly into her mind. Her attention was busy, behind her back as it were, listening, listening for a renewal of the sound. But there was none. Then through her reading she began to think that, as soon as she had quite mastered herself, she would go in at her leisure, and quite quietly, crying upon Janet to bring in her chair and her footstool; and then would call Andrew to shut the windows and bar the door, as Robbie wished. Perhaps a man understood the dangers better, and it was well in any case to do what he wished. She would have liked to rise from her seat at once, and go in hurriedly and do this, but would not allow herself, partly because she felt it would be foolish, as there could be no danger, and partly because she would not allow herself to be supposed to be afraid, supposing that there was. She sat on, therefore, and read, with less and less consciousness of anything but the words that were before her eyes.