“It was a passing fancy; a foolish one, perhaps, or a touch of vanity,” said Ian, with a smile, “but it is past now, and I have paid for it.—Did you make fast the canoe?” he added, turning abruptly to the Indian, who was seated on his buffalo robe by the stove.
Without waiting for an answer he rose and descended the staircase to the passage, where poor Miss Trim had nearly met a watery grave.
Here the canoe was floating, and here he found one of the domestics.
“Has the wedding come off yet?” he asked in a low, but careless, tone, as he stooped to examine the fastening of the canoe.
“What wedding?” said the domestic, with a look of surprise.
“Why, the wedding of Mr Ravenshaw’s daughter.”
“Oh no, Mr Ian. It would be a strange time for a wedding. But it’s all fixed to come off whenever the flood goes down. And she do seem happy about it. You see, sir, they was throw’d a good deal together here of late, so it was sort of natural they should make it up, and the master he is quite willin’.”
This was enough. Ian Macdonald returned to the room above with the quiet air of a thoughtful schoolmaster and the callous solidity of a human petrifaction. Duty and death were the prominent ideas stamped upon his soul. He would not become reckless or rebellious. He would go through life doing his duty, and, when the time came, he would die!
They were talking, of course, about the flood when he returned and sat down.
Elsie was speaking. Ian was immediately fascinated as he listened to her telling Victor, with graphic power, some details of the great disaster—how dwellings and barns and stores had been swept away, and property wrecked everywhere, though, through the mercy of God, no lives had been lost. All this, and a great deal more, did Elsie and Cora and Mrs Ravenshaw dilate upon, until Ian almost forgot his resolve.