CHAPTER XXIV
BY RIGHT OF PURCHASE
Sallie had been far too happily occupied since she had come to Loquhariot to have been conscious of the wheels within wheels revolving about her there.
She could scarcely at once accustom herself to look upon the great, grey, age-old castle as her home; but there was Janet M'Kissock always eager to help her in that respect, with endless stories of bygone days which made the place seem always more familiar and friendly to her. She grew, by degrees, to know and love it almost as if she had lived there all her life.
It was much more difficult to grasp the idea that the whole of the beautiful white world beyond its windows was also hers, and hers alone; from the rugged, snow-clad mountains towering behind and on either hand, even to the Small Isles, like bergs in the sun amid the smoking seas in that turbulent weather. But Slyne missed no opportunity to impress that important fact upon her. And she was finding it always easier to forget her unhappy past, to enjoy the marvellous present and the most inspiriting part in it, to leave the over-difficult future to evolve itself.
The men and women about the place were all devoted to her. She had very soon won the staunch good-will of the cottagers at the cliff-foot. And her soft sway was everywhere undisputed, although Slyne had at first been inclined to contest it himself. But he soon seemed to realise that it would be best, in the meantime, to order events from the background and in her voice.
He had shown some disposition, too, to question the extent of the liberty she might now assume to herself. But he had not pressed that point unduly either, and they continued on that footing of pleasant comradeship which he had been at such ceaseless pains to promote. His debonair courtesy to her, his easy deference to most of her wishes, were very different indeed from his off-hand manner of former days. And she could not but be grateful to him, in the meantime, for the almost over-ample fulfilment of his original promise.
Regarding her pledge to him, he had said nothing more, although she spent long afternoons and evenings in his company when the weather was at its worst, while Mr. Jobling was away. Captain Dove left the two of them very much to themselves, and Slyne had offered to teach her to play billiards, to pass the time.
She would have been entirely content, indeed, but for the hardship her coming had entailed on Justin Carthew. She had met him more than once out of doors, and he had always seemed pleased to see her, but—it was of common report that he was a poor man, and she could not help feeling that he had shown himself very much more generous to her than she to him. She found comfort, however, in the conclusion that circumstances were quite beyond her control, and that he would understand better by and by the complications through which she had had to find her way as best she could.