"It's no that, Lewie," replied she, wiping away her tears, "that gies me pain. I hae nae fear o' faith and troth that has been pledged, and better than pledged; for I hae seen it i' yer looks, and heard it i' the soonds o' yer deep-drawn sighs. Thae tears are for a broken friendship—for the return o' evil for guid—for the withered blossoms o' a bonny flower I hae cherished and watered, in the hope it wad yield me a sweet smell when I kissed its leaves i' the daffin o' youth or the kindliness o' age. If it is sae sair to lose a friend, what, Lewie—what wad it be to lose a lover?"
"The very existence of great evils, Effie," said he, "makes us happy, in the thought that they are beyond our reach."
"But did I no think," said she, "that I was beyond the reach o' the pain o' experiencing the fauseness o' Lucy Cherrytrees—the very creature o' a' ithers, I hae chosen as my bosom friend—to whom I confided a' my thochts and the very secret o' my love?"
"But it is an ill wind that blaws naebody guid, as they say, Effie," said Lewis. "I can better appreciate your goodness, now that I have experienced the faithlessness of another."
"An' if I hae lost a friend," replied Effie, "I am the mair sure o' my lover. Ye dinna ken, Lewie, how muckle this has raised you even in my mind, whar ye hae aye occupied the highest place. Ye hae rejected the offered luve o' the braw heiress o' Burnbank, for the humble dochter o' David Mearns, wha earns his bread in the sweat o' his brow. Oh! what can a puir, penniless cottager's dochter gie in return to the man wha, for her sake, turns his back on a big ha', a thoosand braid acres, an' a braw heiress?"
"Her simple, genuine, unsophisticated heart," replied Lewis, "with one unchangeable, devoted affection beating in its core. Were Burnbank Hall as big as the Parliament House, and Burnbank itself longer than the lands watered by the Brambleburn, and Lucy Cherrytrees as fair as our unfortunate Mary Stuart, I would not give my simple Effie, with no more property of her own than the bandeau that binds her fair locks, for Lucy Cherrytrees and all her lands."
The two lovers continued their evening walks, indulging in conversations which, embracing the subject of their affection, and anticipating the pleasures of their ultimate union, realized that fullest enjoyment of hope which is said to transcend possession. No notice was taken of their mutual sentiments on the subject of Lucy Cherrytrees' affection for Lewis, and her unjustifiable attempts to displace her old friend, to make room for herself in the heart of the contested object of their wishes.
Matters continued in this state for some time, Effie being regularly gratified by a visit from Lewis three times a-week. On one occasion a whole week passed without any intelligence of her lover. Her inquiries had produced no satisfactory explanation of the unusual occurrence; and Fancy, under the spell of the genius of Fear, was busy in her vocation of drawing dark pictures of coming evil. At last she was told by her father, who had procured the intelligence from a friend of George Campbell, the father, that young Lewis had been suspected of an intention to marry the poor daughter of the cottager, David Mearns, and had been despatched, without a minute's premonition, 'to an uncle, who was a merchant in Rio de Janeiro. No time had been given to him to write to Effie; and care had been taken to prevent him from sending her any intelligence while he remained at Liverpool, previous to his departure. The statement was corroborated by intelligence to the same effect, procured by one of Laird Cherrytrees' servants from one of the servants of George Campbell, who told it to Lucy, and who again told it to Effie, with tears in her eyes, which she took every care to conceal. The effect produced on the mind of Effie Mearns, by this unexpected misfortune, was proportioned to its magnitude, and the susceptibility of the feelings of the delicate individual on whom it operated. For many days she wept incessantly, refusing the ordinary sustenance of a life which she now deemed of no importance to herself or to any one else. All attempts at comforting a bruised heart were—as they generally are in cases of disappointed love—unavailing; and the effects of time seemed only apparent in a quieter, though not in any degree less poignant sorrow. Every object kept alive the remembrance of the youth who had first made an impression on her heart, and whose image was graven on every spot of the neighbourhood which had been consecrated by the exchange of a mutual passion. The scenes of their wanderings, hallowed as they had been in her memory, were now peopled with undefined terrors; and every time that she was forced abroad to take that air and exercise which latterly seemed indispensable to her existence, her sorrow received an accession of power from every tree under which they had sat, and every knowe or dell where they had listened to the musical loves of the birds, as they exchanged their own in not less eloquent sighs.
The first circumstance that produced any effect on the mind of the disconsolate maiden, was a misfortune of another kind, which, realizing the old adage, seemed to follow with all due rapidity the footsteps of its precursor. Her mother, who sat on one side of the fire, while Effie occupied her usual seat in a corner of the cottage in the other, had been using all the force of her rude but impressive eloquence to get her daughter to adopt the means that were in her power for the amelioration of a grief which might render her childless.
"I am gettin auld, Effie," she said, "an' you are the only are I can look to for administerin to yer faither an' to me that comfort we hae a richt to expect at the hands o' a dochter wha never yet was deficient in her duty. Our poverty, which winna be made ony less severe, as ye may weel ken, by the income o' years, will mak yer attention to us mair necessary; an' it may even be—God meise the means!—that your weak hands may yet be required to work for the support o' yer auld parents. I hae lang intended to speak to you in this way, and it was only pity for my puir heart-broken Effie that put me aff frae day to day, in the expectation that either some news wad come frae Lewie, or that ye wad get consolation frae anither and a higher source, to support ye for trials ye may yet hae to bear up against, for the sake o' them that brocht ye into the world. A' ither means hae been tried to get ye to determine to live, an' no lay yersel doun to dee, an' they havin failed, what can I do but try the last remedy in my pooer—to speak, as I hae now dune, to yer guid sense, an' lay afore ye the duties o' a dutifu' bairn, which are far aboon the thochts o' a disappointed love. Promise, now, my bonny Effie, that ye will try to gie up yer mournin, for the sake o' parents whase love for ye is nae less than Lewie Campbell's."