He affected, therefore, to complain of a violent headache, occasioned by the heat of the day, to which he had not been exposed since his illness, and made a formal apology to Sir Arthur, who, listening more to recent suspicion than to the gratitude due for former services, did not press him to keep his engagement more than good-breeding exactly demanded.
When Lovel took leave of the ladies, Miss Wardour’s manner seemed more anxious than he had hitherto remarked it. She indicated by a glance of her eye towards Captain M’Intyre, perceptible only by Lovel, the subject of her alarm, and hoped, in a voice greatly under her usual tone, it was not a less pleasant engagement which deprived them of the pleasure of Mr. Lovel’s company. “No engagement had intervened,” he assured her; “it was only the return of a complaint by which he had been for some time occasionally attacked.”
“The best remedy in such a case is prudence, and I—every friend of Mr. Lovel’s will expect him to employ it.”
Lovel bowed low and coloured deeply, and Miss Wardour, as if she felt that she had said too much, turned and got into the carriage. Lovel had next to part with Oldbuck, who, during this interval, had, with Caxon’s assistance, been arranging his disordered periwig, and brushing his coat, which exhibited some marks of the rude path they had traversed. “What, man!” said Oldbuck, “you are not going to leave us on account of that foolish Hector’s indiscreet curiosity and vehemence? Why, he is a thoughtless boy—a spoiled child from the time he was in the nurse’s arms—he threw his coral and bells at my head for refusing him a bit of sugar; and you have too much sense to mind such a shrewish boy: aequam servare mentem is the motto of our friend Horace. I’ll school Hector by and by, and put it all to rights.” But Lovel persisted in his design of returning to Fairport.
The Antiquary then assumed a graver tone.—“Take heed, young man, to your present feelings. Your life has been given you for useful and valuable purposes, and should be reserved to illustrate the literature of your country, when you are not called upon to expose it in her defence, or in the rescue of the innocent. Private war, a practice unknown to the civilised ancients, is, of all the absurdities introduced by the Gothic tribes, the most gross, impious, and cruel. Let me hear no more of these absurd quarrels, and I will show you the treatise upon the duello, which I composed when the town-clerk and provost Mucklewhame chose to assume the privileges of gentlemen, and challenged each other. I thought of printing my Essay, which is signed Pacificator; but there was no need, as the matter was taken up by the town-council of the borough.”
“But I assure you, my dear sir, there is nothing between Captain M’Intyre and me that can render such respectable interference necessary.”
“See it be so; for otherwise, I will stand second to both parties.”
So saying, the old gentleman got into the chaise, close to which Miss M’Intyre had detained her brother, upon the same principle that the owner of a quarrelsome dog keeps him by his side to prevent his fastening upon another. But Hector contrived to give her precaution the slip, for, as he was on horseback, he lingered behind the carriages until they had fairly turned the corner in the road to Knockwinnock, and then, wheeling his horse’s head round, gave him the spur in the opposite direction.
A very few minutes brought him up with Lovel, who, perhaps anticipating his intention, had not put his horse beyond a slow walk, when the clatter of hoofs behind him announced Captain Mlntyre. The young soldier, his natural heat of temper exasperated by the rapidity of motion, reined his horse up suddenly and violently by Lovel’s side, and touching his hat slightly, inquired, in a very haughty tone of voice, “What am I to understand, sir, by your telling me that your address was at my service?”
“Simply, sir,” replied Lovel, “that my name is Lovel, and that my residence is, for the present, Fairport, as you will see by this card.”