White Wings: A Yachting Romance, Volume II. William Black
It has got nothing to do with the money. But – but – he – was my mother's only brother."
The lips tremble for a moment; but she collects herself. Her courage fights through the stun of this sudden blow.
"I will not believe it!" she says. "How dare they say such things of him? How is it we have never seen anything of it in the papers?"
But the Laird leaves these and other wild questions to be answered at leisure. In the meantime, his eyes are burning like coals of fire; and he is twisting his hands together in a vain endeavour to repress his anger and indignation.
"Tell them to put a horse to," he says in a voice the abruptness of which startles every one. "I want to drive to the telegraph-office. This is a thing for men to deal wi' – not weemen."
CHAPTER II.
AN ULTIMATUM
When our good friend the Laird of Denny-mains came back from the post-office, he seemed quite beside himself with wrath. And yet his rage was not of the furious and loquacious sort; it was reticent, and deep, and dangerous. He kept pacing up and down the gravel-path in front of the house, while as yet dinner was not ready. Occasionally he would rub his hands vehemently, as if to get rid of some sort of electricity; and once or twice we heard him ejaculate to himself, "The scoondrel! The scoondrel!" It was in vain that our gentle Queen Titania, always anxious to think the best of everybody, broke in on these fierce meditations, and asked the Laird to suspend his judgment. How could he be sure, she asked, that Frederick Smethurst had really run away with his niece's little property? He had come to her and represented that he was in serious difficulties; that this temporary loan of seven thousand pounds or so would save him; that he would repay her directly certain remittances came to him from abroad. How could he, the Laird, know that Frederick Smethurst did not mean to keep his promise?
But Denny-mains would have none of these possibilities. He saw the whole story clearly. He had telegraphed for confirmation; but already he was convinced. As for Frederick Smethurst being a swindler – that did not concern him, he said. As for the creditors, that was their own look-out: men in business had to take their chance. But that this miscreant, this ruffian, this mean hound should have robbed his own niece of her last farthing – and left her absolutely without resources or protection of any kind in the world – this it was that made the Laird's eyes burn with a dark fire. "The scoondrel! – the scoondrel!" he said; and he rubbed his hands as though he would wrench the fingers off.
We should have been more surprised at this exhibition of rage on the part of a person so ordinarily placid as Denny-mains, but that every one had observed how strong had become his affection for Mary Avon during our long days on the Atlantic. If she had been twenty times his own daughter he could not have regarded her with a greater tenderness. He had become at once her champion and her slave. When there was any playful quarrel between the young lady and her hostess, he took the side of Mary Avon with a seriousness that soon disposed of the contest. He studied her convenience to the smallest particular when she wished to paint on deck; and so far from hinting that he would like to have Tom Galbraith revise and improve her work, he now said that he would have pride in showing her productions to that famous artist. And perhaps it was not quite so much the actual fact of the stealing of the money as the manner and circumstance of it that now wholly upset his equilibrium, and drove him into this passion of rage. "The scoondrel! – the scoondrel!" he muttered to himself, in these angry pacings to and fro.
Then he surprised his hostess by suddenly stopping short, and uttering some brief chuckle of laughter.
"I beg your pardon, ma'am," said he, "for the leeberty I have taken; but I was at the telegraph-office in any case; and I thought ye would not mind my sending for my nephew Howard. Ye were so good as to say – "
"Oh, we shall be most pleased to see him," said she promptly. "I am sure he must have heard us talking about the yacht; he will not mind a little discomfort – "
"He will have to take what is given him, and be thankful," said the Laird, sharply. "In my opeenion the young people of the present day are too much given to picking and choosing. They will not begin as their parents began. Only the best of everything is good enough for them."
But here the Laird checked himself.
"No, no, ma'am," said he. "My nephew Howard is not like that. He is a good lad – a sensible lad. And as for his comfort on board that yacht, I'm thinking it's not that, but the opposite, he has to fear most. Ye are spoiling us all – the crew included."
"Now we must go in to dinner," is the practical answer.
"Has she come down?" asks the Laird, in a whisper.
"I suppose so."
In the drawing-room we found Mary Avon. She was rather pale, and silent – that was all; and she seemed to wish to avoid observation. But when dinner was announced the Laird went over to her, and took her hand, and led her into the dining-room, just as he might have led a child. And he arranged her chair for her; and patted her on the back as he passed on, and said cheerfully —
"Quite right – quite right – don't believe all the stories ye hear. Nil desperandum– we're not beaten down yet!"
She sate cold and white, with her eyes cast down. He did not know that in the interval her hostess had been forced to show the girl that paragraph of the Hue and Cry.
"Nil desperandum– that's it," continued the good-hearted Laird, in his blithest manner. "Keep your own conscience clear, and let other people do as they please – that is the philosophy of life. That is what Dr. Sutherland would say to ye, if he was here."
This chance reference to Angus Sutherland was surely made with the best intentions; but it produced a strange effect on the girl. For an instant or two she tried to maintain her composure – though her lips trembled; then she gave way, and bent her head, and burst out crying, and covered her face with her hands. Of course her kind friend and hostess was with her in a moment, and soothed her, and caressed her, and got her to dry her eyes. Then the Laird said, after a second or two of inward struggle —
"Oh, do you know that there is a steamer run on the rocks at the mouth of Loch Etive?"
"Oh, yes," his hostess – who had resumed her seat – said cheerfully. "That is a good joke. They say the captain wanted to be very clever; and would not have a pilot, though he knows nothing about the coast. So he thought he would keep mid-channel in going into the Loch!".
The Laird looked puzzled: where was the joke?
"Oh," said she, noticing his bewilderment, "don't you know that at the mouth of Loch Etive the rocks are right in the middle, and the channel on each side? He chose precisely the straight line for bringing his vessel full tilt on the rocks!"
So this was the joke, then: that a valuable ship should be sunk? But it soon became apparent that any topic was of profound interest – was exceedingly facetious even – that could distract Mary Avon's attention. They would not let her brood over this thing. They would have found a joke in a coffin. And indeed amidst all this talking and laughing Mary Avon brightened up considerably; and took her part bravely; and seemed to have forgotten all about her uncle and his evil deeds. You could only have guessed from a certain preoccupation that, from time to time, these words must have been appearing before her mind, their commonplace and matter-of-fact phraseology in no way detracting from their horrible import: "Police-officers and others are requested to make immediate search and inquiry for the above named; and those stationed at seaport towns are particularly requested to search outward-bound vessels." The description of Mr. Frederick Smethurst that preceded this injunction was not very flattering.
But among all the subjects, grave and gay, on which the Laird touched during this repast, there was none he was so serious and pertinacious about as the duty owed by young people to their parents and guardians. It did not seem an opportune topic. He might, for example, have enlarged upon the duties of guardians towards their helpless and unprotected wards. However, on this matter he was most decided. He even cross-examined his hostess, with an unusual sternness, on the point. What was the limit – was there any limit – she would impose on the duty which young folks owed to those who were their parents or who stood to them in the relation