“AND so the Cornel’s at Marchmain; it’s like you’re acquaint with all the history of that family, Patchey, my lad—tak up your glass; ould comrades like you and me are no in the way of meeting every day, and you’ve a long road and a lone across the moor.”
So said Sergeant Kennedy, possessed with a virtuous curiosity to learn all that could be learned from “the Cornel’s own man,” who, with the instinct peculiar to his class, had speedily found out that good ale and company were to be had at the “Tillington Arms,” where Mrs. Gilsland showed great respect and honour to the important Patchey. Patchey had already taken glasses enough to increase his dignity and solemn demeanour. He had grown slow and big of speech, and eloquent on the great importance of his own services to the Colonel.
“He’s a wise man for other folk,” said Patchey deliberately, “but a child, and nothing but a child, where his own affairs is concerned. If it werena for me that ken the world, and keep a strict eye upon the house, he would be ruined, mum; ye may take my word for it—ten times in the year.”
“Acquaint with all the family?—I’m no a braggart,” said Patchey, in answer to this question; “but it stands to natur that in the coorse of our colloquies upon affairs in general the Cornel says many a thing to me.”
“Not a doubt about it—especially,” said the Sergeant, gravely, “as you’re well known to be a discreet lad, and wan that’s to be trusted—as was known of ye since ever ye entered the regiment, though I say it. Ye see, mistress, he was always a weel-respected man.”
“The Cornel, as I was saying,” continued Patchey, passing loftily over this compliment, “says many a thing to me that it would ill become me to say over again; but this ye a’ ken as well as me. The gentleman at Marchmain was married upon the Cornel’s sister, and died of a stroke, and the visitation of God, the day afore yesterday; and a’ the great fortune that’s been lying gathering this mony a year has come to his son.”
“Eyeh, Mr. Patchey! but the fortin’—that’s just the thing I cannot make owght of, head nor tail,” cried Mrs. Gilsland; “there was never no signs, as ever I heard tell on, of fortin’ at Marchmain, and for a screw and ould skinflint, that would give nowght but the lowest for whatever she wanted, I’ll engage there’s no the marrow of Peggy from Kenlisle to Cardale; and if you had asked me, I could have vowed with my last breath that the family had seen better days, and were as poor as ever a family pretending to be gentry could be.”
At this statement, which he took to be derogatory to his dignity, Patchey squared his spare shoulders, and erected his head.
“Being near relations of my ain family,” said Patchey, “where persons have oucht to say agin the family at Marchmain, I would rather, of the twa, that it was not said to me.”
“Agin the family!” cried Mrs. Gilsland—“havers! wasn’t Mr. Horry at my house five nights in the week, and the Cornel himsel’ brought Miss here to dine? Do you mean to tell me its agin a family to say it’s seen better days? Eyeh! wae is me! to think there’s no a soul in the Grange but ould Sally, and the young Squire out upon the world to seek his fortin’ like any other man! but where’s the man would dare to say I thought the less o’ Mr. Roger? That’s no my disposition, Mr. Patchey. It may be the way o’ the world, but it isn’t mine.”
“Leftenant Musgrave, if it’s him you’re meaning, he’ll do weel, mum,” said Patchey, with solemnity; “he’s been visiting at our house, and the Cornel’s tooken him up. I would not say but more folk nor the Cornel had a kindness for that lad; but these affairs are awfu’ delicate. I wadna say a word for my life.”
“Eyeh, man! I’ll lay a shilling it’s Miss!” cried Mrs. Gilsland, in great excitement and triumph.
“But all this has little to do with the family at Marchmain,” said Sergeant Kennedy, as Patchey shook his head with mysterious importance—“what’s the rights o’ that story if wan might ask, Patchey, my friend?—for it’s little likely the Cornel would keep a grand family secret like that from a confidential man like you.”
“Ye’re right there, Sergeant; he’ll say more to me, will our Cornel, than to ony other living man, were it Mr. Ned or Mr. Tom, that are but callants,” said Patchey. “I ken mair nor most folk of a’ our ain concerns; but it’s as good as a play to hear this. I’ve made it out, a sma’ bit at a time, mysel’; and if it werena that the gentleman’s dead, ye might hew me down into little bits, before ye would get anything that wasna wanted to be heard, out of me. But he’s gane, poor gentleman, and a’ the better for him, as I’ve little doubt; and Mr. Horry, as ye call him, has come into a great fortune. Ye see the rights of it was this:—the auld man of a’, the grandfather, had been a captious auld sinner, though I say it that should not; and being displeased ae way or anither at his son, this ane that’s now dead, he made a will, strick cutting him off, and leaving the haill inheritance at his death to his son, a baby in his nurse’s arms. That’s just the short and the long of it. I’ve read sichlike in print; but it’s no often ye meet wi’ a devil’s invention like that in living life. And the Cornel’s sister’s husband, ye see, he took it savage, being but a young man then; and the poor lady died, and down came he here, with an ill heart at a’ the world—and the rest ye ken as weel as me.”
“Eyeh, man, is that the tale?” said Mrs. Gilsland. “I wouldn’t say but it was dead hard upon Mr. Horry’s papaw; but, dear life! was the man crazed that he would take it out on his childer?—for more neglected things than them two, begging your pardon, Mr. Patchey, were not in this countryside; and how they’ve comed up to be as they are is just one of the miracles of Providence. Neyther a play nor a lesson like other folks’s childer, nor a soul, to see them frae year’s end to year’s end. It was common talk; that’s the way I know; but, eyeh, Mr. Patchey! had the very Cornel himsel’ no thought for them poor childer there?”
“The Colonel was at his duty, mum,” said Patchey. “He was resident at Rum Chunder station, and me with him; and he served in the Burmah war, and wherever bullets were flying, as the Sergeant can tell you. There was little time to think of our own bairns, let alone ither people’s, in these days. The Colonel was in Indeea, and in het wark, and me with him, for nigh upon forty year.”
“Hot work, ye may well say, Patchey, my friend,” said the Sergeant, authoritatively. “It’s little they know, them easy foulks at home, what the like of huz souldiers goes through. Eat when you can and sleep when you can, but work and fight awlways: them’s the orders of life as was upon you and me.”
“Eyeh, Sergeant!” cried Mrs. Gilsland, suddenly facing round upon the self-betrayed veteran, “was them the words you said to my Sam, when the lad was ’ticed away and ’listed all out of your flatteries?—or to the young Squire, when he hearkened to you? Eyeh, ye deceitful ould man! Is’t a parcel o’ stories, and nowght else, ye tell to the poor young lads, that knaw no better? and make poor mouths, and take pity on the sodgherin’, when ye’re awl by yoursel’?”
“Whisht, mistress, whisht!” said the Sergeant, who had recovered during this speech from his momentary dismay. “Did I say owght but what’s come true? Sam Gilsland’s been home on furlough, Patchey—as pretty a lad as ever handled a gun—corporal, and well spoken on; and the young Squire’s leftenant, and mentioned in the papers—and what could friend or relation, if it was an onreasonable woman, wish for more?”
“Ye may make your mind easy, mum, about Leftenant Musgrave; and your son, if he’s steady, will come well on in the Rifles—’special when the Cornel’s tooken him up,” said Patchey. “Our Cornel, he’s that kind of a man when he takes an interest in a lad he’s not one that forgets. I should say he would do uncommon well if he’s steady, being come of responsible folk, and the Cornel for a friend.”
“The Lord be thankit, I have little reason to complain!” said Sam’s mother, wiping her eyes with her apron; “and it’s a rael handsome uniform, though it’s no so gaudy as your redcoats. I took my Sam for an officer and a grand gentleman when he came in at the door, before I saw his honest face,” cried the good woman, with a sob of pride; “and the Cornel’s good word is as good as a fortin’, and he’s uncommon kind is the young Squire. I wish them all comfort and prosperity now and evermore,” she concluded, with a little solemn curtsey, giving emphasis to her good wishes—“and Miss and Mr. Horry, as well; though he’s no more like the Cornel than you or me.”
“He takes after the faither’s family—he’s no like none of our folk,” said Patchey; “but, though I wouldna say the Cornel altogether approves of him, he’s much concerned about the young gentleman the noo. He’s showed great feeling after a’, that young man; he was like a lad out of his mind when the faither was ill; and the day of the death, what does the Cornel find but Maister Horace dead on his face, fainted off in the study, and in a high fever ever since. The like of that, ye ken, shows feeling in a young man.”
“Feeling? They were none such good friends in life, if awl tales be true,” said Mrs. Gilsland. “My man, John, was all but put to the door when he went for Mr. Kerry’s things; and a lad like him, that was never greatly knawn for a loving heart, and was coming into a fortin’ besides—feeling here or feeling there, I don’t see no occasion for Mr. Horry fainting away.”
“Nor me,” said the Sergeant, emphatically; “but I ever said, and I’ll ever say, that though he’s the Cornel’s nevvy, and doubtless well connected, and good blood on wan side of the house, I’ll ever say yon’s an inscrutable lad.”
“That may be,” said the solemn Patchey; “but scrutable or no, he’s in a brain fever, and craves guid guiding, and here’s me come for the medicine, if I hadna fallen in with ower guid company. Weel, weel—an hour mair or less will do the lad nae harm. I’ve little faith in physic for such like disorders. If ye’ve a good constitution and a clear conscience, and the help of Providence, ye’ll fight through: if ye havena, ye must e’en drop out of the ranks, and anither man’ll take your place. But I have Mr. Horace’s bottle in my pocket a’ this time; so, with your leave, I’ll bid you good day.”
Saying which, Patchey stalked out of the “Tillington Arms,” and took his solemn way across the moor. His step was slow, and his cogitations momentous. If he did not think much about Horace and his medicine, he settled sundry knotty points in philosophy as he wended through the fragrant heather. Patchey’s gravity and intense sense of decorum increased habitually with every glass he emptied; but, perhaps, when his moralities flourished most, he made least haste about his immediate business, and it is to be feared that the confidential communication which the Colonel made to him when he reached the house was not of a flattering character. Horace got his physic an hour or two later than the proper time; but Patchey’s flowers of eloquence blossomed no more that day in the kitchen of Marchmain.