BUT Menie Laurie was by no means satisfied that even simple little July should make comparison so frequent between Randall, her own hero, and the altogether new and sudden elevation of Johnnie Lithgow. Johnnie Lithgow might be very clever, might be a newspaper conductor, and a rising man; but Randall—Randall, in spite of the little chillness of that assumed superiority which could think humiliation necessary to bring his youthful countryman down—in spite of Menie’s consciousness that there lacked something of the frank and generous tone with which one high spirit should acknowledge the excellence of another—Randall was still the ideal genius, the something so far above “clever,” that Menie felt him insulted by praise so mean as this word implied.
There was little time for speculation on the subject, yet many a mood of Menie’s was tinged by its passing gleam, for Menie sometimes thought her betrothed unappreciated, and was lofty and scornful, and disposed in his behalf to defy all the world. Sometimes impatient of the estimation, which, great though it was, was not great enough, Menie felt not without a consoling self-satisfaction that she alone did Randall perfect justice. Johnnie Lithgow!—what though he did write articles! Menie was very glad to believe, condescendingly, that he might be clever, but he never could be Randall Home.
“You’ll hae heard the news,” said Miss Janet, sitting very upright in one of the Burnside easy-chairs, with her hands crossed on her knee; “they say that you and our Randall, Miss Menie, my dear, were the first, between you, to carry word of it to his mother, and her breaking her heart about her son. But Mrs Lithgow’s gotten a letter frae Johnnie now, a’ about how grand he is—and I hear he’s paying a haill guinea by the week for his twa rooms, and seeing a’ the great folk in the land—no to say that he’s writing now the paper he ance printed, and is great friends with our Randy. Randy was aye awfu’ particular o’ his company. I was saying mysel, it was the best sign I heard of Johnnie Lithgow that Randall Home was taking him by the hand; I’m no meaning pride, Mrs Laurie. I’m sure I ken sae weel it’s a’ his ain doing, and the fine nature his Maker gave him, that I aye say we’ve nae right to be proud; but it would be sinning folks’ mercies no to ken—and I never saw a lad like Randall Home a’ my days.”
Menie said nothing in this presence. Shy at all times to speak of Randall—before her own mother and his aunt it was a thing impossible; but she glanced up hastily with glowing eyes, and a flush of sudden colour, to meet Miss Janet’s look. Miss Janet’s face was full of affectionate pride and tenderness, but the good simple features had always a little cloud of humility and deprecation hovering over them. Miss Janet knew herself liable to attack on many points, knew herself very homely, and not at all worthy of the honour of being Randall’s aunt, and had been snubbed and put down a great many times in the course of her kindly life—so Miss Janet was wont to deliver her modest sentiments with a little air of half-troubled propitiatory fear.
Mrs Laurie made little response. She was busy with her work at the moment, and, not without little angles of temper for her own share, did not always quite join in this devout admiration of Randall Home. Menie, “thinking shame,” said nothing either, and, in the momentary silence which ensued, Miss Janet’s heart rose with a flutter of apprehension; she feared she had said something amiss—too much or too little; and Miss Janet’s cheeks grew red under the abashed eyes which she bent so anxiously over the well-known pattern of Mrs Laurie’s carpet.
“I’m feared you’re thinking it’s a’ vain-glory that gars me speak,” said Miss Janet, tracing the outline with her large foot; “and it’s very true that ane deceives ane’s-sel in a thing like this; but it’s no just because he’s our Randall, Mrs Laurie; and it’s no that I’m grudging at Johnnie Lithgow for being clever—but I canna think he’s like my ain bairn.”
“A merry little white-headed fellow, with a wisp of curls,” said Mrs Laurie, good-humouredly—“No, he’s not like Randall, Miss Janet—I think I’ll answer for that as well as you; but we’ll see them both, very likely, when we get to London. Strange things happen in this world,” continued Menie’s mother, drawing herself up with a little conscious pride and pique, which the accompanying smile showed her own half amusement with. “There’s young Walter Wellwood of Kirkland will never be anything but a dull country gentleman, though he comes of a clever family, and has had every advantage; and here is a boy out of Kirklands parish-school taking up literature and learning at his own hand!”
Miss Janet was slightly disturbed, and looked uneasy. Randall too had begun his career in the parish-school of Kirklands: there was a suspicion in this speech of something derogatory to him.
“But the maister in Kirklands is very clever, Mrs Laurie,” said Miss Janet, anxiously; “he makes grand scholars. When our Randall gaed to the grammar-school in Dumfries, the gentlemen a’ made a wonder o’ him; and for a’ his natural parts, he couldna hae gotten on sae fast without a guid teacher; and it’s no every man could maister Randy. I mind at the time the gentlemen couldna say enough to commend the Dominie. I warrant they a’ think weel o’ him still, on account of his guid success, and the like o’ him deserves to get credit wi’ his laddies. I’m sure Johnnie Lithgow, having had nae other instruction, should be very grateful to the maister.”
“The maister will be very proud of him,” said Menie; “though they say in Kirklands that ever so many ministers have been brought up in the school. But never mind Johnnie Lithgow—everybody speaks of him now; and, mother, you were to tell Miss Janet about when we are going away.”
“I think John will never look out of the end window mair,” said Miss Janet. “I can see he’s shifting his chair already—him that used to be sae fond o’ the view; and I’m sure I’ll be very dreary mysel, thinking there’s naebody I ken in Burnside. But what if you dinna like London, Mrs Laurie? It’s very grand, I believe, and you’ve lived in great touns before, and ken the ways o’ the world better than the like o’ me; but after a country life, I would think ane would weary o’ the toun; and if you do, will you come hame?”
Mrs Laurie shook her head. “I was very well content in Burnside,” she said. “With my own will I never would have left it, Miss Janet; but I go for good reasons, and not for pleasure; and my reasons will last, whether I weary or no. There’s Menie must get masters, you know, and learn to be accomplished—or Miss Annie Laurie will put her to shame.”
“I dinna ken what she could learn, for my part,” said Miss Janet, affectionately, “nor how she could weel be better or bonnier, for a’body can see the genty lady-breeding Miss Menie’s got; and there’s naebody atween this and the hills needs to be telt o’ the kind heart and the pleasant tongue, and the face that every creature’s blithe to see; and I’m sure I never heard a voice like her for singing; and a’ the grand tunes she can play, and draw landscapes, and work ony kind o’ bonnie thing you like to mention. Didna you draw a likeness o’ Jenny, Miss Menie, my dear? And I’m sure yon view you took frae the tap o’ our hill is just the very place itsel—as natural as can be; and, for my part, Mrs Laurie, I dinna ken what mortal could desire for her mair.”
Mrs Laurie smiled; but the mother was not displeased, though she did think it possible still to add to Menie’s acquirements, if not to her excellence; and Menie herself went off laughing and blushing, fully resolved in her own mind to destroy forthwith that likeness wherein poor Jenny’s “high shouther” figured with an emphasis and distinctness extremely annoying to the baffled artist, whose pencil ran away with her very often in these same much-commended drawings, and who was sadly puzzled in most cases how to make two sides of anything alike. And Menie knew her tunes were anything but grand, her landscapes not at all remarkable for truth—yet Menie was by no means distressed by Miss Janet’s simple-hearted praise.
The evening was spent in much talk of the departure. July Home had followed her aunt, and sat in reverential silence listening to the conversation, and making a hundred little confidential communications of her own opinion to Menie, which Menie had some trouble in reporting for the general good. It was nine o’clock of the moonlight April night when the farmer of Crofthill came to escort his “womankind” home. The clear silent radiance darkened the distant hills, even while it lent a silver outline to their wakeful guardian range, and Menie came in a little saddened from the gate, where the father of her betrothed had grasped her hand so closely in his good-night. “No mony mair good-nights now,” said John Home. “I’ll no get up my heart the morn, though it is the first day of summer. You should have slipped up the hill the night to gather the dew in the morning, May; but I’ll learn to think the May mornings darker than they used to be, when your ain month takes my bonnie lassie from Burnside. Weel, weel, ane’s loss is anither’s gain; but I grudge you to London smoke, and London crowds. You must mind, May, my woman, and kept your hame heart.”
Your home heart, Menie—your heart of simple trust and untried quiet. Is it a good wish, think you, kind and loving though the wisher be? But Menie looks up at the sky, with something trembling faintly in her mind, like the quiver of this charmed air under the flood of light—and has note of unknown voices, faces, visions, coming in upon the calm of her fair youth, unknown, unfeared; and so she turns to the home lights again, with nothing but the sweet thrill of innocent expectation to rouse her, secure in the peace and tranquil serenity of this home heart of hers, which goes away softly, through the moonlight and the shadow, through the familiar gloom of the little hall, and into the comforts of the mother’s parlour, singing its song of conscious happiness under its breath.