IT was very difficult for Rowland to decide what course he ought to pursue practically at the moment after these bewildering experiences. He was a man who had a great contempt for what he would himself have called shilly-shallying, and for the impotence which could be mastered by difficulties, and could not make the most of a trying situation. He would a little time before have scoffed at the possibility of any such thing happening to himself. No such thing had ever happened in the course of his work, which had involved many interests far more important than the interests of two insignificant creatures—girl and boy: which had sometimes been weighted with the responsibility of life and death for many; and yet he had not paused and hesitated as now. Two insignificant creatures, girl or boy, will blot out earth and even heaven from you, standing so near as they do, annihilating all perspective. What short work would he have made with them had they been a gang of navvies, or more difficult, a staff of clerks or engineers! But Marion and Archie were a very different matter. They had a right not only to all he could do for them, but to himself and everything that was best in him. Nothing could do away with that claim of nature. Not disapproval, dissatisfaction on his part, not even unworthiness on theirs. And they were not unworthy, poor things. Their only fault it was, and it was not their fault, that their father was in one atmosphere and they in another. Not their fault! he it was who had left them in that atmosphere—condemned them to it, and he must bear the penalty.
They enjoyed their day in the carriage, driving about wherever they liked, displaying their grandeur to admiring friends—at least Marion enjoyed it to the bottom of her heart. And she was bon prince in her elevation. She waited in all her splendour at the door of a little house, where everybody came to the window to stare at “the carriage” while a sick girl was hastily dressed in her best—and took the invalid out for a drive. There was a vain kindness in the girl, and a warm desire to bestow favours which was partly the product of vanity and partly of a better inspiration. She was really proud and happy when the colour came faintly into the cheeks of her ailing friend, although she never failed afterwards to attribute her recovery to “yon drive I took you.” The kindness was vulgar, and fed conceit, yet it was kindness in its way. Archie was not perhaps so happy. He soon tired of “the carriage,” and desired to be left at the cricket ground, which they again visited, and joined his friends, not without a certain glow of superior rank and importance about him from the fact of his being dropped there by the carriage, yet glad to escape from a position that was tiresome.
They all dined that evening with Mr. Rowland at his hotel—Mrs. Brown in such splendour of apparel that her brother-in-law was abashed by her appearance. Marion was fortunately more simply arrayed, and her father tried to believe that it was her own good taste which made the difference. The poor man felt all their little solecisms at table with double force, as remembering that he had once himself felt all the perplexity which paralysed Archie as to what he was to do with his knife and fork and table-napkin, and the finger-bowl which was put before him at dessert. As for Mrs. Brown, she showed no perplexity at all, but frankly broke every rule, stuck her fork into the potato she preferred, helped herself to the salt with her knife, and then ate her peas with it in the most assured simplicity, unconscious of criticism.
“Will you give me a little of that, sir,” she said to the waiter. “I’m no just sure what it is, but I would like to try. I tell the bairns no to be prejudiced, but just to try everything.”
Rowland felt that the imperturbable waiters were laughing in their sleeves at this strange party. But Marion gave him a little comfort. Marion was as sharp as a needle. She had all her wits about her. She divined from the smallest indication what was the right thing to do; but then she had read a great many novels, in some of which the very circumstances in which she now stood were set forth. Novels are a great help to an intelligent young lady endeavouring to acquire the manners of society to which she has been unaccustomed. Between these several sources of enlightenment she came out with credit from the ordeal, which made Archie feel himself a clown, and which Jane blundered through without being aware. This somehow eased the weight of trouble in Rowland’s heart.
“And what are ye gaun to do the morn?” said Mrs. Brown, lying back in an easy chair with her cap strings unloosed, and a genial glow upon her countenance after her abundant meal. “Have ye some ferlies to let your father see? But he just knew them all before ye were born.”
“I am afraid I have no time to see ferlies,” said Rowland. “I’ve seen a great many in my time. I am engaged to-morrow: and I must get back to London as soon as I can. I can’t leave my wife alone.”
“Oh, man, ye might first let the bairns have their turn,” said Jane, with a cloud on her brow. But alarmed by the darkness of that which gathered on his, she added hastily, “They might take a trip down the water if ye’re so busy. Ye canna expect them to settle to anything and you here.”
Then Rowland had a momentary struggle with himself. He came out of it victoriously on the side of virtue. “I am going,” he said, “to Rosmore to-morrow. Perhaps you would like to come with me, and see the house.”
There was a cry of eager acceptance from Marion of this proposal, and Archie gave his father a look of pleasure. Mr. Rowland was emboldened to add—“We must make the most of it, for in a day or two I must go to London.”
“That’s just what they would like best of all,” said Mrs. Brown. “Archie, puir laddie, would just give his little finger for a look of London. I’ve always said no, for it’s a place full of temptations. But to be with his own father makes a great difference.”
“And me,” said Marion. “Ah, papa,” she added, studying his countenance, “I want to see London; but far more, I want to see mamma.”
“Don’t say——!” said Rowland, and then stopped. He felt a sort of pang of indignation to think of this girl calling Evelyn by that name. This girl—his own girl—his child! He stopped short with a hard drawn breath of vexation. Of course she must say mamma if she would—or mother, a more sacred title. And it would be necessary for Evelyn to submit to it—Evelyn would desire it. Between these two certainties he felt himself caught as in a vice.
“I am sorry,” he said, “that I can’t take you with me to London—it is out of my power.”
“Dear, man,” said Mrs. Brown, “you that just have your pockets full of money, how can it be out of your power? It’s a journey that costs dear, and living in a hotel is just ruination; but you’re no one to consider that. You mauna say it’s out of your power.”
“Money is not everything,” said Rowland shortly.
“Eh no—far be it from me to say it is; but in the matter of taking your two children upon a veesit, what else is there to think o’? Na, na, there are plenty things it canna buy. It can neither bring ease o’ body nor peace o’ mind; but railroad tickets to London—Hoot! it’s siller alone that’s wanted—and you that has just your pockets full!”
“It is out of the question,” said Rowland, and then he stopped suddenly once more, for he had encountered the wistful look in Archie’s eyes—the eyes that were his mother’s. It cost him an effort to repeat his negative in the face of that silent appeal. “I cannot do it,” he said hastily. “Another time—but not now. However, if you would like to come with me and see the house—”
This proposal was accepted faute de mieux, and he set off next morning accompanied by the two young people, who by this time had become a little accustomed to him, and had learned to adapt themselves a little to his “ways.” Marion at least had learned to note when he was worried and put out, and though she was not yet at all aware what points in her conduct disturbed him, or that it was her conduct that disturbed him, her quick perception had already noticed that something did from time to time derange his equanimity, and that it was his children who were the cause.
“It will be Archie,” she said to herself. Already, so quick is the contagion of a new sentiment, Marion had begun to be dissatisfied about Archie’s clothes. His coat was rough and badly made in comparison with his father’s coat; his boots were clumsy, his linen dingy. All these things she had found out for herself. Archie was not bad-looking: he was rather handsome than the reverse; but he had not at all the same appearance as his father, who was old and without any graces. This Marion discovered all by herself. She had not attained to any such enlightenment on her own account.
When they got out at Rosmore pier, other revelations began. They found a dog-cart awaiting them with a beautiful horse and a groom, the perfection of whose get up was more than words could tell, though they were not learned enough to perceive that. Only a dog-cart!—Marion felt that she was coming down from the glories of “the carriage;” but the obsequiousness of everybody around reconciled her a little to the less dignified vehicle. The drive through the woods overawed the young people. They gave each other a look of unmingled gratification and dismay. When they reached the house itself, the dismay perhaps was uppermost, but they did not as yet venture to say a word. Nothing could be more beautiful than the situation of the house, or the woods which approached it, when everything was in the full height of summer; the sun blazing over a country in which at almost every corner there was a burn to toss back a dazzling ray. From the colonnade the view had been opened a little by judicious clearing, and the broad Clyde, like a silver sea, lay glistening at the foot of the knoll, with all its passing boats and sails, and the background of the smoky but not unpicturesque town throwing up its towers and spires on the other side of the estuary. They were impressed for a moment in spite of themselves, and lingered looking at the view while their father went indoors.
“It’s awfully bonnie,” said Archie.
“So it is,” said Marion, holding her breath a little. They stood side by side overawed, not venturing to say any more. Indoors they were still more silent, following their father from room to room. In every one of them were workmen, and every kind of luxurious article was being added to the original furniture. By-and-bye they became bewildered by the number of rooms and their names—dining-rooms and drawing-rooms were comprehensible, but the libraries, morning rooms, boudoirs, studies, made their heads go around.
“And what’s this?” said Marion in bewilderment.
“This is Mrs. Rowland’s own sitting-room,” said a polite functionary with what the young people characterised as an English accent.
“What does she want,” said Marion, almost angrily, “with another sitting-room? when she’s got the dining-room and the drawing-room, the morning-room and the library.”
“Oh, that is just the thing, Miss,” said the functionary; an enigmatical saying which made the girl stare at him for a moment in perplexity, but added no light.
They wandered upstairs and downstairs, wondering where their own places were to be in the middle of this bewildering space and unaccustomed luxury. There were some small back rooms in the corner of a wing, to which instinctive suspicion naturally pointed as the “holes” that would be allotted to them.
“That’s where she’ll put us,” said Marion, “to get us out of the way.”
Archie did not make any reply, but he thought it very likely. To tell the truth, those back rooms were larger and quite as well fitted up as the rooms in Sauchiehall Road.
Rowland almost forgot their existence as he went over the house, examining what had been done, pointing out what there was still to do. So much of his ideal was in it, of which nobody knew save himself. He had furnished the house in fancy many a time, fitted it up in such a way as house was never fitted up before. It filled him at once with sweet delight and disappointment, to see the reality growing before him. It was not, and could not be, ever so fine as his dreams, and yet it was Rosmore, and it was his. He went about anxious, yet elated, looking out from every window to savourer over and over again the well-known prospect—the Clyde, visible in a different aspect from every corner; the boats upon its dazzling surface, which seemed to hang in space, which seemed to pause and quiver, as if upon the wing, as they crossed the openings, to give the passengers a sight of the house. He knew what was being said on the deck of the steamboats that rustled across and across. “Oh, ay, it’s let—and maybe it will be sold—to Jims Rowland, that was once a lad in a foundry in Glescow, nae mair, and now is the great Railway Man from India, and has come hame very well-off, and gotten the place he had aye set his heart upon. Oh, my lord doesna like to part with it, nae doubt, but siller is not a thing to be turned from the door.” He knew that was what was being said. He had heard it himself, or something very near it; it kept singing in his ears like a pleasant tune—“Jims Rowland, that was once a lad in a Glescow foundry, and has gotten the place he had aye set his heart upon.” Yes, it was what he had set his heart upon, and it was his at the last. And to make it perfect was all his intent and thought. He forgot again that natural difficulty which his own neglect and forgetfulness had gone so far to make—the two standing under the colonnade, where they had strayed after their examination of the newly furnished rooms, and looking out again with a sullen shade over their eyes upon “the view.”
“Well?” he said, coming suddenly upon them, full of his own elation and excitement, “and what do you think of the house?”
There was a pause; and then Marion answered him. “Oh, the house is very well, papa. It is a great big house, and there is a fine view.”
“Is that all you have to say?”
“I don’t know what more I can say. It will be awfully lonely in the winter-time, and when it’s raining; but perhaps you will only come here in the summer, and have another place for the dark days.”
“The dark days,” he repeated with a little trouble. “You don’t know much about it, I’m afraid,” he added with an attempt to be jocular; “the fine folk go to London in the summer, and spend what you call the dark days in the country. That’s the right thing to do.”
“But it’s awfully foolish,” said Marion with a very serious face.
Archie did not say anything in articulate words, but he made a sort of murmur of assent.
“Now if it was me,” said the girl, “I would live here in the summer and take one of the new houses, the new big houses out by the Park, or on the Kelvin Road; they’re grand big houses, bigger than this, just like palaces, to spend the winter in; and where we could go to all the grand parties, and be near the football ground—where there was aye something going on. There will be very little going on here.”
“Unless there might, maybe be a curling pond,” suggested Archie, but very dubiously, and with a sigh.
Rowland was struck with a certain reasonableness in this suggestion, which chilled his enthusiasm a little in spite of himself. “Come and have some luncheon,” he said, “and afterwards we can talk of that.” Lunch was set out for them in a small room, one of the many which had bewildered Marion. There was already a tribe of servants in possession, and the small, well-ordered table and silent servants overawed the young people once more. The new butler had the air of a minister (he had, indeed, though Marion did not understand these fine distinctions, the airs of a Dean at the least), and it was all that the girl could do not to call him sir. She accepted what he handed to her meekly with a reverential submission to his better knowledge. As for Archie, he had committed himself, but fortunately not so as to be comprehended by any one but his sister, by offering the gentleman in black a chair.
“Well,” said their father again, “so you think Rosmore will be dull, and there will be nothing going on?”
“That was my opinion,” said Marion firmly. Archie was not to be reckoned upon in company as a steady backer up, and she thought it wisest not to give him the opportunity of betraying her. “The rooms are very pretty, and there’s a beautiful view; but you cannot be always looking at the view. And it’s very rainy down here. It rains mostly every day. And then there are so many trees. In the winter-time it will be terrible dark, and not a shop on this side, or a place to go to.”
“You will have to lay in all your stores, my dear, before the winter comes.”
“No, not that,” said Marion; “but the shops are always a diversion; it is not for buying things. And there will be no parties to go to.”
“Have you many parties,” said Rowland with a laugh, “where you are?”
Marion gave a glance round, feeling it necessary to keep up her dignity before the solemn servants. “Oh, yes,” she said, “plenty! We go out a great deal. There was a ball last week at the MacColls. I was all in white; at my age, just new out, that’s aye the proper thing.”
“So you are out, are you,” said Rowland somewhat grimly; “the MacColls are——”
“Oh, papa, they are people of great consideration,” said Marion stopping him; “it is a real good name, well-known everywhere.” Marion was making very rapid progress. She was proud at their first interview of knowing the MacColls, who had the great shop in Buchanan Street. Now she had cut adrift the shop and sheltered her friends under the ægis of a well-known name, with all the skill of a leader of society. “But there’s nobody here,” she said, spreading out her hands and shaking her head.
“How do you know there is nobody here? There seem a number of houses as far as I can see.”
“Not of people like us, papa,” said Marion; “not of houses that mamma could visit at.” She had her eye upon the butler, who was visibly impressed, and to whom she was consciously playing. “There are only Glasgow people coming for the salt water—I mean for the sea-bathing; and the Manse, and the like of that; no gentlemen’s houses. Of course it was only that I was looking for,” she added with the air of a princess. Archie sat opposite and regarded his sister with wide-open eyes. He did not know her in this new development. As a person of rank standing on her dignity, Marion was to him a new revelation. He admired yet wondered at her.
As for her father, he burst into a laugh which was louder and more boisterous than became his usual character. “You might perhaps,” he said, “recommend the place to your friends, the MacColls, for the salt water.”
“Papa!” said Marion in dismay. The butler was just going out of the room followed by his attendant footman. She watched him till he was quite gone, and the door softly closed behind him. Then she said in a lower tone, “I have always read that the servants know more about you than you know yourselves, and I took care to say very little about the MacColls; for though they are well-off, they are not—in our position, papa.”
“Oh May!” said Archie in consternation.
It was the comic side of this speech which first struck her father. He laughed once more loud and long. “You will soon be quite fit for a society lady,” he said. But immediately fell into absolute gravity again, with a face blank as wood; discouraging and repressive, had Marion been sensitive. It was very amusing, but one does not desire to be so amused by one’s own child.
“I was thinking chiefly,” Marion resumed with dignity, “of mamma. She will expect some society, and there will be none; just the Manse, and a house or two like that, scarcely genteel, not in Our Position. We might do very well, Archie and me, though it would be dull; but she will be expecting to go out to her dinner, and to be asked to parties, and show off all her grand gowns. And there will be nobody. And not even a shop to go to, to spend an hour in an afternoon. And you cannot always be looking at the view. It is mamma that I am thinking about,” Marion said.
He did not again bid her not to speak of Evelyn so; for was it not the best thing he could hope for, that his child should think of his wife as of a mother? but his heart revolted all the same, and the girl’s commonplace prettiness, her little assured speech, even the undeniable sense that there was in her remarks, sense of the most prosaic kind, yet genuine enough in its way, exasperated him. He said dryly, “I think I can take my wife in my own hand.”
“Yes,” said Marion; “but maybe it will be a great disappointment to her, when she knows that it is so bonnie a place and all that and then comes here, so far away, and finds that there is nothing but the view.”
Sense! undeniably it was sense, in its petty, miserable way; and what if it might be true? After all, he had only known Evelyn on one side of her character. She was much superior to himself in a hundred ways. She had the habits of a life very different from his, the habits of good society, of knowing “the best people.” Rowland himself, in his rough practical way, had not a very profound admiration for the best people. There were even more bores among them, he thought, than among the most simple, and their views were not more elevated. But then Evelyn knew no other life than theirs, and to bring her down here to an unbroken solitude, or to the society of the sea-bathers, the people who came for “the salt water,” might perhaps be a dangerous experiment. A cold shiver ran over him, while his daughter prattled on in her cool precocious wisdom. How could he tell that she would be sufficiently compensated by “the view” as to forget everything else, or that she would be able to bear from morning to night the unbroken enjoyment of his own society, and of Marion and Archie? His mind went away into a close consideration of her previous life as far as he knew it. The society at the Station was perhaps not very choice, but it was abundant. The people there knew people whom she knew, were acquainted with her own antecedents, and the kind of life to which she had been accustomed, a life which he himself did not know much about, much less his daughter and his son. A woman brought up in a great country house, overflowing with company, such as people in humbler positions know only by books, accustomed to go up to town for the season, to make rounds of visits, etc., etc.—would not she perhaps expect all that to begin over again after the period of her humiliation was over, when she had become the wife of a rich man? And if instead she found herself seated opposite to him for life, with his two children only to diversify the scene, though it was in a beautiful house with a beautiful view! how would Evelyn bear it? Nothing but a view! The little monkey! the little wretch! Rowland in his heart was still a man of the people, and he would have liked to take Marion by the shoulders and give her a shake. And yet, probably, she was right.