THE next day was such a Sunday as had never been passed in the Hewan before. Mrs Ogilvy did not go to church: consequently Sandy was not taken out of the stable, nor was there any of the usual cheerful bustle of the Sunday morning, the little commotion of the best gown, the best bonnet, the lace veil taken out of their drawers among the lavender. Nobody but Mrs Ogilvy continued to wear a lace veil: but her old, softly tinted countenance in the half mask of a piece of net caught upon the nose, as was once the fashion, or on the chin, as is the fashion now, would have been an impossible thing. Her long veil hung softly from her bonnet behind it or above it. It could cover her face when there was need; but there never was any reason why she should cover her face. Her faithful servants admired her very much in her Sunday attire. Janet, though she was so hot a churchwoman, was not much of a churchgoer. Somebody, she said, had to stay at home to look after the house and the dinner, even when it was a cold dinner: and to see the mistress sit down without even a hot potatie, was more than she could consent to: so except on great occasions she remained at home, and Andrew put a mark in his Bible at the text, and told her as much as he could remember of the discourse. It was a “ploy” for Janet to come out to the door into the still and genial sunshine on Sunday morning, and see the little pony-carriage come round, all its polished surfaces shining, and Sandy tossing his head till every bit of the silver on his harness twinkled in the sun, and Andrew, all in his best, bringing him up with a little dash at the door. And then Mrs Ogilvy would come out, not unconscious and not displeased that the old servants were watching for her, and that the sight of her modest finery was a “ploy” to Janet, who had so few ploys. She would pin a rose on her breast when it was the time of roses, and take a pair of grey gloves out of her drawer, to give them pleasure, with a tender feeling that made the little vanity sweet. The grey gloves were, indeed, her only little adornment, breaking the monotony of the black which she always wore; but Janet loved the lustre of the best black silk, and to stroke it with her hand as she arranged it in the carriage, loath to cover up its sheen with the wrapper which was necessary to protect it from the dust. Nothing of all this occurred on the dull morning of this strange Sabbath, which, as if in sympathy, was grey and cheerless—the sky without colour, the landscape without sunshine. Mrs Ogilvy came out to the door to speak to Andrew as he ploughed across the gravel with discontented looks—for to walk in to the kirk did not please the factotum, who generally drove. She called him to her, standing on the doorstep drawing her white shawl round her as if she had taken a chill. “Andrew,” she said, “I know you are not a gossip; but it’s a great event my son coming home. I would have you say little about it to-day, for it would bring a crowd of visitors, and perhaps some even on the Sabbath: and Mr Robert is tired, and not caring to see visitors. He must just have a day or two to rest before everybody knows.”
“I’m no a man,” said Andrew, a little sullen, “for clashes and clavers: you had better, mem, say a word to the wife.” Andrew was conscious that in his prowl for victuals the night before he had spread the news of Ogilvy’s return,—“and nae mair comfort to his mother nor ever, or I am sair mistaen”—far and wide.
“Whatever you do,” Mrs Ogilvy said, a little subdued by Andrew’s looks, “do not say anything to the minister’s man.”
She went back, and sat down in her usual place between the window and the fireplace. The room was full of flowers, gathered fresh for Sunday; and the Bible lay on the little table, the knitting and the newspapers being carefully cleared away. She took the book and opened it, or rather it opened of itself, at those chapters in St John’s Gospel which are the dearest to the sorrowful. She opened it, but she did not read it. She had no need. She knew every word by heart, as no one could do by any mere effort of memory: but only by many, many readings, long penetration of the soul by that stream of consolation. It did her a little good to have the book open by her side: but she did not need it—and, indeed, the sacred words were mingled unconsciously by many a broken prayer and musing of her own. She had gone to her son’s room, to the door, many times since she parted with him the night before; but had heard no sound, and, hovering there on the threshold, had been afraid to go in, as she so longed to do. What mother would not, after so long an absence, steal in to say again good-night—to see that all was comfortable, plenty of covering on the bed, not too much, just what he wanted; or again, in the morning, to see how he had slept, to recognise his dear face by the morning light, to say God bless him, and God bless him the first morning as the first night of his return? But Mrs Ogilvy was afraid. She went and stood outside the door, trembling, but she had not the courage to go in. She felt that it might anger him—that it might annoy him—that he would not like it. He had been a long time away. He had grown a man almost middle-aged, with none of the habits or even recollections of a boy. He would not like her to go near him—to touch him. With a profound humility of which she was not conscious, she explained to herself that this was after all “very natural.” A man within sight of forty (she counted his age to a day—he was thirty-seven) had forgotten, being long parted from them, the ways of a mother. He had maybe, she said to herself with a shudder, known—other kinds of women. She had no right to be pained by it—to make a grievance of it. Oh no, no grievance: it was “very natural.” If she went into the parlour, where she always sat in the morning, she would hear him when he began to move: for that room was over this. Meantime, what could she do better than to read her chapter, and say her prayers, and bless him—and try “to keep her heart”?
Many, many times had she gone over the same thoughts that flitted about her mind now and interrupted the current of her prayers, and of the reading which was only remembering. There was Job, whom she had thought of so often, whose habit was, when his sons and daughters were in all their grandeur before anything happened to them, to offer sacrifices for them, if, perhaps, in the carelessness of their youth, they might have done something amiss. How she had longed to do that! and then had reminded herself that there were no more sacrifices, that there had been One for all, and that all she had to do was but to put God in mind, to keep Him always in mind: that there was her son yonder somewhere out in His world, and maybe forgetting what his duty was. To put God in mind!—as if He did not remember best of all, thinking on them most when they were lost, watching the night when even a mother slumbers and sleeps, and never, never losing sight of them that were His sons before they were mine! What could she say then, what could she do, a poor small thing of a woman, of as little account as a fly in the big world of God? Just sit there with her heart bleeding, and say between the lines, “In my Father’s house are many mansions”—and, “If a man love me, my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him:” nothing but “my Robbie, my Robbie!” with anguish and faith contending. This was all mixed up among the verses now, those verses that were balm, the keen sharpness of this dear name.
She was not, however, permitted to remain with these thoughts alone. Janet came softly to the door, half opening it, asking, “May I come in?” “Oh, who can prevent you from coming in?” her mistress said, in the sudden impatience of a preoccupied mind, and then softly, “Come in, Janet,” in penitence more sudden still. Janet came in, and, closing the door behind her, stood as if she had something of the gravest importance to say. “What is it, woman, what is it?” Mrs Ogilvy cried in alarm.
“I was thinking,” said Janet, “Mr Robert brought nae luggage with him when he came last night.”
“No—he was walking—how could he bring luggage?” cried Mrs Ogilvy, picking up that excuse, as it were, from the roadside, for she had not thought of it till this minute.
“That is just what I am saying,” said Janet: “no a clean shirt, nor a suit of clothes to change, and this the Sabbath-day——!”
“There are his old things in the drawer,” said Mrs Ogilvy.
“His auld things!—that wouldna peep upon him, the man he is now. He was shapin’ for a fine figger of a man when he went away: but no braid and buirdly as he is now.”
Janet spoke in a tone of genuine admiration and triumph, which was balm to her mistress’s heart. His bigness, his looseness of frame, had indeed been one of the little things that had vexed her among so many others. “Not like my Robbie,” she had breathed to herself, thinking of the slim and graceful boy. But it gave her great heart to see how different Janet’s opinion was. It was she who was always over-anxious. No doubt most folk would be of Janet’s mind.
“I was thinking,” said Janet, “to take him a shirt of my man’s, just his best. It has not been on Andrew’s back for many a day. ’Deed, I just gave it a wash, and plenty of stairch, as the gentlemen like, and ironed it out this morning. The better day the better deed.”
“On the Sabbath morning!” said Mrs Ogilvy, half laughing, half crying.
“I’ll take the wyte o’t,” said Janet. “But I can do nae mair. I canna offer him a suit of Andrew’s: in the first place, his best suit, he has it on: and I wouldna demean Mr Robert to a common man’s working claes; and then besides——”
“If you’ll get those he’s wearing, Janet, and brush them well, that’ll do fine. And then we must have no visitors to-day. I know not who would come from the town on the Sabbath-day, except maybe Miss Susie. Miss Susie is not like anybody else; but oh, I would not like her to see him so ill put on! Yet you can never tell, with that ill habit the Edinburgh folk have of coming out to Eskholm on the Sunday afternoon, and then thinking they may just daunder in to the Hewan and get a cup of tea. The time when you want them least is just the time they are like to come.”
“We’ll just steek the doors and let them chap till they’re wearied,” said Janet, promptly. “They’ll think ye’ve gane away like other folk, for change of air.”
“I’m loth to do that—when folk have come so far, and tired with their walk. Do you think, Janet, you could have the tea ready, and just say I have—stepped out to see a neighbour, or that I’m away at the manse, or——? I would be out in the garden out of sight, so it would be no lee to say I was out of the house.”
“If it’s the lee you’re thinking of, mem—I’m no caring that,” and Janet snapped her fingers, “for the lee.”
Neither mistress nor maid called it a lie, which was a much more serious business. The Scottish tongue is full of those nuances, which in other languages we find so admirable.
“Oh, Janet!” cried Mrs Ogilvy again, between laughing and crying, “I fear I’ll have but an ill character to give you—washing out a shirt on Sunday and caring nothing for a lee!”
“If we can just get Andrew aff to his kirk in the afternoon. I’ll no have him at my lug for ever wi’ his sermons. Lord, if I hadna kent better how to fend for him than he did himsel’, would he ever have been a man o’ weight, as they say he is, in that Auld Licht meetin’ o’ his, and speaking ill o’ a’ the ither folk? Just you leave it to me. Bless us a’! sae lang as the dear laddie is comfortable, what’s a’ the rest to you and me?”
“Oh, Janet, my woman!” said the mistress, holding out her hand. It was so small and delicate that Janet was seized with a compunction after she had squeezed it in her own hard but faithful one, which felt like an iron framework in comparison. “I doubt I’ve hurt her,” she said to herself; “but I was just carried away.”
And Mrs Ogilvy was restored to her musing and her prayers, which presently were interrupted again by sounds in the room overhead—Janet’s step going in, which shook and thrilled the flooring, and the sound of voices. The mother sat and listened, and heard his voice speaking to Janet, the masculine tone instantly discernible in a woman’s house, speaking cheerfully, with after a while a laugh. His tone to her had been very different. It had been full of involuntary self-defence, a sort of defiance, as if he felt that at any moment something might be demanded of him, excuse or explanation—or else blame and reproach poured forth upon him. The mother’s heart swelled a little, and yet she smiled. Oh, it was very natural! He could even joke and laugh with the faithful servant-woman, who could call him to no account, whom he had known all his life. If there was any passing cloud in Mrs Ogilvy’s mind it passed away on the instant, and the only bitterness was that wistful one, with a smile of wonder accompanying it, “That he could think I would demand an account—me!”
He came down-stairs later, half amused with himself, in the high collar of Andrew’s gala shirt, and with a smile on his face. “I’m very ridiculous, I suppose,” he said, walking to the glass above the mantelpiece; “but I did not want to vex the woman, and clean things are pleasant.”
“Is your luggage—coming, Robbie?” she ventured to say, while he stood before the glass trying to fold over or modify as best he could the spikes of the white linen which stood round his face.
“How much luggage do you think a man would be likely to have,” he said impatiently, standing with his back towards her, “who came from New York as a stowaway in a sailing-ship?”
She had not the least idea what a stowaway was, but concluded it to be some poor, very poor post, with which comfort was incompatible. “My dear,” she said, “you will have to go into Edinburgh and get a new outfit. There are grand shops in Edinburgh. You can get things—I mean men’s things—just as well, they tell me, as in London.”
She spoke in a half-apologetic tone, as if he had been in the habit of getting his clothes from London, and might object to a less fashionable place—for indeed the poor lady was much confused, believing rather that her son had lived extravagantly and lavishly than that he had been put to all the shifts of poverty.
“I’ve had little luggage this many a day,” he said,—“a set of flannels when I could get them for the summer, and for winter anything that was warm enough. I’ve not been in the way of sending to Poole for my clothes.” He laughed, but it was not the simple laugh that had sounded from the room above. “What did I ever know about London, or anything but the commonest life?”
“Just what we could give you, Robbie,” she said, in a faltering tone.
“Well!” he cried impatiently. And then he turned round and faced her—Andrew’s collars, notwithstanding all his efforts, giving still a semi-ludicrous air, which gave the sting of an additional pang to Mrs Ogilvy, who could not bear that he should be ridiculous. He confronted her, sitting down opposite, fixing his eyes on her face, as if to forestall any criticism on her part. “I’ve come back as I went away,” he said with defiance. “I had very little when I started,—I have nothing now. If you had not kept me so bare, and never a penny in my pocket, I might have done better: but nothing breeds nothing, you know, mother. It’s one of the laws of the world.”
“Robbie, I gave you what I had,” she exclaimed, astonished, yet half relieved, to find that it was she who was put on her defence.
“Ay, that’s what everybody says. You must have kept a little more for yourself, however, for you seem very comfortable: and you talk at your ease of a new outfit, while I’ve been glad of a cast-off jacket or an old pair of breeks that nobody else would wear.”
“Oh Robbie, Robbie!” she cried in a voice of anguish, “and me laying up every penny for you, and ready with everything there was—at a moment’s notice!”
“Well, perhaps it’s better as it is,” he said: “I might just have lost it again. You get into a sort of a hack-horse way—just the same round, and never able to get out of it—unless when you’ve got to cut and run for your life.”
“Robbie!”
“I’ll tell you about that another time. I don’t know what you’re going to do with me, now you’ve got me here. I’m a young fellow enough yet, mother—a sort of a young fellow, but not good for anything. And then if this affair comes up, I may have to cut and run again. Oh, I’ll tell you about it in time! It’s not likely they’ll be after me, with all the loose swearing there is yonder, and extraditions, and that kind of thing; but I’m not one that would stand being had up and examined—even if I was sure I should get off: I’d just cut and run.”
“Is there any danger?” she said in a terrified whisper.
He burst out laughing again, but these laughs were not good to hear. “Of what do you think? That they might hang me up to the first tree? But till it blows over I can be sure of nothing—or if any other man turns up. There is a man before whom I would just cut and run too. If he should get wind that I was here”—he gave a suspicious glance round. “And this confounded house on a level with the ground, and the windows open night and day!”
“Who is it? Who is the man?” she said. She followed every change of his face, every movement, every question, with eyes large with panic and terror.
What he said first, he had the grace to say under his breath out of some revived tradition of respect, “Would you be any the wiser if I told you a name—that you never heard before?” he said.
“No, Robbie, no. But tell me one thing, is it a man you have wronged? Oh Robbie, tell me, tell me that, for pity’s sake!”
“No!” he shouted with a rage that overcame all other feelings. “Damn him! damn him! it’s he that has never done anything but hunt and harm me.”
“Oh, God be thanked!” cried his mother, suddenly rising and going to him. “Oh Robbie, my dear, the Lord be praised! and God forgive that unfortunate person, for if it’s him, it’s not you!”
He submitted unwillingly for a moment to the arm which she put round him, drawing his head upon her breast, and then put her not ungently away. “If there’s any consolation in that, you can take it,” he said: “There’s not much consolation in me, any way.” And then he reached his large hand over the table to her little bookcase, which stood against the wall. “I can always read a book,” he said, “a story-book; it’s the only thing I can do. You used to have all the Scotts here.”
“They are just where they used to be, Robbie,” she said, in a subdued tone. She watched him, still standing while he chose one; and throwing himself back in his chair, began to read. It added a little sense of embarrassment, of confusion and disorder, to all the heavier trouble, that he had thrown himself into her chair, the place in which she had sat through all those years when there was no one to interfere with her. Glad was she to give up the best place in the house to him, whatever he might please to choose; but it gave her a feeling of disturbance which she could not explain, not being even aware at first what it was that caused it. She did not know where to sit, nor what to do. She could not go back to fetch her open Bible, nor sit down to read it, partly because it would be a reproach to him sitting there reading a novel—only a novel, no reading for Sabbath, even though it was Sir Walter’s; partly because it would seem like indifference, she thought, to occupy herself with reading at all, when at any moment he might have something to say to her again.