CHAPTER IX.
THE OLD LOVE AND THE NEW.
So Roland Lindsay was engaged to Annot Drummond. Hester could have no doubt about that when she saw the ring upon her mystic finger; and she supposed rightly that till he could ascertain definitely 'how the land lay' at Earlshaugh nothing further was arranged, and at last, to her supreme satisfaction—an emotion she once never thought to feel, so far as Roland was concerned—the day of his departure for Fifeshire came.
'I must turn up at Earlshaugh now,' said he, when the last evening came. 'I have asked Jack Elliot, Skene, and one or two other fellows, over for the covert shooting; and also, I suppose, I shall have to give my attention to Mr. Hawkey Sharpe in the matters of subsoil and drainage, mangold wurzel, and all that sort of thing.'
'I don't think he will trouble you much on these matters,' said Sir Harry dryly.
'Why, uncle?'
'You will find that he deems them his own peculiar province and interest too,' replied Sir Harry, with a lowering expression of eye; and that his once jolly old uncle's manner was now somewhat cool to him Roland was unpleasantly sensible: and when the evening drew on, and, knowing that he would depart betimes in the morning, he had to bid Hester farewell, something of regret—even remorse—came across his mind. He suspected too surely all she had been led to hope of him in the past—the love he could not give her now, at least; and he strove to affect a light bearing to her, and appear his old insouciant self, while thinking over Annot's instilled suspicions.
'Skene!' he muttered; 'was my regard for Hester a passing infatuation, or an old revived fancy? Was it likely to have proved a lasting attachment if Annot had not come? And in Hester would I have but received the worn-out remnant of an attachment for another? Do not look so strange—so white, cousin,' said he in a low voice, as he touched her hand.
'White am I?' asked Hester with inexpressible annoyance; 'if so, it is caused by anxiety for papa—he is not strong, Roland.'
'Of course,' glad to affect or adopt any idea; 'but always trust to me——'
'To you!'
'Yes; we have ever been friends, and shall be so always, I hope, for I never forget that I am your cousin, though the privileges of such might turn a wiser head than mine,' he added, unwisely, awkwardly, and with a little laugh.
A gleam came into Hester's eyes, which always looked nearly as black as night, and there was an angry curl on her red lip for a moment.
Bewildered—besotted, in fact—though Roland had become, by the wiles, graces, and beauty of the brilliant Annot, it was impossible for him not to feel, we say, some compunction, and keenly too, for his treatment of the soft and gentle Hester. He could not and dared not in any fashion approach so delicate a subject with her—explanation or exculpation was not to be thought of; yet he felt reproach subtly in her manner; he could read it in her eyes, strive to conceal her emotions as she might; and confusion made him blunder again.
'Hester, we part but for a few days,' said he in a low voice, and with more empressement of manner than he had adopted for some time past; 'we have ever been excellent friends, have we not, my dear girl? and now we shall be more so than ever.'
Hester remained silent. 'Why now, more than ever?' thought she, while his half-apologetic tone irritated and cut her to the heart, and she knew that a much more tender leave-taking with Annot was over and had taken place unseen; and now, indulging in dreamy thoughts of her own, that young lady was idling over the keys of the piano.
'Will you miss me when I am gone?' he asked, with a little nervous smile.
'No doubt you will be missed—by papa especially.'
'Well, I hope so.'
'Why?'
'It is nice to feel one's self important to others,' said he. with another awkward attempt at a jest; adding, 'May I?' as he lighted a cigar.
She grew paler still; for a moment he looked sorrowfully into her white-lidded and velvety dark blue eyes, and attempted to touch her hand, but she shrank back.
'I should like,' he began, 'to stay a little longer, of course, but I must go; the covert shooting is at hand, and Earlshaugh must wait me.'
'It is more than some do there, papa thinks.'
'The more reason for me to go, cousin,' said he, with darkening face.
'Go—and the sooner the better,' thought Hester bitterly; 'there is now no middle course for me—for us; we must be everything or nothing to each other—and nothing it is!'
'Good-night, Hester dear,' said he, still lingering. 'Adieu, Annot. I shall be off to-morrow by gunfire, as we say in barracks, when all are asleep in Merlwood.'
'Good-night.'
And so they parted, but not finally.
Early though the hour next day, Hester was too active by habit, too much of a housewife, and too kind of heart to permit him to depart without being down betimes to give him a cup of coffee and to see him ere he went, despite his laboured apologies. How fresh and bright Hester seemed in her white morning dress, with all its frills—fresh from her bath, and both clear-skinned and fair, as only a dark-haired and dark-eyed girl usually looks at such a time, requiring none of that powdering and other odious process now known as 'making up.' Annot's low curtains remained closely drawn, and there was no sign of that young lady, for the sun was barely over the woods of Hawthornden.
Hester tendered her soft cheek for Roland's farewell salute, and carried it bravely off—better even than he did, as with a wave of the hand he was driven away.
He was gone—gone, and had ceased to be hers. Lingeringly the girl looked around her. To Hester every flower and shrub in the garden seemed to have a voice and say so. Every inanimate object told her so again and again. Fragments of his cigar lay about the gravel walks; there yet swung his hammock between the trees; and there was almost no task she could attempt now that was not associated with him, and, worse than all, with Annot Drummond.
Long did Hester sit on a garden sofa, as the former could see from her window, while brushing out her marvellous hair—sit with cold and locked hands and pathetic eyes, motionless and miserable, as she listened like one in a dream to the singing of the birds, the humming of the bees around her, and the pleasant murmur of her native Esk.
The fair and beautiful girl saw this and knew the cause thereof; yet in her great love and passion, if not in her artful design, she was pitiless!
She was too well trained, she thought, by her mother to be otherwise. Taught from her cradle to look upon wealth, and all that wealth could obtain, as the chief object of life, she had from the days of her short frocks and plaited hair, heard only of 'excellent matches,' of 'moneyed marriages,' and 'eligible men,' and so her mind was framed in another world from Hester's.
Men, thought the latter, cared little for a love that was easily won, she had read. Perhaps Roland valued hers lightly thus. Well, she would assert herself—might even go to Earlshaugh, meet him beneath his own roof, and in his own home show herself that she was heart-whole, could she but act the part her innate pride suggested.
At first she avoided Annot, whom she heard hourly idling over the piano; she felt, amid all her crushing and mortifying thoughts, that she would be happier if busy, and so she bustled about the house affecting to be dreadfully so; tied up, let down, snipped, and twined rose-bushes in the garden, and strove to look happy and cheerful, with a sick and sinking heart—even attempting to sing, but her voice failed her.
On the other hand, the frivolous, emotional, and perhaps somewhat sensuous nature of Annot required change, society, and above all some exciting incident to keep her even in tolerable humour and mental health; and now that she had no companion at Merlwood but Hester and her old uncle, with his inevitable hookah and Indian small talk, she became unmistakably triste and fidgety, impatient and absent—only awake and radiant when the postman was expected. She felt utterly bored by Merlwood now, and could not conceal her impatience to fulfil her visit to Earlshaugh.
'I quite look forward to that event,' said she.
'No doubt,' assented Hester.
'It will be so delightful—a country house full of people, and mamma not there to watch and scold me in private.'
'For what?'
'Ah, you should see or hear her after she has caught me idling much with a detrimental, or daring to leave my hand in his for a moment.'
'Annot!'
'I fear that I am a natural born flirt, Hester.'
The latter made no reply, as she thought, a little disdainfully, that these would-be artless speeches were merely meant to 'cast dust in her eyes,' and with regard to her own visit to Fifeshire, she was seldom twice in the same mood of mind.
'Invited to Earlshaugh—to meet, see, and associate hourly with him, and with her, too, there!' Hester would think. 'Better feign illness and stay at home—at sequestered Merlwood; but that would only be putting off the evil day. As her kinsman, she must meet him some time and face it boldly—meet him as little more than a friend, after all that had passed between them, and he had left—unsaid!'
'I cannot make you and Roly—I mean Roland—out!' said Annot on one occasion.
'How?' asked Hester. 'I do not understand you.'
'I always thought myself quick in discovering cases of spoon——'
'Don't be slangy, Annot.'
'Slang or not, you know the phrase and all it expresses!'
'Well?'
'When I first came here I made up my mind that Roland was entirely yours, though I could not be sure whether you returned his regard; but after being with you both for nearly a month, I find myself quite at a loss.'
'Do you?' said Hester icily.
'Yes—you parted last night without the least sign of regret or emotion, and all that sort of thing.'
'How dare she attempt to quiz me thus?' thought Hester, feeling almost that she could strike the smiling little speaker; 'how dare she?—but she knows not all I know—all I was compelled to overhear!'
So, as days passed on, beyond dark shadows under her eyes, the result of broken nights, there was little bodily sign of what Hester endured mentally.
'Why, Hester, you have really and truly received a letter at last from Earlshaugh!' exclaimed Annot one morning, to Hester's annoyance and pique, as the former quickly recognised the coat of arms and post-mark; and that Annot, who received missives from the same source daily, should jest over the event, made Hester, with all her innate gentleness of heart, almost hate the speaker.
It was from Roland at last, thanking her and Sir Harry for their great kindness to him, and hoping to see her and Annot Drummond together at Earlshaugh at the time proposed.
Nothing more!
'Go to Earlshaugh—no—no!' was again Hester's first thought, with a kind of shudder; 'to be with them morning, noon, and evening—the feeling would madden me—yet how am I to excuse myself?'
'You never go from home now, papa,' she took an opportunity of saying as she wound her soft arms round Sir Harry's time-silvered head and drew it down upon her breast; 'and seldom though I do so, I wish to escape this visit to Earlshaugh—I am most loth to leave you.'
'For a few weeks—a few miles' distance!'
'But who will take my place when I am gone? Who will make your breakfast so early, cut the papers, and brighten up the fire for you——'
'The housekeeper, of course.'
'Deck the room with flowers; walk with you along the woody paths by the river? Who will read, play, and sing to you at night? I do not wish to go at all, papa—let Annot go alone.'
'Nonsense, girl! I shall miss you, of course, but it is only for a time,' said her father, who knew and felt well that it was in the nature of Hester to think and anticipate his every wish, and do all that in its truest and holiest sense made Merlwood a home for him.
'You are not worrying yourself about anything, dear?' said the old gentleman, who had his own thoughts on the matter, as he put an arm caressingly round her, and eyed her anxiously.
'Of course not, papa,' replied Hester with assumed briskness; 'about what should I worry?'
'Little troubles look big at times,' said he, laying his head back in his easy-chair.
Her trouble was not a little one, however, and while pursuing his own thoughts her father made her pale cheek grow paler still.
'Annot seems to have taken a great fancy to Roland; but the fancies of town-bred girls are often mere moonshine.'
'Not the fancies of such girls as Annot, with a home-like Earlshaugh in prospective,' said Hester, with a forced laugh, as she recalled Annot's several confidences.
'Ah!' muttered the old gentleman dubiously, while tugging his wiry white moustache; 'still, it may be a fancy that will pass,' he continued, still pursuing his own thoughts; 'and things always come right in the end.'
'On the stage and in novels, papa,' replied Hester, laughing outright.
'But they do wind up rightly, dear, even in real life sometimes.'
'You know, papa, it is always said that no man ever marries his first love.'
'It may be so, Hester—it may be so; but one thing you may be sure of, if he is a true man.'
'And that is—
'He never can forget her.'
Sir Harry's eyes kindled, and his voice grew soft as he said this; for his thoughts were wandering away to the wife of his youth—she who now lay in the old kirkyard above the Esk—and of whom Hester seemed then a living reproduction, or the old man thought so; and when he spoke thus in the love and chivalry of his heart, he revived in Hester a moth-like desire to go to Earlshaugh after all, such is the idiosyncrasy of human nature; and as some one has it, 'to suffer that self-immolation, which is common to unhappy lovers. She longed to see Roland once more'—to feast her eyes upon the man who seemed happy with another, no matter what the after-pain might be.
What she meant to say or do, or how to look—when this new fancy seized her—she knew not. She only knew that—meanly, she thought—she hungered and thirsted for the sound of his voice and a glance of his eyes, before, perhaps, he—even as the husband of Annot Drummond—went to Egypt or elsewhere, it might be to return, perhaps, no more.
Meanwhile, that 'fair one with the golden locks' was all feverish impatience till the time came for quitting Merlwood, and had no doubt that Roland would cross the Forth to meet her.
'You seem strangely interested in the movements of Roland,' said Sir Harry rather grimly to her.
'He is almost half a cousin, is he not, uncle?' said Annot, in her most cooing and caressing way; 'but no one would think me so foolish as to lose my heart to a mere cousin.'
'None will suspect you of such a loss, indeed,' observed Hester, with some pardonable bitterness, as she recalled all she had so unwillingly overheard in the shrubbery on that eventful evening.