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COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES GRANT 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 " THE ROMANdE OF WAR," " THE CAMERONIANS,' 
 
 " THE SCOTTISH CAVALIER," 
 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. L 
 
 LONDON: 
 HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 
 
 1885. 
 
 All rights reserved. 
 
COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 B^IRKWOODBEAE. 
 
 ' You are a dear and good-Iiearted jewel, 
 Mary !' said Ellinor. * How you can con- 
 stantly face and soothe the sorrows and 
 miseries of all these poor people, I cannot 
 conceive ; I am not selfish, I hope, and 
 yet the frequent task would be too much 
 for me/ 
 
 *You are not without a tender heart,' 
 replied Mary, as she set down her little 
 hand-basket, now empty. * I have paid 
 but one visit to-day — a very sorrowful one 
 — and I am glad to be back again in our 
 
 VOL. I. B 
 
2 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 own pretty home. When I saw old Elspat 
 the funeral was over, and dear Dr. Wod- 
 row had brought her back to the little 
 lonely cottage from which her husband 
 had been borne away. It was so sad and 
 strange to see the empty bed, with a plate 
 of salt upon the pillow, and the outline 
 of his coffin still on the coverlet, and the 
 now useless drugs and phials on a little 
 table, close by — sad reminiscences that only 
 served to torture poor Elspat, whose grey 
 head the minister patted kindly, while tell- 
 ing her, in the usual stereotyped way, 
 that whom He loved He chastened — that 
 man is cut down like a reed — all flesh is 
 grass, and so forth. But old Elspat shall 
 not live alone now — she is to come here, 
 and be a kind of factotum for us.' 
 
 * That is like your kind, considerate 
 heart, Mary; always thinking of others 
 and never of yourself.' 
 
 'When I think of the brio^htness of 
 our own home, Ellinor — though death has 
 
EIRKWOODBBAB. 3 
 
 twice darkened it — and compare it with 
 that of old Elspat, my heart throbs with 
 alternate gratitude and sorrow.' 
 
 * Poor Elspat Gordon/ 
 
 The speakers were sisters, two bright 
 and handsome girls, one of whom had just 
 returned from an errand of charity and 
 benevolence, while the younger was seated 
 in a garden before her easel and paint- 
 block, on which* she was depicting, for 
 perhaps the twentieth time, the features 
 of their home, Birkwoodbrae — works of 
 art in which their favourite fox-terrier 
 Jack always bore a prominent part ; and 
 Jack, his collar duly garlanded with fresh 
 rosebuds and daisies, was now crouched 
 at the feet of the fair artist. 
 
 Mary Wellwood was fair-haired, with 
 darkly-lashed eyes of violet-blue. Many 
 would call her very handsome, but few 
 merely pretty. She was far beyond the 
 latter phrase. With all its soft beauty 
 and dimples, there were too much decision 
 
 B 2 
 
4 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 and character in her face to justify the 
 simple term prettiness, while it was a face 
 to haunt one a life long ! 
 
 Two years younger than Mary, Ellinor 
 was now twenty. Her dark hazel eyes 
 were winning in expression, and, like 
 Mary's, longly-lashed, and what lovely 
 lips she had for kisses ! Hers was no 
 button of a mouth, however. Critics 
 might say that it was a trifle too large ; 
 but her lips were beautifully curved, red, 
 and alluring, often smiling, and showing 
 the pure, pearl-like teeth within ; and yet, 
 when not smiling, the normal expression 
 of Ellinor's face was thoughtful. 
 
 The orphan daughters of Colonel Well- 
 wood — a Crimean veteran — the two girls 
 lived alone in their pretty sequestered 
 home at Birkwoodbrae. They had not 
 a female relation in the world whom they 
 could have invited to share it; and though 
 sometimes propriety suggested a matron 
 or chaperone as a necessity to two hand- 
 
BIRKWOODBRAE. 5 
 
 some and ladylike girls, living almost 
 under the shadow of the manse, and 
 as the minister, Dr. Wodrow, had been 
 left by their father on his death-bed a 
 species of guardian to them, ' why hamper 
 themselves with some uncomfortable old 
 frump, when they could be perfectly happy 
 without her, with their father's old servants 
 about them ?' was always the after reflection 
 of each. 
 
 Thus for three years the time had glid- 
 ed away, and Mary's -life we shall show to 
 have been a busy, active, and useful one,' 
 adding to and nearly doubling indeed the 
 little income left them by their father, 
 through her own efforts in the production 
 and sale of the agricultural produce of the 
 few acres of Birkwoodbrae, with a skill 
 and independence of spirit that won the 
 admiration and respect of all who knew her. 
 
 Yet the house they loved so well, and the 
 patch of land around it, did not belong 
 to the orphan sisters. 
 
6 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 The heir of the entail — for, according to 
 ' Shaw's Index,' small though the property 
 of Birkwoodbrae might be, it had been 
 entailed as far back as 1696, with date of 
 tailzie 1694, by Eonald Wellwood, a re- 
 mote ancestor, who was one of the many 
 victims of King William's treachery at 
 Darien — the heir of entail, we say, held a 
 lucrative diplomatic appointment abroad, 
 and left his two nieces in undisturbed 
 enjoyment of the house and lands. 
 
 Thus the latter, in Mary's care, had be- 
 come quite a little farm, the produce of 
 which, in grazing — even in grain — butter, 
 eggs, and poultry, doubled, as we have 
 said, the pittance left to her and her sister 
 by their father, the improvident old 
 colonel. 
 
 In the words of Herbert's Jacida Pni~ 
 deiitum, Mary Well wood's motto had ever 
 been, ' Help thyself and God will help 
 thee.' 
 
 The house of Birkwoodbrae was a little 
 
BIEKWOODBRAE. 7 
 
 two-storied villa, with pretty oriel win- 
 dows, about which the monthly roses, 
 clematis, and Virginia creeper clambered : 
 and it had been engrafted by the colonel 
 on an old farmhouse, the abode of his 
 ancestors, which had two crow* stepped 
 gables and a huge square ingle-lum — the 
 later being now the ample kitchen fire- 
 place of the new residence, and in the re- 
 mote quarter of the little household. 
 
 A lintel over the door that now led to 
 the barnyard told the date of this portion 
 of the mansion, as it bore the legend often 
 repeated by Mary : — 
 
 ' Blissit be God for al his giftis. R. W. 1642,' 
 
 and showed that it had outlived the wars 
 of the Covenant and the strife that ended 
 at Killiecrankie ; and by its wall there 
 grew a hoary pear-tree, called a longovil 
 — the name of a kind of pear introduced 
 into Scotland by Queen Mary of Guise, the 
 Duchess of Longueville. 
 
 This part of the house was, or used to 
 
8 COLVILLE OP THE GUAEDS. 
 
 be haunted by a goblin known as *the 
 Darieu Ghost/ a spectre that used to 
 appear during the blustering winds of 
 March, on the anniversary of the storming 
 and sack of Fort St. Andrew by the Span- 
 iards, when a thousand Scotsmen perished, 
 among them, Ronald, the Laird or Gude- 
 man of Birkwoodbrae. This ghost was 
 a heavily-booted one, with spurs that were 
 heard to jingle as it went ; and it was 
 wont to appear by the bedside of some 
 sleeping visitor, over whom it would bend 
 with pallid face and gleaming eyes ; and 
 those who had found courage enough to 
 strike at the figure with hand or sword, 
 found, to their dismay, that notwithstand- 
 ing his heavy-heeled boots, by some idio- 
 syncrasy, peculiar perhaps to ghosts, the 
 stroke passed unimpeded through it; but 
 Mary averred that since the railway had 
 come throuo'h Strathearn, less and less had 
 been seen of the Dai'ien spectre, and now 
 it came no more. 
 
BIEKWCODBEAE. 9 
 
 Around the house were groups of lovely 
 silver birches, the ' siller birks ' that gave 
 the place its name; in front the ground 
 sloped gently downward, till the little gar- 
 den, with its well-kept plots and parterres 
 of flowers, ended in a park of emerald 
 green grass, where the spotlessly white 
 sheep and brindled cattle grazed amid the 
 sweetest sylvan scenery, the vivid colours 
 of which were now brought forth by the 
 fleecy whiteness of the clouds, the deep 
 blue of the skj, and -the brilliance of the 
 sunshine ; and, as William Black has it, ' I 
 have heard Mr. Millais declare that three 
 hours' sunshine in Scotland is worth three 
 months of it at Cairo.' 
 
 When Mary came forth into the garden 
 again, she wore an old straw hat to save 
 her complexion from the glare, and had 
 the smartest and most becoming of lawn- 
 tennis aprons pinned over her dress, with 
 Swedish gloves upon her hands, as she 
 proceeded to snip and train some strag- 
 
10 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 gling sprays of roses about the walls of 
 the house, and seemed to do so with lov- 
 ing and gentle care, as if the said house 
 was a thing of life, and sensible of the 
 love she bore it ; while uttering many a 
 yelp and gurgle, Jack, the fox-terrier, 
 overwhelmed her with the wildest of 
 canine caresses. 
 
 Now Jack was deemed a wonderful 
 * doggie ' in his way, and had been the 
 gift of Elspat's husband, an old Gordon 
 Highlander, who had followed Roberts to 
 victory, and had Jack by his side in more 
 than one battle in Afghanistan. Jack was 
 all muscle, and white as snow, save two 
 tan-coloured spots, one over the right eye 
 and the other in the centre of his back. 
 He was the perilous enemy of all dogs, 
 and cats too, and at the sight of one or 
 other his muscles grew tense, his hair 
 bristled up, and he showed his molar 
 tusks ; but otherwise he was absurdly 
 
BIRKWOODBRAE, 1 1 
 
 meek aDcl gentle, and in appearance be- 
 lied his combative nature. 
 
 * Is it not strange, Ellinor,' said Mary, 
 resuming the subject of their conversa- 
 tion, 'that Elspat's husband, who never 
 recovered from the wound received three 
 years ago in a battle in India, had a pre- 
 sentiment that he would die of it, and on 
 the anniversary of the very day, hour, and 
 moment he was hit, he expired ? Yes, 
 Jack, and you, my dear little doggie, were 
 there too,^ she added, nestling Jack's head 
 in her pretty neck. * In spite of all that 
 Dr. Wodrow said and inveighed against 
 superstition, the piper would lead the 
 funeral party thrice deisal-wise round the 
 burial-ground before entering it.' 
 
 ' And no doubt the doctor would quote 
 his ancestor's famous Anahcta^ said 
 Ellinor. 
 
 ' On that occasion he did not,' replied 
 Mary ; * but it's too bad of you, Ellinor, to 
 
12 COLVTLLE OF THK GUARDS. 
 
 quiz the dear old man, who does his duty 
 so well. I always recall what papa used 
 to say, that no one who does not try 
 with all the strength one possesses to do 
 some good to those about them, can pos- 
 sibly say they do their best to live use- 
 fully and honestly. Oh, Ellinor, what a 
 delicate arum lily you have there !' Mary 
 suddenly exclaimed. 
 
 ' I am putting it in my foreground. It 
 came with some lovely peaches.' 
 
 * From Eobert Wodrow ?' 
 
 ' Yes,' replied Ellinor, with a soft and 
 pleased smile, for thereby hung a tale, as 
 young Eobert Wodrow (of whom more 
 anon), the minister's only sod, from his 
 boyhood had sighed for Ellinor, and was 
 never perfectly happy but when with her, 
 and, like the lover of Rosamund Gray, 
 * he could make her admire the scenes he 
 admired, fancy the wild flowers he fan- 
 cied, watch the clouds he was watching, 
 and not unfrequently repeat to her the 
 
ElEKWOODBRAE. 13 
 
 poetry which he loved, and make her love 
 it too.' 
 
 And so, in early youth, the boy and girl 
 had grown fond of each other — far fonder 
 than either of them at first suspected. 
 
 'By the way,' said Mary, suddenly, and 
 pausing in the act of snipping off a de- 
 cayed rose with her garden scissors, ' the 
 Dunkeld family are back at Craigmhor.' 
 
 ' With visitors, of course ?' 
 
 *As usual — gentlemen to shoot when 
 the season opens in. a week or two ; and 
 one, a Captain Colville — a very handsome 
 man — is, I hear, the intended of that 
 haughty girl, Blanche Galloway/ 
 
 'Well, I am not ill-natured,* said Elh- 
 nor, with her pretty head on one side, as 
 she reproduced Robert Wodrow's lily in 
 flake-white; 'but the man who marries 
 Blanche won't have his sorrows to seek. 
 However, we shall not call, unless they do 
 so first, of course ; so these people are 
 nothino" to us.' 
 
14 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' Nay,' said Mary ; ' with visitors at 
 Craigmhor, the housekeeper must neces- 
 sarily require more eggs, fowls, flowers, 
 and I know^ not what.' 
 
 * Sending these things to market at 
 Perth or Forteviot is all very well, but 
 I do dishke orders from the great folks 
 at the manor house.' 
 
 ' So do I, but needs must, you know, 
 Ellinor/ 
 
 * What ^vould papa have thought ?' 
 
 * Had he thought more at times we had 
 not been reduced to such shifts — not that 
 I upbraid him, poor old man.' 
 
 ' I detest catering for these great folks, 
 "who ignore our existence, save by a bow 
 — more often a stare — at church,' persisted 
 Ellinor. 
 
 ' I care not — together w^c are independ- 
 ent, and happy here as the day is long : 
 are not you so, Ellinor ?' 
 
 * Yes ; but how if one of us were to get 
 married ? Such things happen.' 
 
BIEKWOODBRAE. 15 
 
 * Don't speculate on that, though I think 
 Eobert Wodrow does,' said Mary, with 
 something between a laugh and a sigh, as 
 she took her way to the hen-court to see 
 after her fowls. 
 
16 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 mart's adventure. 
 
 On the following day, after seeing old 
 Blspat duly installed in one of the cosiest 
 rooms of the old portion of the mansion 
 as a kind of housekeeper, Mary Wellwood 
 put on her garden-hat, brought forth her 
 fishing-tackle, tied a pretty basket round 
 her waist, and, taking her rod, a dainty 
 little one — -the gift of Ellinors admirer, 
 Robert Wodrow — set forth, accompanied 
 by Jack, to get a trout or two from the 
 May, for Mary was an expert angler, giv- 
 ing, ere she departed, a last look at her 
 favourite hen, with a callow brood of 
 primrose-coloured chickens, over which she 
 clucked noisily in the sunshine amid a 
 
maby's adventure. 17 
 
 wisp of straw, while eyeing Jack the 
 terrier with keen alarm and antagonism. 
 
 Mary left Ellinor again at her easel, and 
 smiled when she saw that the latter had 
 given some finishing touches to her cos- 
 tume, and had stuck a sprig in her lace 
 collarette, in expectation of a visit from 
 Eobert Wodrow and his mother. She 
 knew well of the loving friendship and 
 incipient regard that had long existed 
 between Eob and Ellinor; and that as 
 ' friends of years' standing each had begun 
 — she hoped — to feel that in all the world 
 the other was the dearest, and a union for 
 life would of course follow. 
 
 But young Yv^'odrow, who was now past 
 his twentieth year, had ' his way to make ' 
 in the world, and, till he had graduated 
 in medicine, matrimony was not to be 
 seriously thought of. 
 
 She had one or two errands of mercy 
 to fulfil ere she reached the river side, 
 and began to put her rod together, and 
 
 VOL. I. c 
 
18 COLVILLE OP THE GUAKDS. 
 
 deftly did so with purpose-like little hands, 
 that were cased in her garden-gloves, while 
 Jack kept close by her side. In the woods 
 there were no cats to worry, but he had 
 sharp eyes for the rabbits that scudded 
 about — sharp as any poacher or game- 
 keeper could have. 
 
 The day was a bright and lovely one 
 in summer. The pale primrose had come 
 and gone, and the bluebells were already 
 fading out of the woods ; the sorrel was 
 becoming redder, and the wild strawberry, 
 with its little white flowerets, was peeping 
 out in unlikely places. The grass in the 
 meadows was green and studded with 
 golden buttercups, and the voice of the 
 cushat dove could be heard at times 
 among the silver birches — the 'siller birks' 
 that cast their quivering and aspen-like 
 shadows on the waters of the bonnie May, 
 "which is a fine "stream for trout, ten miles 
 in length, from its rise among the Ochils 
 to its confluence with the lovely Earn. 
 
Mary's adventube* 19 
 
 Everywhere here the scenery is rich and 
 beautiful, and the banks of the May are 
 very varied. In one part a long and deep 
 channel has been worn by its "waters 
 through the living rocks which almost 
 close above it, and far down below they 
 gurgle in obscurity with a deep and mys- 
 terious sound. At another place thej pour 
 in silver spray over a linn, thirty feet in 
 height, and form a beautiful cascade, and 
 everywhere the glen scenery is picturesque 
 and richly wooded with the graceful silver 
 birch, which is so characteristic of the 
 Scottish Highlands, where it climbs 
 boldly the brows of the steepest hills and 
 rocks, though the oak prevails in the 
 valleys of the Grampians. 
 
 There had been recently a ' spate,' or 
 summer flood in the river, so the trout 
 took to the fly greedily, and intent on her 
 task Mary had nearly filled the little 
 basket that hung at her w^aist with fish — 
 two or three of which weighed heavily — 
 
 c2 
 
20 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 and cost her little fingers no small trouble 
 to diseogage the hook from their gills, ere 
 she became aware that she had a com- 
 panion in her sport, of which she was very 
 fond. But though Mary loved to dangle 
 a little rod over a brook that teemed with 
 finny denizens, it was, of course, quite 
 beyond her strength or skill to hold a big 
 rod over a river for the chance of hooking 
 a ^pounder.* 
 
 Mary Well wood had reached a part of 
 the stream where it was more difficult to 
 fish, as its banks were thickly wooded, 
 when she saw near her, similarly occupied, 
 a gentleman, who, though he did not seem 
 to watch her, certainly did so, for to his 
 eyes angling seemed an odd amusement 
 for a young girl — a lady especially — 
 though it is not more so than archery, and 
 certainly not so much as bringing down a 
 grouse upon the wing, a feat attempted by 
 some damsels now-a-days. 
 
 Clad in a rough tweed suit, with fishing- 
 
Mary's adventure. 21 
 
 boots that came above his knees, a straw 
 hat, the band of which was garnished with 
 flies and lines, he was a man above the 
 middle height, apparently nearer thirty 
 than twenty, handsome in figure and in 
 face. The latter was of a rich, dark com- 
 plexion, with regular features ; a heavy, 
 dark brown moustache, and unmistakably 
 keen hazel eyes. He was a man with a 
 fine air and of decided presence. 
 
 He had been observing Mary Wellwood 
 for some time before she was aware of his 
 presence or vicinity, and the consequence 
 was that for each trout he caught the 
 girl caught three ; for while she was solely 
 intent on making the fly, with which her 
 hook was baited, alight on the eddying 
 water in the most delicate manner directly 
 above where she supposed the fish to be, 
 he was, as he would have phrased it, 
 * taking stock ' of her lissom and graceful 
 figure, which her tight costume showed to 
 the utmost advantage as she stooped over 
 
22 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 the stream ; the perfect form of her 
 * thorouorhbrecl ' ears and hands, and the 
 exceeding fairness of her skin, which was 
 of that snowy kind which usually accom- 
 panies light brown hair, and Mary's was of 
 a brilliant light brown, shot witb gold, 
 when the ruddy flakes of sunshine struck 
 it through the trees aslant. 
 
 Desirous of getting away alike from his 
 observation and vicinity, Mary lifted her 
 line in haste, but, alas ! it was caught by 
 the root of a silver birch, which held it fast 
 a little beneath the water, and from which, 
 after drawing off her gloves, she sought 
 in vain to disentangle it. Here was a 
 dilemma. 
 
 ' Permit mc ?' said the stranger, plant- 
 ing his rod in the turf, and lifting his hat 
 as he came towards her. He at once 
 succeeded in releasing lier hook and line, 
 while Jack at once fraternised with him. 
 
 * Thanks — thank you so much,' said 
 Mary, colouring a little, as she quickly 
 
Mary's adve^'ture. 23 
 
 wound the line up, and with a bow passed 
 on to a part of the stream some yards 
 further down; the stranger had looked 
 at her shapely white hand, as if he longed 
 to take it within his own, and, as if by 
 magnetism, was strongly attracted to- 
 wards it. 
 
 But Mary — who intended to catch just 
 one more fish — had barely resumed her 
 operations before a most unforeseen mis- 
 hap occurred to her. After a ' spate,' the 
 water of the May is often dark in some 
 places, and to reach a pool wherein she 
 knew by past experience some fine trout 
 were sure to be lurking, by the assistance 
 of a stone she reached a flat boulder fully 
 six feet from the bank, but her foot — 
 light thoug^^it was — had barely left the 
 former ere it turned over in the current 
 and vanished, leaving her isolated amid 
 the stream, whereat her terrier yelped and 
 barked furiously. 
 
 The distance was too great for her to 
 
24 COLVILLE OF THll GUARDS. 
 
 leap ; moreover, the bank was steep there, 
 and to fall would end in a complete im- 
 mersion, and, gathering her skirts above 
 her little booted feet, she looked around 
 her with a comical air of perplexity and 
 dismay, which her companion of the rod 
 was not slow to perceive, and again he 
 instantly approached, but this time with 
 an absolute smile rippling all over his 
 face. 
 
 * You cannot leap this distance without 
 risk, and so must permit me to assist you 
 again,' said he, stepping at once into 
 the water, which rose midway up his long 
 fishing-boots. He put an arm round her 
 — a strong arm she felt it to be — and at 
 once lifted her to the bank. 
 
 ^I have to thank you again, sir,' said 
 Mary, blushing in earnest now. 
 
 ' I am so glad that I was within sight — 
 you were quite in a scrape, perched on 
 that fragment of rock, with the dark water 
 eddying round you,' said he, again lifting 
 
mart's adventure. 25 
 
 bis hat ; * but perhaps you can repay me 
 by indicating the nearest path to Craig- 
 mhor ?' 
 
 Mary did so, on which, still lingering 
 near, he remarked, 
 
 ' And so these are the Birks of Inver- 
 may, so famed in Scottish song, and story, 
 too, I believe? It is indeed a lovely spot !' 
 
 ' Lovely, indeed/ replied Mary, as the 
 praise of her native glen went straight to 
 her heart ; ' even we, who live here all the 
 year round, never tire of its beauty.' 
 
 'lam here for the first time ; I came to 
 this quarter only yesterday, and the alter- 
 nately bold and sylvan nature of the 
 scenery impressed me greatly. You must 
 be fond of fishing,' he added, with a well- 
 bred smile, 'and seem more expert with 
 your rod tlian I.' 
 
 *But I only know the May,' replied 
 Mary, taking her rod to pieces as a hint 
 that she was about to withdraw, on whicli 
 the stranger began to do the same. 
 
26 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' I have fished for trout in many places 
 — even in the Lake of Geneva,' said he, 
 *and, curiously enough, the fish there 
 are precisely the same as those in Lough 
 Neagh in Ireland.' 
 
 *In weather so clear and light as this 
 — even after flood — it is no easy task to 
 lure them to destruction here/ replied 
 Mary, ' and a light enough basket is often 
 carried home, even from the best parts of 
 the stream.' 
 
 * Such has been my fortune to-day,' said 
 he, as he quietly proceeded by her side ; 
 but now Mary remembered that the path 
 she had indicated to him as leading to 
 Craigmhor was also the one she had to 
 pursue to reach Birkwoodbrae. 
 
 ' Our May trout are very beautiful, and 
 are as good in quality as in appearance,' 
 remarked Mary, scarcely knowing what to 
 say. 
 
 *I hope you do not venture to such 
 places as this in winter,' said he, pointing 
 
Mary's adyentuee. 27 
 
 to some rocks that overhung the shaded 
 stream. 
 
 * Why ?' asked Mary, laughing. 
 
 * Because, when the water freezes — as I 
 suppose it does — and these rocks are cov- 
 ered with snow, there must be danger.' 
 
 ' I fear you look at them with a Lon- 
 doner's eyes.' 
 
 * I am a Londoner — in one fashion — 
 Captain Colville of the Guards.' 
 
 ' Oh, I do not fear the snow,' said Mary ; 
 * I have been up on the summit of yonder 
 hill when it was covered deep with snow/ 
 she added, pointing to a spur of the Ochils, 
 while her eyes kindled, for under the 
 shadow of those mountains she was born ; 
 ' but I vv^as only a child then.' 
 
 ' And what object took you up at such a 
 time, may I ask ?' 
 
 * To save a wee pet lamb, that else must 
 have perished in the snow.' 
 
 ' And did you carry it down ?' 
 ^ Yes — of course.' 
 
28 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' By Jove !' exclaimed the Guardsman, 
 twirling his moustache. 
 
 * We call that place Crow Court,' said 
 Mary. 
 
 'Why?' he asked. 
 
 ' Because sometimes in summer the 
 crows collect there in such numbers that 
 the green hillside is blackened with them, 
 as if they „ had all been summoned for 
 the occasion ; and sometimes they have 
 been known to wait for a day or two 
 while other crows were winging their way 
 hither from every quarter of the sky. 
 Then a great clamour and noise ensue 
 among them, and the whole will fall upon 
 one or two crows that have been guilty of 
 something, and after picking and rending 
 them to death they disperse in flights as 
 they came.' 
 
 The Guardsman knew not what to make 
 of this bit of natural history, and could 
 only stroke his moustache again. 
 
 Something in this girl's sweet but de- 
 
Mary's adventure. 29 
 
 termined profile — something ia tlie fresh- 
 ness of her character, and her slightly 
 grave manner, as that of one already ac- 
 customed, but gently, to rule others, had a 
 strange charm for Leslie Colville — for 
 such was his name — though he was evi- 
 dently a man accustomed to the ways of 
 West-End belles and Belgravian mammas. 
 Yet this girl never flattered him even by a 
 smile, and her violet-blue eyes met his 
 keen dark hazel ones as calmly as if their 
 sexes were reversed, while her whole man- 
 ner had the provoking indifference and the 
 conscious air of self-possession which can 
 only be acquired in the best society ; and 
 yet, to his very critical eye, her costume 
 was rather unsuited to the atmosphere of 
 E,egent Street and Tyburnia, being ex- 
 tremely plain, and destitute of every acces- 
 sory in the way of brooch, bracelet, ring, or 
 even the inevitable bow. 
 
 To him it seemed quite refreshing to 
 talk to a girl who, with all her loveliness, 
 
30 COLVILLE OP THE GUARDS. 
 
 evidently seemed not to know how to flirt 
 or even think about it. 
 
 'I must now bid you good-morning/ 
 said Mary, on reaching a hedge-bordered 
 path that led to her home. 
 
 * What is the name of that house so 
 charmingly embosomed among birches T 
 he asked. 
 
 ' Birkvv'oodbrae.' 
 
 ' Birkwoodbrae — indeed !' he repeated, 
 with a start that Mary detected, but be- 
 lieved it to be simulated, and felt some- 
 what offended in consequence. 
 
 ^ The name seems to interest you,' said 
 she, coldly, almost with hauteur. 
 
 *Do you reside there?' he asked, while 
 regarding her so curiously that Mary felt 
 her natural colour deepen. 
 
 * Yes, and have done so since my father's 
 death,' and, bowing again, she quickly 
 withdrew, while he, with hat in hand, 
 looked after her. 
 
 ^ These are the last trout we shall 
 
Mary's adventure. 31 
 
 have for a time — of my own fishing^ at 
 least, Ellinor/ said Mary, as slie relieved 
 herself of the basket and told of the fore- 
 noon adventures. 
 
 ^Why?' 
 
 * 1 have no wish to be escorted by an}^ of 
 the visitors at Craigmhor; least of all by 
 Captain Colville, the fiance, as I under- 
 stand he is, of that intolerable girl, 
 Blanche Gallovvay.' 
 
 ' I should think not,' replied Ellinor, 
 laughing at her sister's unusual air of 
 annoyance. 
 
 But the sisters had not heard the last of 
 Captain Leslie Colville. 
 
32 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE INTRODUOTTON. 
 
 A DAT or two after the rencontre we have 
 narrated, when the sisters were quietly 
 reading in their little drawing-room, the 
 curtained windows of which opened to the 
 lovely glen, through which May flows, 
 visitors were announced — two strangers 
 and their old friend the parish minister. 
 
 The latter entered, hat in hand, with the 
 cheery confidence of one who knew he was 
 welcome, saying, 
 
 'My dear girls, allow me to introduce 
 two new friends — Captain Colville and Sir 
 Redmond Sleath — Miss Well wood — Miss 
 Ellinor Wellwood.' 
 
 A few well-bred bows, with the sub- 
 
THE INTHODUCTION. 33 
 
 sequent inevitable remarks about the 
 weather followed, and as all seated them- 
 selves, Dr. Wodrow said, 
 
 ' We have had a long ramble bj the 
 Linn, and even as far as the King's 
 Haugh, and have just dropped in to have 
 a cup of afternoon tea, my dears.' 
 
 Mary sweetly gave a smile of welcome 
 and assent, as her hand went to the bell. 
 
 The old minister, who knew that for 
 reasons yet to be explained, Captain Col- 
 ville was anxious to see once more the 
 fair girl whom he had met and suc- 
 coured by Mayside, had artfully arranged 
 the proper introduction, which had now 
 come to pass, and the end of which he — 
 good, easy, and unthinking man — could 
 little then foresee. 
 
 Sir Redmond, as he was introduced to 
 Mary, took his glass out of his right eye, 
 where it had hitherto been, and placed it 
 in his left to focus Ellinor when introduc- 
 ed to her, each time bowing very low, yet 
 
 VOL. T. . J> 
 
34 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 with an expression of appreciative scrutiny 
 in his face. 
 
 The transference of his glass from eye 
 to eye was perhaps a small matter in 
 one way, yet in another it was very indi- 
 cative of the man's cool insouciance of char- 
 acter and bearing. 
 
 On the unexpected arrival of these 
 visitors, the first thoughts of the sisters 
 were that their household furniture was 
 decidedly the worse for the wear, that it 
 was all old-fashioned, and that the cur- 
 tains, carpets, and chairs were all toned 
 down by time ; yet everything was scru- 
 pulously clean, and in all its details Birk- 
 woodbrae was evidently the home of gen- 
 tlewomen of taste and refinement. Flowers, 
 artistically sorted, were distributed where- 
 over they might be placed with propriety, 
 with all the pretty trifles and nick-nacks 
 peculiar to the atmosphere of ' the British 
 drawing-room,' while the ueurest music lay 
 upon the open piano, and Colville's observ- 
 
THE INTEODUCTION. 35 
 
 ant eye quickly detected the latest novels 
 and illustrated papers too. 
 
 *Miss Wellwood and I are already old 
 friends/ said Captain Colville, with a 
 pleasant smile, as he slid at once into 
 conversation with Mary, laughingly, about 
 their meeting by the river. 
 
 'You have not been fishing for some 
 days past, Miss Wellwood,' he remarked, 
 incidentally. 
 
 *No, I have been otherwise occupied,' 
 replied Mary, as she thought 'he has been 
 looking for me, or has missed me,' and she 
 knew not whether to be flattered or pro- 
 voked by the discovery, while, with secret 
 pleasure, Colville w^as looking into her 
 minute and handsome face, with its starry 
 blue eyes, and tender, mobile mouth — a 
 face as rare in its candour and innocence 
 of expression as in its delicate beauty. 
 
 Sir Eedmond Sleath — of whom more 
 anon — was tall, fair-haired, and undoubt- 
 edly handsome, with a tawny or blonde 
 
 D 2 
 
36 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 moustache, and regular features. He was 
 every way the style of man to please a 
 woman's fancy, yet to those who watched 
 him closely it was evident that his blue 
 eyes — for they were a species of cold 
 China blue rather than grey — had a shifty, 
 almost dishonest expression, and that no 
 smile ever pervaded them, even when his 
 lips laughed. 
 
 He was in morning costume, with accur- 
 ately fitting, light-coloured gloves, and a 
 dainty 'button-hole' in the lapel of his 
 black coat ; while Colville wore a dark 
 velvet shooting-coat and tan gaiters, his 
 thick, brown hair carefully dressed, his 
 dark moustache pointed, a plain signet 
 ring glittering on his strong brown hand 
 — an onyx, which bore, as Ellinor's sharp, 
 artistic eye observed, the Well wood crest, 
 or one uncommonly like it — a demi-lion 
 rampant ; but then the crests of so many 
 families are the same. 
 
 Dr. Wodrow, the minister of Invermay 
 
THE INTEODUCTION. 37 
 
 (called of old the Kirktown of Mailler), 
 was a tall, stout, and more tlian fine- 
 looking man, with aquiline features, and 
 a massive forehead, from which his hair, 
 very full in quantity, and now silvery 
 white, seemed to start up in Jove-like 
 spouts, to fall behind over his ears and 
 neck. He had keen, dark-grey eyes, 
 always a pleasant smile, with a calm, 
 kind, and dignified, if not somewhat pomp- 
 ous, manner, born, perhaps, of the con- 
 sciousness that, after the laird, he was a 
 chief man in the parish. 
 
 His one little vanity, or pet weakness, 
 was pride in his descent from the pious 
 but superstitious old author of * Analecta 
 Scotica,' and other almost forgotten works, 
 but who was a great man in his time, 
 before and after the Treaty of Union, and 
 in honour of whom he had named his 
 only son ' Robert.' 
 
 The afternoon tea proceeded in due 
 course, served in fine old dragon china, 
 
38 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 brought in by old Elspat, a hard-featured 
 little woman, in deep black, owing to her 
 recent bereavement, who curtseyed in an 
 old-fashioned way to each and all, and 
 with whom the minister shook hands, 
 somewhat to the surprise of his London 
 friends. 
 
 ' What a splendid type of dog you have 
 here, Miss Wellwood — all muscle and 
 sinew — half bull, half fox terrier,' said 
 Coiville, in a pause of the conversation, 
 patting Jack, who was nestling close to 
 Mary's skirt, for the captain deemed right- 
 ly that her dog was a safe thing to en- 
 large upon. 
 
 * He is indeed a pet — the dearest of 
 dogs,' she replied, tickling Jack's ears, 
 and getting a lick of his red tongue in 
 return. 
 
 ' Are you not afraid of him ?' asked Sir 
 Redmond, a little nervously. 
 
 ' Afraid of Jack — I should think not !' 
 replied Mary, laughing. 
 
THE INTRODUCTION. 39 
 
 But somehow Jack seemed to have an an- 
 tipathy for the baronet, and growled and 
 showed his molar tusks very unmistakably 
 each time that personage focussed him 
 with his eyeglass. 
 
 The cabinet portrait of an old officer, in 
 uniform with epaulettes and one or two 
 medals, seemed to attract the interest of 
 Leslie Colville. 
 
 * That is papa,' said Mary, in an explan- 
 atory tone. 
 
 ' Ah, he was in the service, then,' said 
 the captain, smiling. ' So am I — in the 
 Scots Guards.' 
 
 ' The Scots Guards ! Then perhaps 
 you know our cousin, Captain Wellwood.' 
 
 ' Of course I know him intimately,' he 
 replied, with some hesitation, while colour- 
 ing deeply. 
 
 Mary thought there was something 
 strange in his manner, as he spoke in a 
 low and indistinct voice, heard by herself 
 alone, so she pursued the, to her, rather 
 
40 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 distasteful subject no further, but the cap- 
 tain added, 
 
 ' A lucky dog — he has succeeded lately 
 to a pot of money — quite a fortune, in fact/ 
 
 ' Lucky indeed/ assented Sir Eedmond. 
 * By Jove, there is nothing like money for 
 enabling one to enjoy life. Don't you 
 think so, doctor ?* 
 
 ' No/ replied the minister, shaking his 
 Yv^hite head, ' I agree with my worthy 
 ancestor, who remarks, in the third vol- 
 ume of his Analecia, that " wealth is apt to 
 abate the godly habits of a people." Of 
 course, Sir Kedmond, you have read Wod- 
 row's AnalectaJ 
 
 ' Sorry to say, my dear sir, that I never 
 heard of it.' 
 
 ' Indeed. It was the labour of twenty- 
 seven years. Thus, you may see that he 
 was unlike Hue, the learned Bishop of 
 Avranches, who used to say that all human 
 learning could be comprised in one volume 
 folio.' 
 
THE INTRODUCTION. 41 
 
 Sir Eedmond felt himself somewhat at a 
 loss here, and ignoring the minister, 
 whom he deemed ' an old parish pump,' 
 he turned again to Ellinor Wellwood, 
 some of whose framed landscapes drew 
 attention to her m-erits as an amateur 
 artist, and led to the production of a port- 
 folio of her sketches, over which the 
 baronet hung, as well as over herself, in 
 real or well-simulated admiration. 
 
 The latter could scarcely be, as Ellinor 
 had so many personal attractions, her 
 long lashes imparted such softness to her 
 dark hazel eyes, and the contour of her 
 head and neck seemed so graceful and 
 ladylike as Sir Eedmond stdoped over 
 her, and complimented her artistic efforts. 
 
 Meanwhile Jack, with his hair bristling 
 up, and his bandy legs planted firmly on 
 the carpet, was growling, snarling, and 
 showing such manifestations of making 
 his tusks acquainted w^ith the baronet's 
 calves or ankles, that he had to be igno- 
 
42 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 miniously taken out of the room by 
 Elspat. 
 
 ' Dog's have strange instincts and anti- 
 pathies/ said Dr. Wodrow, rather unluck- 
 il}^, and unaware of all his words implied. 
 *Ah,' he added, as Ellinor displayed one 
 of her drawings, ' that is the Holy Hill of 
 Forteviot, and these stones you see de- 
 picted among the turf possess a curious 
 legend — the story of a miller's daughter 
 who married a king — a story you must 
 get Miss Wellwood to tell you one of these 
 days. And so you have given old Elspat 
 a home here, Mary/ he added, smoothing 
 her bright hair with his hand, as he had 
 been wont to do when she was a child, 
 caressingly. 
 
 'Yes, for Ellinor and I both love the 
 poor old creature.' 
 
 ' You are one after God's own heart, 
 Mary/ said the minister, his grey eyes 
 kindling as he spoke. 
 
THE INTEODUCTION. 43 
 
 * We have never forgotten the straoge 
 weird dream — if dream it was — she had 
 in the winter night before dear papa died.' 
 
 ' And this dream ?' said Captain Colville, 
 inquiringly, and regarding the girl's face 
 with genuine interest. 
 
 *Was a waking one — tell him, Marj/ 
 said Dr. Wodrow, seeing that she hesi- 
 tated to speak of such things to an utter 
 stranger. 
 
 * When papa was on his death-bed,' said 
 she, *the winter snow.covered all the hills; 
 it lay deep in the glen there, and even the 
 great cascade at the Linn hung frozen 
 like a giant's beard in mid-air. About 
 the solemn gloaming time Elspat saw from 
 her cottage window a strange, dim, flicker- 
 ing light leave our house here, and proceed 
 slowly towards the village church, by a 
 line where oio road lies, and pass through 
 the churchyard wall at a place where no 
 gates open, and then, at a certain point, 
 
44 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 it vaDished ! At that precise time papa 
 died, and when the funeral day came — a 
 day never to be forgotten by us — the 
 roads were so deep with snow that the 
 procession took the way traversed by the 
 light, and, as the gates were buried deep, 
 the. wall was crossed at the point indi- 
 cated by the light, and the grave was 
 found to have been dug where the light 
 vanished.' 
 
 Mary's gentle voice broke as she told 
 this little story, and whatever Colville 
 thought oF it, though a town-bred Scots- 
 man, no unbelief was traceable in his 
 face. 
 
 ' We know not what to think of such 
 things,' said Dr. "Wodrow, with one of his 
 soft smiles ; ' but, as Sir William Hamilton 
 says in his metaphysics, ''to doubt and be 
 astonished is to recognise our own ignor- 
 ance. Hence it is that the lover of wis- 
 dom is to a certain extent a lover of the 
 mythic, for the subject of the mythic is 
 
THE INTRODUCTION. 45 
 
 the astonishing and the marvellous." But 
 the corpse-light is a common superstition 
 here, as the tomb-fires of the Norse used 
 to be of old.' 
 
46 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ROBERT WODRO W. 
 
 Leaving EUinor and Sir Redmond occu- 
 pied with the contents of the portfoho, 
 Mary, accompanied by the other two 
 visitors, issued into the garden, where all 
 the flowers of summer were in their bril- 
 liance. They lingered for a time at the 
 door of the barnyard, surmounted by the 
 quaint legend, and beyond which the}^ 
 could see Mary's cow standing mid-leg 
 deep among luxuriant clover, while at the 
 sight of her all the fowls, expectant of a 
 feed, came towards her noisily in flights ; 
 nor were they quite disappointed, as the 
 pockets of her lawn-tennis apron were 
 not without some handfuls of corn, and 
 
EGBERT WODEOW. 47 
 
 Colville could not help thinkiug what a 
 charming picture she made at that mo- 
 ment, as she stood with her sheeny hair 
 in the sunshine expatiating on the good 
 qualities of her feathered subjects, among 
 whom many of Lord Dunkeld's pheasants 
 came to feed as usual, but the birds 
 looked so beautiful in their brown and 
 golden-tinted plumage that Mary had 
 never the heart to drive them away. 
 
 * That is a beautiful Cochin China/ said 
 she to Colville ; ^ she consumes a gallon of 
 barley every ten days ; and is not that 
 black Spanish cock a splendid fellow? His 
 feathers are like the richest satin, and how 
 strongly his plumage contrasts with ray 
 snow-white dorkings ; and are not these 
 chickens like balls of golden fluff — dear 
 wee darlings !' 
 
 And as she spoke, and scattered some 
 grains among them from her quick white 
 hands, the birds fluttered in flights about 
 her, as if she was the mother of them all ; 
 
48 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 and, as sbe gave Colville some corn to 
 throw among them, the Guardsman, with 
 all his admiration of her, could not resist 
 a covert smile at himself and. his sur- 
 roundings. 
 
 She looked so fresh and so innocent, 
 and so ready to tell him all her little plans 
 and of her local interests. 
 
 To him, a club man — a man of the 
 world — accustomed to the giddy whirl of 
 London life, the Parks, the Row, Hurling- 
 ham and Lillie Bridge ; Lord's Cricket 
 Ground, garden and water-parties, ' feeds ' 
 at the ' Star and Garter,' and heaven only 
 knows all what more — it was a new 
 sensation this, and a wonderfully pleasant 
 one. 
 
 He was next obliged to visit her ducks 
 
 as they swam to and fro in an artificial 
 
 pond — 
 
 ' With glassy necks of emerald hue, 
 And wings barred witli deepest bine 
 That sapphire gives ; and ruddy breast 
 By the clear dimpling waters pressed,' 
 
ROBERT WODROW. 49 
 
 as Dr. Wodrow quoted the poet ; and then 
 her brown owl, which had been caught by 
 Robert Wodrow, nearly at the risk of his 
 life, in the ruined tower of Invermay, and 
 now sat in a hollow of the garden wall 
 secured by a net, behind which it winked 
 and blinked and waited for a sparrow or a 
 field-mouse ; and the girl seemed so bright 
 and independent, so happy and so busy 
 with all the objects which formed her 
 little cares, that Leslie Colville surveyed 
 her with a kind of wonder and curiosity, 
 for, while being perfectly ladylike, perfectly 
 bred and delicately nurtured, she was so 
 unlike any woman he had ever met before ; 
 her world was, in many respects, one alto- 
 gether apart from his. 
 
 Meanwhile Sir Redmond, the very pic- 
 ture of bland laziness, though secretly 
 keen as a ferret, with his glass in his left 
 eye and his hands thrust into his trousers 
 pockets, and his hair parted like a woman's 
 in the middle, was standing before Ellinor, 
 
 VOL. I. E 
 
50 COLYILLE or THE GUARDS. 
 
 and contemplating her with evident satis- 
 faction, for he was a vaurien by nature. 
 
 * And you have come here to shoot ?* 
 said she, as the portfolio was relinquished 
 at last. 
 
 * To shoot — -yes,' he replied ; * this will 
 be my first turn at the game in Scotland.' 
 
 ' Robert tells me that the gleds have 
 sucked half the grouse eggs this season.* 
 
 ^ Gleds — what are they — nasty little 
 boys ?' 
 
 ' They are a kind of crow,' replied EUi- 
 nor, laughing excessively. 
 
 'And who is Robert?' asked Sir Red- 
 mond, slowly, readjusting his eyeglass. 
 
 ' The son of Dr. Wodrow,' replied Ellinor, 
 colouring a little, as he could perceive. 
 
 ' He prognosticates a bad look-out for 
 us on the 1 2th of next month ?' 
 
 The normal expression of Sir Redmond's 
 face, which was perhaps lazy insolence, 
 seemed to change when a smile spread 
 over it, and then the sensual lips, partly 
 
EGBERT WODIIOW. 51 
 
 hidden by their fair moustache, became 
 almost handsome. In Ellinor's sketches 
 there had been ample food for ready con- 
 versation. Sir Redmond had seen all the 
 picture galleries in Europe, and, whether 
 he understood it or not, could talk of art 
 with all the ease and fluency of a well-bred 
 man of the world who was desirous of 
 pleasing, and he had watched with grow- 
 ing interest her changing face and the 
 brightening expression of her sweet eyes 
 that had become trained to observe all 
 things; but now that the portfolio was 
 closed, the conversation had begun to flag 
 a little. 
 
 * Robert also told me,' said Ellinor, to 
 fill up an awkward pause, ' that as the 
 grouse had been seen close to the barn 
 and orchard walls, it is a sign of a severe 
 winter.' 
 
 'It is too soon to think of winter yet; 
 but he seems to be an authority in 
 
 zoological matters, this Mr. — Mr. ' 
 
 E 2 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 
52 COLYILLE OP THE GUABDS. 
 
 * Wodrow/ 
 
 * Ah, yes — Robert Wodrow.' 
 
 ' He is here to speak for himself,' said 
 Ellinor, with just the slightest soupqon of 
 confusion or of annoyance in her manner 
 as a young man entered unannounced, and 
 was at once introduced to Sir Eedmond 
 Sleath, who, in responding to his bow, 
 proceeded at once to focus him with his 
 eyeglass. 
 
 With a well-knit, well- set-up figure, 
 Robert Wodro\y was an active-looking 
 young fellow, somewhat less in stature 
 than Sir Redmond, less dignified in air 
 and bearing, yet not less like a gentleman. 
 He had his father's regular features, his 
 open character of face, and honest dark- 
 grey eyes, in which at times there was a 
 thoughtful expression, the result of hard 
 study. At others a merry, devil-may- 
 carish one, the result of life among the 
 rollicking medical students of a great 
 University. 
 
EGBERT WODROW. 53 
 
 Without adverting to any subject on 
 which the two had been talking with 
 reference to himself, he proceeded at once 
 to address Ellinor. 
 
 'I have brought the ferns you wished 
 for/ said he, placing in her hand a tuft of 
 sprays. 
 
 ' Oh, thanks ; my wish was so slightly 
 expressed/ 
 
 * It was a command to me/ he said, in a 
 low voice. 
 
 ' How far did you walk for them ?' 
 
 * More than ten miles down Earnside.' 
 ' Ten miles V 
 
 ' Near to Strath Allan.' 
 
 *Dear me — the Allan Water!' said Sir 
 Eedmond. ' Is that the place where the 
 miller's lovely daughter so sadly miscon- 
 ducted herself in the sweet spring time of 
 the year ?' 
 
 Eobert's reply to this question was only 
 a cold and haughty stare, under which 
 even the baronet's insouciance nearly failed 
 
54 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 Lira, but from that moment the two men 
 instinctively felt themselves enemies. 
 
 * Why did you take so much trouble for 
 a mere trifle, Robert?' asked the girl. 
 
 ' Because I heard you express a wish to 
 have that particular fern, Ellinor/ replied 
 the young fellow, whose eyes seemed to 
 say that he would have gone ten times 
 the distance ungrudgingly for one of her 
 old smiles, or for the smile she was now 
 according, not to him, but to her strange 
 visitor, whose eyebrows were slightly and 
 inquiringly elevated, as he glanced at the 
 speaker, who seemed so much en famiJle at 
 Birkwoodbrae, and called Ellinor by her 
 Christian name, and who saw that she 
 placed the fern leaves on the table, and 
 soon — Eobert Wodrow thought too soon — 
 forgot all about them apparently. 
 
 *You have known Robert long, I pre- 
 sume, Miss Ellinor?' said Sir Redmond, 
 with a twinkle in his cold, china-blue eyes, 
 
EGBERT WODEOW. 55 
 
 and as he would have spoken of a boy or a 
 child. 
 
 * I have known him all my life/ she replied. 
 
 * Indeed !' drawled the other, who now 
 rose and took up his hat, as Colville and 
 Dr. Wodrow appeared, and were about to 
 depart, and, bidding adieu to the ladies, 
 the two visitors from Craigmhor bent their 
 steps in that direction, while the minister 
 lingered behind. 
 
 * Isn't she pretty !' exclaimed Sir Red- 
 mond, as they proceeded along the high- 
 way that seemed like a private avenue, so 
 thickly was it bordered and over-arched 
 by beautiful and drooping silver birches. 
 
 ' She — who — which ?' asked Captain Col- 
 ville, with a slightly ruffled tone. 
 
 * Ellinor — the youngest sister.' 
 
 ^ Miss Ellinor Wellwood,' said Colville, 
 with an accent on the word, * is downright 
 lovely, man ; but you think every girl 
 pretty, especially when in the country.' 
 
56 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' And away from contrasts, you mean ; 
 but excuse me ; I am neither so facile nor 
 so inflammable as that comes to ; yet I do 
 know a handsome girl when I see one ; and 
 by Jove, little Bllinor is one to cultivate. 
 Two such girls living there alone seems a 
 singular proceeding.' 
 
 ' In your eyes, I have no doubt,' replied 
 Colville, stooping to light a cigar, and hide 
 the expression of annoyance that crossed 
 his face ; ' but it is not so much, perhaps, 
 in the place where their parents have been 
 respected ; and where all know them well, 
 and seem to love them.' 
 
 ' Dressed as I could dress her,' continued 
 Sleath, still pursuing one thought, and 
 that an evil one, ' she would make quite a 
 sensation — never saw such hair and eyes, 
 by Jove.' 
 
 * What do you mean ?' asked Leslie 
 Colville, coldly. 
 
 * Well, among other things, I mean that 
 she is a deal too pretty to be thrown away 
 
EOBEET WODROW. 57 
 
 upon that Scotch country clodhopper, who 
 is evidently spoony upon her — has known 
 her all her life, and all that sort of thing, 
 don't you know/ 
 
 ' Whom do you mean now?' 
 
 ' This — well — ah — what's his deuced 
 name — Eobert Wodrow.' 
 
 * The son of a very worthy man — a 
 friend of mine, Sir Redmond.' 
 
 ' Oh — ah — iudeed.' 
 
 Colville's face darkened and grew rather 
 steru. 
 
 Why? 
 
 We shall be able to let a little light on 
 his secret emotion in time to come. 
 
 Meanwhile the speakers were the source 
 of some speculation amoDg those they had 
 just quitted. 
 
 *Who are those gentlemen, Dr. Wod- 
 row?' asked 'Mary. 
 
 'Captain Colville, of the Household 
 Brigade, and Sir Eedmond Sleath, a 
 baronet, and wealthy, I believe, friends 
 
58 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 of the Dunkeld family, come here for 
 the Twelfth. Are you pleased with them T 
 
 ' Oh, yes,' replied Ellinor, but Mary 
 remained silent. 
 
 ' Perhaps one may prove like the hunter 
 who came in the olden time to hunt here, 
 and wooed the pretty maid of Forteviot,' 
 said the doctor, laughing, and pinching 
 her soft cheek. 
 
 ' And Captain Oolville is engaged to 
 Blanche Galloway, is he not?' she asked. 
 
 * So I believe. A man of undoubted 
 wealth, he has lately succeeded to pro- 
 perty of various kinds, and means, it is 
 said, to urge his claim in the female line 
 to the peerage of Ochiltree, which has 
 been dormant since the death of David, 
 fourth lord, in 1782. He has thus 
 assumed the name of Oolville.' 
 
 ' Lord Oolville of Ochiltree,' said Mary, 
 softly and thoughtfully. 
 
 ' Yes — he claims that peerage, my dear,' 
 replied Dr. Wodrow. ' I have a great and 
 
EOBEET AVODEOW. 59 
 
 melaDclioly respect for our dormant, ex- 
 tinct, and — more than all — for our at- 
 tainted peerages. The men who held 
 them were generally, if not all, true to 
 Scotland, which is more than we can say 
 for our mongrel and often cockney-born 
 peers of the present day ; but Captain 
 Colville would be one, good, honest, and 
 true, I doubt not.' 
 
 ^ And his own name ?' 
 
 * I do not precisely know/ replied the 
 minister, whose son listened to all this 
 with a lowering brow, but lingered a little 
 behind his father, and, while the latter 
 was striding along the green lanes towards 
 the manse, Eobert was telling Ellinor over 
 again of all his hopes and plans, and his 
 expectation of certainly graduating in 
 medicine at Edinburgh, and that he would 
 get his diploma very shortly ; and then — 
 and then — Vv'hat then ? 
 
 A kiss given in secret seemed more 
 than a reward for all his labours and con- 
 
60 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 sumption of the midnight oil in a lonely 
 lodging up a common stair near the old 
 ' Academia Jacohi VI. Scotorum Begis,' and 
 where he had pored for many a weary 
 hour over 'Quain's Anatomy/ ^Christison's 
 Dispensatory,' 'Balfour's Botany/ and so 
 forth, inspired by his love for Ellinor 
 Wellwood, and now he left her, with his 
 heart full of happy dreams of the future. 
 
 ' Why did Dr. Wodrow bring those two 
 strange gentlemen here?' remarked Ellinor. 
 
 ' You may well surmise/ said Mary ; ' to 
 visit two girls living alone as we do. It 
 is so unlike him and his usual care.' 
 
 ' That Captain Colville struck me as 
 being very inquisitive about us and our 
 surroundings.' 
 
 ' I do not think so,' replied Mary ; ' but 
 his friend appeared a very blase man of 
 the world indeed, if I am a correct judge. 
 But, if afternoon tea was merely their 
 object, why not have gone to the manse?' 
 
 Gentlemen visitors — especially of such 
 
KOBEBT WODROW. 61 
 
 a style as these two — one a baronet, the 
 other a Guardsman and claimant of a 
 peerage — were not very usual at Bu^k- 
 woodbrae ; so, apart from the natural sur- 
 mises as to why the old minister, usually 
 so wary, chary, and shy about all intro- 
 ductions, should have brought these two 
 to pass, the two girls had much to specu- 
 late upon that proved of considerable 
 interest to both. 
 
 Old Colonel Wellwood, as we have said, 
 when on his death-bed, had verbally left 
 his two orphan daughters in the care and 
 custody of his old friend the minister, and 
 faithfully and kindly had the latter and his 
 worthy better-half taken the trust upon 
 them. 
 
 But no influence could induce the sisters, 
 Mary especially, to quit Birkwoodbrae and 
 reside at the manse. There was a strong 
 spirit of independence in the girls, and 
 believing in self-help they continued to 
 reside in the house wherein their parents 
 
62 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 died, undisturbed, as we have said, by 
 their kinsman, who was far away abroad. 
 
 Till the next Sunday in church the 
 sisters of Birkwoodbrae saw nothing of 
 their two visitors. The latter — io^norinof 
 the service, or seeming at least rather in- 
 different about it — were in Lord Dunkeld s 
 joew, a large, old-fashioned one, panelled 
 with carved oak, lined with crimson velvet, 
 and having a little oak table in the centre 
 of it. An arched window, in which some 
 fragments of the original stained glass of 
 pre-Eeformation times remained, was near, 
 and throusch it the sunshine streamed on 
 the handsome face and unexceptionable 
 bonnet of Blanche Galloway, who barelj^ 
 accorded the sisters a bow, and then bent 
 her over her book, which she shared with 
 Captain Colville. 
 
 Her father, the old lord — of whom more 
 anon — seemed to doze, while Sir Redmond, 
 when not glancing towards Mary and 
 Ellinor Wellwood, seemed to occupy him- 
 
ROBEET WODEOW. 63 
 
 self with studying the faces, not of the 
 hard-featured country congregation, but of 
 the Scoto-Norman chancel arch, which ex- 
 hibited elaborate zig-zag rows of heads of 
 fabulous figures and animals, characteristic 
 of church architecture in the days of 
 William the Lion and Alexander I. A 
 few coats armorial were discernible here 
 and there, emblems of races, conquests, 
 honours, and dignities of later times, all of 
 which had passed away ; tombs where 
 whilom hung the helmets, banners, and 
 swords of those who defended Scotland 
 when Scotland was true to herself, and the 
 days w^hen she would sink to be a neglect- 
 ed province were unforeseen. 
 
 Of Dr. "Wodrow's sermon Ellinor took 
 little heed. With the watchful and loving 
 eyes of Robert upon her she was only 
 anxious to get away from church without 
 being addressed by Sir Eedmond Sleath, 
 and as the latter and his friend the 
 captain were on ' escort duty ' with the 
 
64 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 fair Blanclie, Mary fully shared her anx- 
 iety and wish ; thus both sisters were on 
 the wing by the close of the last psalm, 
 that sound so welcome to the shepherd- 
 dogs, who were coiled under their 
 master's pews, and at the first notes 
 thereof were seen to yawn and stretch 
 forth their legs in anticipation of a fight 
 in the churchyard, or a scamper after the 
 sheep on the breezy sides of the hills. 
 
 Leslie Colville and Sir Redmond were 
 not, however, though we have said it, 
 'friends.' Their natures were too dis- 
 similar for that; they were merely ac- 
 quaintances, and, like some other guests, 
 had met for perhaps the first time at 
 Craig mil or. 
 
 Both were — to the casual eye — unex- 
 ceptionable in manner and appearance ; 
 but Oolville's nature and disposition were 
 open, manly, candid, and genuinely honest ; 
 while those of Sir E-edmond, whose baron- 
 etcy dated from ' yesterday,' were crooked, 
 
EGBERT WODEOW. 65 
 
 selfish, and secretly prone to man}^ kinds 
 of dissipation and evil. He had gone 
 through the worst curriculum of both that 
 the worlds of London and Paris can 
 furnish. His very eyes and lips, at times, 
 told as much. 
 
 Discovering speedily that Leslie Colville 
 resented any loose or slighting remarks 
 concerning the young ladies at Birkwood- 
 brae, and that he still more would be dis- 
 posed to resent any attentions on his part 
 towards them, though ivliy or wherefore 
 seemed very mysterious, Sir Redmond 
 Sleath contrived to pay more than one 
 visit, and to bestow more than one atten- 
 tion in secret, at least unknown to Col- 
 ville ; he, a sly Englishman of the worst 
 type, conceiving that the other was only 
 a ' sly Scotsman,' with views of his own, 
 as he himself had. 
 
 On the pretence of bringing books, 
 music, flowers, and so forth to the sisters, 
 but more particularly Ellinor, Sir Redmond 
 
 VOL. I. p 
 
66 COLYILLK OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 had found his way to the little villa rather 
 oftener than Dr. Wodrow, and still more 
 than the latter's son, would have relished. 
 Hence, one day when Eobert came to 
 Birkwoodbrae, he saw the wished-for ferns 
 he had gone so far and so lovingly to 
 procure — not planted in her little fernery, 
 but — lying dead, withered, and forgotten 
 in a walk of the garden. 
 
 Robert Wodrow made no remark on 
 this, but the neglect seemed somehow to 
 tell a bitter tale to his heart. 
 
67 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE DUNKELD FAMILV. 
 
 ' Ah, London is the true place for life ! 
 One exists only in the country, but in 
 London we live !' exclaimed Lady Dunkeld. 
 
 * You are right, my Lady Dunkeld !' ex- 
 claimed Sir Eedmond Sleath ; but life in 
 London had for him some elements to his 
 listener unknown — or, if so, not cared for 
 — flirtations with pretty actresses, dinners 
 to fast fair ones at the ' Star and Garter,' 
 cards, billiards, pool, and pyramid, all 
 very nice things in their way, but ruinous 
 if carried to excess, even by a bachelor of 
 Sir Redmond's means. 
 
 ' I agree with you also, mamma,' said 
 
 her daughter ; ' but what is it to be — a 
 
 f2 
 
6S COLYILLE OF THE GTTAJID3. 
 
 ball, or dinner-party, or a garden-party we 
 must give, if not all the three ?' 
 
 * A garden-party by all means, Blanche/ 
 And Blanche shrugged her shoulders 
 with the quaint foreign gesture which she 
 inherited with her French blood, and took 
 a sheet of paper from her desk to make 
 out a list of names, to which her father, 
 the old peer, listened with perfect indiffer- 
 ence, if he listened at all. 
 
 Though descended from Patrick Gallo- 
 way, who was minister of the Gospel at 
 Edinburgh in the reign of James VI., the 
 Dunkeld family, as the Scottish Peerage 
 tells us, were first ennobled in tbe person 
 of Sir James Galloway of Carnbee, in Fife- 
 shire, who was Master of the Requests to 
 James YI. and Charles I., Secretary of 
 State and Clerk to the Bills, and was 
 * created Lord Dunkeld by patent on the 
 15th of May, 1645.' After intermarriages 
 with the families of Duddingston and Dud- 
 hope, we come to ' James, third Lord Dun- 
 
THE DUNKELD FAMILY. 69 
 
 keld, who was bred to the army, and 
 
 was accounted a very good oflBcer,' says 
 
 Douglas ; ' he joined Lord Dundee when 
 
 he raised forces for King James YIL, and 
 
 was with him at the battle of Killiecrankie/ 
 
 There he was one of the foremost in 
 
 that heroic charge, before which 
 
 * Horse and man went down like drift-wood 
 
 "WTien the floods are black at Yule, 
 And their carcases were whirling 
 In the Garry's deepest pool.' 
 
 Outlawed, he became a colonel in the 
 French service, and fell in battle but long 
 after ; his name appears as ' my Lord 
 Dunkell ' in the Liste des Officiers Genereaux 
 for May 10, 1748. 
 
 James, the fourth lord, v/as also a gene- 
 ral in the French army, and was a Grand 
 Cross of St. Louis. 
 
 His grandson, the present lord, proved 
 — untrue to the old traditions of his race 
 — a very different, useless, and mediocre 
 Scottish peer, of the type too well known 
 in our day. He had no property in Scot- 
 
70 COLVILLE OF THE GCTARDS. 
 
 laiad, and no more interest in her people, 
 morally, practically, or politically, than a 
 Zulu chief. He was proud of his descent 
 and title, nothing more, and, not being 
 very wealthy, thought, like his wife, that 
 Leslie Colville would be a very eligible 
 son-in-law ; while at his death his title 
 would inevitably pass to a second cousin, 
 Colonel Charles Edward Galloway, chef 
 cTescadron of a cavalry regiment, then 
 quartered at Chalons-sur-Marne. 
 
 Lord Dunkeld had one pet vanity — a 
 real or fancied resemblance in his profile 
 to those of the Grand Monarque and the 
 later Louis of France ; a facial angle indi- 
 cative of weakness certainly, if not of 
 worse ; but, if the idea pleased him, it did 
 no one any harm. 
 
 Though thoroughly English bred, and 
 Eoglish in all her ideas, as taken from her 
 mother, the Hon. Blanche Gabrielle — so 
 called from her grandmother, Gabrielle de 
 Pontaine-Martel (daughter of the marquis 
 
THE DUNKELl) FAMILY. 71 
 
 of that name) — bad considerable French 
 espieglerie in her manner, and many pretty 
 foreign tricks of it, with her eyebrows and 
 hands, but she was naturally cold, ambi- 
 tious, selfish, and vain. 
 
 It was the luncheon-time at Craigmhor, 
 which Lord Dunkeld only rented. The 
 shooting had not yet begun ; the circle 
 therefore had some difficulty in getting 
 through the days, and the necessity for some 
 amusement being devised, * something being 
 done,' was on the tapis. 
 
 Blanche wore a dress of plain blue serge, 
 with a simple linen collar and lace collarette 
 encircling her slender neck. Her hair, of 
 a light golden tint, was dressed in the 
 most perfect taste by the deft fingers of 
 Mademoiselle Eosette, her French maid. 
 In contrast to her hair, her eyes were dark 
 — large eyes, full of observation and ex- 
 pressive of sensitiveness -, she had delicately 
 cut lips, which always seemed to droop 
 when she did not smile. 
 
72 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 She had a general air of great softness 
 and sweetness, which was most deceptive, 
 as Blanche Galloway was secretly strong, 
 with all the strength of one who in love, 
 hate, or ambition could be fearless, and 
 wily as fearless. Lastly, she had that 
 which so often comes with foreim blood 
 in a girl's veins, the faintest indication of 
 a moustache, or down, at the corners of 
 her red and mobile lips. 
 
 Luncheon, we say, was in progress. 
 Colville, Sir Eedmond, and some other 
 guests (who have no part in our story) 
 were busy thereat ; and the old family but- 
 ler — in some respects an old family tyrant, 
 who resented any alteration in the daily 
 domestic arrangements as something bor- 
 dering on a personal affront — was carving 
 at the sideboard. 
 
 It was high summer now. The chest- 
 nuts were in full leaf, and their shadows 
 were lightened by the silver birches. The 
 garden around Craigmhor was red with 
 
-^ THE DUNKELD FAMILY. 73 
 
 roses ; the stone vases on the paved ter- 
 race were teeming with fragrant blossoms, 
 and the stately peacocks, their tails studded 
 with the fabled eyes of Argus, iridescent 
 and flashing in the sunshine, strutted to 
 and fro. 
 
 Craigmhor (or the Great Rock) was 
 neither a Highland stronghold of the 
 middle ages nor a Scoto-French chateau of 
 the latter James's, but a very handsome 
 modern villa, with all the appurtenances 
 and appliances that wealth and luxury can 
 supply in the present day, otherwise my 
 Lady Dunkeld could not have endured it. 
 
 Once a belle in Mayfair, she had many 
 remains of beauty still, as she was not 
 over her fortieth year. Sooth to say — 
 and we are sorry to record it — she did 
 not like Scotsmen very much, but she 
 rather approved of Leslie Colville. He 
 was now very rich — the probable inheritor 
 of a title nearly as old as that borne by 
 her husband ; and having been educated 
 
74 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 at Eugby, and being now in the Guards, 
 he was a kind of Englishman by naturali- 
 zation, a view which perhaps Colville would 
 have resented. 
 
 For many reasons Lady Dunkeld did 
 not care about a ball in the country ; it 
 was so difficult where to draw the line 
 with regard to the invitations. 
 
 In London her balls were always a suc- 
 cess — no one knew precisel}^ how or why 
 — yet they were so, though organised just 
 like those of other people. Her cards of 
 invitation were always in keen request, 
 and, though she had the reputation of 
 yearly launching into society, and getting 
 excellent matches for a bevy of lovely 
 girls, her daughter Blanche, now in her 
 twenty-fourth year, was still upon her 
 hands. 
 
 So the idea of a garden-party was 
 carried nem. con.^ as suitable to ' all sorts.' 
 
 They might have in the garden and 
 lawn those with whom they could not 
 
^ THE DUNKELD FAMILY. 75 
 
 be intimate in the house. It was easy 
 to entertain with ices, wine, and fruity 
 music, and chit-chat those whom they 
 cared not to have at their mahogany, or 
 to meet in the tolerably perfect equality 
 of a ball-room. Oh, yes, a garden-party 
 was just the sort of thing to have for 
 the people about Craigmhor, who were not 
 county people. 
 
 So, while some of the gentlemen with- 
 drew to smoke and idle in the gun-room 
 or stables, Blanche seated herself at her 
 davenport, and, with a dainty gold pencil, 
 proceeded to make out the list for her 
 mamma. 
 
 Certain names were put down as a 
 matter of course ; those of adjacent land- 
 holders or the renters of shootings — many 
 of whom were English idlers of good 
 position ; also ' a paper lord/ v/ho lived 
 in the vicinity, for, in absence of the 
 real article, as Sir Redmond said, with a 
 laugh, Hhe factitious rank that accrues 
 
76 COLVILLE OF THE GUABDS. 
 
 to the Scottisli bench was always accept- 
 able in Scotland.' But though Sir Red- 
 mond was a baronet, he came of a farail}^ 
 which, like that of Mrs. Grizzle Pickle, 
 
 * was not to be traced two generations 
 back by all the powers of heraldry or 
 tradition.' 
 
 A country doctor and a clergyman or 
 two, with their families, come next, in- 
 cluding the Rev. Dr. Wodrow, of course. 
 
 'The Misses Wellwood, mamma?' said 
 Blanche, inquiringly, as she looked up 
 from her list. ' I saw them at church on 
 Sunday.' 
 
 ' Are these girls living alone — still ?' 
 asked Ladv Dunkeld, * without even an 
 old maid to play propriety.' 
 
 ^ It is clearly against the rules of society, 
 mamma.' 
 
 * As laid down by Mrs. Grundy. Have 
 them, by all means,' said Lord Dunkeld ; 
 
 * but for their extreme goodness, charity, 
 a,nd spotless lives, uncharitable people 
 
THE DUNKELD FAMILI. 77 
 
 might say uncliaritable things. We must 
 have them, Blanche ; their father was a 
 brave old officer.' 
 
 Whether it was some French associa- 
 tions and his half-blood that influenced 
 ]iim, we cannot say ; but Lord Dunkeld 
 by no means shared in the prejudices 
 of his wife and daughter against the two 
 orphan girls at Birkwoodbrae, more especi- 
 ally, as he admitted, their father had been, 
 like himself and his fathers before him, a 
 man of the sword, 
 
 ^Put their names down, Blanche,' said 
 Lady Dunkeld ; adding mentally, ' men like 
 Sir Eedmoad will be sure to get up a 
 flirtation, which these cottage girls will be 
 sure to misunderstand.' 
 
 ' But will they come, mamma ?' said 
 Blanche. ' You know we have never 
 called on them.' 
 
 ' That is a matter easily remedied — 
 deliver your invitations in person,' said old 
 Lord Dunkeld. 
 
78 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 * And if we invite them here, are we 
 also to invite the elder girl's shadow T 
 asked Blanche. 
 
 ' Her shadow !' exclaimed Lady Dankeld. 
 ' Who do you mean ?' 
 
 * That young man — I do not rightly 
 know his name — to whom she is, Rosette 
 tells me, engaged.' 
 
 ' Of course not ; where would your list 
 end if we went on thus?' 
 
 Blanche either meant Ellinor's lover, or 
 made a mistake ; but somehow both Col- 
 ville and Sir Redmond Sleath noted her 
 words. 
 
 After a time it was discovered that ' the 
 young man ' referred to was Dr. Wodrow's 
 only son, so his name was included in the list. 
 
 ' How many such acquaintances as these 
 people are made in a year and then 
 dropped,' observed Blanche, unaware that 
 Captain Colville coloured with something 
 of pain and even annoyance at her remark. 
 
 To all this sort of thing Sir Redmond 
 
THE DUNKELD FAMILY. 79 
 
 Sleath listened with attention. "We need 
 not conceal the fact or circumstance that 
 this enterprising baronet had marked out 
 the soft, dreamy, artistic, and gentle 
 Ellinor for a kind of affaire clu coeur pecu- 
 liarly his own. Mary Wellwood, from her 
 natural strength of character, he knew to 
 be beyond the range of his nefarious views 
 or schemes; and eventually, the warmth 
 of bis attentions to Ellinor were only 
 curbed in public or veiled by a wholesome 
 fear of his new acquaintance, Captain Col- 
 ville, who, he thought, was ^idiotically 
 smitten' by a fancy for or interest in 
 Mary, for a time, of course, he supposed, 
 ' as these things never lasted ;' and he 
 hoped, when the Guardsman went back to 
 town and was fully under the influence of 
 Blanche and her mother, to return to the 
 vicinity of Birkwoodbrae on any pretence, 
 and then have the field to himself. 
 
 For a man like Sir Kedmond there was 
 a strange fascination in achieving the con- 
 
80 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 quest of, or in 'running to earth,' as he 
 would have phrased it, a girl so pure and 
 confiding as Ellinor, and whose beauty 
 and helplessness inspired him with a kind 
 of love, as he thought it, but a selfish love 
 peculiarly his own. 
 
 It may excite surprise that such world- 
 lings as Lord and Lady Dunkeld did not 
 prefer a baronet as a parti for their 
 daughter's hand ; but Leslie Colville was 
 by far the richer of the two, and possessed 
 landed property in various directions ; 
 and, however Sir Redmond might admire 
 Blanche Galloway, he dared not raise his 
 eyes to her, for very sufficient reasons yet 
 to be explained. 
 
 Finding that Colville, as we have said, 
 was curiously disposed to resent some of 
 his off-hand remarks about Mary and 
 Ellinor Wellwood, he began to take refuge 
 in professions of the greatest esteem for 
 them both, and occasionally urged his 
 regard for the youngest. 
 
THE DUNKELD FAMILY. 81 
 
 * In love again — you — and with, a little 
 
 country lass?' said Colville, laughing. 
 
 ' You who were over head and ears, as the 
 
 saying is, with Lady Sarah, all last season, 
 
 as repute said.' 
 
 ' When she loved me — if she was capable 
 of it,' replied Sleath, with a dark look, 
 ' she was indeed my Queen of Hearts.' 
 
 * And now, having married that mil- 
 lionaire fellow, she is Queen of Diamonds. 
 But what could you expect of a girl who 
 was engaged to two men at once, and wore 
 the ens^aofement rinofs of both T 
 
 ' Of course her heart was no longer her 
 own when the milliona^ire solicited. She 
 accepted him, and made a hecatomb of my 
 letters and tiiose of another fool, who is 
 now broiling with his regiment in South 
 Africa. '' The world well lost for love " 
 is poetic, certainly, but devilish stupid 
 practically.' 
 
 Though entirely opposite and different 
 in character and disposition, both these 
 
 VOL, I. G 
 
82 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 men looked forward with pleasure to the 
 anticipated garden-party — Colville with 
 real satisfaction to the hope of meeting 
 Mary Wellwood once more ; and Sir Eed- 
 mond to the chances of furthering his 
 own particular views. 
 
S3 
 
 CHAPTER YI. 
 
 THE VISIT. 
 
 Putting some constraint upon themselves, 
 we are sorry to say, Lady Dunkelcl and 
 her daughter on the following afternoon 
 drove over to Birkwoodbrae, and sent in 
 their cards to Mary and Ellinor Well wood, 
 who were busy in their little drawing-room 
 with some piles of freshly-cut flowers ; and 
 though both were startled — or certainly 
 surprised — by this unusual visit, nothing 
 of that emotion was perceptible in their 
 manner; yet the arrival of the London 
 carriage, with its showy hammercloth, 
 with the Dunkeld arms on the panels, a 
 row of plated coronets round the top, the 
 elaborate ' snobbery.' if we may call it so, 
 
 g2 
 
84 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 of rank — Scottish rank, too often without 
 patriotism — was there — excited something 
 akin to terror among the old servants ; 
 and the way in which one of the tall 
 ' matched footmen ' pulled the door bell, 
 and the other banged down the carriage 
 steps, went quite ' upon the nerves ' of 
 old Elspat Gordon, and the visitors sailed 
 in, displaying those perfect toilettes which, 
 were suited to the Row, and which London 
 alone can produce. 
 
 The beauty of the day, of the weather 
 generally, more than all the beauty of 
 Birkwoodbrae and its garden, ' which 
 seemed quite a love of a place, with all 
 its roses and flowers,' were all discoursed 
 on rapidly and fluently by Lady Dunkeld 
 and Blanche Galloway, while their obser- 
 vant eyes took in every detail of the 
 sisters, their appearance, dress, and sur- 
 roundings, with all of which they felt 
 secretly bound to admit that no solid fault 
 could be found, though the carpets, hang- 
 
THE VISIT. 85 
 
 ings, and so forth had certainly seen better 
 times. 
 
 ' We are to have a garden-party in a 
 few days^ Miss Wellwood,' said Lady 
 Dunkeld, * and hope to have the pleasure 
 of seeing you and Miss Ellinor. Lest you 
 might be out, I have brought your cards ; 
 but, being a country gathering, it will be, 
 I fear, rather a tame affair,' she added, 
 smiling, as she laid the embossed and 
 scented missives on the table. 
 
 Mary's long lashes quivered as she 
 glanced at Ellinor. Both bowed an assent, 
 and murmured thanks, adding that they 
 led very quiet lives now, and seldom went 
 much abroad. 
 
 ' What are vou making^ with all these 
 beautiful flowers?' asked Blanche Gallo- 
 way ; ' two funeral chaplets apparently.' 
 
 * They are so — green ivy leaves, white 
 roses, and lily of the valley,' replied Mary. 
 
 ' For what purpose ?' 
 
 * To lay on the graves of papa and 
 
86 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 mamma. To-morrow is the anniversary 
 of her death — she died in summer, papa 
 in winter,' she added, with the slightest 
 perceptible break in her voice. 
 
 ' Oh, indeed ; how good of you !' mur- 
 mured Lady Dunkeld. 
 
 * How pretty !' cooed her daughter, one 
 of those young ladies so carefully trained 
 as to think it ' awfully bad form ' to betray 
 any emotion or feeling that was in any 
 way natural. 
 
 * Sir Redmond Sleath was so enchanted 
 with your drawings, Miss EUinor,' said 
 Lady Dunkeld, to change the subject, as 
 woful ones were eminently distasteful to 
 her. ' He is never weary of singing their 
 praises/ 
 
 This was not strictly true, for the 
 baronet had just barely mentioned the 
 matter once, but poor Ellinor blushed with 
 real pleasure. 
 
 * He is very good-natured,' said Miss 
 Galloway, lest the listener might value Sir 
 
THE VISIT. 87 
 
 Redmond's praises too highly ; * but fas- 
 tidious — oh, very fastidious. Don't you 
 think he has handsome eyes ?' 
 
 *I did not observe them.' 
 
 ' Indeed ! They are a lovely blue.' 
 
 ' I never before heard a man's eyes called 
 lovely,' said Mary, laughing. 
 
 * And he is such a flirt!' 
 
 ^Blanche, child !' expostulated her mother. 
 
 ' But he has strange ideas — people say 
 he will never marry,' added the ^ child,' 
 who was determined that, whatever Elli- 
 nor might think, she was not to flatter 
 herself that she had made anything ap- 
 proaching a conquest. * He has been 
 everywhere, and, of course, has seen every- 
 thing.' 
 
 ' And is a male flirt, you say ?' said Mary, 
 smiling. 
 
 ' Too awfully so -, but then, most of the 
 young ladies he knows are not disinclined 
 to a little flirtation, and can take very good 
 care of themselves.' 
 
88 COLVILLE OP THE GUAEDS. 
 
 As Miss Galloway spoke, there was the 
 slightest derisive erection of her delicate 
 eyebrows, and the pointed intonation of 
 mockery in her well-bred voice. All this 
 was meant for Ellinor's edification, and 
 she did not entirely forget it ; but to Mary 
 there seemed something discordant, flip- 
 pant, and strange in thus discussing a 
 visitor's ways or character. 
 
 *We all travelled together/ said Lady 
 Dunkeld, ' and came straight from London 
 to Perth. As for tarrying in Edinburgh, 
 that was not to be thought of.' 
 
 ' Of course not,' added Blanche, shrug- 
 ging her shoulders. * I don't tliink even 
 Captain Colville with all his patriotism 
 could stand the dulness, the narrow ideas, 
 and the bad style of people there. All 
 provincial towns are so unbearable after 
 London.' 
 
 Mary Wellwood resented, but silently, 
 their ungracious remarks. Her memories 
 of Edinburgh were experiences never to 
 
THE VISIT. 89 
 
 be forgotten ; and she thought of the lovely 
 valley gardens, the veritable river of green- 
 ery under the vast Castle Eock, the glori- 
 ous white terraces of the New Town, the 
 dark and history-haunted masses of the 
 Old — the Regalia, Mons Meg, and all the 
 rest of it, as she had seen them in the 
 happiest days of her girlhood ; and she 
 felt pleased when Lady Dunkeld said : 
 
 ' Captain Colville had not been there for 
 years ; and he was disposed to stay a day 
 or two behind us.' 
 
 ' Surely not for the sake of any beauty 
 he sa^,' exclaimed Blanche, laughing ; 
 ' but in many ways he is very different from 
 Sir Redmond.' 
 
 He was indeed, we are glad to say ; but 
 in what particular manner the Hon. 
 Blanche referred to, the sisters were not 
 fated to know, as Lady Dunkeld now rose, 
 the carriage was summoned, and saying 
 with one of her sweet but stereotyped 
 smiles, ' we shall expect to see you at our 
 
90 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 little affair, gave them the tips of her 
 gloved fiogers and swept away. 
 
 Marj and Ellinor looked at each other 
 with a little expression of surprise and 
 bewilderment in their faces, and both felt 
 that Blanche Galloway had, to say the 
 least of it, disappointed them by her gene- 
 ral style. 
 
 Their emotions varied — one moment 
 they felt flattered and pleased by the re- 
 cognition of their own position and that 
 once held by their parents in society which 
 the sudden visit from the ladies of the 
 great house implied. 
 
 At another moment they felt the reverse 
 — feared they were being patronised, and 
 thought they should decline the invitation. 
 
 Yet why ? 
 
 To do so would be, perhaps, to adopt 
 the position of an inferior ; and the invita- 
 tion might be the result of real kindness 
 of heart, after all. 
 
 They knew not that they were indebted 
 
THE VISIT. 91 
 
 for the whole affair chiefly to a few friendly 
 remarks made by Lord Dunkeld, and more 
 especially by Leslie Colville, though those 
 of the latter caused some afterthoughts. 
 
 ' Men are very weak,' surmised Lady 
 Dunkeld ; ' but, of course, a man in Cap- 
 tain Colville's position can mean nothing 
 more than simplest kindness, but the girls 
 are pretty — unfortunately for themselves, 
 I think, more than pretty.' 
 
 The pride, admiration, and half-alarm 
 of Elspat Gordon and other old servitors 
 on the subject of the visit, which proved 
 their nine days' wonder, amused while it 
 annoyed Mary. She had her own ideas — ^ 
 it might be fears for the future — and, 
 though she said little, she thought a good 
 deal. 
 
 The acceptances were written and de- 
 spatched ; and costumes were the next 
 thing to be considered for the entertain- 
 ment, of which Robert Wodrow heard the 
 tidings with a very dark expression in his 
 face indeed. 
 
•92 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 'Of what are you thinking, Ellinor?' 
 asked Mary, softly, seeing the dark eyes 
 of her sister fixed apparently on vacancy. 
 
 ' Only of how differently the lives of 
 some of us are allotted, and how pleasantly 
 some ]3eople are circumstanced, compared 
 with others.' 
 
 * Meaning ourselves and such as Blanche 
 Galloway ? 
 
 ' Well, yes/ 
 
 ' Never mind, Ellinor dear,' replied 
 Mary ; ' I always say, blessed be God for 
 all His gifts/ she added, thinking of the 
 legend over the old doorway. 
 
93 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 DREAMS AXD DOUBTS. 
 
 The sun of a soft and balmj summer 
 afternoon was, as the song has it, 
 
 ' Glinting bright 
 On Invermay's sweet glen and stream,' 
 
 on all the silver birches that grow thereby, 
 on the rocky gullies through which the 
 stream gurgles and babbles as it forces a 
 passage towards the Earn, and on the 
 green mound of the Holy Hill, of which 
 its ceaseless current has swept so much 
 away, when Mary Wellwood, alone, or at- 
 tended only by her dog, and full of her 
 own happy and innocent day-dreams, took 
 a narrow path that leads northward down 
 the side of the sylvan strath. 
 
94 COLYILLE OP THE GUAEDS. 
 
 Her dress was plain, but fitted well her 
 lithe and slender figure. She had on the 
 daintiest of white cuffs and collar ; a sun- 
 shade over her head lined with pink im- 
 parted to her soft face a glow that it did 
 not naturally possess, and over her left 
 arm were the two chaplets she and Bllinor 
 had been so lately preparing. 
 
 No sound but the rustle of leaves and 
 the twitter of birds broke the sunny still- 
 ness, till she eventually heard Jack, her 
 fox-terrier, who was careering in front 
 of her, barking and yelping with all the 
 satisfaction of a joyous dog that has met 
 with a friend, and almost immediately 
 afterwards a turn of the rocky patli 
 brought her face to face with Captain 
 Colville, who, rod in hand and basket 
 on shoulder, had just quitted his fishing 
 in the May after a satisfactory day's sport, 
 and about whose well-oraitered leo:s Jack 
 was leaping and bounding noisily. 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 95 
 
 ^When Jack was here, I knew bis 
 mistress could not be far off,' said Col- 
 ville, lifting his fly-garnished wideawake 
 and presenting a hand with his brightest 
 smile. 'You know the saw, Miss Well- 
 wood, *'Love me, love my dog," but it 
 would seem that Jack loves me. And 
 Jack is a travelled dog, I understand — one 
 who has seen the world?' 
 
 * Yes ; Jack was a soldier s dog — was 
 with Eoberts' army in India, and in more 
 than one battle,' replied Mary. 
 
 ' I too have been in India — a bond be- 
 tween Jack and me,' said Colville, as he 
 produced a biscuit from his pocket, and 
 the dog caught it with a snap. 
 
 ' He wags his dear old tail quite as if 
 he recognised a comrade,' said Mary, 
 laughing, while Colville accompanied her 
 along the narrow path over which the 
 silver birches drooped their graceful foliage. 
 
 ' And so you and your sister, Miss Elli- 
 
96 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 nor, are cousins of my brother-officer, 
 Wellwood ? said Colville, af fcer a pause, 
 and a little abruptly, as Mary thought. 
 
 ' I am sorry to say we are/ 
 
 ' Why sorry — he is not half a bad 
 fellow ?' 
 
 ' Well, I have no reason to be otherwise 
 than quite indifferent on the subject of 
 his existence. It was some family matter. 
 Our parents were never friends, and he — 
 he ' 
 
 * What ?' 
 
 ' Has chosen to forget there were such 
 persons in the world 'as Ellinor and I; 
 and considering that we have so few re- 
 lations — ^none else nearly now- ' Mary 
 
 paused, and her eyes fell on the chaplets 
 through which her slender arm was passed. 
 
 ' He could never have seen you/ said 
 Colville, earnestly ; ' had he done so he 
 would never have forgotten you, believe 
 me ; and when I tell him ' 
 
 * Tell him nothing, pray.' 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 97 
 
 * As you please, Miss Wellwood. I knew 
 him in India, before I was in the Guards.' 
 
 ' Indeed.' 
 
 * Yes ; I remember his first dinner with 
 our mess at Lahore — got screwed, as the 
 phrase is; and how do you think he was 
 taken to his bungalow ?' 
 
 * In a cab, perhaps/ suggested Mary. 
 
 * We carried him through the lines 
 shoulder-high upon a door, with the bugles 
 playing the " Dead March in Saul," before 
 him.' 
 
 ' Then he is dissipated ?' 
 
 * Oh — awfully — a wild fellow, in that 
 sense.' 
 
 * He was wounded in an affair with a 
 hill tribe ?' 
 
 ' So was I. Had your odious cousin 
 been shot, I suppose you would not have 
 cared much ?' 
 
 'Nay — nay — nay,'' exclaimed Mary; 'can 
 you think so vilely of me? Perhaps I 
 might have wept for him ?' 
 
 VOL. I. H 
 
98 COLVILLE OF THE GITAEDS. 
 
 'Indeed. Why?' 
 
 ' In the knowledge that, like Ellinor and 
 myself, he had no father, mother, or other 
 kindred to sorrow for him.' 
 
 Her voice, musical at all times, and 
 sweetly modulated — for a chord seemed to 
 run through every word — broke a little 
 just then ; and she coloured on seeing 
 how earnestly her companion was regard- 
 ing her. 
 
 ' For what purpose are those wreaths of 
 flowers ?' he asked, softly, after a pause. 
 
 ' To lay upon our graves. ' 
 
 ' Our graves,' he repeated. 
 
 ' Papa and mamma's graves, I mean.' 
 
 * A melancholy duty.' 
 
 ' The only one that is left us now.' 
 *May I accompany you?' 
 
 * If you choose. Captain Colville.' 
 ' And where are they buried ?' 
 
 ' Here/ replied Mary, as she gently 
 opened the gate of the churchyard, and 
 they entered together. 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 99 
 
 It was an old and sequestered burying- 
 ground — older than the days when For- 
 doun, the Father of Scottish History, 
 wrote of the district as Fortevioch, a 
 supposed corruption of the Gaelic for dis- 
 tant and remote. Old headstones, spotted 
 with lichens and green with moss, were 
 there half sunk in the ground amid the 
 long rank grass ; but the two graves that 
 Mary sought so lovingly, were smoothly 
 turfed and adorned with flowers planted 
 by the hands of herself and EUinor. 
 
 As she knelt to deposit a chaplet at the 
 head of each, Colville read the inscriotion 
 on the modest tombstone to the memory 
 of Colonel Wellwood, of the Scots Fusi- 
 liers, and Ellinor his wife, and Mary, 
 glancing upwards, saw that as he read a 
 soft expression stole into his face, while he 
 hastily, almost surreptitiously, lifted his 
 hatj and then looked more kindly, if possi- 
 ble, at her. 
 
 * Well,' thought the girl, 'he is, at least, 
 
 h2 
 
100 OOLYILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 the best of good fellows to feel this inter- 
 est in total strangers. It is, I suppose, 
 what poor papa used to call ^' the Free- 
 masonry of the service." ' 
 
 Anon came other thoughts that were 
 less pleasing to her. Did real emotion 
 and kindness prompt all this, or was it but 
 a cunning attempt, by an affectation of 
 sympathy and friendly interest, to gain her 
 favour. 
 
 But she repelled the suspicion as some- 
 thing unworthy of him and of herself. 
 
 Quitting the churchyard in silence, he 
 softly closed the gate, and they continued 
 to walk on slowly a little way together, 
 and Colville was silently recalling Mary's 
 curious legendary story of the funereal 
 light seen by Elspat, the old soldier's 
 widow. 
 
 Mary Wellwood's manner and bearing 
 proved to Colville wonderfully attractive. 
 Easy, unaffected, and apparently uncon- 
 scious of her own beauty, she was charm- 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 101 
 
 ing. She was equal, in all the attributes 
 of good society, to any girl he had met, 
 and Leslie Colville was no bad judge, as 
 he had been brought up in an exclusive 
 set, among whom any faults of breeding 
 were discrepancies never to be atoned for. 
 
 And she — how was she affected towards 
 him ? Stealing a glance at his handsome 
 face and figure from time to time, and 
 listening to his very pleasant voice, Mary 
 — somewhat of a day-dreamer — was think- 
 ing- how deliofhtful it would have been had 
 Crod given her and Ellinor such a man as 
 a brother to guide, love, and protect them. 
 
 It began to seem to both that they had 
 been friends — companions certainly — for a 
 longer time than they had known each 
 other ; they discovered so much in com- 
 mon between them, so far as sentiment 
 and opinion went ; but remembering Mr. 
 Wodrow's assurance that Captain Colville 
 was engaged to Blanche Galloway, she 
 compelled herself to be somewhat reserved 
 
102 COLYILLE OP THE GUARDS. 
 
 in her manner towards him, yet more 
 than once it thawed unconsciously. How- 
 ever, she was a little startled when, after 
 a pause, he said suddenly, in a low and 
 earnest tone, while looking down into her 
 face, 
 
 * Tell me something of your life here at 
 Inverma}^ Miss Wellwood ?' 
 
 ' Something of my life — what a strange 
 request !' exclaimed Mary, her dark bhie 
 eyes dilating as she spoke. ' What can I 
 tell you that could be of interest to you ?' 
 
 ' Pardon me — how your time passes, for 
 instance, I mean.' 
 
 ' As you see,' she replied, smiling, * and 
 as you have seen ; my daily duties but 
 repeat themselves. iTiave my little house- 
 hold to look after, accounts and taxes to 
 pay — thanks to cur kind kinsman abroad 
 (for Birkwoodbrae is entailed) we have 
 no rent to pay ; I have my feathered 
 family in the yard to supervise; my garden 
 ^ith its flowers and fruits ; my poor pen- 
 
DRPUMS AND DOUBTS, 103 
 
 sioners in the village and all round about.' 
 
 *A grey life for one so young and 
 winning, * thought Colville ; ' and with 
 you/ he added aloud, * so runs the world 
 away ?* 
 
 *Yes; 
 
 ' And all your people love you, Dr. 
 Wodrow tells me ?' 
 
 *I hope so — nay, I am sure they do,' 
 replied Mary, with one of her brightest 
 smiles. 
 
 ' And you love the scenery here ?' 
 
 * Yes — every rock and tree and stream ; 
 they have all their old stories and young 
 associations to me.' 
 
 ' And your old home at Birkwoodbrae ?' 
 he added, smiling at her enthusiasm. 
 
 ' Yes — dearly, every stone of it !' 
 
 He paused a little, as if lost in thought, 
 and then said, 
 
 ' But surely you must miss something 
 in your life. Miss Wellwood — you must be 
 lonely amid these birchen woods ?' 
 
104 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' Lonely with Ellinor and all my work ? 
 Oh ! no. I assure you I am not/ 
 
 * But you cannot expect to have her — a 
 girl so very handsome — always with you ?' 
 
 ^ Perhaps not,' said Mary, and her long 
 dark lashes drooped, as her thoughts hov- 
 ered between poor Robert Wodrow and 
 his probable rival, the tawny-haired 
 Englishman. 
 
 * Nor can she always have you ; and 
 what then?' said Oolville, lightly touching 
 her hand, and lowering his voice in a way 
 that to some there would have been no 
 mistaking; but Mary, devoid of vanity, 
 was all unconscious of it, and, disliking to 
 talk about herself, now talked of other 
 things. 
 
 Again and again Colville thought, in 
 her perfect sweetness, humility, and com- 
 posure, how utterly dissimilar she was in 
 many ways from the town-bred girls he 
 had been wont to meet in his London life 
 especially, where the beautiful was so 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 105 
 
 often combined with the artificial, and 
 even youth with utter hollowness of heart. 
 Amid dinners, garden-parties, the Eow, 
 and the general role of his life as a Guards- 
 man, the pet of many a woman and her 
 fair brood, all the more that he was now 
 the inheritor of a revenue that was .great, 
 he had been conscious of all that. 
 
 To Mary — who was a close observer in 
 her way — it sometimes seemed that there 
 was in Captain Colville's face, when he 
 addressed her, a half-amused expression, 
 mingling with much of undoubted admira- 
 tion. The first was occasionally a source 
 of pique to her ; and the other was a 
 source of pique, too, rather than pleasure ; 
 for, if he was the fiance of Miss Galloway, 
 he had no business to amuse himself with, 
 or bestow admiration on, any other young 
 lady, and these ideas made her manner to 
 him reserved at times. 
 
 In being jassisted over an awkward stone 
 stile, though she required no aid, yet she 
 
106 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 was compelled to take his proffered grasp, 
 but even then unconsciously her 
 
 ' Very coldness still was kind, 
 And tremulously gentle her small hand 
 Withdrew itself from his, but left behind 
 A little pressure, thrilling, and so bland 
 And slight, that to the mind 'twas but a doubt.* 
 
 As her slim hand was quickly withdrawn 
 from his, and she murmured her * thanks/ 
 Mary's first thought was that it was cased 
 in a somewhat too well-worn glove, and 
 Colville perhaps remarked this too, for he 
 said, 
 
 ' Do you always wear gauntlet gloves T 
 
 '' No ; but then I am so much in the 
 garden among thorns and bushes that 
 ordinary gloves are useless, and I used to 
 get through so many of six and a quarter/ 
 
 ' Surely even that is too large for a 
 hand like yours,' said he ; and Mary now 
 fairly blushed at the tenor of the con- 
 versation, and when he attempted again 
 to take her shapely little hand in his 
 
DKEAMS AND DOUBTS. 107 
 
 she resolutely withheld it, and, thinking 
 of Blanche Galloway, said, 
 
 ' Please don't, Captain Colville ; and now 
 I must bid you farewell, with many thanks 
 for your escort/ 
 
 And Colville, who was under the im- 
 pression, from Blanche Galloway's mis- 
 taken remark, that Eobert Wodrow was 
 ' the lover of the elder sister,' thought he 
 would not just then press his society 
 further upon Mary Wellwood. Nor could 
 he have done so, for just where the little 
 wooded path they had been pursuing 
 opened upon the highway, a well-appointed 
 little park phaeton, drawn by a pair of 
 beautiful ponies, and driven by Blanche 
 Galloway, was seen drawn up under the 
 trees about forty yards off. 
 
 ' The time has passed so quickly when 
 with you. Miss Wellwood,' said Colville, 
 lifting his hat with an air of positive con- 
 fusion, * that I forgot — I quite forgot ' 
 
 'What, Captain Colville?' 
 
108 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 '^That Miss Galloway's pony carriage 
 was to meet me here, and drive me home. 
 Ah, there it is ' 
 
 * And she too, I think,' said Mary, turn- 
 ing, and growing pale with absolute pain 
 and annoyance at the whole situation ; yet, 
 after all, there was nothing in it. How- 
 ever, the Honourable Blanche, after a 
 glance at Mary from under her tied veil, 
 turned away also; and Mary, with pride 
 awakened and a sense of mortification, 
 pursued the path to Birkwoodbrae. 
 
 But Jack, as if loth that the two should 
 part, scoured backwards and forwards be- 
 tween them, till, after a time, he finally 
 followed his mistress, and even from this, 
 probably, Blanche angrily drew deductions. 
 
 "We fear the captain did not enjoy much 
 his drive home, though driven by a Park 
 beauty in that luxurious pony phaeton, as 
 Blanche put her own construction on the 
 meeting and sudden parting — a construc- 
 tion far apart from the reality. She was 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 109 
 
 sorely piqued, and he was not surprised 
 by her taciturnity, though he strove to 
 ignore it, and expatiated on the beauty of 
 the scenery, on lights and shades, tints 
 and effects, as if he had been a Eoval 
 Academician ; nor was he surprised when 
 she remarked to him very pointedly and 
 plainly in the drawing-room after dinner, 
 when she was idling over the piano, 
 
 ' 1 don't think mamma will approve 
 much of your cultivating those strange 
 girls at Birkwoodbrae.' 
 
 ' I do not do so,' said he, stooping close 
 to her pretty head ; *but did not you and 
 Lady Dunkeld call for them the other 
 day?' 
 
 ' Out of curiosity — and urged, perhaps, 
 by Dr. Wodrow, who greatly affects to 
 favour them.' 
 
 * Surely this is severe ?' urged Colville, 
 gently. 
 
 ' Men, like women, cannot be too wary 
 of ciance medley acquaintances,' persisted 
 
110 COLYILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 Blanche, cresting up her handsome head. 
 
 * I have somewhere read,' said her mam- 
 ma, who was now au fait of the whole 
 episode, ' that men may study women as 
 they do a barometer, but only understand 
 them on a subsequent day.' 
 
 ' It may be so,' said Colville, ' but what 
 then?' 
 
 ' I agree with Blanche in her views of 
 these Wellwood girls. People may do 
 much in town that they cannot do in 
 country places, where everyone's actions 
 are, as it were, under a microscope ; where 
 every trivial movement is known, freely 
 commented upon, and often exaggerated 
 by menials and the vulgar. Thus,' con- 
 tinued Lady Dunkeld, with a very set ex- 
 pession on her usually placid face, * I am 
 not sure — nay, I am quite certain — it does 
 not agree with what society calls les con- 
 venances, visiting these young girls.' 
 
 ' In some respects you are right,' replied 
 Colville, colouring with real pain ; * but I 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. Ill 
 
 was not visiting. I only met Miss Well- 
 wood near the old burjing-ground — more- 
 over, they are ladies, she and her sister, 
 perfect ladies !' he urged, with a gleam in 
 his dark eyes, which Lady Dunkeld was 
 not slow to detect. 
 
 ' But living so eccentrically alone ?' 
 
 ^ So independently, let us say,^ he con- 
 tinued. 
 
 ' Captain Colville is quite their cham- 
 pion,' said Blanche, with a laugh that was 
 not very genuine ; and then the subject 
 dropped. 
 
 Lady Dunkeld exchanged a quick glance 
 with her daughter, and slowly fanned her- 
 self with an inscrutable expression on her 
 certainly aristocratic face, and adopting 
 the imperturbable placidity generally pecu- 
 liar to her class and style. 
 
 Her somewhat unmotherly and selfish 
 views deeply pained Colville, for reasons 
 peculiarly his own, but had quite an oppo- 
 site and most encouraging effect upon the 
 
] 12 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 enterprising mind of Sleatb, who had lis- 
 tened in attentive silence. 
 
 A day or two subsequently a parcel 
 came for Mary, addressed to Birkwoodbrae, 
 but having with it no other clue than the 
 vague one of the Edinburgh postmark. It 
 contained, for both sisters, two beautiful 
 boxes of gloves, all of the most delicate 
 tints and finest quality. Each box was a 
 miracle of carved white Indian ivory, lined 
 with blue satin, a sachet of perfume on 
 the under side of each lid, and their initials 
 in silver on the upper. 
 
 Remembering what had passed at the 
 stile, Mary Well wood could not doubt who 
 the donor was, and she flushed hotly with 
 pleasure ; yet it could all mean nothing — 
 nothing but gallantry. 
 
 To decline the gifts would seem churlish 
 and ungracious. She could not write, and 
 resolved to wait for the first meeting with 
 Colville to thank him. 
 
 Ellin or was quite in a flutter about the 
 
DREAMS AND DOUBTS. 113 
 
 gifts — more so than Mary, who really felt, 
 after a time, some confusion and dismay, 
 for in the course of her simple life no such 
 episode had occurred before ; and she was 
 all unlike the fair Blanche, to whom boxes 
 of gloves were as nothing, and who could 
 book her bets for far more than gloves on 
 the winner of the Oaks or the Derby with 
 the prettiest air of sang fr old in the world. 
 
 Mary's mind became filled with pleasant 
 dreams, that joined with unpleasant 
 doubts. 
 
 Was Colville really becoming an admirer 
 of hers ; or dared he be so, if the rumour 
 about Blanche Galloway was true ? 
 
 VOL. L 
 
114 
 
 CHAPTEE VIII. 
 
 A TRUCE. 
 
 KoBERT WoDEOW, full of thought, pursuing 
 his way through a green hedge-bordered 
 lane that led to Birkwoodbrae from the 
 manse, suddenly heard the shrill yelp of a 
 dog, followed by an execration, and at a 
 little distance perceived Sir Robert Sleath, 
 issuing from the garden gate at the man- 
 sion, in the act of picking up a large stone 
 to hurl at Jack — Mary Wellwood's pet. 
 Jack, by dashing through the hedge, 
 shirked the stone, as all wise dogs do, but 
 if the baronet had bestowed upon him a 
 kick, as Eobert never doubted, the terrier 
 had enough of the bull in his blood to 
 
A TRUCE. 115 
 
 remember it well, as Sleath found to bis 
 cost when the time came. 
 
 Closing the garden gate, he found him- 
 self face to face with young "Wodrow. He 
 had his hat partly on the back of his head, 
 his hands thrust into the back pockets of 
 his morning coat, a cigar in his mouth, and 
 with an insouciant stare, and a species of 
 dry nod that was supremely insolent and 
 infinitely worse than no recognition at all, 
 he passed on his way without speaking. 
 Robert Wodrow, whose heart was already 
 sore enoupfh in more wavs than one, felt it 
 swell with passion as he entered the 
 garden, which was still in all the beauty of 
 summer. 
 
 He had lately felt in many ways that a 
 change had come over Ellinor, but he had 
 been, as yet, too proud to notice it to 
 herself. 
 
 The baronet was shooting now every 
 day, and "Wodrow thought that, even if 
 Ellinor was under that person's influence, 
 
 I 2 
 
116 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 she might give bim a little more of her 
 society, as of old — even twenty minutes ; 
 but no, be could seldom or never see her 
 alone ; and while love and sorrow made 
 him humble at one time, jealousy and 
 disappointment made him proud and ran- 
 corous at others. 
 
 The sweetness of his disposition had 
 departed ; his studies were becoming con- 
 fused or neglected ; and none saw the 
 change that was coming over him with 
 more pain and anger than his mother. 
 
 Of all the men that had seen and 
 admired EUinor, his instinct told bim that 
 this man Sleath would prove the most 
 dangerous ; yet to his own sex the manners 
 of the latter seemed far from winning. 
 
 And already Elspat Gordon and other 
 old servants, with the keen observance and 
 love of gossip peculiar to their class, had 
 begun to prognosticate a more brilliant 
 future for Ellinor Wellwood than the 
 obscure career of a country doctor's wife, 
 
A TRUCE. 117 
 
 and sa^v her the ladj of *a real live 
 baronet/ and riding in a chariot to which 
 that of Cinderella was as nothing in com- 
 parison ; and, as if to make the mischief 
 worse, rumours of their surmises and of 
 their hopes reached somehow — but readily 
 enough in a sequestered district — the ears 
 of Kobert Wodrow, and were as gall and 
 wormwood to his soul. 
 
 All this might be mere wretched gossip ; 
 and though Ellinor might not actually 
 have any regard for Sir Redmond, yet 
 Eobert Wodrow feared that somehow she 
 was already in a dumb way yielding to or 
 feeling his influence and power. 
 
 The subtle homage, the studied phrase- 
 ology, and flattering air of gallantry and 
 devotion which Sir Eedmond infused into 
 his conversation when alone — but only 
 when alone — with Ellinor, had somewhat 
 turned the girl's little head, and led her to 
 draw comparisons between all that kind of 
 thing and poor Robert Wodrow's ' use and 
 
118 COLVILLE OF THE GUAKDS. 
 
 wont ' style of attention and ' matter of 
 course' position, as the lover of her 
 maidenhood expanded from the playmate 
 of her childhood. 
 
 Mary was away on some of her errands 
 of mercy or work ; Ellinor was alone when 
 Robert approached, and found her idling 
 in the garden, with a sunshade over her 
 head ; and his heart, of course, foreboded 
 that there she must have been with the 
 obnoxious visitor who had just departed. 
 
 Elspat had been brushing out her loug 
 and flowing dark brown hair, that was so 
 rich and heavy as to seem almost a burden 
 to her shapely head and slender neck ; and 
 Eobert reflected savagely that thus she 
 must have appeared before ' that fellow.' 
 
 She was adjusting with slender and 
 deft little fingers, while a sweet, soft, self- 
 satisfied smile rippled over her face, in her 
 lace collarette, a tuft of stephenotis with 
 two buds of a particular kind of rose that 
 Robert knew grew in the conservatory of 
 
A TRUCE. 119 
 
 Craigmhor alone ; and his eyes fastened 
 an;^rily on them at once, though she made 
 no reference to them, or how they came 
 to be there. The presence of the person- 
 age he had just passed fully accounted for 
 that ; he had doubtless transferred them 
 from his own buttonhole to her hand, and 
 E-obert knew quite enough of 'the lan- 
 guage of the flowers ' to know what two 
 rosebuds, so given, implied. And now 
 her face wore — so Eobert thought — just 
 such a smile as that of Faust's Marguerite, 
 when plucking the mystical rose-leaves in 
 her garden. 
 
 Robert felt that the gap between them 
 
 » 
 
 was widening; he did not present his 
 hand, nor did she offer hers, but continued 
 to adjust her little bouquet, while he stood 
 before her with his hands thrust into the 
 pockets of his grey morning-coat, and 
 kicked away a pebble or two that lay in 
 the gravelled walk. 
 ' Ellinor !' 
 
120 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 ' Well, Eobert/ she replied, a little ner- 
 vously ; ' you have come to tell me that 
 you have passed, I suppose ?' 
 
 ^JSTo.' 
 
 ' Why— what then ?' 
 
 ' Because I have not passed/ 
 
 ' Not passed !' said EUinor, looking at 
 him with genuine regret. 
 
 'No — on the first of this month the 
 medical degrees were conferred as usual, 
 but not on me — not perhaps that you care 
 much now,' he added, in a thickening 
 voice. * I shall have to try again — if, 
 indeed, I ever try more.' 
 
 * Why, Robert, what has come to you 
 that you talk to me thus? I am most 
 sorry for you indeed.' She looked liim 
 earnestly, but Eobert thought not hon- 
 estly, in the face, 
 
 ' You are more intent on your own flir- 
 tations than my failure — a failure perhaps 
 caused by yourself.' 
 
 * Who can I flirt with here ?' 
 
A TRUCE. 121 
 
 ' You know best,' replied Robert, sulkily. 
 
 'Eeally, Robert, you are very unpleas- 
 ant !' exclaimed the girl, tears almost start- 
 ing to her eyes, though there was a 
 provoking twinkle in their hazel depths, 
 nevertheless. 
 
 * Now perhaps I am ; but how long do 
 you think I am going to stand this sort of 
 thini??' 
 
 ' What sort of thing ?' 
 
 ' The dangling after you of that English 
 fool who has just left.' 
 
 ' This is going from bad to worse, 
 Robert,' replied Ellinor, with a pout on 
 her beautiful lip. ' It is being downright 
 rude, and national reflections are in tlie 
 worst possible taste.' 
 
 * You have not been treating me well 
 for some time past, Ellinor ; you seem to 
 grudge every moment you give me, and 
 the little time you do spend with me, you 
 seem no longer your old pleasant ami 
 hopeful self, but abstracted and distraite,^ 
 
122 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' You are always worrying me/ retorted 
 the girl, * and hinting of broken promises 
 when I have never made any.' 
 
 ' Between us, they were scarcely neces- 
 sary, Ellinor, and yet you have made me 
 scores.' 
 
 ' I — when?' 
 
 '.Since we were children.' 
 
 ' Oh — of course, when we played at be- 
 ing sweethearts, and all that sort of thing.' 
 
 * Played ! It has been no child's plaj^ 
 with me at least.' 
 
 ' Such child's play is ended now — and I 
 won't be scolded thus.' 
 
 She had never adopted this tone to him 
 before, and young Wodrow was shocked, 
 startled, and enraged ; but still he dissem- 
 bled, for love will tame and subdue the 
 proudest heart, and his was full of great 
 love for the girl who now stood before 
 him, biting her nether lip, and shuffling 
 the gravel with a little impatient foot. 
 
 ' Ellinor,' said Eobert, yet without at- 
 
A TRUCE. 12B 
 
 tempting to take her hand, ' if you did 
 not quite encourage my love, you permit- 
 ted and adopted it — you accepted it since 
 we were happy little children that toddled 
 and played about together' — and that love 
 has gone on, growing with my growth and 
 strengthening with my strength ; and I 
 never dreamed of, never thought of pic- 
 turing the time when you might cast me 
 off. And now I never doubted that when 
 I graduated ' 
 
 ' Oh, Robert/ interrupted the girl, ner- 
 vously, ' you are too romantic ; too much 
 of a boy ' 
 
 ' I am not a boy now, and I won't be 
 called one ! and as for a romance — cer- 
 tainly you have become very matter-of- 
 fact, when 1 have heard you laugh at even 
 a competence as not being sufficient.' 
 
 ' Shall I tell you what I think it should 
 be ?' said Eilinor, a little defiantly. 
 
 ' Do,' he responded, gloomily. 
 
 * I think it means a handsome house — 
 
124 COLVFLLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 nofc a cottage (love in that is all very well, 
 
 'but may be apt to fly out of the windows) ; 
 
 fine furniture — beautiful pictures and 
 
 dresses — lots of servants — a carriage ' 
 
 ' Oh, stop, please ! Since when have 
 you found all these things necessary for 
 existence? Dear Ellinor, people can be 
 very happy together with less.' 
 
 ' Quiet as our lives have been here, 
 Eobert, poor Mary and I have often had 
 wrung hearts and harassed spirits to keep 
 up an outward and an empty show.' 
 
 * What is enough for one, as mother 
 often says, is enough for two.' 
 
 ' Perhaps, and perhaps not,' said Ellinor, 
 with a waggish expression. 
 
 Robert Wodrow did not reflect just then 
 that erelong there might be more mouths 
 than two to feed. 
 
 * And all these new views of our pros- 
 pects and of life generally, have occurred 
 to you because ' 
 
 ' Because what ?' 
 
A TRUCE. 125 
 
 ' This man Sleath has come to Tnver- 
 maj.' 
 
 EUinor grew pale. There were a few- 
 moments' silence, and when Robert Wod- 
 row spoke again his voice sounded strange 
 even to himself. 
 
 * I was never half good enough for you, 
 EUinor — I know that/ said he, humbly, 
 'yet I will never give you up until — until 
 I bear you are fully engaged to him.' 
 
 * Engaged ! How your tongue does run 
 on, Eobert,' replied EUinor, with a curious 
 laugh. ^ He has never even spoken to me 
 in any very pointed manner ; but rather 
 than be worried thus,' she added, with a 
 swelling in her slender throat, ' I must ask 
 you to forget me — do.' 
 
 'Men such as I am do not forget so 
 easily, EUinor.' The angry colour died 
 out of Wodrow's dark face, and, clenching 
 his hands, he muttered under his thick 
 moustache — ' Curse him !' 
 
 * He would not speak thus, Robert, if it 
 
126 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 is Sir Redmond you mean. He has seen a 
 great deal of the best of society.' 
 
 ' And a great deal more of the ivorst, I 
 suspect,' said her lover, more exasperated 
 by the slightest defence of his supposed 
 rival ; but, nerving himself to be calm, he 
 asked — ' Am I, then, to suppose that you 
 have not promised your future — the future 
 that I have a right to say was not yours to 
 assign — to this stranger — to this sudden 
 interloper ?' 
 
 ' I have not. But why be so mysterious, 
 tragic, and absurd, Robert ?' she exclaim- 
 ed, with a little gasping laugh that nearly 
 became a sob ; for, sooth to say, Ellinor's 
 secret heart upbraided her, and she felt 
 that she was treating the lover of her girl- 
 hood and the friend of all her years with 
 duplicity. 
 
 ' Then,' said he, ' why do you permit at- 
 tentions that are purposeless to you, and 
 most distasteful to me ?' 
 
A TRUCE. 127 
 
 * Eobert, what do you mean ?' she asked, 
 plaintively. 
 
 * I mean, why do you permit that tawny- 
 haired fellow to flirt with you, and excite 
 the comment of lookers-on ?' 
 
 ' He does not flirt with me, Robert.' 
 
 ' Do you mean to say that his attentions 
 are more serious than what is called 
 flirtation ?' 
 
 ' I say nothing about them,' said Ellinor, 
 annoyed and alarmed by his vehemence and 
 categorical questioniug. 
 
 ' Ah — indeed !' he hissed through his 
 clenched teeth. 
 
 ' I cannot prevent him sayiug things 
 sometimes— without — without making a 
 scene. Do not be hard upon me, Robert — 
 I do love you — I always loved you ; not 
 perhaps as you wish — but — but ' 
 
 She paused, sobbed, and laid her sweet 
 face upon his arm, which went caressiogly 
 round her bent and beautiful head, with 
 
128 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 all its wealtli of dark brown flowing 
 hair. 
 
 *,You love me !' he whispered, softly. 
 
 * As an old friend — oh, yes.' 
 
 He withdrew, and again eyed her gloom- 
 ily and silently. 
 
 'Advise me, Eobert,' said she, implor- 
 ingly. 
 
 ' In what can I advise you, if your own 
 heart does not ?' 
 
 * We are both so miserably poor.' 
 
 * And your new admirer is so rich ?' 
 They were drifting among shoals again, 
 
 so Ell i nor made no reply. 
 
 'I suppose he loves you? To judge by 
 my own heart, EUinor, I don't wonder at 
 it — but if so, why does he not at once come 
 to the point and end his dangling ? Why 
 delay, and why conceal ?' 
 
 *Do not let us quarrel, Robert,' said the 
 girl, gently and sweetly, with her soft hazel 
 eyes full of unshed tears ; * we have always 
 been such chums — such friends. Some 
 
A TItUOE. 129 
 
 one is comiDg — kiss me once more — and 
 kiss me quickly !' 
 
 A light step was heard on the ground 
 near the garden gate, and the welcoming 
 bark of Jack announced it was that of Mary 
 returning. 
 
 The mutual kiss was swiftly given and 
 taken ; but to neither did it seem like the 
 kisses of old. 
 
 Robert Wodrow felt that it sealed only 
 a truce between him and Ellinor Well- 
 wood ; that neither were happy now, and 
 that her heart was drifting away from him. 
 Their farewell seemed to be like the sum- 
 mary of Lord Lytton's advice, 
 
 ' In short, my deary, kiss me and be quiet.' 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
130 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 colyille's warning. 
 
 Despite the disparaging remarks or com- 
 ments so ungenerously made by Lady 
 Dunkeld and her daughter, a subsequent 
 afternoon saw both Sir Redmond Sleath 
 and Leslie Colville seated in the pretty 
 drawinof-room of the sisters at Birkwood- 
 brae. 
 
 Sir Redmond had inadvertently dropped 
 a hint that he meant to visit there, and, 
 greatly to his annoyance, Colville proposed 
 to accompany him. 
 
 It was an early day in August, and 
 every breath of air was still ; not a leaf 
 was stirring in the silver birches without, 
 or among the monthly roses that clambered 
 
colville's warning. 131 
 
 round the open windows wliicli faced the 
 pretty garden. "Within the room all was 
 arranged with care and taste, while the 
 polished grate, filled with fresh flowers, 
 the bouquets in jars and vases, the snow- 
 white curtains, and other etcetera bore 
 token of feminine diligence and skill. 
 
 Stretched on a deer-skin. Jack lay with 
 sleepy eyes, half open to watch the move- 
 ments of his mistress, when 'visitors ' were 
 announced by Elspat, with a peculiar and 
 provoking smirk of satisfaction on her 
 hard Scotch visage, and the costumes for 
 the forthcoming garden-party, on which 
 those clever fingers of the sisters were 
 busy, were hastily tossed aside ; the two 
 gentlemen were ushered in, and Jack 
 snarled and barked so furiously at Sir 
 Eedmond that he had to be carried bodily 
 out of the room by Elspat. 
 
 The baronet affected to laugh, but felt 
 in his heart that nothing would please him 
 
 k2 
 
132 COLVILLE OF THE GIJAEDS. 
 
 befcter than to get * a quiet pot-sbot at that 
 d d cur !' 
 
 ' We merely dropped in when passing/ 
 said Sir Eedmond, who, strange to say, 
 seemed to be constrained, even awkward, 
 in manner, and Bllinor v/as somewhat 
 silent and abashed too. 
 
 ' It is kind of you to visit us,' replied 
 Mary, addressing herself, however, to Col- 
 ville ; * we have so little amusement to 
 offer ; there is so little attraction ; we live 
 so quietly here at Birkwoodbrae.' 
 
 Colville looked as if he thought there 
 was a good deal to attract, and his dark 
 eyes seemed to say so as he looked into 
 Mary's, which drooped beneath his gaze. 
 
 *Your presents came, Captain Colville. 
 They are beautiful, and fit to perfection. 
 Eilinor and I cannot sufficiently thank 
 you,' she said, in a low voice. 
 
 ' Oho !' thought Sir Redmond, ' he has 
 been sending them presents. Eh ! a sly 
 doir/ 
 
colville's warning. 133 
 
 'A few gloves are not worth mentiou- 
 ing/ replied Colville, hurriedly. And then 
 he added — ' How beautiful is the view all 
 round this place, especially that with the 
 silver birches and the stream glittering 
 under their shadow. Ere I leave this, 
 Miss Wellwood, you must show me some 
 of your favourite places, your pet nooks — 
 the scenery here is so full of picturesque 
 spots.' 
 
 ^Ellinor knows all such places hereabout 
 better than I do. They employ her pencil 
 freely/ said Mary, diffidently ; ' and they 
 are the very abode of old legends, fairies, 
 and so forth.' 
 
 ' I know that she is an artist possessed 
 of both taste and skill,' said Colville; *but 
 is she also the musician ?' he asked, turn- 
 ing to the piano, which was open. 
 
 * I am chiefly,' replied Mary, smiling ; 
 ' but I think you should hear Ellinor sing 
 the " Birks of Invermay." ' 
 
134 COLVILLE OF THE GUAKDS. 
 
 ' Who — or what are they ?' asked Sir 
 Redmond, with a drawl. 
 
 ' Those very birches you see from the 
 window,' replied Mary, laughing. 
 
 ' And there is a song about them ?' 
 
 ' There are several.' 
 
 ' Do let us hear at least one, Miss 
 Eilinor,' urged Sir Redmond, as he placed 
 the piano stool before the instrument. 
 
 Accordingly Eilinor, without further 
 preface or pressing, seated herself, and 
 sang with great sweetness and pathos 
 neither David Mallet's affected stanzas nor 
 Bryce's ludicrous lines, but the simple old 
 song of the sixteenth century to its won- 
 derfully beautiful air : — 
 
 ' The evening sun was glinting bright 
 On Invermay's sweet glen and stream ; 
 The woods and rocks in ruddy light 
 Appeared as in a fairy dream. 
 In loving fear I took my path 
 To seek the tryst that happy day, 
 With bonnie Mary, young and fair, 
 Among the Birks of Invermay. 
 
colville's warning. 135 
 
 * It wasna till the pale moonshine 
 "Was glancing deep in Mary's e'e, 
 That with a smile she said, " I'm thine, 
 And ever true to thee will be !" 
 One kiss — the lover's pledge — and then 
 We spoke of all that lovers say, 
 And wandered hameward through the glen, 
 Among the Birks of Invermay.' 
 
 At the mention of Mary's name in tlie 
 song, the eyes of Colville involuntarily 
 sought those of her who bore it, and she 
 coloured perceptibly. The performance of 
 Ellin or was duly applauded by Sir Red- 
 mond, though he afterwards confided to 
 Colville it was 'the silliest piece of Scotch 
 twaddle ' he had ever heard. Yet his 
 admiration of Ellinor personally was open 
 and unconcealed, perhaps too much so, 
 and of its own kind was no doubt genuine 
 enough, and while she sang, Ellinor w^as 
 inwardly hoping her hair was tidy and 
 looked well, as she felt conscious he was 
 gazing straight down on it; while Mary 
 had an uncomfortable feeling that visits 
 from these gentlemen might be miscon- 
 
136 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 strued by Lady Dunkeld, their hostess, 
 aud still more so by her daughter — a 
 conviction that at times made her almost 
 cold in her manner to Captain Colville, 
 whom she believed to be that young lady's 
 especial property. And she blamed her- 
 self, and blushed for herself, in the con- 
 sciousness that she sometimes treasured 
 up, and repeated to herself, little things 
 he had said—appeals to her taste, her 
 opinion, and so forth. While Colville, 
 however he was situated with regard to 
 Miss Galloway, made no secret of how he 
 delighted in the quaint frankness of Mary 
 Wellwood since the afternoon he had first 
 met her, when both were fishing in the 
 May. 
 
 ' And so this locality is full of old 
 legends of fairies and so forth ?' said Col- 
 ville, referring to a previous remark of 
 Mary's. 
 
 ' Yes ; but then every foot of ground in 
 Scotland has about it something historical 
 
colville's warning. 137 
 
 or legendary — all teems with the past.' 
 
 ' The present is more to my taste, Miss 
 Wellwood/ said Sleath, twirling out his 
 straw-coloured moustache. 
 
 * It would not be so if you lived always, 
 as we do, under the shadow of the Ochil 
 mountains.' 
 
 ' I agree with you, by Jove.' 
 
 But Mary did not perceive that they 
 misunderstood each other. 
 
 ' Sir Redmond is guiltless of romance as 
 any man living, I believe, Miss Wellwood/ 
 said Captain Colville, ' but London life 
 makes one sadly prosaic and incredulous.' 
 
 ' Has it made 3^ou so ?' 
 
 ' I hope not — I can scarcely say. But 
 did not my old friend Dr. Wodrow hint 
 that some old legend is connected with 
 those stones, or the ruin, on vonder knoll 
 by the river ?' 
 
 ' The Holy Hill ?' 
 
 'Yes.' 
 
 ' Ah,' said Mary, as a smile rippled over 
 
138 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 her bright face, ^ that is not a legend — it 
 is history.' 
 
 ' About what ?' 
 
 ' A miller's dau2:hter who married a kiniz/ 
 
 ' Then it is a tale of the days 
 
 •'When King Cophetua loved the beggar maid." ' 
 
 ' Something of that kind. But in the 
 remoter ages of Scottish history the Holy 
 Hill was the site of a royal residence ; for 
 there King Kenneth II. died, and there 
 Malcolm III. was born — he who married 
 Margaret of Ensrland.' 
 
 * These things didn't happen yesterday,' 
 said Colville, smiling down into her earnest 
 and animated face. 
 
 ' In those days there was an old miller 
 here in Forteviot who had one dauorhter 
 named Edana, a girl of rare beauty, and 
 who was famed therefor throughout all the 
 land between the Earn and Forth.' 
 
 ' And, of course, she had lovers in 
 plenty r' 
 
cola^ille's warning. 139 
 
 * So the story says ; but she would lis- 
 ten to none, nor was her heart stirred, till 
 one morning, about Beltane time, when 
 filling a jar with water at the May, there 
 came ridino^ under the silver birches — for 
 silver birches were here then as now — a 
 marvellously handsome young knight on a 
 white horse, alone and unattended, and 
 courteously he besought her for a draught 
 of water, saying that he had ridden that 
 morning from the Moathill of Scone, and 
 was sorely athirst. 
 
 ' He wore an eagle's feather in his hel- 
 met, from under which his golden hair fell 
 upon his shoulders like that of a girl. His 
 mantle of striped scarlet, violet, and blue 
 was fastened on his breast by a brooch of 
 g-old, and the rino-s of his coat-of-mail 
 shone like silver in the morning sun. 
 
 ' Edana had never looked on such a face 
 and figure before, and he seemed equally 
 taken by her great, if rustic, loveliness. 
 He lingered with her long in the birchen 
 
140 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 wood ; tbither he came again and again, 
 and love between them ripened fast, as it 
 seems always to have done in the olden 
 time, if we are to believe song, ballad, and 
 story. 
 
 * The miller ere long heard of these 
 stolen meetings, and his heart filled with 
 alarm lest the so-called handsome stranger 
 who had bewitched or won his daughter's 
 heart might prove some evil spirit of the 
 Flood or Fell ; but Edana said he could 
 be no evil spirit who wore a crucifix round 
 his neck, and daily said his prayers in the 
 old chapel of Kirktoun Mailler. 
 
 * But the miller uttered an execration 
 under his silver beard, put his battle-axe 
 to the grindstone, and kept watch when 
 next the voungr knio^ht came ; and then, 
 behold, his heart seemed to die within him 
 as he recognised' — the king ! 
 
 * And so in time it quickly came to pass 
 that Edana became the wife of Duncan, 
 King of Scotland — the same king who was 
 
colville's warning. 141 
 
 slain at Cawdor — and the mother of Mal- 
 colm III., who was born at the Holy Hill, 
 and hence an ancestress of Queen Vic- 
 toria.' 
 
 With a soft yet strange smile on his 
 face, Colville listened to this old story, 
 and, brief though it was, Sleath, as it was 
 not to his taste, would have yawned, had 
 not good breeding forbade him. 
 
 * Perhaps love and romance, too, still 
 linger among the Birks of Invermay,* 
 said he, laughingly, and with some point 
 in his manner; and there came a time 
 when Mary recalled these words and saw 
 their meaning ; and now, deeming that 
 their visit had been protracted long 
 enough, the gentlemen rose to depart — 
 Sleath only lingering to kiss his hand to 
 EUinor — surreptitiously, as he thought, 
 but the jaunty action was detected by 
 Colville. 
 
 Somehow, Mary thought she wished that 
 Captain Colville — Miss Blanche Galloway's 
 
142 COLVILLE OF THE GUATIDS. 
 
 fiance — had not called that affcernoon ; 
 yet, if asked, she could not have told the 
 reason why. 
 
 Was an interest in him growing in her 
 heart unknown to herself — one beyond the 
 wish that she and Ellinor had such a 
 brother ? It almost seemed so, for she 
 felt altered in some way, but in wliat way 
 she knew not, though the present and the 
 future became curiously mingled in her 
 thoughts, as they were just then in those 
 of Ellinor. 
 
 Sleath was fast winning the fancy of the 
 latter, if not her heart. She had been 
 content with the love of Robert Wodrow 
 and the prospect of a future with him ; she 
 thouofht now how different it would be to 
 become the wife of a man who would give 
 her rank, position, wealth, and she thought 
 the time and ' the prince ' had now come. 
 
 Yet with all this it was strange that her 
 heart never thrilled at his voice or ap- 
 proach, nor did her pulses quicken at the 
 
CCLVILLE's WARNI^'G. 143 
 
 touch of bis hand, as they had often done 
 at the honest clasp of Robert Wodrow. 
 
 ^ Why was this?' she asked of herself. 
 
 ' You are very silent, Colville,' observed 
 Sleath, as they walked homeward together 
 cigar in mouth. 
 
 * There is somethiuo; in that mrVs face 
 which seems familiar to me, as if I had 
 foreshadowed it in some dream !' exclaimed 
 Colville. 
 
 ' Which girl's face?' asked Sleath, 
 sharply. 
 
 * Mary's — Miss Wellwood,' replied Col- 
 ville, colouriug with annoyance at having 
 been betrayed into confidence with a man 
 he disliked. 
 
 ' Stuff,' said Sir Redmond ; ' as if people 
 foreshadowed faces in the Row or Regent 
 Street ! What would the fair Blanche 
 think of this idea? And what a cock- 
 and-bull yarn that was about the "gra- 
 cious Duncan " and the miller's daughter.' 
 
 ' Why doubt it ? — the story is a pretty 
 
144 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 one, any way/ said Colville, with annoy- 
 ance in his tone. 
 
 ' Let us skip Mary — it is her sister I 
 admire.' 
 
 ' Your demeanour to that young lady is 
 rather strange, Sir Redmond,' said Col- 
 ville, with a gravity of manner and eye 
 that did not fail to strike his listener. 
 
 * Strange — how ?' 
 
 ' A very short intimacy seems to have 
 placed you on rather friendly terms.' 
 
 ' Rather,' replied Sir Redmond, tugging 
 at the end of his moustachios, with a very 
 self-satisfied smile on his hlase face. * She 
 is an unsophisticated kind of Jeanie 
 Deans, or Effie rather, whom one may flirt 
 with, patronise, or quarrel with and make 
 it up again ; treating her with any amount 
 of chic when so inclined, and ' 
 
 Whatever in his profound vanity or 
 spirit of insolence Sir Redmond was about 
 to add, he paused. There was a dark, 
 sterD, and indignant expression in the face 
 
colville's waening. 145 
 
 of Leslie Oolville that there was no mis- 
 understanding just then. 
 
 ' Hey — how — what the deyvil — are you 
 smitten in that quarter too?' asked Sleath. 
 
 ' No — what do you mean ?' 
 
 * Thought you were, perhaps, that's all/ 
 was the somewhat sulky response. 
 
 * I am not what you think,' replied Ool- 
 ville, quietly. ' I only warn you to adopt 
 a different tone in reference to these young 
 ladies, and to take care what you are about !' 
 
 ^ JSTow, what the devil is all this to Mm V 
 thought the baronet, malevolently ; and he 
 had hardihood enough to give his thought 
 expression, on which Colville's face grew 
 darker still. 
 
 * Sir Redmond,' said he, ^ there is no use 
 in beating about the bush with you. I 
 have often heard you say that there was 
 but one excuse in this world for matri- 
 mony.' 
 
 * Yes— well?' 
 
 * Miss Ellinor Wellwood is poor, as you 
 
 VOL. I. L 
 
146 COLYILLE OP THE GUARDS. 
 
 may say, yet you seem very attentive in 
 that quarter/ 
 
 Confounded at what he deemed the 
 presumption of all these queries, Sleath 
 stuck his glass into his right eye, and 
 glared through it at his companion with 
 undoubted surprise. 
 
 ' Attention,' he muttered ; * not at all ! 
 Who is thinking of matrimony ? And if 
 I were so, may I ask what it is to you T 
 
 ' More than you think,' replied Colville, 
 with suppressed passion, as he adjusted 
 his shirt cuffs; 'but enough of this subject 
 — here is the gate of Craigmhor.' 
 
 Colville said no more; but he thought 
 a good deal, and he muttered to himself a 
 Spanish proverb, 
 
 ' Puerto abierta^ al santo iiento — the open 
 door tempts the saint ; and, by Jove, this 
 fellow is no saint — so I shall keep my eye 
 on him !* 
 
 Hitherto it had seemed to EUinor, but to 
 Mary chiefly (as she had no special ad- 
 
colville's warning. 147 
 
 mirer), that life had been dull and colour- 
 less — if a happy and contented one — at 
 Birkwoodbrae ; and already the days there- 
 of — before these visitors came — seemed 
 to be part of another and remoter 
 existence; for love and the illusions of 
 love were shedding their haloes over the 
 present. 
 
 * I hope dear Mary Well wood will not 
 make a fool of herself with that Captain 
 Colville,' said Mrs. Wodrow to her spouse, 
 with reference to this very subject. ' I 
 hear that he has been calling at Birkwood- 
 brae again, though engaged, they say, to 
 Miss Galloway. She is old enough to 
 know that officers are the greatest flirts in 
 the world — men not to be trusted. When 
 / was a girl, I always heard so.' 
 
 Dr. Wodrow laughed softly, as he looked 
 up from the notes of his next sermon, and 
 said, 
 
 *I don't think, my dear, you ever had 
 much experience of them out of novels ; 
 
 l2 
 
148 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 but I will own to you tbat officers now- 
 a-days are not like what they were at 
 one time. Even my worthy ancestor, in 
 1724, deplores in his ^Analecta' that 
 Christian officers had left no successors 
 to such men as Colonel Blackadder, of the 
 Cameronians, Colonel Erskine, and Major 
 Gardiner, of Stair's Grey Dragoons — all 
 men who could expound on the Gospel 
 better than I.' 
 
149 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE GARDEN-PARTY AT CRAIGMHOR. 
 
 It was the afternoon of a hot day early 
 in August, when the sunlight bathed in 
 glory all the scenery — green mountain 
 and rocky glen, wood and water — about 
 Craigmhor, giving alternately strong light 
 and deep shadow, with a warmth of col- 
 ouring over all, turning into a sheet like 
 molten gold an artificial lochlet, where the 
 ducks and coots swam together among 
 the great white water-lilies. 
 
 On the balustraded terrace before the 
 house, the rustic baskets of carved stone 
 were ablaze with beautiful flowers ; the 
 hum of bees and the twitter of birds were 
 
]50 COLVILLE or THE GUARDS. 
 
 all about, but were unbeard amid tbe buzz 
 of many voices and the music of a rifle 
 volunteer band tliat played on tbe smootli- 
 ly-mown lawn tliat stretched away before 
 the house till it ended in the woodland 
 greenery of the park, or ' policy/ as it is 
 called in Scotland — greenery that now 
 showed blotches of yellow and russet upon 
 the ferns, that whilom had seemed great 
 green fans of emerald hue, amid which the 
 dun deer rested when dewy evening fell. 
 
 But now the deer had all gone to the 
 hill-sides, for promenading on the lawn 
 and in the beautiful gardens, or seated 
 near the tall, French windows that opened 
 on the terrace, and the lace curtains of 
 which were wafted gently on the breeze, 
 were the many guests of Lady Dunkeld, 
 whose garden-party was now, as Sir Red- 
 mond Sleath slangily said, ' in full blast.' 
 
 Mellowed by distance among the trees 
 came the murmur of the unseen May over 
 its rocky bed. 
 
THE GARDEN-PAETT. 151 
 
 There were lawn-tennis courts, and tlie 
 all but obsolete croquet, for those who 
 were so minded-; and in a gaudy-striped 
 marquee ices, creams, jellies, champagne- 
 cup, et cetera, distributed by solemn 
 valets in showy liveries with powdered 
 heads. 
 
 There were winding paths between beau- 
 tifully-trimmed shrubberies, bordered by 
 flowers of gorgeous hues ; there were leafy, 
 tunnel-like vistas, and long and statel}^ 
 conservatories mth tesselated floors, where- 
 in to flirt when the heat of the day proved 
 too great ; and there were bright-coloured 
 rugs and soft cushions spread upon the 
 grass, Avhereon the lazy might lounge or 
 loll ; and, as the guests were pouring in 
 from carriage, phaeton, and dogcart. Lady 
 Dunkeld, in the richest of London toilettes, 
 received them mth the same insipid and 
 stereotyped smile for each and all — her 
 words of welcome or ofl*er of her hand 
 varying only according to the social 
 
152 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 position of those who approached her. 
 
 ' The second of the Wellwood girls who 
 are coming here to-day is something of an 
 artist, I hear,' observed Lord Dunkeld. 
 
 ' I believe so,' replied his lady ; ' and I 
 hope she will not make her appearance a 
 limp figure, aesthetically-dressed in a large- 
 patterned gown of Anglo-Saxon fashion, 
 Avith a lily in her hand. Oh, here they 
 are ! Dressed in the best taste, too !' 
 
 "Weak, yet aristocratic though his profile. 
 Lord Dunkeld looked every inch a peer in 
 style and bearing. He was undoubtedly a 
 striking-looking, elderly man, mth hair 
 now white as the thistledown, his person 
 erect and unbroken as Avhen he led his 
 
 attalion against the Russian trenches at 
 Sebastopol, and he received the two sisters, 
 Mary and Ellinor Wellwood, with a warmth 
 and courtesy that nearly made them forget 
 the limp hand and wan smile of Lady 
 Dunkeld, and the ill-concealed coldness, 
 annoyance, and secret pique of Blanche 
 
THE GARDEN-PARTY. 153 
 
 Galloway, though she veiled them under a 
 well-bred smile of welcome, while resolved 
 it should be their last, as it w^as their first, 
 entertainment at Craigmhor, and such it 
 eventually proved to be. 
 
 Nor were her emotions lessened by see- 
 ing how Colville hurriedly quitted a group 
 to welcome them, and how smihngly Sir 
 Redmond approached Ellinor from a con- 
 servatory, adjusting as he came a button- 
 hole bouquet which he had recently re- 
 ceived from the hand of her — Blanche 
 Galloway, v/ho was quite inclined to attract 
 both gentlemen if she could. 
 
 Whatever views Lady Dunkeld and her 
 daughter, the fair Blanche, may have had 
 in the matter of the now wealthy Captain 
 Colville and Sir Redmond Sleath, two 
 little episodes in which these gentlemen 
 were concerned developed themselves dur- 
 ing the garden-party, which w^ere rather 
 beyond the calculations of the two ladies, 
 and proceeded to some extent unknown to 
 
154 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 tliem — but to some extent only, as Made- 
 moiselle Rosette was abroad in the grounds, 
 and had her shrewd French eyes remark- 
 ably vnde open. 
 
 And Blanche Galloway became disagree- 
 ably surprised when she learned on what 
 ' friendly terms ' the sisters were with 
 those two gentlemen, who as visitors at 
 Craigmhor she had rather been disposed 
 to consider as her own peculiar property. 
 
 Robert Wodrow was there too, not to 
 enjoy himself, but to watch Sir Redmond 
 and Ellin or, as the latter could read 
 only too distinctly in his lowering and 
 upbraiding yet tender eyes, though he af- 
 fected to converse gaily with Colville and 
 others. 
 
 ' Let me get you some iced champagne 
 cup,' said Sir Redmond, in a low voice, as 
 he offered Ellin or his arm and led her 
 away, adding, with one of his unpleasant 
 laughs, ' Here is old Dr. Wodrow, with his 
 Sabbath-day smile, and his wife, in her 
 
THE GAEDEN-PARTY. 155 
 
 awful toilette — our sulking friend the son 
 too. They have been among the first to 
 come, and will be the last to go away — hke 
 all stupid people. How like fish out of 
 the water they look !' 
 
 Ellinor, to do her justice, felt a swelling 
 in her throat at these remarks on those 
 she had been so long accustomed to view 
 as her dearest friends, and fanned herself 
 almost angrily. 
 
 ' And how is Jack, that surhest of curs, 
 who always snaps and snarls at me as if I 
 were a tramp or a beggar ?' asked Sir 
 Redmond. 
 
 EUinor laughed now, and soon found 
 herself chatting away with the glib Sir Red- 
 mond as if she had known him not only a 
 few days, but a few years. How different 
 he was in his fluency of speech, his per- 
 fect tone of manner and softness of voice, 
 from Robert Wodrow. 
 
 Poor Robert Wodrow ! 
 
 • What smooth tongues these southron 
 
156 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 fellows have,' lie was thinking, savagely, 
 as his eyes followed the pair ; ' and how 
 she seems to listen to him, drinking in 
 every word, like a moonstruck fool !' 
 
 And already he felt all the tortures of 
 jealousy, ^ the injured lover's hell.' 
 
 A suspicion that he was watched or sus- 
 pected by Colville, after the latter's very 
 distinct and open warning^ inspired Sir 
 Eedmond Sleath with a secret emotion of 
 revenge against him — a curiously mingled 
 hatred and desire to triumph in his love 
 affair with Ellinor ; and since that warning- 
 had been given a coolness had ensued 
 between the baronet and the guardsman — 
 a coolness that outlasted their visit to Lord 
 Dunkeld. 
 
 To Sir Redmond it seemed, as he 
 thought over and over again, that a 
 couple of fatherless and motherless girls 
 living as they curiously did together, and 
 alone ^ with no one to look after them but 
 an infernal old pump of a Presbyterian 
 
.THE GAEDEN-PARTT. 157 
 
 parson,' were fair game to be run after in 
 his own fashion, and Ellin or, as the one 
 possessing less firmness of purpose, was 
 certain to be the most easily netted. 
 
 As Sir Redmond led Ellinor away, Col- 
 ville's brow grew dark as that of Robert 
 Wodrow, and the baronet was not slow to 
 detect this emotion and defy it. 
 
 ^Was this jealousy and love of El- 
 linor? Did he admire her and Mary 
 too ?' thought the baronet. ' By Jove, it 
 seems so.' 
 
 They were long absent from the main 
 body of the guests, none of whom missed 
 them perhaps, save Robert Wodrow and 
 Miss Galloway. How long Colville did 
 not precisely know, as he contrived to be 
 elsewhere eno:ao;ed himself. 
 
 While Mary was talking to old Mrs. 
 Wodrow, who was indulging the while in 
 a few peculiar and not very well-bred, if 
 knomng, nods and smiles in the direction 
 of Miss Galloway, over whose chair on the 
 
153 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 terrace Captain Colville was stooping, she 
 overheard him say, while the former was 
 prettily making up for him a button-hole 
 of stephenotis, with a white rosebud and 
 maiden-hair fern — and say — with empresse- 
 ment but laughingly, 
 
 ' If lusty love should go in search of beauty, 
 Where should he find it fairer than in Blanche ? 
 If zealous love should go in quest of virtue, 
 Where should he find it purer than in Blanche ? 
 If love, ambitious, sought a match of birth. 
 Whose veins bound richer blood than Lady Blanche V 
 
 He was only quoting Shakespeare, and 
 did so laughingly, and not at all with the 
 tenderness of love, Mary thought ; but 
 Blanche Galloway was evidently delighted, 
 tapped him with her fan in mock anger, 
 and then adjusted her bouquet in his 
 lapelle. 
 
 On ivliat terms were they, these two ? 
 
 Mrs. Wodrow had evidently no doubt 
 about it, as she Avhispered to Mary, 
 
 * How sweet it is to watch young lovers ! 
 I was right, you see.' 
 
THE GAEDEN-rARTy. 159 
 
 Mary felt something closely akin to pique 
 and pain, and resolved to be upon her 
 guard, while Mrs. Wodrow was, woman- 
 like, appraising the cost of Lady Dunkeld's 
 dress — ' The best Lyons purple — must have 
 cost a guinea a yard.' 
 
 ' Captain Colville has been in love, or 
 fancied himself so, a great many times, I 
 hear,' resumed gossipy Mrs. Wodrow, ' but 
 never got the length of being engaged until 
 lately, I beheve.' 
 
 ' Then he is her fiance^' thought Mary ; 
 M3ut what matters it?' 
 
 Sooth to say, it was for her behoof, per- 
 haps, that Mrs. Wodrow pressed these hints 
 upon her. 
 
 'Come with me, Miss Wellwood,' said 
 Captain Colville, suddenly approaching 
 her ; ' permit me to show you some of the 
 grounds — the rosaries are indeed beautiful 
 — after we have visited the refreshment 
 marquee.' 
 
 He lightly touched her hand, and — fol- 
 
160 COLTILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 lowed the while by a somewhat cloudy and 
 inquiring glance from Blanche Galloway — 
 she permitted herself to be led away from 
 the terrace, and though resolved to be, as 
 we have said, on her guard, and studiously 
 indifferent, she could not help the increased 
 beating of her heart, for the voice and eyes 
 of Colville were very winning. 
 
 From the refreshment marquee they 
 wandered through the rosaries, round the 
 shrubbery, and past the artificial pond, till 
 they reached the skirts of the lawn, and 
 the hum of the voices there, and even the 
 music of the band, became faint, and con- 
 versing with her, she scarcely knew on 
 what, he led her to a seat — a rustic sofa — 
 under the trees that formed the boundary 
 of the pleasure-grounds. 
 
 ^ Do you know that in the sunshine your 
 hair is quite like gold. Miss Wellwood ?* 
 said he, gazing upon her with unmistak- 
 able admiration. 
 
THE GARDEN-FAETT. 161 
 
 ^ I would it were real gold,' replied 
 Mary, laughing. 
 
 'I would rather possess it as it is, and 
 so would any man,' said Colville, while 
 Mary cast a restless glance at the distant 
 groups of gaily-dressed promenaclers, as 
 aught approaching tenderness just then 
 alarmed and annoyed her. 
 
 After a pause he said, 
 
 ' Those scarlet berries do not become 
 your complexion. They are suited to a 
 dark beauty, not a fair one.' 
 
 ' Ellinor pinned them in my collarette,* 
 replied Mary, colouring now. 
 
 ' Give me the berries, and I shall sub- 
 stitute ihis,' he urged, taking the little 
 bouquet of stephenotis buds and ferns 
 from his lapelle. ' Do exchange with me,' 
 he added, softly and tenderly. 
 
 ' But Miss Galloway — her gift to you — 
 what will she think?' urged Mary, timidly. 
 
 * She mil never notice the change ; and 
 if she does, what then ?' 
 
 VOL. I. M 
 
162 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 Mary tliought this strange and ungal- 
 lant, but ere she conld prevent him, his 
 deft hands had quickly achieved the ex- 
 chan2:e, and her scarlet berries were in his 
 button-hole. 
 
 ' I cannot have you wear these, even if 
 I wear your rosebuds. Give them back to 
 mCj please, Captain Colville.' 
 
 And she stretched out her hand implor- 
 ingly, but he shook his head and smiled 
 with a curious satisfied smile ; and again 
 Mary insisted on a re-exchange of the 
 flowers. 
 
 ' Please, do not urge me,' said he, also 
 adopting an imploring tone. ' I wish to 
 keep them — to keep them for ever, if you 
 will permit me ; whatever has touched 
 your cheek — your hand, must be sacred to 
 me,' he added, with perfect earnestness of 
 manner. 
 
 * Do not talk to me thus — for your own 
 amusement. Captain Colville,' said Mary, 
 her eyes sufl'used with tears. 
 
THE GARDEN-PARTY. 163 
 
 ' Amusement !' he repeated, mtli a low 
 tone of pain. • Can you think so meanly 
 of me? If you knew the genuine emotion 
 of my heart towards you, Mary Wellwood, 
 and the true regard with which you have 
 inspired me ' 
 
 ^ I cannot, must not, listen to this,' said 
 poor Mary, attempting to rise in alarm, 
 and most loth to precipitate a scene, but a 
 touch of his hand restrained her. 
 
 'Not listen to me! And why not?' 
 asked Colville ; and then he remembered 
 Blanche Galloway's insinuation about 
 young Wodrow, and paused. 
 
 ' It is unbecoming your position and 
 mine, I feel that you are but amusing 
 yourself ^Yith. me,' continued Mary, re- 
 pressing a sob in her slender white throat 
 with difficulty. 'You are a rich man of 
 fashion — a man about town, I believe the 
 term is ; I am but the orphan daughter of 
 
 a very poor one ' 
 
 M 2 
 
164 OOLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ^Of a gallant old officer,' said Colvilley 
 softly. 
 
 ft/ 
 
 ' True.' 
 
 ' And you actually think me a snob ? It 
 is very hard. Ere long I shall get another 
 to plead for me,' he added, laughing. 
 
 ' What can he mean ?' thought Mary. 
 
 ^ You pardon me just now,' said he^ 
 looking down upon her with great tender- 
 ness. 
 
 ' Yes,' said Mary, sweetly and simply ; 
 ' but do not offend me again.' 
 
 And bright though the sunny landscape 
 around her, it seemed for a moment to 
 grow brighter to her eyes, and her pulses 
 quickened, for she felt a thrill at the tone 
 of his voice and the expression of his eyes. 
 She felt too, somehow, as if the world 
 would never seem quite the same to her 
 afterwards ; and with this Avas blended an 
 emotion of pain that these feelings were 
 excited in her breast aimlessly and uselessly 
 by the affianced of another ! 
 
THE GAEDEN-PAHTy. 165 
 
 It was almost a relief to her wlien he 
 laughed, and, breaking the silence of a full 
 minute or so, said, 
 
 ' Now, I am about to rival your sister, 
 Miss Ellinor, in the achievement of some- 
 thing artistic,' and, opening a pocket-knife, 
 he proceeded to carve on the fine smooth 
 bark of a tree that overshadowed the rustic 
 sofa the letters ' M. W.' 
 
 ' My initials,' said Mary, watching his 
 work. 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 * I don't think Lord Dunkeld will thank 
 you for injuring his timber thus.' 
 
 'I don't care about Dunkeld's timber. 
 I've a good mind to be like that fellow in 
 Shakespeare — what's his name ? — Orlando, 
 
 and 
 
 " Carve on every tree 
 The fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she." 
 
 Queer phrase that — means inexpressible, I 
 suppose. See !' he added, as he quickly 
 cut three other initials beside Mary's — 
 L. W. C. — and the date. 
 
166 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. . 
 
 ' Please, don't — please, don't,' urged Mary, 
 almost with tears in her tremulous tones. 
 
 'Why?' he asked, looking doAvn upon 
 her with a bright and winning smile. 
 
 ' These initials may be seen.' 
 
 ' By whom — and what then?' 
 
 Mary was silent, but thought only of 
 Miss Galloway, though that young lady 
 seldom favoured the woods with her 
 society ; and now Colville completed his 
 work with a most orthodox true lovers' 
 knot, Mary growing more and more 
 appalled as it proceeded. 
 
 'You have a middle name?' she asked, 
 timidly. 
 
 ' Every fellow has now-a-days — snobbish, 
 isn't it ? In my case I cannot help it.' 
 
 ' And the middle name ?' 
 
 'Don't ask it — you know me but as 
 Leslie Colville, and that is my genuine 
 baptismal appelation . ' 
 
 'This bit of wood engraving may be 
 deuced unfair to lier if young Wodrow see& 
 
THE GAEDEN-PARTT. 167 
 
 it,' was the not uno;enerous tliou<^iit of 
 Leslie Colville. 
 
 'What if Blanche sees it?' was the timid 
 reflection of Mary ; thus, mentally, these 
 two were at cross-purposes. ' Do restore 
 to me or cast away that bunch of berries,' 
 she again said to him. 
 
 ' I cannot think of it ; but I shall con- 
 ceal it, if you will permit me,' said he, as 
 he kissed her little bouquet, and placed it 
 in his breast-pocket. 
 
 His tenderness seemed very true, but 
 might be — nay, Mary thought, must be — 
 mere flirtation. He had said, ' Ere long I 
 shall get another to plead for me.' Who 
 was that other ; and to plead for what ? 
 
 It was all very mysterious, and for a 
 moment or two Mary felt as one in a 
 dream. Under the old trees where they 
 lingered were cool and grateful shadows, 
 and on the soft breeze from the gardens 
 and shrubberies came the. perfume of roses 
 and heliotrope, with the drowsy hum of 
 
168 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 modulated voices and the music of the 
 
 band. 
 
 * Listen,' said he, touching her hand 
 
 lightly, while his features brightened ; ' do 
 
 you hear the sweet low air ?' 
 
 ^ It is " The Birks of Invermav." ' 
 'How it brino's the words of the sweet 
 
 song back to me — 
 
 " It wasna till the pale moonshine 
 Was glancing deep in Mary's e'e ; 
 That with a smile she said ' I'm thine,' 
 And ever true to thee •will be !" 
 
 You see how it and the name have 
 impressed me.' 
 
 'Don't, please. Captain Colville,' said 
 Mary, withdrawing her hand ; ' you should 
 not go on this way. It is not honourable 
 in you, and is annoying to me.' 
 
 ' What a puzzle you are !' said he, look- 
 ing at her Avith undisguised admiration, 
 mingled with — to her annoyance — the 
 slightest soupqon of amusement in his 
 handsome eyes, • as she proceeded slowly 
 across the lawn to rejoin the garden-party, 
 
THE GAEDEN-PAETY. 169 
 
 from which Mary felt he had purposely 
 lured her. 
 
 Meanwhile, he was closely scrutinising 
 the soft and downcast face of Mary — 
 downcast because she was too conscious 
 of the fervour of his regard. 
 
 With all her beauty, Mary Wellwood 
 had not yet had a lover. No man had 
 addressed her in terms of admiration or 
 love, and this fact, together with the some- 
 what secluded life she led, made the (per- 
 haps passing) attentions of Colville of 
 more importance than they would have 
 seemed to a young lady living in the 
 world like Miss Galloway, and, if the gal- 
 lant Guardsman was only amusing himself, 
 it was rather cruel of him ; so Mary's emo- 
 tions were of a somew^hat mixed nature. 
 
 Could she but fashion her little tell-tale 
 face for a brief period, and make it stony 
 as that of a sphinx ! 
 
 A curious sense of wrong, of deception 
 — even probable sorrow and affront, pos- 
 
170 COLVILLE 0^ THE GUARDS. 
 
 sessed her, mingled witli tliat of a new and 
 timid deliglit. 
 
 The touch of his hand seemed to mag- 
 netise her, and yet she longed to get away 
 from the reach of his eyes, his subtle and 
 detaining voice, for were they not the 
 property of Blanche Galloway ! 
 
 ' Why should he wrong her and love me, 
 as I actually think he does ?' surmised 
 Mary. ' What can I be to him more than 
 a flower perhaps by his wayside of life, to 
 be passed and forgotten when he goes 
 back to that gay world which is peculiarly 
 his — the great whirling world of '' So- 
 ciety." Worthy of him; I so poor can 
 never hope to be, and that proud, impe- 
 rious girl would soon teach him to forget 
 me !' 
 
 So thought and mused the girl — fondly, 
 sadly, and bitterly — and turning from the 
 music of the band, and the gay groups 
 that laughed and chatted around her, she 
 gazed down a vista of silver birches that 
 
THE GAEDEX-PARTT. 171 
 
 led towards the house, and saw their stems 
 glittering like silver columns in the flecks 
 of sunshine. 
 
 Blanche Galloway was not long in dis- 
 covering that the little bouquet her own 
 hands had assorted for Colville was now in 
 the breast of Mary Wellwood's dress, and 
 as she turned bluntly away from the lat- 
 ter, Dr. Wodrow, who knew not the cause 
 thereof, remarked to his better-half that 
 their young hostess had given Mary ^a 
 dark look — such a look as Jael, the mfe 
 of Heber the Kenite, might have given.' 
 
 Leslie Colville too ere long detected dark 
 looks in the face of Robert AYodrow, who 
 abruptly took his departure ; and the for- 
 mer felt piqued and annoyed to find him- 
 self, as he believed, the rival of a mere 
 ' bumpkin,' all unaware that Ellinor was 
 the cause of Robert's wrath ; and mean- 
 while where was that young lady ? 
 
172 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 IN THE CONSERVATORY. 
 
 In an atmospliere of drooping acacias, 
 little palmSj curious ferns, cacti, and other 
 exotics in tubs and pots, where the light 
 was subdued by the greenery overhead 
 and around, and where the plashing of a 
 beautiful bronze fountain alone broke the 
 stillness, for in the nook of that great con- 
 servatory to which Sir Redmond Sleath 
 had successfully drawn EUinor alone, the 
 music of the band and the merry voices of 
 the garden party were scarcely heard, they 
 were seated together on a blue velvet 
 lounge ; and he, having possessed himself 
 of her fan, was slowly fanning her, while 
 
IN THE CONSERVATORY. 173 
 
 he hung adimringly over her — a process 
 to which she submitted with a soft, 
 dreamy smile in her speaking hazel eyes ; 
 while with every motion of the fan the 
 ripples of her fine dark hair were blown 
 slightly to and fro. 
 
 Certainly a short intimacy had put these 
 two on terms of familiarity, for he said, as 
 he ceased to fan her, and settled down on 
 the lounge by her side, with one arm, 
 casually, as it were, thrown along the back 
 thereof, 
 
 ' I am not a stranger to you now.' 
 
 His voice was pleasantly modulated as 
 he stooped over her, and looked down on 
 her drooping eyelashes. 
 
 ' Oh, no — not now,' replied Ellinor. 
 
 ' I am so happy to hear you admit this.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 Ellinor felt her question to be foolish, as 
 it was a leading one. 
 
 ' Can you ask me ?' said Sir Kedmond, 
 in a still lower voice, and venturing to 
 
174 COLVTLLE OP THE GUAEDS. 
 
 toucli — -just to pat — lier hand ; 'there are 
 many persons whom we may know for 
 years, and yet find them somehow stran- 
 irers, but it is not so with vou and I.' 
 
 He now took her hand in his, and saw 
 that it Avas delicately white — for she had 
 drawn a glove off — and felt soft as velvet ; 
 he saw, too, that her white.-veined eyelids 
 with their long lashes drooped under his 
 earnest gaze, and that her red lips quiv- 
 ered. Was he actually influencing her 
 already? He could scarcely believe it, 
 even with all his unparalleled assurance. 
 
 She glanced nervously round her. 
 
 ^ Do not be alarmed, dear girl — darling 
 Ellinor, let me say,' whispered Sleath, in 
 his most honeyed accents, for who was to 
 call him to account for his impertinence, 
 if impertinence it really was ? ' I shall be 
 content to wait — to w\ait and win your 
 love, if you will but let me hope. Some 
 day — say one day you will listen to me, 
 and I shall tell you more freely, more 
 
IN THE CONSERVATORY. 175 
 
 boldly liow I love you — how I shall make 
 you my own !' 
 
 Ellinor trembled as she listened to these 
 stilted phrases that came so glibly from 
 his tono;ue — how often he had said them 
 to others she little knew; and — even 
 Robert Wodrow apart — she had never 
 played with a man's heart as Sleath was 
 now playing with hers. 
 
 He said much more, runnino- on in the 
 same inflated style, feeling quite a zest in 
 the, to him, well-nigh worn-out game of 
 love-making ; and Ellinor listened. She 
 was far from being a fool, yet she failed to 
 realise that his tones were very second- 
 hand indeed, and that the real expression 
 of his blue eyes, if triumphant, was also 
 false. 
 
 Her voice trembled so that she made no 
 response, and the flowers in the breast of 
 her dress rose and fell with the quickened 
 beating of her fluttered and, we are sorry 
 to say, happy heart. 
 
176 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 A conviction troubled her, nevertheless^ 
 and would not be put aside — that he would 
 master her and compel her to love him 
 blindly by the mere force of his — practised 
 — will, and she strove to resist it. 
 
 ^ You are over-confident, though flatter- 
 ing me, Sir Redmond,' said she, a little 
 defiantly at last. 
 
 'And what does that prove?' 
 
 'That you are not, perhaps, what you 
 really profess to be — ^in love.' 
 
 'With you?' 
 
 ' Yes,' she replied, in a breathless voice. 
 
 ' Have you ere this learned what love 
 is ?' 
 
 ' I know what it should be like — timid 
 and diffident,' she replied, uneasily, as her 
 thoughts flashed sorrowfully to poor studi- 
 ous Robert Wodrow. 
 
 'You fear I do not love you ?' he asked, 
 reproachfully. 
 
 ' I do not fear it.' 
 
 ' Look into my eyes.' 
 
IN THE CONSERVATORY. 177 
 
 She did look, and her own lowered, for 
 she saw that which so often passes for love 
 with the unthinking or unwary — deep and 
 burning passion ; and again she glanced 
 nervously around her, but felt impelled to 
 remain where she was. Sir Redmond de- 
 tected the motion, and, misconstruing it, 
 said, with a contemptuous smile that was 
 too subtle for her to perceive, 
 
 ' You and that — a — Mr. Robert Wodrow 
 were sweethearts, as it is called, when you 
 were children, I have heard.' 
 
 ' Indeed !' 
 
 ^Well?' 
 
 ' The very reason, if true, that we should 
 wish to be no more to each other,' replied 
 EUinor, with some annoyance, remember- 
 ing certain angry and bitter speeches of 
 Robert's when last they m.et and parted, 
 and some of his dark looks within the last 
 hour. 
 
 Sir Redmond was radiant at this re- 
 sponse. She drew on her gloves, and was 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
178 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 about to rise, when he detained her, and, 
 drawing her suddenly towards him, boldly 
 kissed her, not once, but t^yice ! 
 
 She grew very pale, and drew back, and 
 felt as if about to weep. 
 
 ' Why do you shrink from me, Ellinor ?' 
 he asked, mth tenderness, while detaining 
 her hands. 
 
 ' I do not shrink ; but — but all this has 
 been so sudden.' 
 
 ' Listen to me, dearest — dearest Ellinor. 
 With all your artistic tastes, you must of 
 course appreciate pretty things ?' 
 
 ' I do,' she replied, tremblingly, not 
 knowing what was coming next. 
 
 ' Do you admire this ?' he asked, draw- 
 ing from a pocket and unclasping a scarlet 
 morocco case, on the blue satin lining of 
 which there reposed a necklace of virgin 
 gold, with a locket attached, studded with 
 coral and diamonds, both miracles of the 
 jeweller's art. 
 
 ^ It is lovely !' exclaimed the girl. 
 
IN THE CONSERVATORY. 179 
 
 ' I am glad you like it, for it is yours.' 
 
 ' Mine !' said the 2firl, in a breathless 
 voice, as she felt herself grow pale, and 
 recognised the costliness of the jewel, but 
 scarcely knowing what she did or what she 
 said, while a curious mixture of dumb joy 
 in her new lover and remorse for the for- 
 mer one seized her. 
 
 She heard hurried and passionate words 
 poured into her ear ; she felt the firm, 
 warm clasp of Sir Redmond's hands on 
 hers as he begged permission to clasp the 
 necklet round her slender throat, Avhile 
 yieldingly she turned towards him, and 
 deftly — he was not unused to episodes 
 such as this — as he touched her soft, white 
 skin, he clasped it on, his eyes glowing 
 with fire and animation as he bent over 
 her sweet little face. 
 
 The latter was pale rather than flushed, 
 and her mobile lips were quivering as he 
 pressed his to them, pursuing his advan- 
 tage with all the courage, skill, and tact 
 
 N 2 
 
180 COLVILLE OF TEP: GUARDS. 
 
 his past rascally exjoerience had given him ; 
 while the force of his sudden love, if it 
 scared, also delighted Ellinor, though the 
 upbraiding and set visage of Robert 
 
 Wodrow seemed to rise between them. 
 
 * 
 
 ' One day I shall see the family dia- 
 monds of the house of Sleath sparkling 
 on your brow and bosom, love,' said he, 
 kissing her eyes, as gravely as if the said 
 house of Sleath had come in with the 
 European rabble of the Conqueror. ' And 
 you promise to be mine, Ellinor ?' he 
 added, pressing her close to him. 
 
 ' Yes,' she rephed, in a scarcely audible 
 whisper. 
 
 ' There arc some men who can love 
 several women in succession — or imagine 
 they do so. I am not one of these, believe 
 me, darling ! I have never — could never 
 have done that. You, Ellinor, are the 
 first love of my heart — my first and onl}' 
 one!' 
 
 Ho^v he talked, this man who knew well 
 
IN THE CONSERVATORY. 181 
 
 what passion was, but never loved, and 
 tlie girl was too truthful generally herself 
 to doubt ; so her heart throbbed as his 
 honeyed words fell on her willing ear. 
 
 ' And so, love, we shall soon be made 
 one now,' he whispered, with another 
 caress. 
 
 After a time she said, timidly and blush- 
 
 ingly, 
 
 ' You will tell — you will talk with Dr. 
 Wodrow about all this, Redmond?' 
 
 'How delicious to hear my name on 
 your lips ! But — Dr. Wodrow — why — is 
 he a relation ?' 
 
 ' No.' 
 
 * Why then — what then ?' 
 
 * He is a kind of guardian ; papa, on his 
 deathbed, bequeathed Mary and me to his 
 care.' 
 
 ' Consult him — impossible!' said Sir Red- 
 mond, whose face darkened. ' Why should 
 we condescend to consult that old pump 
 with the Sabbath-day face, when our own 
 
182 COLVrLLE OF THE GUAKDS. 
 
 hearts agree ? Besides, if my uncle, from 
 whom I have great expectations, knew that 
 I had married a Scotch girl — he has such 
 curious prejudices ' 
 
 'Your uncle?' queried Ellinor, timidly. 
 
 ' I have, unfortunately, an old and 
 strangely-tempered relation in that degree. 
 He is dying under an incurable disease, 
 and probably cannot live out this ^\inter 
 — certainly not next spring. I am the 
 heir to all his estates, and it is his fancy 
 that I should marry into a family of title — ' 
 
 'Otherwise?' 
 
 'I shall lose every shilling — every one!' 
 
 ' Poor man ! If the end is so near, 
 surely we can wait, Redmond — nay, of 
 course, we must wait,' she added, coyly 
 and fondly. 
 
 ' I cannot wait, my love for you will not 
 permit me, yet I am, though well enough 
 off, not so rich that I can afford to lose a 
 great inheritance. Could we — can we — 
 but keep our marriage from his know- 
 
IN THE CONSERVATOEY. 188 
 
 ledge ? But we will talk of all this ano- 
 ther time, darling. I am too hasty, too 
 impetuous, with you. People are coming 
 this way. Take my arm ; let us go !' 
 
 And he led her out into the sunlighted 
 lawn in such a state of bewilderment that 
 but for the chain and locket, of which, to 
 avoid explanations, she divested herself, 
 she would have deemed the whole episode 
 a dream. 
 
 So 'the song was sung, the tale was 
 told, and the heart was given away.' 
 
 Ellinor, on rejoining her friends, looked 
 about her, and felt somewhat of a relief 
 that she could nowhere see Robert Wod- 
 row, who, as we have said, had abruptly 
 taken his departure, and even amid the 
 splendour of Sir Redmond's proposal — for 
 a splendid one it seemed to poor Elhnor — 
 an emotion of reproach for unloyalty to 
 Robert Wodrow, the first and early lover 
 of her girlish life, rose up in her mind. 
 
 While her soul was yet loaded with the 
 
184 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 memory of that, to her. most naturally 
 great episode in the conservatory, on 
 whicli all her future life was to turn, we 
 may wonder what she would have thought 
 had she overheard a few bantering words 
 that passed between Sir Redmond Sleath 
 and the Honourable Blanche Galloway as 
 they were looking towards her and evi- 
 dently talking about her, while Mrs. Wod- 
 row, who was near, strained her ears to 
 listen. 
 
 'A wife, you say? No, my dear Miss 
 Galloway; I can't afford such a luxury 
 in these times, and consequently cannot be 
 a marrying man, unless ' 
 
 'Unless what?' 
 
 ' I found one facile enough to have me, 
 and with the necessary amount of acreage, 
 coalpits, money in the Funds, or elscAvhere.' 
 
 ' If so, why are you so attentive in that 
 absurd quarter, where there is no money 
 certainly?' asked the lady, pointing to 
 Ellinor with her fan. 
 
IN THE CONSERVATORY. 185 
 
 ^ Why, indeed !' thought Mrs. Wodrow, 
 exasperated about her son Robert. 
 
 Sir Redmond paused. 
 
 'Why?' asked the young lady again, 
 categorically. 
 
 ''Pour passer le temps^' replied Sir Red- 
 mond, with one of his insolent smiles, as he 
 twirled out the ends of his tawny mous- 
 tachios. 
 
 Mrs. Wodrow did not hear his answer, 
 though she saw the expression of his face ; 
 and at this reply Miss Galloway smiled 
 triumphantly and disdainfully while slowly 
 fanning herself. 
 
186 
 
 CHAPTER XIL 
 
 AFTER THOUGHTS. 
 
 There are generally two distinct sets of 
 people at every country entertainment 
 carrying out the principle of ' pig-iron 
 that looks down on tenpenny nails ;' but 
 Lady Dunkeld's garden-party Avas voted a 
 charming gathering. She had a special 
 skill for assorting her guests, and did so 
 accordingly, though some of our dramatis 
 jjersonw assorted themselves ; and the re- 
 sult was so far harmony, apparently — we 
 say apparently, for it was not universal. 
 
 Thus Blanche Galloway was displeased 
 with the manner in which Leslie Colville 
 hovered about Mary Wellwood, wdiile Col- 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 187 
 
 ville, and more especially Robert WodroWy 
 were both displeased by the consjDicuous 
 absence of Sir Redmond and Ellinor. 
 Robert knew not where they had been^ 
 and somehow never thought of looking in 
 the conservatories, and probably would 
 not have done so had the idea occurred to 
 him. 
 
 He had not been near her all day, and 
 he was now, more than ever, beginning to 
 reahse bitterly that the girl he had loved 
 so well all these years past, and who, he 
 certainly thought, loved him, was going 
 out of his life as completely as if she had 
 never existed. Yet he could not relin- 
 quish her without another effort — another 
 last appeal ; though he quitted the gaieties 
 of Craigmhor early with a sore and swollen 
 heart. 
 
 The evening was far advanced when the 
 sisters returned to Birkwoodbrae. 
 
 There was a letter lying on the dining- 
 room table addressed to Ellinor in the 
 
188 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 familiar liandwritino; of Robert Wodrow. 
 Why did lie write to lier now when he 
 lived so close by, as a hedge only separ- 
 ated Birkwoodbrae from the glebe ? unless 
 to tell her what he dared not trust his lips 
 to do ; and her heart foreboded this. 
 
 The letter lay almost beneath her hand 
 white and a^larino; in the last flush of the 
 sunset ; but, until Elspat had retired and 
 Mary had followed on some household 
 matter intent, she did not trust herself to 
 open it. 
 
 Then when there was no one by to ob- 
 serve her, she slowly opened the letter of 
 the lover who too truly feared he had been 
 supplanted by another. 
 
 Line after line — though it was brief — 
 the words were loving and tender, but 
 ended in bitterness and upbraiding; pas- 
 sion made them eloquent, and they burned 
 into the heart of the girl as the eyes and 
 voice of Robert haunted her ; but she felt 
 besotted by this new and showy admirer, 
 
AFTEE THOUGHTS. ISO" 
 
 he was so different from homely, honest, 
 Robert Wodrow — so different from any 
 man she had ever met before ; and why 
 should Robert, who was only her friend — 
 her old playmate, she strove to think, but 
 with much sophistry, attempt to compete 
 with him and control her movements. 
 
 ' I must give you up, Robert,' she half 
 whispered to herself; and then the idea 
 occurred to her, ^ would she have done so 
 had she never met Sir Redmond Sleath ?' 
 
 The letter had a postscript : — 
 
 ' My darling, the windows of your room 
 face mine over the orchard wall. If you 
 have not cast me utterly out of your 
 heart, for pity sake give me some sign 
 then to-morrow — place a vase of flowers 
 uj)on your window-sill, and I shall know 
 the token.' 
 
 But Robert Wodrow next day, from 
 earliest dawn till morn was long past, 
 looked and watched in vain for the sign, 
 but none was given to him ; for though 
 
190 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 the heart of Ellinor Wellwood was wrung 
 within her, she was too completely under 
 a new and baleful influence now, and the 
 old love was fast being forgotten. 
 
 To do her a little justice, we must admit 
 that her first impulse had been to accord 
 the poor fellow the token for which his 
 soul thirsted. 
 
 A vase of flowers, sent to her but that 
 morning from Sir Redmond by the hands 
 of his valet, was on the mantelpiece. She 
 put her hands towards it mechanically, as 
 if she would have placed it on her window 
 sill in obedience to that pitiful letter ; but 
 strange to say the flowers were all dead — 
 already dead and withered ! 
 
 Why was this ? 
 
 Something superstitious crept over the 
 girl's heart as she looked on them ; she 
 turned away — and the token was not 
 given. 
 
 Robert, we have said, watched with 
 aching heart and aching eyes in vain. 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 191 
 
 Had the postscript escaped her notice ? It 
 might be so; and to this straw, like a 
 drowning man, he clung. So the day 
 passed on ; and Ellinor began to think 
 she had done wisely in not raising hopes 
 only to crush them, and gave herself up to 
 thoughts of Sir Redmond, and the secret 
 contemplation of his beautiful gift. 
 
 Sir Redmond had poured into her ear 
 much of love, of passion, of admiration, 
 and so forth, certainly ; but even to 
 Ellinor's unsophisticated mind his pro- 
 posal of marriage seemed a strange one. 
 
 Each sister had ample food for her own 
 thoughts. Mary was rehearsing over and 
 over again the cutting of the initials on 
 the tree, and the manner of Colville to 
 herself. If he really was engaged to 
 Blanche Galloway (of which she had no 
 positive proof), it was not flattering to 
 either of them ; yet the expression of his 
 eyes seemed ever sweet, candid, and honest ; 
 and she gave fully her confidence to Ellinor. 
 
192 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 The latter, who had never a secret to 
 keep from her sister before, felt with 
 shame and compunction that she had one 
 now — one of vast importance to them 
 both ; but Sir Redmond had bound her to 
 secrecy for a little time, and she could but 
 trust ; so fondly she thought over that 
 scene in the conservatory — his proposal, a 
 dazzling one, for would she not one day be 
 Lady Sleath, proud, wealthy, and inde- 
 pendent of all the world ? 
 
 Even her parents, who were lying in 
 their graves, with all their love of her, had 
 never in their proudest and most exultant 
 moments pictured for either of their chil- 
 dren a future like this ! 
 
 So she seemed to live in an enchanted 
 world, out of which the figure of Robert 
 Wodrow faded. ' Once in our lives,' says 
 a writer, ^ Paradise opens for all of us out 
 of the dull earth, and moments, golden 
 with the light of romance, shine upon us 
 with a radiance like unto no other radiance 
 
AFTER THODGHTS. 193 
 
 of time, and we do not stay to count the 
 cost of the bitter desolation that follows. 
 For Eve herself would scarcely have sur- 
 rendered one memory of Eden for all the 
 joys to be found upon earth.' 
 
 Colville, when in the solitude of his own 
 room, overlooking the woods of Craigmhor, 
 was full of his own thoughts, some of 
 which were not very pleasant, as he was 
 dissatisfied with himself. He had a little 
 plan he wished to carry out, as we shall 
 show in time, and he felt perhaps that he 
 was acting foolishly. He had come from 
 London with the Dunkeld family, who 
 evidently expected more from him in 
 regard to Blanche than he had yet evinced, 
 and the rumour of their engagement was a 
 false one. 
 
 He had also come mth his mind inspired 
 with doubt, indifference, even prejudice 
 against some of those he had met, the 
 Wellwood sisters in particular ; and, instead 
 of finding them objectionable in any way, 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
194 COLVILLB OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 they were far more refined than himself, 
 the ' curled pet ' of many a Belgravian 
 drawing-room. 
 
 Many a fair face in these regions was 
 forgotten now, and his thoughts were all 
 of Mary Wellwood — more than he dared 
 acknowledge to himself Though he had 
 seen so little of her, he felt — was it the 
 result of some magnetic affinity ? — as if he 
 had known her all his life; as if a full 
 knowledge of her character had suddenly 
 crept into his heart, and yet this was im- 
 possible just then. 
 
 'Mary Wellwood !' he murmured to 
 himself. 
 
 He had heard of Colonel AYell wood's 
 daughters in London more than once, from 
 one who should have befriended them, but 
 always omitted to do so, and whose views 
 and opinions of two friendless girls were 
 ever slighting and hostile ; and now that 
 he met and knew them, Colville despised 
 himself for some of the thoughts in which 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 195 
 
 he liad first indulered concernino; tliem, and 
 the more tenderly lie thougiit of Mary tlie 
 more reproachful of himself he grew. 
 
 He had made no declaration — no; he was 
 neither so rash nor so foolish as that yet, 
 with all his romance, if the object of her 
 regard was Mr. Robert Wodrow. 
 
 Of her feelings towards himself he could 
 not form the slightest idea, and her manner 
 was a source of perplexity. One moment 
 she was frank, genial, and mthout re- 
 straint ; but the next, if he became in the 
 least degree tender, she grew retiring, 
 distant, and cold ; and, though he knew it 
 not, this bearing was born of the rumours 
 concerning Blanche Galloway, and he was 
 all unaware how local gossip had mixed up 
 his name with that of this young lady. 
 
 On one occasion he suspected that Mary 
 avoided him, and once she seemed nearly 
 to dislike him ; thus he was pleased that 
 he had not too formally committed him- 
 self, and so, until he could put the matter 
 
 2 
 
196 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 'to the touch, to win or lose it all,' he 
 would but torment himself with doubts 
 and fears in the way usual to all lovers ; 
 but ere the time came, events were to occur 
 which, though in some measure caused by 
 himself, the bitter issue of them he could 
 never have foreseen. 
 
 The two chief episodes of the garden- 
 party were of course well known to the 
 two ladies at Craio:mhor, as Mademoiselle 
 Rosette had two bright and sharp French 
 eyes in her head, and knew perfectly well 
 how to use them. 
 
 ' I don't like the conduct of Sir Red- 
 mond, of course, Blanche,' said Lady Dun- 
 keld, ' and have no wish that he should 
 involve himself with an obscure girl whom 
 he met in our house.' 
 
 ' I believe it to be all nothing more than 
 a mere coquetterie de salon,' said Lord Dun- 
 keld. ' Sleath is not a marrying man.' 
 
 'And Captain Colville's conduct with 
 the other sister, wandering away into 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 197 
 
 remote parts of the ground ; I suppose 
 that was a coqvxtterie de salon too, mamma,' 
 said Blanche, her eyes sparkling with 
 anger, while she shrugged her shoulders, 
 and briskly used her dark blue and bronzy 
 green fan of peacocks' feathers. 
 
 'What— how?' 
 
 ' They strolled away from everyone to- 
 o-ether, and were absent ever so lono;.' 
 
 ' This is intolerable ; but men will be 
 men, you see, Blanche. If Miss Wellwood 
 had been a married lady it would not have 
 mattered so much. I think when a young 
 man is attached to a married lady it keeps 
 him out of harm's way,' said Lady Dun- 
 keld; ' however, we must take some decided 
 measures with Miss Wellwood, and with 
 Captain Colville too.' 
 
 ' Dear mamma !' cooed Miss Blanche 
 Galloway, and she laughed that worldly 
 little laugh of hers, which was so indicative 
 ■of her character. 
 
 The result of all this was that, when 
 
198 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 Mary and Ellinor called ceremoniously 
 shortly after the garden-party, Lady Dun- 
 keld, who was seated at one of the 
 drawing-room windows, on seeing them 
 approach, rose hastily and retired. 
 
 ' No one was at home.' 
 
 Next day the sisters were scarcely no- 
 ticed by Lady Dunkeld and her daughter 
 at church. 
 
 Other persons were not slow to remark 
 this, and the surmises thereon — though 
 the two girls knew nothing about them — 
 were the reverse of pleasant or flattering. 
 
 Mary observed the absence of Captain 
 Colville, Avho was not in the Dunkeld 
 pew ; and on the following day she felt a 
 keen pang on learning that he was gone 
 for a few days to shoot with Lord Dunkeld 
 in the Forest of Alyth. 
 
 So he had gone without paying her a 
 farewell visit, thought Mary. 
 
 ' He is to return in a fortnight,' said 
 her informant, Mrs. Wodrow, near whose 
 
AFTEIl THOUGHTS. ] 99 
 
 chair Mary was seated on a tabourette in 
 the cosy manse parlour, making up a gala- 
 cap for the old lady ; and near her crouched 
 Jack, watching the process. 
 
 The parlour was a pretty apartment,, 
 neither morning-room nor boudoir, though 
 somewhat of both, with many indications 
 of a woman's presence. 
 
 Rare old china was disposed in odd 
 nooks, and china bowls with roses freshly 
 gathered from the garden ; and the furni- 
 ture, if old-fashioned, and pertaining to 
 the early days of Mrs. Wodrow's home- 
 coming to the manse as a young wedded 
 wife, was all polished to perfection. On a 
 shelf was an imposing row of the ' Wodrow 
 Society's ' religious publications, including 
 ' The Last Words of My Lady Coltness,' 
 ' Of My Lady Anne Elcho,' the life of the 
 gallant Covenanter, Sergeant John Nisbet 
 of Hardhill, and so forth. 
 
 'Apropos of Captain Colville,' said the 
 old lady, looking down on her young 
 
200 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 friend, ' I hope you liave not lost your 
 heart to him, Mary ?' 
 
 'I should think not,' replied Mary, 
 stoutly, but colouring so deeply, neverthe- 
 less, tlip.t Mrs. Wodrow could see how the 
 crimson suffused even her delicate neck. 
 
 ' That is well, Mary ; mischief enough 
 has been wrought among us already,' re- 
 sumed Mrs. Wodrow, her benign old face 
 becoming cloudy. 
 
 Mary knew to what she referred, but 
 seemed, or affected to seem, wholly intent 
 on the cap ; and Mrs. Wodrow looked ad- 
 miringly and affectionately down on her 
 dimpled wrists and little white hands. 
 
 ' I do wish I had something nice and 
 fresh for trimming !' she exclaimed, as she 
 twirled round the cap for inspection. ' I 
 think these rosebuds will do with this 
 spray of ivy,' she added, searching a 
 flower-box, and putting her head medi- 
 tatively on one side. 
 
 'Then, Mrs. Wodrow,' she exclaimed, 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 201 
 
 ^if I fail to please you, you must be a 
 dreadful coquette, you old dear !' 
 
 ' Thanks, pet Mary ; when did you ever 
 fail to please me ?' said the old lady, caress- 
 ing the girl's head, and adding, anxiously, 
 ^ You do not look well, Mary ; where were 
 you this morning ? Not in the clachan, I 
 hope, as I hear there is scarlatina there.' 
 
 ' I have no fear ; I took a kind message 
 from Robert about a sick baby. I fear it 
 is dying, and God pity the poor mother, 
 the only light of whose life is likely to go 
 out in darkness.' 
 
 ' You have a tender heart, Mary. 
 Robert, poor Robert ; you know he has 
 failed to pass, Mary?' 
 
 ' Yes ; I am so sorry, and so is Ellinor.' 
 
 ' Ellinor may well be,' said Mrs. Wodrow, 
 with some asperity. 
 
 'Why?' asked Mary, her colour deepen- 
 ino^ ao:ain. 
 
 ' Because her fair face has come be- 
 tween him and his wits, poor fellow, and 
 
202 COLYILLE OF THE GUABDS. 
 
 I shouldn't wonder if we lose him alto- 
 gether.' 
 
 ^ Lose him !' repeated Mary, in a breath- 
 less voice ; ' how ?' 
 
 ^ He seems desperate and says that 
 rather than slave for another session at 
 college he will go for a soldier.' 
 
 ' Oh, never, never think of such a 
 thing !' 
 
 ' He and Ellinor seem to have quar- 
 relled.' 
 
 ' Quarrelled — surely not ! About what 
 or who ?' 
 
 ' That man Sir Redmond Sleath, and his 
 attentions to her.' 
 
 ' They will make up this quarrel as they 
 have made up others long ago,' said poor 
 Mary, cheerfully, as she little knew to 
 what a crisis the baronet's admiration for 
 her sister was coming — nay, had come. 
 She knew nothing of the scene in the con- 
 servatory and other minor scenes, of the 
 present of jewellery, of utterances and 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 203 
 
 promises. She believed the whole affair 
 was only a lovers' quarrel, stimulated by 
 jealousy on Robert's part, and vanity on 
 that of Ellinor ; and meantime she sympa- 
 thised with Mrs. AYodrow, and would have 
 done so with Robert had he been there, 
 but he was fully and painfully occupied 
 elsewhere at that precise time. 
 
 ' As children — as boy and girl, they may 
 have quarrelled, Mary ; but this affair will 
 be a serious one for both, for Robert 
 especially. His studies are neglected, his 
 appetite is gone, and he looks the ghost of 
 himself.' 
 
 Mary knew not what more to urge, as 
 she had seen, with some anxiety, Sir Red- 
 mond's admiration of her sister, and said, 
 after a pause, 
 
 ' I wonder what manner of man Sir Red- 
 mond is?' 
 
 ' Judging by the little I saw of him at 
 the garden-party — where the mischief 
 seems to have been done — not a good 
 
204* COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 man, Mary dear — not a good man, though 
 a handsome one in his way, and to a young 
 girl, I doubt not, fascinating, Yet I would 
 rather see my daughter dead, if I had one, 
 than married to a man with eyes so cold, 
 so cruel and shifty.' 
 
 'But who is thinking of marriage?' said 
 Mary, with a slight laugh, little knowing 
 that it was a contingency as remote from 
 the thoughts of Sir Redmond as her own. 
 
 'And I don't think that Captain Col- 
 ville — for all that Dr. Wodrow seems 
 to like him so much — can be good in every 
 way if he has such a friend or companion 
 as Sir Redmond Sleath,' said the old lady, 
 shaking her head. 
 
 These provoking words haunted Mary 
 for weeks after, as the tormenting frag- 
 ment of a song or air will haunt us — not 
 because we like it, though it will recur 
 again and again. Then he had gone with- 
 out the formality of a farewell visit. Had 
 the Dunkcld ladies aught to do with that? 
 
AFTER THOUGHTS. 205 
 
 Mary's heart foreboded that they had. 
 
 Mrs. Wodrow was full of indication 
 at the worry and humiliation undergone 
 by her son, and even the doctor was not 
 disinclined to inveio:h ao;ainst o^arden- 
 parties and such-like gatherings, as his 
 ancestor did against theatres — ' those semi- 
 naries of idleness, looseness, and sin,' as he 
 termed them in Analecta Scoiica. 
 
 The peaceful current of the sisters' life 
 — the life they led at bonnie Birkwoodbrae, 
 was soon to be roughly disturbed now, 
 and events were to occur which they could 
 never have foreseen. 
 
206 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE LAST APPEAL. 
 
 Robert Wodeow, on the afternoon referred 
 to in our last chapter, was, we have said, 
 eno:ao:ed elsewhere than at the manse, and 
 yet he was not very far away. 
 
 Incidents -trivial at the time had now 
 recurred with convincing and accumulat- 
 ing force to his feverish mind on one 
 hand; on the other, he feared that he 
 might have been too hasty in his condem- 
 nation, and too summary in his suspicions, 
 in quitting the party at Craigmohr as he 
 had done ; yet wlieve were these two all the 
 time he had missed them, and what was 
 the subject of their discourse while he had 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 207 
 
 been lingering amid the gay groups in the 
 sunshine, and was grotesquely tortured by 
 the music of the band ? 
 
 And the token he had prayed for had 
 not been accorded ! How he loathed the 
 little world in which he lived ; how he 
 longed to eschew everyone there, and get 
 far away from the Birks of Invermay, for 
 to see Ellinor among these vnth another, 
 and that other 'the slimy Sleath,' as he 
 thought, would drive him mad. 
 
 To think of Ellinor — to meet and hans: 
 about her ; to anticipate her every wish 
 and want, so far as lay in ^his humble 
 power, had been for years — in the intervals 
 of his hard studies — the daily occupation 
 of Robert Wodrow's life ; and now all this 
 was at an end; his ' occu23ation,' like 
 Othello's, seemed gone. 
 
 Knowing that Mary was at the manse, 
 he thought he would find Ellinor at home 
 alone, and he was right, so he ventured 
 near Birkwoodbrae to make a ' last appeal ;' 
 
208 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 and yet even in this he had been, to a 
 certain extent, interfered with by his rival 
 
 The latter, well aware of the time when 
 Mary Wellwood was generally abroad 
 among her poor people, or otherwise em- 
 ployed, had sent his valet, John Gaiters — 
 a well-trained rascal — with a beautiful 
 bouquet and a perfumed note to EUinor. 
 
 In the note he urged her by ever}^ 
 means in her power to preserve secrecy 
 close as the grave concerning the terms on 
 which they were, lest his expectations 
 might be destroyed, and -svith them her 
 own ; and then he pressed her to meet him 
 at a certain point near the Linn on the 
 May, at a given time, when he would tell 
 her more. 
 
 This missive was curiouslv and most 
 warily worded to be the production of one 
 who professed to be such an ardent lover. 
 It did not bear even his signature, but 
 only his initials mysteriously twisted into 
 a species of monogram. To one more 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 209 
 
 worldly wise or less foolish than Ellinor, 
 some doubts would have been inspired by 
 its tenor alone, but she had none, and 
 simply felt joy and tumult in her breast. 
 
 She clasped the golden locket round her 
 neck, and A\ith brightness spreading over 
 her sweet face, contemplated herself in a 
 hand mirror, while indulging in day- 
 dreams of her future as Lady Sleath, being 
 driven in a splendid carriage to Bucking- 
 ham Palace, or down St. James's Street, 
 Avith bare shoulders in broad daylight, 
 with a train some yards long and dia- 
 monds in profusion, to be presented at the 
 drawing-room in the gloomy old palace of 
 the Tudors, surrounded by handsome fel- 
 lows in snowy uniforms, who murmured 
 compliments about her beauty. 
 
 Had '■ dear Redmond ' not described to 
 her, too, something of the life they would 
 lead together? Returning from Tybur- 
 nian and Belgravian balls at 6 a.m., break- 
 fasting at mid-day, and then going for ' a 
 
 VOL. T. P 
 
210 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 spin ' in the Row, where cavaliers would 
 surround her, or canter by her side and 
 beg for waltzes at Lady A.'s and the 
 Countess of B.'s. Then dress again for 
 a flower fete at the Botanical Gardens ; for 
 pigeon-shooting at Hurlingham (wherever 
 that was — poor Ellinor had not the ghost 
 of an idea !) Sunday at the Zoo, and a 
 dinner at the ' Star and Garter,' or it might 
 be at the ' Trafalgar ' in Greenwich, which 
 she supposed to be one of H.M.' ships. 
 
 Suddenly, amid visions such as these, 
 unheard or unannounced, Robert Wodrow 
 stood before her, hat in hand, and in his 
 eyes, keen and dark grey, a brooding light 
 that boded evil to some one ! 
 
 He was pale almost to ghastliness, and 
 her eyes drooped, as if a weight oppressed 
 their full white lids when they met his 
 iixed gaze. However, he took her proffer- 
 ed hand mechanically, and then she tried 
 to talk gaily, not knowing what she said ; 
 but the talk proved a miserable failure. 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 211 
 
 How he lon2:ed to take her in his arms 
 once again ; to kiss her glossy brown hair, 
 her damask cheek, her rosy lips ; to im- 
 plore her to love him still and share his 
 humble future ! But no ; it would be 
 more cowardly to take any advantage then 
 of any passing remorse she might feel ; 
 and better was it, perhaps, that she should 
 marry this other man, if he really loved 
 her, and forget — if she could — that there 
 was such a poor fellow as Robert Wodrow 
 in the secluded world she would leave 
 behind her ; and he said something of this 
 to her in faltering accents, and for a time 
 the heart of Elhnor faltered too — but for 
 a time only. 
 
 The new vision was too bright to fade 
 quickly away ! 
 
 ' I am eating my heart out with sorrow 
 and uncertainty — I am sick of suspense, 
 ElUnor,' he said, after a pause ; ' our happy 
 meetings, our walks, our talks, our plans 
 
 p2 
 
212 COLVILLll OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 for the future — are tliey all as nothing to 
 you now, Ellin or?' 
 
 'That is it, Robert,' she said, making a 
 prodigious effort to be calm and cool; 
 ' you see, Robert, we have been so much 
 together.' 
 
 ' All our days, EUinor !' 
 
 '■ Too much so — yes, all our days ; so it 
 never struck me that — that ' 
 
 'What, darling?' 
 
 ' You cared for me in that way.' 
 
 ' Indeed ! Your doubts come too late.' 
 
 ' Or I might have learned to care too,' 
 she said, with confusion. 
 
 ' You did love me, and care for me too, 
 before that fellow Sleath came among us,' 
 said Robert, gloomily ; for it seemed hard 
 indeed that, after the happiness of their 
 boyhood and girlhood, after all the bud- 
 ding hopes of riper years, under this man's 
 new and hateful influence, she made lisfht 
 of him and his love — mocked him, it 
 seemed, laughed at him for being so fool- 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 213 
 
 isli to care for her 'in tliat way,' as she 
 phrased it. 
 
 ' Robert,' said she, after a pause, ' why 
 be so angry about a little flirtation ?' 
 
 She spoke deprecatingiy, and her face 
 wore a sickly smile. 
 
 'To flirt was never your wont, and I 
 have read that the essence of flirting is 
 that it is a stolen pleasure, the future 
 results of which cannot be foreseen.' 
 
 ' It would be tame between such old 
 friends as you and I, Robert.' 
 
 'Tame indeed — and unnatural,' said he, 
 huskily. 
 
 His eyes, which hitherto had been flxed 
 upon her colourless face, now fell upon the 
 ornament she was wearing — an ornament 
 he had never seen before ; and from its 
 apparent value his heart too surely fore- 
 boded who the donor was ; yet he dis- 
 dained to refer to it, though he said, up- 
 braidingly, 
 
 ' Oh, Ellinor, how I have loved, and still 
 
214 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 love yon, is known only to Heaven and 
 myself; yet never again shall my hand 
 touch yours ; never again my arm go round 
 you ; never more shall my lips touch yours, 
 though yearning — oh, God only knows 
 how intenselv — lono^ino; to do so once 
 again — only once again !' 
 
 She evinced no sign of a truce in this 
 position, and was devoutly hoping that 
 Robert Wodrow would adopt some other 
 role than that of lover. 
 
 ' Robert,' she said, nervously, ' are we 
 not friends ?' 
 
 'No; 
 
 ' Can we not be friends again ?' 
 ^Friends! How can you ask me? It 
 was, you w^ell know, always understood,' 
 he continued, making an effort to be calm, 
 ' that when I could afford to marr}', you, 
 Ellinor, would be my wife. Why take all 
 my love and give me back not an atom 
 now ?' 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 215 
 
 She accorded no answer. 
 
 ^ You have ceased to be true to me. I 
 have known and felt it for weeks past,' he 
 continued, ' and yet I cannot regain my 
 freedom of heart.' . 
 
 Her head was weary, but her heart was 
 beating wildly and painfully ; and Robert's 
 eyes, as he surveyed her with all their 
 sadness of expression, were expressive of 
 the fondest love. 
 
 Never before had these two spoken or 
 confronted each other with bitterness of 
 heart until now, and each felt that for the 
 other all was over, and that the tender 
 past, 'the grace of a day that was dead,' 
 would never come again. 
 
 ' Robert, I have always hated the idea ot 
 being poor,' urged Ellinor, as if to extenu- 
 ate herself, ' and with you, a young, strug- 
 gling, country practitioner, supposing the 
 summit of your ambition won, I should 
 never be otherwise. Pardon me,' she 
 
216 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 added, recalling the Alnascliar visions his 
 visit had interrupted, ' if I speak un- 
 kindly.' 
 
 ' Say, rather, cruelly, and you A\ill be 
 nearer the truth, Ellinor Welhvood ; yet I 
 am sorry for you.' 
 
 • Be not so, Robert. I repeat that I 
 would never be happy poor — now,' she 
 added, involuntarily. 
 
 'You have made that discovery since 
 this interloper came !' 
 
 She was silent, but her silence was assent, 
 and he took it as such. 
 
 ' Not happy even at dear old Birkwood- 
 brae or the home I meant to provide close 
 by it ?' he said, reproachfully. 
 
 ' Be reasonable, Robert ; happen what 
 may, we can always be dear friends.' 
 
 ' Friends — again !' he exclaimed, sternly; 
 *you and I, Ellinor?' 
 
 Then his manner changed, for the great- 
 ness of his love made him very humble, and 
 he said. 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 217 
 
 ' Do you know what you are doing — do 
 you fully think of it even ? You cannot 
 love this man, Ellinor, whom, I suppose, 
 you are going to marry, as you loved me.' 
 
 ^Marriage, Robert!' said she, blushing 
 deeply now ; ' how fast your thoughts run.' 
 
 ' How ?' 
 
 ' If that is to be, it is in the future, of 
 course — but just now ' 
 
 She paused with some confusion, as she 
 thought of the injunctions laid by Sleath 
 upon her. 
 
 'You cannot love him?' 
 
 ' Perhaps not quite exactly yet, Robert,' 
 replied Ellinor, not knowing really what 
 to say, and feeling some shame at 
 the part she was acting ; ' but think of 
 his position, and the place he can give 
 me — a poor, almost penniless, girl — in 
 society.' 
 
 ' And in that place you expect to be 
 happy ?' 
 
 ' 1 shall have substantial srrounds for 
 
218 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 happiness, and I tliink, Robert dear, 3'ou 
 wish me well.' 
 
 'Heaven knows I do, though you are 
 learning fast to forget. Search your heart, 
 Ellinor,' he continued, piteously ; ' think 
 over our past, darling — of our mutually 
 anticipated future, in which each seemed 
 to see only the other. Against reason, 
 hope, and all I hear I cannot forget, and 
 hence I love you — love you still, Ellinor.' 
 
 He stretched out his hands to her, and 
 his eyes grew very dim. 
 
 For a moment she was tempted to throw 
 herself upon his loving breast, and there 
 sob out her remorse and seek his formve- 
 ness ; but the demons of pride and ambi- 
 tion ruled her heart too strongly now, and 
 she withheld or crushed the emotions of 
 pity and generosity that so fleetly inspired 
 her. 
 
 When that emotion came again they 
 were far apart, and it came too late — too 
 late ! 
 
THE LAST APPEAL. 219 
 
 How this last meeting might have ended 
 it is difficult to say ; but Robert Wodrow, 
 thinking it was useless to protract the 
 agony he felt, pressed his tremulous lips 
 to her right hand, and, without trusting 
 himself to look again in her face, swiftly 
 withdrew, and quitted the house. 
 
 Poor Robert ! She was indeed sorry for 
 him — sorry that the old friendly relations, 
 as she strove to deem them now, should be 
 broken up. ' They had been such chums ' 
 — Robert, more justly, deemed it 'lovers' 
 — in the dear past time that would never 
 — could never — come again ! 
 
 Better a thousand times, if it was to be, 
 that they parted now, and that it Avas over 
 — all over and done with, thought EUinor, 
 after a time. 
 
 Amid all this there was a strange and 
 conflicting — a mysterious foreboding in 
 her mind, that by casting off the honest 
 love of Robert Wodrow she might be en- 
 tailing future misery on herself. 
 
220 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 The last appeal had been made, and, 
 though in vain, young Wodrow did not 
 regret that he had made it, but he feared 
 that Ellinor might be following a shadow 
 and missing the substance. So true it is 
 that Hhe golden moments in the stream 
 of life rush past us, and we see nothing 
 but sand; that angels come to visit us, 
 and we only know them when they are 
 gone.' 
 
221 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 GRETCHEN AND FAUST. 
 
 ^And you have quarrelled with poor 
 Robert?' said Mary, somewhat reproach- 
 fully, to her sister. 
 
 ' Nay — not quarrelled, exactly/ replied 
 Elhnor. 
 
 'What, then?' 
 
 ' Agreed to part.' 
 
 ' After— a//; oh, EUinor !' 
 
 'All what?' 
 
 ' Well, you know what I mean.' 
 
 ' We have always been in the habit of 
 calling each other by our Christian names, 
 and by pet names, too, such as Robbie 
 and EUie — a bad system — and — and — in 
 
222 COLVILLB OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 fact, you know, Mary, we regarded each 
 other rather as brother and sister than as 
 
 -as- 
 
 ' Lovers — and in this new view of the 
 situation you are no doubt influenced by 
 Sir Redmond Sleath ?' 
 
 ' Perhaps,' repHed Elhnor, doggedly, as 
 she watched the hands of the clock. 
 
 ' If he means honourably — and he dare 
 not mean otherwise — you are perhaps 
 worldly-wise. But poor Robert !' 
 
 The exclamation, though uttered low, 
 found an echo in the heart of Ellinor. 
 Yet she was inexorably intent on keeping 
 her invited appointment, of which Mary 
 had not, of course, the least suspicion. 
 
 ' I do not like Sir Redmond,' said Mary, 
 with a tone of decision. 
 
 ' Why ?' asked Ellinor, changing colour. 
 
 ^ He never looks me straight in the face, 
 and at times, with all his insouciance^ he 
 can do nothing but tug out his moustache, 
 as if to show off his white, useless hands. 
 
GRETCHEN AND FAUST. 223 
 
 He certainly has hung about you, Ellinor, 
 more than I — considerino; our friendless 
 and lonely position — have quite rehshed.' 
 
 ' Not perhaps more than Captain Colville 
 has hung about you, Mary,' retorted El- 
 linor, softly ; ' and I may as well admit 
 that Sir Redmond always speaks to me of 
 his love, and has asked me to love him in 
 return.' 
 
 ' He has done this ?' exclaimed Mary, 
 grooving pale. 
 
 ' Yes,' replied Elhnor, kissing her sister, 
 perhaps to hide her own face. 
 
 ' Has he asked you to be his wife ?' 
 
 The look of unrest — sorrowful unrest — 
 she had detected more than once in El- 
 linor's face crept over it now. The latter 
 cast her sweet eyes down and made no 
 reply, as in this important matter she was 
 as yet tongue-tied. 
 
 'Be wary — be wary, pet Ellinor, for it 
 has been truly said that common-sense 
 and honesty bear so small a proportion to 
 
224 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 folly and knavery tliat human life at least 
 is but a paltiy province.' 
 
 *Is tliis out of one of Dr. Wodrow's 
 sermons ?' asked Ellinor, with some annoy- 
 ance. ^ Surely I am the best judge of 
 what is for my own happiness.' 
 
 ' Perhaps ; but remember the proverb,' 
 said Mary, thinking of the absent Colville 
 and fading hopes. 'Happiness is like an 
 echo which answers to the call, but does 
 not come.' 
 
 'What an old croaker it is !' said Ellinor, 
 as she laughingly kissed her sister again 
 and slipped away from her. 
 
 She re-read Sir Redmond Sleath's letter 
 — the first love-letter she had ever re- 
 ceived, if we except the sorrowful and 
 upbraiding epistle from Robert Wodrow. 
 It seemed orthodox enough, as it began 
 ' My darling,' but had no genuine signa- 
 ture, and there was very little devotion 
 expressed in it, and was brief and curt. 
 
 Perhaps Sir Redmond disliked letter- 
 
GllETCHEN AND FAUST. 225 
 
 writing — most men do ; but there seemed 
 something wanting in this letter — some- 
 thing she could not define, and the lack of 
 which she felt and sighed over. Were 
 Mary's words of warning affecting her ? 
 It almost seemed so ; but she put the 
 document carefully away in the most 
 secret recess of her desk, and hastened to 
 hold the meeting it solicited — and like the 
 Gretchen of Goethe hastening to meet 
 Faust, took her way to the trysting-place 
 near the Linn, and long after in EUinor's 
 mind was the sound of the May, as it 
 poured over the steep cascade, associated 
 with this meeting and all the pain it 
 caused her. 
 
 When she arrived. Sir Eedmond was not 
 there, and was ungallantly late in keeping 
 his appointment ; but he and Lord Dun- 
 keld had lately betaken themselves to ^nl- 
 ing away the evenings at ecarte, though 
 the baronet had a way of turning a king 
 that would have made the fortune of any- 
 
 VOL. I. , Q 
 
226 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 one compelled to pluck wealthy pigeons. 
 
 He came just when Ellinor was very 
 much disposed to pout, and framed the 
 most humble of apologies, as he was re- 
 solved to lose no time in carrying out his 
 nefarious plans in absence of the Guards- 
 man, who seemed to have — he knew not 
 why, unless for evil schemes of his own — 
 a mysterious interest in these two girls, of 
 one of whom he stood somehow rather in 
 awe. 
 
 Pressing Ellinor close to his heart, with 
 her face nestled in his neck, he told her 
 why he had asked for this meeting, and 
 what he had now to propose for their own 
 happiness, and that to deceive his wealthy 
 uncle, from whom their marriage must be 
 kept a secret— there could be no public 
 ceremony — no notice in the newspapers, 
 more than all ! 
 
 ' Dare you trust yourself to me, darling 
 Elhnor, and marry me privately ; and then 
 — then, before spring comes, assuredly — ' 
 
GUETCHEN AND FAUST. 227 
 
 ' My heart recoils from such treachery 
 to Mary — from all this secrecy ; is it — can 
 it be necessary ?' asked the girl, weeping. 
 
 ' Most necessary for our future, if it is 
 to be a brilliant one, as I have no doubt 
 you wish,' he continued, caressing her, 
 and then added, with a sophistry that 
 would have been plain to anyone less 
 simple or less easily deluded than Ellinor, 
 ^ I am quite prepared to acknowledge our 
 marriage to all the world, provided it does 
 not, as it must not, reach my uncle's ears.' 
 
 ' I have heard that trusting to Provi- 
 dence in the shape of elderly relations is 
 often fatal,' said Ellinor, with a sickly 
 smile. 
 
 ' I shall get a special licence, if that will 
 satisfy you, Ellinor darling !' he urged, 
 isrnorant of the fact that in Scotland such 
 a document was unknown, and that there 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury had no more 
 power than ' General Booth.' 
 
 He left nothing unsaid to play upon her 
 
 q2 
 
228 COLVILLE OF THE GTTAUDS. 
 
 weakness, but it was long before he could 
 obtain a half silent consent from her, and, 
 ere he did so, more than once an ug^ly 
 gleam came into his eyes. 
 
 Though not unhandsome, the face of 
 Sir Redmond was not always a pleasant 
 one to look upon. A certain force about 
 it there was, and those who watched it 
 felt that its owner was not a man to be 
 trifled with in anything that touched his 
 self-interest or his evil purposes ; that he 
 was a man ready for emergencies and heed- 
 less of obstacles if he had an end in view. 
 
 Like a character recently described by 
 a novelist, ' his great weapon was his in- 
 flexible will, aided by the reputation he 
 had achieved of never allowino- himself to 
 be defeated. I need not say that he held 
 women in the most supreme contempt, and 
 openly expressed his opinion that every 
 woman had her price. The only merit he 
 assumed was in knowinc; the exact article 
 of barter each had set her heart on.' 
 
GRETCHEN AND FAUST. 229 
 
 Such Avas tlie pleasant personage who 
 had supplanted Robert Wodrow, and even 
 while he was softly caressing the girl and 
 subjecting her to his endearments, he was 
 thinkino^ of the time to come — the time 
 when she would find herself separated 
 from her loving sister, her only tie on 
 earth — alone in the world, penniless and 
 in his power, her character and position 
 utterly lost, and when none would believe 
 her most solemn protestations of inno- 
 cence ; then would be his hour of supreme 
 triumph, when, like a bruised and wounded 
 bird, she would come fluttering to him for 
 succour and protection, and when he might 
 be generous, and make her over to ' that 
 yahoo, Robert Wodrow.' 
 
 ' I shall have a splendid house in which 
 to enshrine you when the time comes and 
 I am free,' continued the tempter ; ' you, 
 my darling, have known no home but this 
 sequestered one — apart from all the world 
 — a world of which you know nothing.' 
 
230 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' And poor Mary — how can I leave her T 
 
 ' Nor need you do so — once we are away 
 and have been made one we shall send for 
 her ; it will only be the matter of a post or 
 two. I shall so love and cherish you both,' 
 urged Sleath, half laughing in his mind at 
 the conviction that she would never see 
 Mary again until — well, until he was tired 
 of her. ' Courage, little one, and you will 
 be Lady Sleath — it is a second edition of 
 the miller's lovely daughter.' 
 
 ' I am not quite so humble as she was,' 
 said Ellinor, making a little moue. 
 
 ' Nor I so exalted as the " gracious 
 Duncan." To-morrow night, then, dearest 
 Ellinor, at this hour — nine o'clock, I shall 
 await you with a hired carriage at the 
 corner of the lane below Birkwoodbrae, 
 and a short drive will take us to the station^ 
 where we shall get the up train for London 
 and the south !' 
 
 Ellinor answered only by her tears, and 
 the silently-accorded kiss that gave consent, 
 
GEETCHEN AND FAUST. 231 
 
 and went shudderingiy back to her home, 
 feeling as if she was hovering on the verge 
 of an abyss. 
 
 And she was so in more ways than one ! 
 
232 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 HOW FAUST SUCCEEDED. 
 
 The day, an eventful one, indeed, to EUi- 
 nor — wore on ; the ' to-morrow night ' of 
 Sir Redmond's arrangements had become 
 * to-night,' and the horn' of nine seemed to 
 be approaching swiftly. 
 
 Mary's warnings to EUinor to ' be wary 
 recurred to the latter persistently and 
 reproachfully, yet she never wavered or 
 swerved from her purpose, though with 
 reference to marriage there came to her 
 memory the words of a writer who says 
 it is a solemn thing when you come to 
 think of it, that if vou make a mistake in 
 the matter you are in for it, and nothing 
 can pull you out again. 
 
HOW FAUST SUCCEEDED. 233 
 
 Ellinor's ambition was, as we have 
 shown, dazzled on one hand, while love 
 and novelty lured her on the other. Her 
 heart was wrung by the duplicity with 
 which she was treating her sister, and the 
 contemplation of what that sister's emo- 
 tions would be when she was missed ; but 
 Sleath's brilliant promises and visions of 
 the future that was before them, deadened 
 the sense of the present for a time. . 
 
 She wrote a farewell letter to Mary, 
 which the latter would in time find on her 
 toilet table. 
 
 ' The first step is taken now, I cannot 
 retrace it,' thought Ellinor, as she closed 
 this letter, a very incoherent and blurred 
 one ; ' and now to begone — to steal away 
 without seeing darling Mary, whom I could 
 not look in the face.' 
 
 Nervously and hurriedly she went 
 through her drawers and repositories, se- 
 lecting and thrusting into a hand-bag those 
 articles which she thought were necessary 
 
234 COLVILLE OF THE GUAKDS. 
 
 for her journey or fliglit. Now and then 
 something turned up which reminded her 
 of happy past hours, of Mary's love, and 
 their parents' memory ; she gazed with 
 tear-bhnded eyes on some faded photo- 
 graphs, and kissed them passionately as if 
 she could neither look on them Ions: enouo-h 
 nor part with them. 
 
 At last her assortment was made, and, 
 fearful of meeting Mary, she threw on her 
 hat and cloak, grasped her bag, slipped 
 softly from the house by a back way, 
 and passing through the old doorway mth 
 the date and legend on its lintel, went 
 quickly towards the place of meeting, with 
 her heart beating wildly, painfully, and all 
 her pulses tingling. 
 
 The anxiety — the craving that had pos- 
 sessed her at times to get away from the 
 reproachful eyes of Robert Wodrow and 
 the upbraiding speeches of his mother, was 
 about to be relieved now ; for under the 
 mal-influence of Sleath the girl's nature 
 
HOW FAUST SUCCEEDED. 235 
 
 seemed to have been changed, but the last 
 words Mrs. Wodrow^ had said to her were 
 in her memory then : — 
 
 ' You took the love of my boy — the one 
 deep love of his life it seemed to be — 
 made a plaything of his heart, and then 
 cast it aside to break and wither, it may 
 be to die !' 
 
 Anyone w^ho saw EUinor at this junc- 
 ture w^ould have found a curious rigidity 
 in the usually soft outline of her sw^eet 
 face, and a perplexed and troubled ex- 
 pression in her hazel eyes as she w^alked 
 onward, feeling it was not yet too late to 
 return. 
 
 But she had passed her w^ord, plighted 
 her troth, given her promise to this man, 
 and why should she not redeem her 
 pledge? She was leaving a homely and 
 dull, a grey and sequestered, if perfectly 
 peaceful life, for the new and brilliant 
 one to be shared with him, wdio loved her 
 so w^ell, and she w^ould fulfil her contract. 
 
286 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 Some — no doubt many — there would be 
 wbo might have no pity for the rash im- 
 prudence of a motherless girl yielding to 
 the temptation given her and eloping thus ; 
 and her name, her story, and her trans- 
 gression, in many a false version, might be 
 bandied from lip to lip, a conviction that 
 galled and fretted her naturally proud 
 spirit ; but the consciousness of all this 
 was inferior to a sense of what she knew 
 Mary would feel, on finding herself deceiv- 
 ed thus and left alone — alone to face the 
 scandal, gossip, esclandre, and reprehen- 
 sion to which her act would give rise ; and 
 the knowledge gave Ellinor acute mental 
 agony. 
 
 She had been that mornino- at the 
 churchyard, as if to bid her parents fare- 
 well in spirit, and saw the last chaplets 
 that she and Mary had woven lying on 
 their graves, all withered now, and she had 
 marvelled when flowers from her hands 
 would be laid there again. 
 
HOvV FAUST SUCCEEDED. 23 
 
 T 
 
 All was still around her now ; she could 
 hear, however, the voice of Mary's tame 
 owl in its nest in the garden wall, and the 
 rush of the May over its rocky bed. 
 
 When might she hear that familiar 
 sound in the sweet moonlight again ? Ay^ 
 Ellinor, when ? 
 
 Perfectly cool and audacious Sir Red- 
 mond Sleath was at the appointed place 
 betimes, and thouo'h an intrio:ue or adven- 
 ture of this kind was nothing ncAV to him^ 
 his heart was certainly beating faster than 
 usual under his well-cut coat as he quitted 
 the hired brougham at the end of the lane 
 which diverged from the highway towards 
 Birkwoodbrae. 
 
 The moon, a sickly and slender one, 
 was waning, and the chill, pale light of its 
 crescent cast the shadows of the tall silver 
 birches across the pathway as he picked 
 his way forward to where the outline of 
 the house at Birkv/oodbrae came before 
 him, with its grey walls and mndows half 
 
238 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 covered by masses of monthly roses and 
 Virginia creepers. The house and all 
 around it seemed still as the grave. He had 
 come betimes, we say, and was thus at his 
 post a little before Ellinor came forth to 
 meet him. 
 
 He heard no sound and saw no sign, and 
 to him seconds seemed like minutes — 
 minutes hours. Could anything have 
 happened? Had Mary baffled the plans 
 of Ellinor, or had the courage of the latter 
 failed her at the last moment ? He had 
 known of such things ; and there was a 
 curious suppressed gleam — a latent glitter 
 in his cold blue eyes that would not have 
 been pleasant to see. 
 
 He heard the house clock strike the 
 hour of nine, and just as the last stroke 
 sounded he saw the waving of a dress and 
 of a white skirt, the wearer of which 
 turned into the lane, and he smiled as 
 such men smile over the triumph of their 
 own selfishness and heartlessness ; but now 
 
HOW FAUST SUCCEEDED. 239 
 
 Ellin or, for she it was, paused in her 
 approach, for something between a yell 
 and a hoarse oath escaped Sir Redmond, 
 Mended with fierce growling, and he felt 
 as if his right leg had been caught in the 
 sharpest of mantraps. 
 
 True to the instincts of hate and ven- 
 geance for more than one kick adminis- 
 tered by Sleath, Jack, the bull terrier, who 
 had been upon the prowl, had caught the 
 baronet by the calf of the leg and held 
 him fast ! 
 
 Now, whether it was a docf, a cat, a 
 hare, or a rabbit on which Jack fastened, 
 he never relaxed his hold while life re- 
 mained in his victim ; and so, after tear- 
 ing Sir Redmond's trousers from heel to 
 waistband. Jack's sharp teeth were closed 
 nigh to meeting in the muscles of his 
 enemy's right leg. 
 
 And well might Ellinor pause in wonder 
 and affright as she shrank under the 
 shadow of a hedge, for to the fierce im- 
 
240 COLTILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 precations of Sir Redmond, and the angry 
 snarling of the dog, were added the swear- 
 ing of the valet, John Gaiters, and the 
 shouts of the brougham driver. 
 
 By the time the dog let go and trotted 
 leisurely to the house, there was nothing 
 left for Sir Redmond and his two attend- 
 ants but an ignominious retreat, and they 
 drove oiF accordingly. 
 
 To Sleath it was a matter for the fiercest 
 exasperation that his carefully matured 
 and well-laid scheme to entrap a beautiful 
 and well-nigh friendless girl^a scheme on 
 the very verge of its fruition — had been 
 baffled, and baffled so absurdly, so gro- 
 tesquely, and with so much physical 
 agony, by ^an accursed cur vv^hich he 
 would yet shoot like a rat,' as he hissed 
 through his clenched teeth. 
 
 And Sleath was, strange to say, the 
 more furious because he had meditated a 
 j^erfidy towards Ellinor. 
 
 Terror of the dog's bite and probable 
 
HOW FAUST SUCCEEDED. 241 
 
 hydrophobia made her would-be lover 
 nearly beside himself. He came no more 
 near Birkwoodbrae, so, for the present, she 
 was safe from him. His pedestrianism w^as 
 effectually marred for several days, and 
 even had he been able to concoct any 
 fresh nefarious scheme, events were about 
 to occur at Birkwoodbrae beyond the con- 
 ception of all. 
 
 However, on the day of the projected 
 elopement, he had made all his arrange- 
 ments for leavino; Craio;mhor, and, havino; 
 formally bade adieu to Lord Dunkeld's 
 household, he could not return, and had 
 to carry out his plans for travelling south 
 without the fair companion w^hom he in- 
 tended should accompany him. In the 
 snug comfort of a Pullman car he gave 
 loose to the rage and mortification natur- 
 ally inspired by his most humiliating and 
 grotesque defeat. He drank heavily, and 
 there w^as a fiendish expression of deter- 
 mination in his face that terrified even his 
 
 VOL. I. R 
 
242 COLVILLE OP THE GUARDS. 
 
 usually stolid valet, Mr. John Gaiters. 
 
 Thouo:li she heard the shrill voice of 
 Elspat crying, 
 
 ' Oh, Miss Wellwood, Jack's been up to 
 mischief — fighting with something ; his 
 jaws are all over mth blood !' 
 
 Ellinor knew not precisely what had 
 happened : she only felt that all was over, 
 how or why she knew not ; but a revul- 
 sion of feeling took possession of her, a 
 flood of tears relieved her, and on her 
 knees by her bedside she thanked Heaven 
 for her escape ! 
 
243 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 EVIL TIDINGS. 
 
 That night before retiring to rest, when 
 seated near Mary, and affecting to read 
 to Ellinor quietly by the light of a pleas- 
 antly shaded lamp, all the stirring and 
 startling events of the recent hour or two 
 seemed a kind of dream — an unreality — 
 though the illusion was apt to be dispelled 
 by Mary's wondering surmises as to wliat 
 Jack had been fighting with, and who 
 made all the noise prior to the dog's return 
 with somewhat ensanguined teeth and 
 jaws ! 
 
 Ellinor, as she looked furtively from time 
 to time at Mary's sweet and placid face, 
 
 ii2 
 
244 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 with its downcast looks and soft, yet firm 
 expression, felt inclined to cast herself on 
 her breast and confess all the story of the 
 late escape. But her heart failed her ; it 
 was too full of shame for her duplicity, 
 with doubt, bewilderment, and a strange 
 kind of hope in the future. 
 
 Her day-dreams, as we have described 
 them, were too bright and too recent to 
 be quite dispelled or abandoned yet. 
 
 And both sisters were quite unaware 
 that they owed the fact of their being 
 placidly seated as usual together at that 
 time to Jack the terrier, who lay asleep 
 with his head resting on Mary's feet, yet 
 snarlino; from time to time and showms: 
 his teeth ; for he was dreaming — as dogs 
 will dream — of his late encounter and 
 revenge. For though Jack had snarled 
 fiercely when assailed by Gaiter's foot and 
 the driver's whip, he had made his first 
 attack Svith that savage and insidious 
 silence' which, as Bell in his British 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 245 
 
 quadrupeds says, indicate the character 
 of the bull-dog ; and, though called a fox- 
 terrier, the gallant Jack had a strong cross 
 of the bull in him. 
 
 Betimes next morning Ellinor sought 
 the spot where she was to have met Sir 
 Redmond. There the wayside grass was 
 bruised, torn, and spotted with blood, 
 which the dew of the August night had 
 failed to wash away, and there lay a half- 
 smoked cigar and a gentleman's kid glove. 
 On the latter. Jack, who accompanied her, 
 mth cocked ears and tail, and with his 
 bandy legs looking more impudent and 
 confident than usual, pounced with a snort 
 of triumph, and tore it to shreds with his 
 teeth and paws, thus giving Ellinor the 
 first light she had on last night's mystery. 
 
 There were marks close by where horses' 
 hoofs had been planted, and the deep ruts 
 of carriage wheels — a carriage brought for 
 her ; all silent witnesses that Sir Redmond 
 had been there ! 
 
246 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 And all this had happened but last 
 night — exactly twelve hours ago ; yet it 
 looked as if a score of years had passed 
 since she stole silently from her room and 
 approached the shaded lane ! 
 
 Troubles and hopes always look brighter 
 by day than by night, in sunshine than 
 under clouds and rain : so Ellinor beofan 
 to consider the Avhole affair with more 
 composure. 
 
 To her it had seemed that, 'although 
 love in a cottage is a very fine thing, love 
 in a Belgravian mansion was decidedly pre- 
 ferable ;' but all that just then seemed to 
 be over and done mth, when, during the 
 day, she heard incidentally through old 
 Elspat of Sir Redmond's sudden departure 
 from Craigmhor — the departure in which 
 she was to have shared ! 
 
 She loved Sir Redmond with her head 
 only, and not with her heart ; and though 
 Robert Wodrow might not have quite 
 
EVIL TIDIKGS. 247 
 
 divined the difference, yet a difference in 
 such love there is. 
 
 And Ellinor as she reflected, vowed to 
 herself that never again would she risk 
 the loss of position as Colonel Wellwood's 
 daughter (even to be a baronet's wife), or 
 place herself so foolishly in a comparative 
 stranger's power, till he was free to claim 
 and wed her, despite relations and wealth. 
 
 Little did the simple Ellinor know the 
 reality of the escape she had so narrowly 
 made from the pitfall prepared for her. 
 ' Vce viclis ! is the watchword of civilisa- 
 tion,' says a writer ; ' a trustful, loving 
 girl succumbs to the artifices of a scoun- 
 drel, and society punishes her by averting 
 the light of its countenance from her, 
 while the man who has committed a crime 
 only next to murder in atrocity is let off 
 scot-free. And so the world wags, my 
 venerable masters ! and it is a jolly one, 
 take it at its worst aspect.' 
 
248 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 Ignorant of the baffled elopement, of 
 course, and perhaps of Sir Redmond's de- 
 parture from the neighbourhood of Inver- 
 may, Robert Wodrow, intent on jA^ns of 
 his own, came near Ellinor no more, and 
 seemed to ignore her existence. 
 
 And, strange to say, ere long she became 
 indignant that he made no sign or ad- 
 vance ; while rumour said he was perhaps 
 going away, no one knew whither. There 
 has seldom been a woman who liked to see 
 a once avowed lover slip from her grasp ; 
 and Robert Wodrow certainly had been 
 Ellinor's lover till the serpent entered her 
 paradise in the shape of rank and 
 ambition. 
 
 But we are somewhat anticipating the 
 events of the day subsequent to her 
 intended flight. 
 
 Mary, after evening fell, and having 
 been round among some of her poor 
 people, was seated somewhat thoughtfully 
 alone, and seemed to have lost most of her 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 249 
 
 usual buoyancy of spirit. Was it a pre- 
 vision of coming evil, she thought, or the 
 result of the weather ? The sun had sunk 
 like a red, glowing ball behind the hills, 
 and there was in the air an extraordinary 
 stiUness which produced a depressing 
 effect upon her spirits. 
 
 The recent visits of Captain Colville and 
 Sir Redmond Sleath, on the one hand, and 
 the cold and haughty demeanour of Lady 
 Dunkeld and her daughter, on the other, 
 had begun to impress upon her the neces- 
 sity for making a change in their little 
 household, and having some pleasant, 
 motherly, and elderly lady to reside mth 
 them as a chaperone ; and her mind was 
 full of thought on this matter when Dr. 
 Wodrow was announced. She welcomed 
 him with pleasure, as usual, all unaware 
 that he was the bearer of tidings that 
 w^ould render all her plans for the future 
 unavailing ! 
 
 He noticed the cloud on Mary's face 
 
250 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 through her smile of welcome, and, taking 
 her hand kindly in his own, he said, 
 
 ' Mary dear, is there anything you par- 
 ticularly dread?' 
 
 ' How strange that you should ask me 
 this,' replied Mary, ^ for I am rather 
 ashamed to say that I feel as if something 
 of evil were about to happen — but the 
 emotion is vague and undefined.' 
 
 ' Then you believe in presentiments?' 
 
 ' I do — sometimes — do not you, Dr. 
 Wodrow?' 
 
 ' I am afraid I do,' said he, with increas- 
 ing kindness and gravity of manner. ' So 
 Robert and Ellinor have completely quar- 
 relled?' 
 
 ' I fear so.' 
 
 ' George Eliot says that " Every man 
 who is not a monster, a mathematician, or 
 a moral philosopher is the slave of some 
 woman or other." But I came not to speak 
 of Robert, poor fellow, but of something 
 concerning yourself.' 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 251 
 
 ' Of me !' said Mary, startled by the 
 grooving gravity of his manner. 
 
 ' Yourself and Ellinor ! I have wanted 
 much to see you all day, my dear.' 
 
 'Why?' 
 
 ' I have news for you.' 
 
 ' Good news or bad?' 
 
 ' Bad, I grieve to say, my dear bairn,' 
 said he, as he paused again with something 
 pitiful in his handsome old face, while 
 Mary's colour changed, and her heart 
 began to beat quicker with pain and ap- 
 prehension. 
 
 ' Have you had a letter from a Mr. Luke 
 Sharpe?' 
 
 ' No— who is he ?' 
 
 ' A lawyer — a writer to the signet in 
 Edinburgh — who is the legal agent of your 
 cousin Wellwood.' 
 
 ' What is all this to me — to us ?' 
 
 ' Your uncle is dead. Your cousin is 
 the next male heir — heir of entail — so 
 Birkwoodbrae, and everything else of 
 
252 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 wliich your uncle died possessed that is 
 entailed, goes to him, and you and EUinor 
 can reside here no longer — so Mr. Sharpe 
 has written me.' 
 
 He evidently said this with an effort — 
 with manifest difficulty, and as if he dread- 
 ed to look in the face of Mary, who for 
 some moments felt as if stunned, and gaz- 
 ed at the lawyer's letter, which he placed 
 before her, as she would at a serpent, and 
 scarcely taking in its meaning. 
 
 'Understand me, child. Your father's 
 elder brother, who permitted you to live 
 unmolested here — as Birkwoodbrae Avas 
 but a moiety of the entailed property — is 
 dead, and young Wellwood, the guardsman 
 of whom Captain Colville spoke so often, 
 claims all.' 
 
 ' And we must go away?' said Mary, in 
 a low, strange, wailing voice, all unlike 
 her own. 
 
 ' Away — yes — but where ?' 
 
 ' God only knows !' 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 253 
 
 And as she spoke the girl wrung her 
 slender interlaced fingers, while the old 
 minister kindly patted her head, as he had 
 often done in her childiiood. After a 
 pause, Mary said, in a voice broken more 
 than once by a hard dry sob, 
 
 ' Our uncle in Australia would seem to 
 have died months ago according to this 
 letter, yet we only hear of the event now.' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' And we have been living here in an- 
 other person's house, though we deemed it 
 our own — another person's, and not think- 
 ing of rent?' she added, bitterly. 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 Mary thought the doctor took the mat- 
 ter somewhat placidly, and felt indignation 
 mingle with her grief. 
 
 ' And for the roof that covered us, EUi- 
 nor and I have actually been indebted for 
 months to our cousin Wellwood, the cold- 
 blooded son of a cold-blooded father, who 
 died at feud with ours, and amid the whirl 
 
254 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 of London life never troubled himself 
 about our existence, even when we were 
 left as orphan girls upon the world. So 
 we have been living here in dear, dear 
 Birkwoodbrae in a fool's paradise, after all 
 — after all !' continued Mary, with gromng 
 bitterness of tone and heart. 
 
 ' " The paradise of fools — to few un- 
 known," as Milton has it,' said the doctor, 
 sententiously. 
 
 ' To turn us out of Birkwoodbrae is no- 
 thing less than the most cruel injustice !' 
 resumed Mary, with anger. 
 
 ' But legal. It is the law of entail.' 
 
 ' Birkwoodbrae is twice as valuable now 
 as it was when poor papa settled here 
 some twenty years ago, and he and we 
 have made it so. It is hard, it is bitter, 
 our home — our dear home — we have known 
 no other ; and so near where they lie — papa 
 and mamma — so near this house in which 
 I closed their eyes.' 
 
 ' I doubt not that if your cousin 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 255 
 
 Wellwood were properly appealed to- 
 
 'We should die ratlier than appeal to 
 him !' interrupted Mary, impetuously, 
 Avhile stamping her little foot upon the 
 floor. ' To do so would be enouo^h to 
 make papa turn in his grave. Though 
 Birkwoodbrae is inexpressibly dear to 
 Ellinor and to me. Papa used to say of 
 cousin Wellwood as a boy, though he 
 never saw him, that he was a puzzle to 
 the whole family.' 
 
 'How, Mary?' 
 
 ' Well, as — as — like a treacherous 
 cuckoo's egg that is dropped into a spar- 
 row's nest and becomes a puzzle to the 
 poor sparrow, which wonders and com- 
 pares it with her own little brood.' 
 
 ' What an odd simile, my dear,' said Dr. 
 Wodrow, his face actually rij^pling over 
 with a smile brighter than Mary relished 
 under the circumstances, and recalled the 
 aphorism of that unpleasant fellow, J. J. 
 Rousseau, that many people feel an inter- 
 
256 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 nal satisfaction at the troubles of even 
 their best friends. 
 
 ' Then you "will not trust a little to 
 humanity and to Wellwood ?' 
 
 ' Death were preferable, I repeat !' ex- 
 claimed Mary, though her tears were falling 
 fast now. 
 
 ' Consider — blood is thicker than water, 
 among us in Scotland particularly.' 
 
 ' Ellinor and I will never stoop so low,' 
 replied Mary, alternately interlacing her 
 fingers in her lap, and mechanically caress- 
 ing the head of Jack, who had placed his 
 nose on her knee, and regarded her wist- 
 fully with his great black eyes, as if he 
 knew instinctively that something distressed 
 his mistress by the expression of her face. 
 
 ' Well, what will be, will be !' said Dr. 
 Wodrow, from his fatalist or Presbyterian 
 point of view, as he cast his eye upward 
 to the ceiling. 
 
 Mary heard his voice as one hears in a 
 dream. The flies buzzed in the window 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 257 
 
 curtains, the last of the birds still twittered 
 about among the climbing creepers at tbe 
 open sasb, the roses sent forth their fra- 
 grance still, and the drooping foliage of 
 the silver birches was gently stirred by 
 the soft evening breeze. 
 
 The old clock ticked loudly on the 
 mantelpiece — unnaturally so — as Mary 
 thought it seemed to do 'when mamma 
 and papa died ;' but when the minister 
 urged again that she should attempt to 
 temporise, 
 
 ' No,' she exclaimed, emphatically, ' we 
 shall not accept a farthing or a farthing's 
 worth of what belonged to our common 
 ancestors. It would ill become Colonel 
 Wellwood's daughters to do so now.' 
 
 ' Lady Dunkeld, I doubt not, has great 
 influence with your cousin Well wood.' 
 
 * She knows him, then ?' 
 
 ' Yes ; people in " Society," as it is 
 called, all know something of each other.' 
 
 ' And you would have me seek his in- 
 
 VOL. I. s 
 
258 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 terest through her ? Enough of this, dear 
 Dr. Woclrow. I think you should know 
 me better/ said Mary, covering her eyes 
 with white and tremulous fingers, as if 
 she would thrust back her tears. 
 
 ' The recognition of the inevitable in 
 human affairs often brings composure when 
 all else fails, we read somewhere,' said the 
 minister. 
 
 ' Whatever is, is doubtless best, and this 
 apparent stroke of evil fortune may — nay, 
 must be so,' said Mary ; ' yet it is hard to 
 bear just now — hard to bear.' 
 
 Dr. Wodrow re2i:arded her bowed head 
 with a soft, kind, and admiring smile. 
 
 'All will come rio'ht in the end, dear 
 Mary,' said he, confidently, and then add- 
 ed, almost laughingly, ' I am sure Captain 
 Colville's advice may prevail with you ; 
 and he will be back before I can return 
 from Edinburgh, whither I must go on the 
 morrow morning early. 
 
 Mary's pallor increased at the mention 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 259 
 
 of Ca^Dtain Colville's name ; but she said, 
 firmly and doggedly, 
 
 ' He is the last man in tlie world whose 
 advice I would seek.' 
 
 But before the well-meaning old minis- 
 ter came back from his journey the crisis 
 in the sisters' affairs seemed ended and 
 over. 
 
 At last he was gone, and Mary sat for a 
 time in the tmlio'hted old dinino'-room as 
 one who was stunned or in a dream, while 
 the beloved and reverend figures of her 
 dead parents seemed once again to occupy 
 in fancy their favourite places by the 
 hearth. 
 
 The good old honest furniture of the 
 room was all of the ' old school,' and had 
 been familiar to her from her childhood ; 
 the vast sofa with its wide arms and cosy 
 cushions ; the dark mahogany sideboard 
 that was like a mural monument, with two 
 urn-like knife-boxes thereon, and over 
 which hung an old, old circular convex 
 
 82 
 
260 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 mirror, surmounted by an eagle with a 
 glass ball in its beak. The horsehair 
 chairs were ranged in rank and file along 
 the wall ; and all these household features 
 spoke to Mary's heart so much of the past 
 and of home that the details of the room 
 gave her a sensation of acute agony, as 
 she caught them at a glance and covered 
 her face with her hands. 
 
 She tried to realise the new life — the 
 homeless life — that must lie before her and 
 Ellinor now, and the rocks, the shoals, 
 and pitfalls that too probably would be 
 ahead. 
 
 Her first emotion of relief — if it could 
 be called so — came when she shared her 
 grief with the startled Ellinor ; and far into 
 the August night sat the two crushed 
 creatures talkins; over the storm-cloud 
 that had so suddenly enveloped them — a 
 cloud that must have descended at some 
 time, though as yet they had not quite 
 foreseen it. 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 261 
 
 ' I cannot believe it — I cannot realise 
 it !' said tliey both, conjunctly and sever- 
 ally, again and again, as they mingled 
 their tears and caresses together, each 
 clinging to the other as if for consolation 
 and help. 
 
 'What on earth will become of us!' 
 exclaimed Ellinor, pushing back the masses 
 of dark brown hair from her forehead. 
 
 ' We shall go away, and at once, in 
 search of a new home — a little nest some- 
 w^here far away from all w^ho know us, 
 Ellinor ; for the condolence, the wonder, 
 surmises, and pity of neighbours would 
 prove intolerable to me !' exclaimed Mary. 
 •We shall have to put our shoulders to 
 the wheel, as poor papa used to say when 
 in money straits. I must turn my French 
 and music to account.' 
 
 ' And I my drawing,' said Ellinor. 
 
 ' Yes, dearest,' added Mary, kissing her, 
 'my few accomplishments will require 
 some brushing up, but your pencil is al- 
 
262 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 ways a ready one ; and people never know 
 what they can do till they try. But then, 
 Birkwoodbrae — dear, bonnie Birkwoodbrae 
 — to think we shall never see it more !' ex- 
 claimed Mary, relapsing into a storm of 
 ofrief ao^ain ; after which she became more 
 composed, and began resolutely to think of 
 the future that must be faced — the future 
 which would necessarily begin for them on 
 the morrow ; and as Mary was by nature 
 independent and self-reliant, as she thought 
 on the pittance left them by their father, 
 she said that, by God's help, they might 
 battle with the world yet ; and battle with 
 it too in London. 
 
 The human mind, it has been said, is 
 naturally pliable, and, provided it has the 
 most slender hope to lean upon, adapts 
 itself to the exigencies of fortune, especi- 
 ally if the imagination be a gay and 
 luxuriant one. 
 
 The dreary night of their new and great 
 sorrow wore on till the small hours of the 
 
EVIL TIDINGS. 263 
 
 morning came, and at last tlie sisters 
 slept ; and ' sleep is a generous robber that 
 gives in strength what it takes in time.' 
 
 So the worthy old minister had gone to 
 Edinburgh. 
 
 Mary conceived not unnaturally that 
 this visit to the Scottish metropolis meant 
 one to Mr. Luke Sharpe with reference to 
 her cousin Wellwood, and the monetary 
 affairs of herself and EUinor ; but she was 
 determined on having no temporising, no 
 patronage, or half-measure from that 
 quarter ; and resolved to leave Birkwood- 
 brae and to go forth to find another home 
 in another land, and to this end she began 
 restlessly, but resolutely, to take the 
 means at once. 
 
 Strange to say, Elhnor, the romantic 
 and volatile, did not seemed so much cast 
 down after a time. She had her own 
 secret hopes, thoughts, and ambition, in 
 Avhich Mary had no share, or of which she 
 had no exact knowledge as yet ; but to the 
 
264 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 latter to leave Birkwooclbrae, to see no 
 more the kind old folks at the cosy manse ; 
 to see no more her pensioners^ her fea- 
 thered pets, and flowers, the hills, the 
 glen, the rockbound stream, and the ' siller 
 birks ' that shaded it — to be far away from 
 all and everything that was dear — to lose, 
 more than all, the dawning love of her 
 young heart — was indeed a catastrophe 
 hitherto unlooked for, and at times her 
 soul seemed to die v/ithin her. But she 
 was more often in those moods to which 
 the young are said to be subject in time of 
 trouble — 'in which the existing alone seems 
 
 unendurable, and anything better than 
 what is' 
 
265 
 
 CHAPTER XYII. 
 
 maey's peeparations. 
 
 Geeatlt to the chagrin of Lady Dunkeld, 
 there seemed no chance of extracting a 
 proposal from Captain Coiville, the rumour 
 of whose engagement to her daughter was 
 simply provincial gossip, and as for Sir 
 Redmond Sleath, for certain cogent reasoDS 
 of his own, perhaps he dared not make 
 one, even if dazzled by the fair Blanche 
 Galloway. 
 
 The invitation to Craigmhor seemed to 
 be a failure as yet, so far as the former 
 was concerned, for after the shooting 
 began on the 12th of August, when not 
 on the moors, he spent much of his tim^ 
 
266 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 most provokingly immersed in correspond- 
 ence concerning the property to which he 
 had succeeded and his peerage claim — 
 both circumstances that greatly enhanced 
 his value in the eyes of such a match- 
 making mother as my Lady Dunkeld. 
 
 He v/as often found closeted in consul- 
 tation with Doctor Wodrow, with whom he 
 seemed to stand high in favour, and it was 
 noted that they always separated in high 
 good humour ; so the supposition was, that 
 the latter was seeking the wealthy Guards- 
 man's good offices for his son Robert. 
 What other matter could they have in 
 hand ? 
 
 Lady Dunkeld was therefore not sorry 
 when Captain Colville took his temporary 
 departure to shoot in the forest of Alyth, 
 trusting to a change on his return. 
 
 If she had flattered herself that, amid 
 the somewhat secluded life all led at Craig- 
 mhor, any fancy Colville had for Blanche 
 would speedily manifest itself, she was 
 
maey's preparations. 267 
 
 doomed to disappointment — angry disap- 
 pointment, and worse ; for, if the stories 
 Mademoiselle Eosette told were true, the 
 captain had spent somewhat too much of 
 his time wandering, rod in hand, on the 
 banks of the May, and tarrying for after- 
 noon tea at Birkwoodbrae. 
 
 The result of all this was that Mary and 
 EUinor had become painfully conscious 
 that many who were their friends before 
 had now begun to view them coldly and 
 distantly, why or wherefore, in their inno- 
 cence, they knew not, because they were 
 ignorant of malevolent hints regarding 
 them dropped to chance visitors at Craig- 
 mhor, by. elevation of the eyebrows, shrugs 
 of the shoulder, or the impatient wave of 
 a fan, if their names were mentioned ; the 
 ladies there — mother and daughter — were 
 leaving nothing undone to injure them in 
 the estimation of all, and even spoke of 
 them as ' young women who were above 
 doing their duty in that state of life 
 
268 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 to which Providence had called them/ 
 A consciousness of all this added to 
 their new mortification, and increased their 
 anxiety to be gone, and they worked away 
 at their arrangements in a species of sup- 
 pressed excitement, and Dr. Wodrow was 
 still in Edinburgh. 
 
 It was neither a Sacramental Fast-day 
 nor a Sunday at Birkwoodbrae, yet a 
 strange stillness, as if death were there 
 again, brooded over all the place ; the 
 house with its roses and creepers, the 
 garden with its now untended flowers, the 
 empty meadow, and the lovely silver 
 birches; and poor Robert Wodrow, as 
 sadly he approached the house for the 
 last time, felt conscious of this as he 
 passed, and with a bitter sigh looked 
 around him. 
 
 Even Jack's bark was unheard ; the 
 scythe lay among the rich clover, the gate 
 that led to the highway stood wide open, 
 and near it liogered some cottar people, 
 
MARYS PEEPARATIONS. 269 
 
 with mouths agape, old and ^^oung, with 
 grave and anxious faces, even with tears, 
 for some of the young girls' ' belongings ' 
 had already been sent away, the gazers 
 knew not where. 
 
 Something strange they thought had 
 come to pass, yet the sunshine of the first 
 of September lay golden on the woods, the 
 pastures, the cattle, and the flower-gar- 
 dens, though beneath was a great shadow 
 like that of death over all, and Eobert 
 Wodrow, impressionable at all times, felt 
 it ; for the sisters were on the eve of de- 
 parture, and another day or two — so 
 quickly had Mary's preparations been made 
 — would see all ended. 
 
 The bright sunshine of the autumn 
 evening was touching, we have said, with 
 fiery light the smooth silver stems of l^he 
 tall birch-trees, and the birds still sang 
 sweetly under the feather-like foliage that 
 hung gracefully downward, unstirred by 
 the faintest breeze, when, looking from 
 
270 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 an open window on the scene slie loved so 
 well, Mary Wellwood paused in the bitter 
 task of making up a list of their household 
 effects ere she left the roof of Birkwood- 
 brae for ever. After she was fairly gone, 
 a letter to Dr. Wodrow would inform hira 
 of all their wishes, she was thinking, when 
 suddenly Robert stood by her side, and put 
 an arm kindly round her. 
 
 ' Why, you will kill yourself with all 
 this work and anxiety ; dear Mary, let me 
 help you,' said he. 
 
 * I am nearly done,' said she, wearily, 
 and with a quivering lip ; * there are but a 
 few relics, books and so forth, I wish to 
 keep ' 
 
 ' Leave it with me ; save you, Mary, and 
 the old folks at the manse, I have no one 
 left to care for now.' 
 
 * Poor Robert !' said she, kissing his 
 cheek, for she knew his meaning well. 
 
 No one can ^ minister to a mind diseased ' 
 like a mother, it has been said ; but Mrs. 
 
mart's peepaeations. 271 
 
 Wodrow, to her sorrow, had signally failed 
 to so minister to her son Robert. 
 
 * And you have failed at the University, 
 Robert ?' said Mary, after a pause. 
 
 ' Utterly !' 
 
 ' How — and why ?' 
 
 * I don't know — at the last moment, 
 somehow,' said he, despondently, looking 
 down on the carpet. 
 
 ' Ellinor, no doubt, was the cause r' said 
 Mary, softly. 
 
 He smiled bitterly, but made no reply. 
 
 ' You will try again, Robert dear ?' said 
 Mary, patting his hand. 
 
 'Never, Mary,' he replied, in a low, 
 husky voice ; ' God only knows how I toiled 
 and toiled, at botany, anatomy, and chem- 
 istry — Balfour and Quain and Miller, and 
 with ivJiat object ; but I have taken my last 
 shot, and shall grind no more.' 
 
 * And what do you mean to do, Robert ?' 
 
 ' Heaven knows — you will hear in time, 
 Mary.' 
 
272 COLVILLB OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 She eyed him wistfully and sorrowfully, 
 acd then said, 
 
 ' After your quarrel with Ellinor ' 
 
 * Don't call it a quarrel, Mary — say cold- 
 ness. Well?' 
 
 ' It is very kind of you to take the trouble 
 to come here now.' 
 
 ' Kind — trouble ; why, what has come to 
 you, Mary, that you speak thus, and to 
 me ? A farewell letter might have done, 
 but I — I preferred to come to the old place 
 once agaiu.' 
 
 ' Pardon me, Robert, but I am so crush- 
 ed — so confused — that I scarcely know 
 wl]at I say.' 
 
 ' But is the step you are about to take 
 absolutely necessary, and in such hot haste 
 too?' 
 
 ' What step ?' asked Mary, as if to delay 
 tlio bitterness of the admission. 
 
 * Leaving Birkwoodbrae ! I can't make 
 out the mystery of it at all !' 
 
 *Alas! we must go; this house was 
 
maey's preparations. 273 
 
 never ours — we dwelt here on sufferance ; 
 and tbe place is another's now — another 
 whom we know only by name and in family 
 feud; 
 
 * Can it be that God's world belongs 
 only to rascals !' exclaimed young Wodrow, 
 bitterly. 
 
 ' Well, the rich and cruel seem to thrive 
 best, for a time at least,' said Mary, a 
 little infected by his mood. 
 
 ' But to go away so far — so far as Lon- 
 don ?' he urged, with an air of bewilder- 
 ment. 
 
 ' The further the better now, Robert.' 
 
 ' But the idea of making your own live- 
 lihood in that awful human wilderness, you 
 and Ellinor, seems so strange — so perilous 
 and unnatural.' 
 
 ' Why so — don't thousands work?' 
 
 ' And starve and die of broken hearts !' 
 
 ^Eobert, you are not encouraging.' 
 
 ' I would that I could be so.' 
 
 ' We must make the attempt as others 
 
 VOL. I. T 
 
274 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 do and have done. We are well-nigli pen- 
 niless now; without Birkwoodbrae and its 
 accessories we could not live alone on the 
 pittance poor papa left us, and here we 
 coald not add a penny to it. I don't think 
 I am fit for much, Robert,' continued Mary, 
 sadly and humbly, with tears in her soft, 
 sweet eyes. * No one will give me a high- 
 class situation, my education has been so 
 very simple, and beyond a little music' — 
 her voice broke fairly now — 'and Ellinor's 
 pencil, she is very clever, you know ' 
 
 ' I wish I could see this infernally grasp- 
 ing cousin of yours !' surmised E-obert, 
 angrily and reflectively. 
 
 ' Don't think of it — I would not accept 
 a favour from his father's son ; for that 
 father was — through life — the enemy of 
 mine !' • 
 
 ' Why — and about what ?' asked Robert. 
 
 ' Some quarrel about a lady in their 
 youth, as subalterns, I believe.' 
 
 ' Oho — the old, old story !' said Robert, 
 
Mary's preparations. 275 
 
 gnawing his nether lip, and taking up his 
 hat, but lingering still. 
 
 ' You will see Bllinor, Robert dear,' said 
 Mary, timidly and pleadingly. ' I can 
 call her from her room — it will be for the 
 last time.' 
 
 The cloud on young Wodrow's face 
 deepened, as he said, in a low voice, 
 
 ' No, Mary — thank you — I dare not — 
 would rather not see her again.' 
 
 ' Why ?' asked Mary, taking his hands 
 caressingly between her own. 
 
 ' All my love for her might — nay, would 
 break out for her with renewed force, for 
 I am in some ways weak and unstable of 
 purpose. Better not — better not — never 
 again — never again,' he muttered, huskily, 
 and Mary kissed him with her eyes full of 
 tears, for just then her heart was very 
 sore indeed. 
 
 ' Besides, Mary, I have schooled myself 
 for the future.' 
 
 * And t\i?it future, Robert.' 
 
 T 2 
 
276 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 ' You will learn in time. Curse tbat 
 fellow,' he suddenly exclaimed, his eyes 
 flashing, as he referred to Sleath, ' what 
 evil chance brouo^ht him among^ us here ? 
 How I can recall his eyes, alternately 
 sleepy and shifty, and the air of would-be 
 high-bred tolerance aud boredom with 
 which he condescended to survey us all 
 and everything here !' 
 
 In the gust of jealous anger that now 
 possessed him, Mary knew that it was use- 
 less to urge again that he should see Elli- 
 nor, and after making her all offers of 
 assistance and proffers of kindness, he 
 strode suddenly away, muttering to himself 
 the lines of Edmondstouue Aytoun. 
 
 ' Woman's love is writ in water, 
 
 "Woman's faith is traced in sand, 
 Backwards, backwards let me wander, 
 To the noble northern land.' 
 
 The little money that Mary could spare 
 
 from what she had been able to realise by 
 
 the hasty sale of two pet cows and the 
 
 stock of her fowl-yard, she bestowed, as far 
 
maey's preparations. 277 
 
 as she could, upon Elspat and other old 
 servants, all of whom were bowed down 
 with wonder, grief and alarm at move- 
 ments and changes so unexpected ; and she 
 felt that she would be glad when the part- 
 ing with all — the final wrench — -was over. 
 
 Between her and these subordinates 
 there v/as a closer bond of sympathy than 
 usually exists between mistress and ser- 
 vant — even in Scotland — now-a-days, and 
 can scarcely be found south of the Tweed. 
 * My English readers,' says an English 
 writer on this subject, ' will probably ridi- 
 cule such a feeling on the part of a ser- 
 vant, for the majority of them are of the 
 belief that money is the only connecting 
 link of a household. So long as wages are 
 regularly paid and the ordinary meals 
 provided, a servant has only to do her 
 duty properly, and leaves it as utter a 
 stranger as when she entered it. There is 
 no obligation on either side, and, if she goes, 
 some one will be found to take her place.' 
 
278 COLYILLE OP THE GUARDS. 
 
 But it is not quite so yet iu the kindly 
 north country, especially the futher north 
 we go ; for the influences of the old feudal 
 system, and of the still older and dearer 
 ties of clanship, linger among the hills 
 and glens, knitting all ranks and condi- 
 tions of men together, and long, long may 
 they continue to do so. 
 
279 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 ON THE BRINK. 
 
 Of a more nervous organisation than Mary, 
 Ellinor, suffering from reaction of spirits 
 and a keen sense of all she had recently 
 undergone, was far from well, and, amid 
 the bustle of preparation for departure, 
 remained much in the seclusion of her 
 own room. 
 
 It was September now, we have said. 
 The autumnal weather and autumnal tints 
 had come somewhat early, and occasional 
 showers brought coolness and freshness to 
 the birchen woods, and pleasant odours 
 came from them and even from the dusty 
 highway and the parched meadows, where 
 
280 COLYILLE OP THE GUARDS. 
 
 the rich after-grass was ready for the 
 scythe, and the grouse on the Perthshire 
 hills had become but too fatally familiaT 
 with the crack and clatter of the breech- 
 loader in the heathery glens. 
 
 Mary Wellwood had of late worked hard, 
 very hard, rising earlier and going to bed 
 later — so much so that her sweet face was 
 beginning to look thin and careworn, and 
 old Elspat remonstrated that she did not 
 give herself time to take her meals, but 
 ^ was for ever think, think, thinking and 
 worrying over accounts and market-books.' 
 
 She had neither Dr. Wodrow nor Robert 
 to advise or assist her then. The former 
 was detained in Edinburgh on clerical or 
 other business, and the latter absented 
 himself for obvious reasons ; so Mar^^ 
 v/orked alone, but no new or QTowino: 
 cares could change the sweet and grave 
 expression of her face or the calm stead- 
 fastness of her violet eyes, yet a startled 
 expression certainly came into them when 
 
ON THE BRINK. 281 
 
 one eveniDg Captain Colville was suddenly 
 ushered in upon her, looking so handsome, 
 brown, and ruddy from exposure among 
 the hills. 
 
 There flashed upon Mary's mind the time, 
 but a short space ago, when she had been 
 thinking of a chaperone for herself and 
 ElHnor : but all was changed since then, 
 and there would be no need of one now. 
 
 He had just returned that morning from 
 shooting in the forest of Alyth^ had heard 
 a rumour of their approaching departure, 
 which the half-dismantled aspect of the 
 drawing-room seemed to confirm. Why 
 was it so ? 
 
 He spoke so pleasantly and sympathetic- 
 ally as he seated himself near her, and she 
 felt all the glamour of his proximity, of 
 his presence, and her breast heaved tumul- 
 tuously in spite of herself. She became 
 nervous, and her eyes suffused deeply. 
 
 'Tears, Miss Wellwood ?' said he, in- 
 quiringly. 
 
282 COLYILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 * We are going far away, Captain Col- 
 ville — leaving this place for ever.' 
 
 ' I have heard something of it ; but 
 why leave Birkwoodbrae?' he asked, smil- 
 ingly. 
 
 Mary told him why. 
 
 ' And, on leaving, whither do you mean 
 to go ?' 
 
 ' London.' 
 
 * Is that not a rash scheme ?' 
 
 * When the will is strong the heart is 
 willing; and we never know what a day 
 may bring forth.' 
 
 He gazed down upon her tenderly, ad- 
 miringly, and, making a half effort to take 
 her hand, paused and said, 
 
 * You surely did not mean to spend all 
 your life in this old tumbledown place, 
 Miss Wellwood?' 
 
 * Don't call it tumbledown, please,' said 
 Mary. 
 
 * I beg your pardon ; but ' 
 
 * It is very dear to me, as the place 
 
ON THE BRINK. 2SS 
 
 Tvhere they lived and died,' interrupted 
 Maiy, with a little break in her voice. 
 
 ' They— who ?' 
 
 * Papa and mamma. It seems like yes- 
 terday when he died in the room above 
 ns, and when he said in a low, weak voice 
 — " Don't cry, Mary darling — don't cry so ; 
 our separation is only for a time ;" and 
 then added, "Is that the daybreak?" 
 *' No," said I. " It is— it is— and so bright T 
 he exclaimed, and then died. Oh, Captain 
 Colville, the light he saw must have been 
 that of the other world, for just as he ex- 
 pired the clock struck midnight, and the 
 lamp was burning very low.' 
 
 ' Poor old gentleman ! But take cour- 
 age,' said Colville, with a soft smile, as he 
 patted her shoulder; 'you have not yet 
 left Birkwoodbrae.' 
 
 ' What can he mean by this !' thought 
 Mary, with a slight sense of annoyance, as 
 she woke up from her dark dreamland. 
 
 ' And your father, the colonel — he — he 
 
284 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 — pardon me, left you little more than 
 Birkwoodbrae when he died ?' 
 
 ' His blessing was the best he had ; 
 Birkwoodbrae, I have said, was not his to 
 leave. We have lived here on sufferance — 
 Ellinor and I.' 
 
 Colville sat for a time silent, and Mary 
 thought his question a very strange one, 
 unless he had a deeper interest in them 
 both than she thought he could possibly 
 have ; and, still pursuing a personal theme, 
 he said, 
 
 ' I have heard from Dr. Wodrow that 
 his son Robert was your sister's admirer, 
 and that they have quarrelled. Is not this 
 to be regretted?' 
 
 ' Regretted indeed !' 
 
 ' You always seemed interested in him.' 
 
 ' As Ellinor's lover — yes.' 
 
 * I always thought he was yours, 
 
 * Mine — who said so ?' 
 
 ' Miss Galloway, repeatedly.' 
 
 * She had no authority for any such 
 
ON THE BRINK. 285 
 
 statement/ said Mary, upon whom a kind 
 of lio^bt was beorinnins: to break, and Col- 
 ville drew a little nearer, as be seemed 
 very muck disposed to take up the thread 
 of the ' old story ' where he had left it off 
 on the afternoon when he carved their 
 initials on the tree, carried off the bunch 
 of berries, and gave her in exchange the 
 bouquet of Blanche Galloway, before he 
 went to Alyth. 
 
 ' Is it not strange, Captain Colville,' 
 said Mary, ' that day after day passes, and 
 yet we hear nothing more of this new heir 
 — this usurper of our poor little home — or 
 of any special notice to quit Birkwoodbrae?' 
 
 'Amid the world he lives in, he may 
 forget.' 
 
 ' He and his father before forgot us al- 
 ways. But still, there is one patrimony 
 of which he cannot deprive us — one near 
 the churchyard wall !' said Mary, bitterly. 
 * However, things are at the worst with us 
 now, and they will be sure to mend/ 
 
286 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 He was observing the rare delicacy of 
 her hand, as she caressed the head of Jack 
 resting on her knee. 
 
 ' How you must loathe that cousin !' 
 said he. 
 
 ' Ob, no ! Heaven forbid ! He has 
 never done us any active harm ; yet we 
 Wellwoods are very unforgiving in our 
 feuds.' 
 
 ' So it would seem.* 
 
 * I must never, never see him, and am 
 most anxious to get away before he comes 
 here, if he cares at all to visit so poor a 
 place.' 
 
 ' He might fall in love with you — nay, 
 would be sure to do so,' said Colville, 
 stooping nearer her, and lowering his voice. 
 * Love, with cousinship, soon develops, and 
 he might marry you.' 
 
 ' I would not marry Mm if there was 
 not another man in the world !' exclaimed 
 Mary, reddening in positive anger, with 
 a choking and half smothered sob in her 
 
ON THE BfilNK. 287 
 
 throat ; and Colville laughed excessively at 
 her increased but momentary annoyance 
 at his suggestion, which indeed was far 
 from being: an unnatural one. 
 
 ' If he saw you, he would certainly leave 
 you in undisturbed possession of Birk- 
 woodbrae/ 
 
 ' A speech meant to be gallant ; but he 
 shall not see me if I can help it.' 
 
 He laughed again, and Mary felt piqued. 
 
 ' From what I hear of all the matter,' he 
 began, ' from what I know of you ' 
 
 ' Of me. Captain Colville — what can you 
 know of Jiie?'' asked Mary, almost petul- 
 antly. 
 
 ^ Shall I say, then, from what I know of 
 your cousin Wellwood ' 
 
 ' Well — quick ; from what you know of 
 him ?' 
 
 ' Which I do as well as one fellow can 
 know another in the same battalion, I am 
 sure he would never dispossess so charm- 
 ing — two such charming cousins.' 
 
288 COLVILT.E OF THK GUARDS. 
 
 ^ Indeed ! you have said something like 
 this already/ 
 
 ' Would you not write to him and ask — ^ 
 
 ' Emphatically — no !' 
 
 'Allow me, then?' asked Colville, in his 
 most persuasive tone. 
 
 ' Never ! I — we shall be beholden to 
 none ! I thought, small as it is, that 
 Birkwoodbrae was almost our patrimony ; 
 ifc proves to be his, so let him have it.' 
 
 * And you ' 
 
 ' Have the world wide before me,' she 
 
 replied, with a quiver of her sweet upper 
 
 lip ; ' with us — Ellinor and me — it may be 
 
 as in Strathallans Lament — 
 
 " Ruin's wheel has driven o'er us, 
 Not a hope may now attend ; 
 The world wide is all before us, 
 But a world without a friend." ' 
 
 ' Heaven ! I hope not,' said he. 
 
 ' Why does he continue on this distaste- 
 ful subject,' thought Mary, ' unless to 
 prolong the conversation ?' 
 
 He now proceeded to pat Jack's head, 
 
ON THE BRINK. 289 
 
 and as be did so his hand came more than 
 once in contact with hers, and each touch 
 sent a' thrill to his heart, while with that 
 mysterious instinct which tells a girl of 
 the emotions with which she is inspiring 
 an admirer, Mary, without turning her 
 head, knew that the fond gaze of Leslie 
 Colville was bent upon her. 
 
 What did he mean? To desert Blanche 
 Galloway, or was ho simply amusing him- 
 self with her, or with both? Her pride 
 revolted at the idea. However, their 
 acquaintanceship would soon be at an end, 
 as he would be leaving like herself; and 
 as if he divined her thoughts, he said 
 something of his approaching departure. 
 
 ' I hope you will have some pleasant 
 memories to carry away with you ?' said 
 Mary, and then she could have bitten her 
 tongue for making the surmise, and added, 
 ' I shall have none but sad ones — though 
 Invermay is so lovely.' 
 
 * Yes ; but there are some memories of 
 
 VOL. I. u 
 
290 COLYILLB OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 it that will ever be dear to me — the hours 
 I have spent here at Birkwoodbrae.' 
 
 If he was betraying himself, he paused, 
 and Mary could feel how her heart was 
 vibrating. 
 
 For a moment her long dark lashes 
 flickered as she glanced at him timidly, 
 and thought how happy his avowed love 
 would make her was he at liberty to do 
 so ; and she remembered that when he was 
 away at Alyth how she had felt a void in 
 her heart, till adversity brought her other 
 things to think of. 
 
 As Colville looked down on the ripples 
 of the girl's golden hair and on her sad- 
 dened face, a great pity that was allied 
 with something warmer and dearer stirred 
 his heart, and bending over her downcast 
 head, he lightly touched her hair with his 
 lips. 
 
 ' Poor child !' said he, and Mary drew 
 haughtily back. She saw there was a 
 smile on his face ; it was a very fond one, 
 
ON THE BRINK. 291 
 
 but she misjudged it, and felt assured that 
 no lover would smile at such a time. 
 Thus his manner perplexed her, so she 
 said, 
 
 ' Do not forget yourself. Captain Col- 
 ville, and that you are engaged to Miss 
 Galloway/ 
 
 * Engaged — to — Miss Galloway!' be re- 
 peated, with genuine surprise and annoy- 
 ance. ' Not at all. Who on earth put 
 that into your little head V he added, with 
 a laugh. 
 
 'Mrs. Wodrow always told me so,' re- 
 plied Mary, covered with confusion, but 
 feeling very happy nevertheless. 
 
 ' Silly, gossiping old woman ! No, Miss 
 Well wood : I am, thank Heaven, a free 
 man — as yet.' 
 
 Here was a revelation — if true. 
 
 He was gazing on her now with eyes 
 that were full of admiration and ardour, 
 while the clasp of his hand seemed to in- 
 fuse through her veins some of the force 
 
 u2 
 
292 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 and love that inspired him. In the glance 
 they exchanged each read the other s se- 
 cret, and he drew her towards him and 
 kissed her. * There are moments in life/ 
 it is said, * when joy makes us afraid : and 
 this was one ' — to Mary at least, and she 
 shrank back — all the more quickly and 
 confusedly that a visitor was approaching ; 
 and a half-suppressed malediction hovered 
 on the lips of Colville as the portly Mrs. 
 Wodrow was ushered in — ushered in at 
 that moment ! 
 
 He rose with annoyance, and still re- 
 taining Mary's hand in his, said hurriedly, 
 and in a low tone, with a little laugh 
 that was assumed to cover her confusion, 
 
 * Promise me that in the matter of leav- 
 ing Birkwoodbrae you will do no more till 
 I see you again io-morrow,^ 
 
 *I promise,' replied Mary, trembling 
 very much, and scarcely knowing what 
 she said ; and, bowing to Mrs. Wodrow, 
 Colville took his departure, while the 
 
ON THE BEINK. 293 
 
 pressure of his hand seemed to linger on 
 Mary's heart. ' Who does not know/ says 
 the authoress of ' Nadine,' * the magnetic 
 thrill — the strange and subduing sense of 
 soul-communion, which sometimes lingers 
 in a hand-clasp ;' and with this thrill in her 
 veins Mary addressed herself to the task 
 of talking commonplace to old Mrs. Wod- 
 row. 
 
 He had been on the brink of a proposal 
 without doubt, yet none had been made. 
 
294 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE DEPAETURE. 
 
 To-MOREOW came, and the next day, and 
 the next, but there was no sign of, or let- 
 ter from, Captain Colville, so Mary resum- 
 ed her arrangements all the more briskly 
 and bitterly. 
 
 Ellinor had heard of his interview with 
 Mary, and felt much tender interest and 
 concern. Had he spoken of Sir Eedmond 
 Sleath, or his movements, she marvelled 
 sorely ; but failed to ask. 
 
 Meanwhile May's recent thoughts were 
 of a very mingled and somewhat painful 
 kind. The memory of his great tender- 
 ness of manner, of the kiss he had snatch- 
 
THE DEPARTURE. 295 
 
 ed, and the assertion that he was not the 
 Jinnee of Blanche Galloway were all ever 
 before her in constant iteration, with the 
 consciousness that no distinct avowal had 
 preceded, and no proposal had followed 
 the episode. 
 
 A kiss ! Their lips had met but once, 
 yet the memory of such a meeting often 
 abides for ever. 
 
 ' How dared he kiss me ! Why did I 
 not prevent him ?' she thought, while her 
 cheeks burned, and the conviction that he 
 had been only amusing himself with her 
 grew hourly stronger in her heart. She 
 remembered, too, that he had laughed 
 once or twice during the most earnest 
 parts of her conversation about her trou- 
 bles, and she thought that most people 
 could hear of the misfortunes of others 
 with tolerable equanimity. 
 
 Was he really engaged to Blanche Gallo- 
 way after all ? and was she the means of 
 preventing the promised visit on ' the mor- 
 
296 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 row ' — the visit that never took place ? 
 
 His visit to Birkwoodbrae on the very 
 day of his return from Alyth was certainly 
 duly reported to that young lady by Made- 
 moiselle Rosette, who had watched and 
 followed him — and smiled brightly as she 
 did so — for where is the French soubrette 
 to be found who does not feel a malicious 
 pleasure in knowing that her master or 
 her mistress is being deceived ? 
 
 The first day of Colville's absence after 
 that thrilling visit dragged wearily on, 
 and, when evening came and the sun set, 
 Mary marvelled was it eight hours since 
 she rose that morning. It looked more 
 like eight hundred, and still longer looked 
 the days that followed, till anger began to 
 mingle with her depression, anxiety, and 
 sense of unmerited humiliation, all of 
 which enhanced her desire to be gone. 
 
 How little could she conceive that, 
 wounded in the right hand by the explo- 
 sion of a friend's fowling-piece when shoot- 
 
THE DEPAETURE. 297 
 
 iug, he was confined at first to bed, and 
 then to his room at Craigmhor; that he 
 was thus unable to write to or communi- 
 cate with her ; and that thus, too, prob- 
 ably she would never see him again, for 
 by the evening of the third day the 
 arrangements for the departure of Ellinor 
 and herself were finally completed. 
 
 ' Would that I could peep into our 
 future, Mary/ said Ellinor, tearfully, on 
 their last evening in their old home. 
 
 * Ah ! the future is indeed a mystery to 
 us,' said Mary ; ' but blessed be God for all 
 His gifts r she added, in a broken voice, 
 as she thought of the legend over the old 
 doorway, through which they would pass 
 no more. 
 
 Many relics were packed and sent to 
 the manse, there to be kept till better 
 times came ; everything else was left in 
 care of the still absent Dr. Wodrow, to be 
 sold for their behoof ; but, for reasons to 
 be given, strange to say, nothing was sold. 
 
298 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 Thougli the apparently strange conduct 
 of Captain Colville in teaching her to love 
 him, and exciting brilliant hopes in her 
 heart only to let them fade, had so deeply 
 mortified Mary that already his image was 
 passing out of her busy thoughts, or 
 seemed as only something to be forgotten 
 as soon as possible, she was not without 
 strong though vague hope of the future 
 for Ellinor and herself ; but hope has often 
 been likened to the mirage of the desert^ 
 and as being often quite as illusory. 
 
 Ellinor, we have said, had thanked hea- 
 ven for her escape from what must have 
 proved a great and perilous esdandre ; yet 
 by one of those idiosyncracies of the female 
 heart she also thanked heaven that London 
 was to be the place of their exile ; Sir 
 Kedmond was there, no doubt, and she 
 felt assured that he loved her still. Mighty 
 though the modern Babylon was — and of 
 that mightiness she had not the slightest 
 conception—they might meet again ; and 
 
THE DEPARTURE. 299 
 
 even, if not, it would be pleasant to walk 
 in the same streets where he walked or 
 rode ; to breathe the same air that was 
 breathed by him : to be in the same place 
 where he was. 
 
 So she had, to enliven the path before 
 her. a little element of romance that was 
 unknown to, and denied to the poor but 
 more practical Mary ; and to her, foolish 
 girl, it seemed that perhaps the dear old 
 tale might conclude, after all, with wedding 
 bells and vows of wedded love. 
 
 Why she should have indulged in these 
 dreams it is difficult to say. Days upon 
 days had passed, and, like Colville, the 
 impassioned baronet, with whom she had 
 been on the point of sharing her future, 
 gave no sign, and she could make none. 
 But she was yet to learn that * all the fine 
 old Grandisonian notions of honour and 
 delicacy towards woman held by our grand- 
 fathers were exploded, or else deemed 
 absolutely antediluvian and absurd.' 
 
300 COLVILLK OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 Now she longed to be goue — gone even 
 from Birkwoodbrae. ' She wanted to see 
 life ' (she thought), ' as poets and painters 
 and young ladies picture it — a sort of 
 misfcj, delicious paradisiacal existence of 
 excitement, unfailing amusement, and per- 
 petual delight.' 
 
 The old peace of mind was gone ; she 
 wished to leave all connected with it be- 
 hind ; and, poor girl, she little knew what 
 was before her — it might be of penury, 
 struggle, and despair ! 
 
 Every movement, as the hour of depart- 
 ure approached, brought a fresh pang to 
 the tender heart of Mary. She had parted 
 with her pets and household cares. Her 
 tame owl she had cast loose, and she 
 watched him as he winged his way back 
 to his eyrie in the ruined tower, from which 
 Eobert Wodrow in happier times had 
 brought him. 
 
 Wearily and sadly she had all the dear 
 familiar spots, and the cottars who dwelt 
 
THE DEPARTURE. 301 
 
 among them, to visit for the last time — 
 hard and shrivelled hands to press and 
 children to kiss. How should she ever get 
 through it all ? 
 
 She picked up a few daisies from the 
 graves where her parents lay, and placed 
 them between the leaves of her Bible, and 
 then it seemed as if there was nothing 
 more to do. 
 
 The evening seemed painfully sweet and 
 silent and still when the sisters quitted 
 their home for the last time, and to Mary 
 it seemed that even ' the grassho|)pers were 
 silent in the grass.' 
 
 The keys were to be handed over by 
 Elspat Gordon to a clerk of Mr. Luke 
 Sharpe's when he chose to come for them. 
 Elspat received the instructions drowned 
 in tears, and as a spell against evil put in 
 her pocket some grains of wheat, as it is, 
 or was, a superstition in Scotland that 
 in every grain there is the representation 
 of a human face, said to be that of the 
 
302 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 Saviour, and hence the efficacy of the spell. 
 
 In the railway-carriage Jack crouched at 
 Mary's feet, and, looking up in her eyes, 
 •whined and whimpered, for dogs have 
 strange instincts. All that was left to the 
 sisters of Birkwoodbrae was the bunch of 
 freshly-gathered roses which each carried 
 in her hand, and many times did Mar}^ 
 bury her hot and tear-stained face among 
 their cool and fragrant leaves. 
 
 ' Good-bye !' she whispered in her heart 
 to many an inanimate but familiar object, 
 as it seemed to Hy past and vanish, till the 
 darkness of descending night shrouded all 
 the scenery. Then Mary closed her eyes, 
 and strove to think, while the clanking 
 train glided swiftly and monotonously on. 
 
 The past, the present, and the future, 
 so far as Colville was concerned, seemed 
 ' to have melted into thinest air ; or perhaps 
 the past alone, with its brief life and glow 
 of love and hope, thrust itself poignantly 
 forward. 
 
303 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 THE HEIR OF ENTAIL. 
 
 The sudden departure of the sisters from 
 Birkwoodbrae, few knew precisely for 
 where, caused something like consterna- 
 tion — at least, a great deal of commisera- 
 tion — in the place they had left behind 
 them. Their sweet, soft, ladylike faces 
 and presence were missed erelong from 
 the pew in which they had sat on Sun- 
 days from childhood; countless acts of 
 kindness, goodness, charity, and benevo- 
 lence were remembered now and rehearsed 
 by cottage hearths and ' ingle-lums ' again 
 and again, and all deplored that the places 
 
304 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 which knew them once would know them 
 no more ! 
 
 When, two days after their departure, 
 Captain Colville, with a magnificent dia- 
 mond ring for Mary, and intent on taking 
 up the story of his love where he had left 
 it off, rode over to Birkwoodbrae, he went 
 in hot haste to the manse for intelligence, 
 and then he and Dr. Wodrow looked 
 blankly in each other s face. 
 
 ' Gone — what does it all mean T impetu- 
 ously asked the captain, whose wounded 
 hand was in a black silk sling, and who 
 looked pale and thin, 
 
 ' Tt simply means that they have abrupt- 
 ly left us, and we may never see them 
 again,' replied Dr. Wodrow, with uncon- 
 cealed grief and irritation. 
 
 *Gone — gone !' exclaimed Colville, chang- 
 ing colour, or losing it rather; * why did I 
 not sooner tell them who I was — why act 
 the part I did, and lure you into doing so, 
 too?' 
 
THE HEIR OF ENTAIL. 305 
 
 *Ay — why, indeed,' groaned the poor 
 minister. ' You see what strength of char- 
 acter they both possess — Mary, certainly, 
 at least.' 
 
 'And they have left no address — no 
 clue ?' 
 
 ' None.' 
 
 'Mary wrote a farewell note to Mrs. 
 Wodrow, saying she had not the heart to 
 bid her good-bye verbally. Her friends of 
 the past, she wrote, were no longer for 
 her now — she had a new sphere of action 
 to enter upon, a new life to lead, and new 
 duties to fulfil, with much more to the 
 same purpose, and that erelong she would 
 write from London.' 
 
 'London!' exclaimed Colville, striking 
 his right heel on the floor. 
 
 It would be an insult, perhaps, to the 
 intelligence of the reader to assume that 
 he or she has not already suspected that 
 Leslie Colville and the encroaching cousin 
 Leslie Well wood were one and the same 
 
 VOL. I, X 
 
306 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 person. Apart from his entailed property, 
 lie had succeeded to other possessions, re- 
 quiring him with reference to his peerage 
 claim to add to his own the name of Col- 
 ville, and hence the incognito he had — for 
 reasons of his own — been enabled to as- 
 sume to his cousins, to Mrs. Wodrow, and 
 others, including even that very acute 
 party Sir E-edmond Sleath. In short, save 
 the minister, no one knew the part he 
 wished to play. 
 
 ' The little drama from which you pro- 
 mised yourself so much interest, generous 
 and romantic pleasure has been thorough- 
 ly overdone,' said Dr. Wodrow, somewhat 
 reproachfully. 
 
 ' Overdone, indeed !' 
 
 * And doubtless has caused, and is caus- 
 ing great pain.' 
 
 ' Poor girl ! Could I have believed that 
 Mary ' 
 
 * Possessed so much individuality, deci- 
 sion, and independence of character.* 
 
THE HEIR OP ENTAIL. 307 
 
 'Most true; the drama has been over- 
 done, but can be qnickly amended by a 
 pleasant epilogue. And it would have 
 been so some days ago but for this 
 wretched accident to my right hand, which 
 prevented me from writing to Mary or to 
 you. Prejudiced, as you know, by my 
 father against them, I wished to learn 
 the real disposition and character of these 
 o'irls before befriendino; them, as I in- 
 
 CD O ' 
 
 tended to do ; and, even while learning to 
 love Mary, T carried my romantic schemes 
 too far. Why the devil did we make all 
 this mystery !' 
 
 ' We. It was your own suggestion and 
 wish — not mine,' said Dr. Wodrow, testily ; 
 ' and now they have anticipated everything 
 by going forth into the wide waste of the 
 world and leaving us no clue.' 
 
 Colville bit his nether lip, twisted his 
 moustache, and remained silent and per- 
 plexed. So the minister spoke again. 
 
 x2 
 
308 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 ^ Captain Colville, I feared you meant 
 to go on for ever playing at cross-pur- 
 poses with the poor girls. How I wish 
 I had interposed, as it was my duty to 
 have done, ere it was too late ; but you 
 bound me to secresy, as you know, and 
 now they have gone far away, and with 
 sore, sore hearts, you may be assured.' 
 
 And this secret, of which the Dunkeld 
 family knew nothing, may explain the 
 curious and laughing manner of Dr. Wod- 
 row when speaking of Mr. Luke Sharpe 
 the lawyer, and announcing to Mary the 
 existence and intentions of the heir of 
 entail. 
 
 * Poor Mary — poor darling !' said Col- 
 ville, in a low voice. 'Why did I pla}^ 
 with her feelings and my own so long [ 
 Fool that I was not to declare my love 
 and propose to her on the spot ?' 
 
 * Ay, fool indeed !' commented Dr. Wod- 
 row, roughly. ' Think of all this worry, 
 mischief, pain, and separation !' 
 
THE HEIR OP E^^TAIL. 309 
 
 ' In studying her character I shall have 
 deceived her as to my own/ 
 
 ' She always seemed to think you were 
 engaged to Miss Galloway.' 
 
 ' I know that now. Why did you not 
 undeceive her?' 
 
 * I had not your permission to move or 
 explain in the matter.' 
 
 ' And we have parted like strangers 
 almost ! What must Mary have thought 
 of me — what can she think of me still ?' 
 
 ' That you were only amusing yourself 
 with her.' 
 
 ' Hence the strangeness and coolness of 
 her manner towards me at times. Oh, 
 Dr. Wodrow, I never knew how much I 
 loved that girl till now !' exclaimed Col- 
 ville, as he now realised fully in that time 
 of pain and surprise that Mary Well wood 
 was the one woman in all the world for 
 him. 
 
 About her there was an originality which 
 struck him. She was unlike any other 
 
310 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 girl he had seen ; she had a freshness and 
 depth of thought which delighted as much 
 as her beauty bewildered him; and he 
 must have loved her as a cousin if he had 
 not loved her as something more. 
 
 And now she and Ellinor had gone^ — 
 fled, as it were — to London in a kind of 
 desperation and sorrow, brought about by 
 his own folly and mismanagement — to 
 London, of all places in the world for girls 
 ignorant of it — beautiful, helpless, and 
 poor ! 
 
 ' But they will soon discover the trick 
 we have played them, Dr. Wodrow,' said 
 Colville, looking up after a silent pause. 
 
 ' How ?' 
 
 * If they look in the Army List they will 
 see that there is only one Wellwood in the 
 Guards — myself, Leslie Wellwood Colville.' 
 
 * That is where they will never think of 
 looking,' replied Dr. Wodrow ; and he was 
 right — the sisters never did ; besides, Army 
 Lists were seldom in their way. 
 
THE HEIR OF ENTAIL. 311 
 
 ' Had that confounded old gossip, Mrs. 
 Wodrow, not come in at the time she did 
 all would have been explained — I was on 
 the point of telling my darling all !' thought 
 Colville, bitterly and angrily ; ' all would 
 have been so different now, and I should 
 have won the confidence, as I had evidently 
 won the love of Mary Wellwood. And now 
 to follow and to find her !' 
 
 ' Where ?' asked Dr. Wodrow, pithily 
 and sharply. 
 
 ' True — true ; I must be patient, and 
 wait for tidings through you,' said Colville, 
 with something like a groan. ' By the by, 
 doctor, your son seems cut up about the 
 departure of my cousins.' 
 
 • No wonder, poor fellow — since boyhood 
 Miss Ellinor was the apple of his eye.' 
 
 'Ellinor?' 
 
 'Yes — and they both seemed happy 
 enough in their hope of each other till Sir 
 Eedmond Sleath came hovering about her.' 
 
 Colville's face grew very dark. 
 
312 COLYILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 *I did Dot like your friend's character,' 
 said the minister. 
 
 ' Friend — he was no friend of mine !' said 
 Colville, bluntly. 
 
 * I saw through him soon after he first 
 came here ; I have had my experience of 
 evil faces, and I could read his like a book.' 
 
 * And what were his views regarding 
 Ellinor ?' 
 
 'Matrimony, on the death of an uncle, 
 I have heard, from whom he has great 
 expectations.' 
 
 * He has no uncle by male or female side. 
 This was some specious falsehood !' ex- 
 claimed Colville, with knitted brows. 
 
 ' How do you know this ?' 
 
 ' As you may know it — by looking in the 
 Baronetage.' 
 
 In the days that succeeded the depart- 
 ure of Mary and Ellinor most eagerly were 
 letters looked for at the manse of Kirk- 
 toun-Mailler, but none came from either, 
 though both sisters had promised to write 
 
THE HEIR OP ENTAIL. 313 
 
 whenever they had found a ne^ borne, 
 however temporary, and periodically the 
 path through the fields, by which the post- 
 man always came, was watched by anxious 
 eves. 
 
 How was this ? — ^what had happened ? 
 were the constant surmises of Dr. and 
 Mrs. "Wodrow, as the}^ looked gravely in 
 each other's face, while more than once 
 each day Colville came to the manse in 
 hope of having tidings. Were both ill — 
 stricken down by some sudden ailment and 
 among strangers — they so gentle, so ten- 
 derly nurtured, and so refined in nature ? 
 
 The doubt and perplexity were intoler- 
 able ! And the upbraiding, almost des- 
 pairing looks of Dr. Wodrow cut Colville 
 to the heart. 
 
 With their departure by railway all clue 
 was lost, and as the days ran on to weeks 
 the anxiety that preyed on the minds of 
 the good people at the manse became sore 
 indeed, and to Colville, who knew what 
 
314 COLVILLE OF THE GUARDS. 
 
 London is, doubfc was simply maddening ! 
 
 From the heir of entail Mr. Luke Sharpe 
 received instructions that everything: was 
 to remain intact and untouched at Birk- 
 woodbrae till the sisters should come back 
 and once more sit by its hearthstone ; and 
 old Elspat, who had been installed there 
 in charo^e, held for a time a kind of daily 
 levee of humble neighbours, whose in- 
 quiries, comments, and regrets were re- 
 iterated and ever recurrent. 
 
 But days, we have said, passed on and 
 became weeks and more, and no tidings 
 came of the lost ones, for so those among 
 the Birks of Inverraay began to consider 
 them. 
 
 Captain Colville had rejoined his regi- 
 ment in London ; Sir Eedmond Sleath was 
 no one knew precisely where, and Robert 
 Wodrow, whose evil genius he had been, 
 abandoning his studies in a kind of despair, 
 had disappeared. Thus a great gloom 
 
THE HECB OF ENTAIL, 315 
 
 reigned over the old manse, and tbe worthy 
 descendant of the author of ' Analeota 
 Scotica' could not find in any page thereof 
 a passage to soothe him in his great 
 sorrow. 
 
 With Colville's return to London a 
 slight hope had grown in the old minister's 
 heart that he might be the means of cast- 
 ing a little light on this painful myster}^, 
 but ere long that hope died away too. 
 
 September stole on, and October came, 
 with its red, yellow, and russet autumnal 
 hues ; the leaves were falling on the empty 
 air ; hardy apples yet hung in the other- 
 wise bare orchards for the coming frosts 
 to ripen ; dark berries clustered on the 
 elder- trees ; long rushes waved in the 
 wind by the banks of the May, which 
 careered the same as ever through its bed 
 of rock towards the Earn ; the call of the 
 partridge and the few notes uttered by the 
 remaining birds of the season came on the 
 
316 COLVILLE OF THE GUAEDS. 
 
 low sighing breeze ; winter was close at 
 hand, and yet there came no tidings of 
 Mary Wellwood or her sister. 
 
 END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 LOKDON : PRINTED BY DUNCAN MAODONALD, BLENHEIM HOUSE.