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HOW ALISTER TOOK IT.
They could not find Alister, who had gone to the smithy. It was
tea-time before he came home. As soon as he entered, his mother
handed him the letter.
He read it without a word, laid it on the table beside his plate,
and began to drink his tea, his eyes gleaming with a strange light,
lan kept silence also. Mrs. Macruadh cast a quick glance, now at the
one, now at the other. She was in great anxiety, and could scarce
restrain herself. She knew her boys full of inbred dignity and
strong conscience, but was nevertheless doubtful how they would act.
They could not feel as she felt, else would the hot blood of their
race have at once boiled over! Had she searched herself she might
have discovered a latent dread that they might be nearer the right
than she. Painfully she watched them, half conscious of a traitor in
her bosom, judging the world's judgment and not God's. Her sons
seemed on the point of concluding as she would not have them
conclude: they would side with the young woman against their mother!
The reward of parents who have tried to be good, may be to learn,
with a joyous humility from their children. Mrs. Macruadh was
capable of learning more, and was now going to have a lesson.
When Alister pushed back his chair and rose, she could refrain no
longer. She could not let him go in silence. She must understand
something of what was passing in his mind!
"What do you think of THAT, Alister?" she said.
He turned to her with a faint smile, and answered,
"I am glad to know it, mother."
"That is good. I was afraid it would hurt you!"
"Seeing the thing is so, I am glad to be made aware of it. The
information itself you cannot expect me to be pleased with!"
"No, indeed, my son! I am very sorry for you. After being so taken
with the young woman,--"
Alister looked straight in his mother's face.
"You do not imagine, mother," he said, "it will make any difference
as to Mercy?"
"Not make any difference!" echoed Mrs. Macruadh. "What is it
possible you can mean, Alister?"
The anger that glowed in her dark eyes made her look yet handsomer,
proving itself not a mean, though it might be a misplaced anger.
"Is she different, mother, from what she was before you had the
letter?"
"You did not then know what she was!"
"Just as well as I do now. I have no reason to think she is not what
I thought her."
"You thought her the daughter of a gentleman!"
"Hardly. I thought her a lady, and such I think her still."
"Then you mean to go on with it?"
"Mother dear," said Alister, taking her by the hand, "give ine a
little time. Not that I am in any doubt--but the news has been such
a blow to me that--"
"It must have been!" said the mother.
"--that I am afraid of answering you out of the soreness of my
pride, and Ian says the Truth is never angry."
"I am quite willing you should do nothing in a hurry," said the
mother.
She did not understand that he feared lest, in his indignation for
Mercy, he should answer his mother as her son ought not.
"I will take time," he replied. "And here is lan to help me!"
"Ah! if only your father were here!"
"He may be, mother! Anyhow I trust I shall do nothing he would not
like!"
"He would sooner see son of his marry the daughter of a cobbler than
of a brewer!"
"So would I, mother!" said Alister.
"I too," said lan, "would much prefer that my sister-in-law's father
were not a brewer."
"I suppose you are splitting some hair, lan, but I don't see it,"
remarked his mother, who had begun to gather a little hope. "You
will be back by supper-time, Alister, I suppose?"
"Certainly, mother. We are only going to the village."
The brothers went.
"I knew everything you were thinking," said lan.
"Of course you did!" answered Alister.
"But I am very sorry!"
"So am I! It is a terrible bore!"
A pause followed. Alister burst into a laugh that was not merry.
"It makes me think of the look on my father's face," he said, "once
at the market, as he was putting in his pocket a bunch of more than
usually dirty bank-notes. The look seemed almost to be making
apology that he was rny father--the notes were SO DIRTY! 'They're
better than they look, lad!' he said."
"What ARE you thinking of, Alister?"
"Of nothing you are not thinking of, lan, I hope in God! Mr.
Palmer's money is worse than it looks."
"You frightened me for a moment, Alister!"
"How could I, lan?"
"It was but a nervo-mechanical fright. I knew well enough you could
mean nothing I should not like. But I see trouble ahead, Alister!"
"We shall be called a pack of fools, but what of that! We shall be
told the money itself was clean, however dirty the hands that made
it! The money-grubs!"
"I would rather see you hanged, than pocketing a shilling of it!"
"Of course you would! But the man who could pocket it, will be
relieved to find it is only his daughter I care about."
"There will be difficulty, Alister, I fear. How much have you said
to Mercy?"
"I have SAID nothing definite."
"But she understands?"
"I think--I hope so.--Don't you think Christina is much improved,
lan?"
"She is more pleasant."
"She is quite attentive to you!"
"She is pleased with me for saving her life. She does not like
me--and I have just arrived at not disliking her."
"There is a great change on her!"
"I doubt if there is any IN her though!"
"She may be only amusing herself with us in this outlandish place!
Mercy, I am sure, is quite different!"
"I would trust her with anything, Alister. That girl would die for
the man she loved!"
"I would rather have her love, though we should never meet in this
world, than the lands of my fathers!"
"What will you do then?"
"I will go to Mr. Palmer, and say to him: 'Give me your daughter. I
am a poor man, but we shall have enough to live upon. I believe she
will be happy.'"
"I will answer for him: 'I have the greatest regard for you,
Macruadh. You are a gentleman, and that you are poor is not of the
slightest consequence; Mercy's dowry shall be worthy the lady of a
chief!'--What then, Alister?"
"Fathers that love money must be glad to get rid of their daughters
without a. dowry!"
"Yes, perhaps, when they are misers, or money is scarce, or wanted
for something else. But when a poor man of position wanted to marry
his daughter, a parent like Mr. Palmer would doubtless regard her
dowry as a good investment. You must not think to escape that way,
Alister! What would you answer him?"
"I would say, 'My dear sir,'--I may say 'My dear sir,' may I not?
there is something about the man I like!--'I do not want your money.
I will not have your money. Give me your daughter, and my soul will
bless you.'"
"Suppose he should reply,' Do you think I am going to send my
daughter from my house like a beggar? No, no, my boy! she must carry
something with her! If beggars married beggars, the world would be
full of beggars!'--what would you say then?"
"I would tell him I had conscientious scruples about taking his
money."
"He would tell you you were a fool, and not to be trusted with a
wife. 'Who ever heard such rubbish!' he would say. 'Scruples,
indeed! You must get over them! What are they?'--What would you say
then?"
"If it came to that, I should have no choice but tell him I had
insuperable objections to the way his fortune was made, and could
not consent to share it."
"He would protest himself insulted, and swear, if his money was not
good enough for you, neither was his daughter. What then?"
"I would appeal to Mercy."
"She is too young. It would be sad to set one of her years at
variance with her family. I almost think I would rather you ran away
with her. It is a terrible thing to go into a house and destroy the
peace of those relations which are at the root of all that is good
in the world."
"I know it! I know it! That is my trouble! I am not afraid of
Mercy's courage, and I am sure she would hold out. I am certain
nothing would make her marry the man she did not love. But to turn
the house into a hell about her--I shrink from that!--Do you count
it necessary to provide against every contingency before taking the
first step?"
"Indeed I do not! The first step is enough. When that step has
landed us, we start afresh. But of all things you must not lose your
temper with the man. However despicable his money, you are his
suitor for his daughter! And he may possibly not think you half good
enough for her."
"That would be a grand way out of the difficulty!"
"How?"
"It would leave me far freer to deal with her."
"Perhaps. And in any case, the more we can honestly avoid reference
to his money, the better. We are not called on to rebuke."
"Small is my inclination to allude to it--so long as not a stiver
of it seeks to cross to the Macruadh!"
"That is fast as fate. But there is another thing, Alister: I fear
lest you should ever forget that her birth and her connections are
no more a part of the woman's self than her poverty or her wealth."
"I know it, Ian. I will not forget it."
"There must never be a word concerning them!"
"Nor a thought, Ian! In God's name I will be true to her."
They found Annie of the shop in a sad way. She had just had a letter
from Lachlan, stating that he had not been well for some time, and
that there was little prospect of his being able to fetch her. He
prayed her therefore to go out to him; and had sent money to pay her
passage and her mother's.
"When do you go?" asked the chief.
"My mother fears the voyage, and is very unwilling to turn her back
on her own country. But oh, if Lachlan die, and me not with him!"
She could say no more.
"He shall not die for want of you!" said the laird. "I will talk to
your mother."
He went into the room behind. Ian remained in the shop.
"Of course you must go, Annie!" he said.
"Indeed, sir, I must! But how to persuade my mother I do not know!
And I cannot leave her even for Lachlan. No one would nurse him more
tenderly than she; but she has a horror of the salt water, and what
she most dreads is being buried in it. She imagines herself drowning
to all eternity!"
"My brother will persuade her."
"I hope so, sir. I was just coming to him! I should never hold up my
head again--in this world or the next--either if I did not go, or if
I went without my mother! Aunt Conal told me, about a month since,
that I was going a long journey, and would never come back. I asked
her if I was to die on the way, but she would not answer me. Anyhow
I'm not fit to be his wife, if I'm not ready to die for him! Some
people think it wrong to marry anybody going to die, but at the
longest, you know, sir, you must part sooner than you would! Not
many are allowed to die together!--You don't think, do you, sir,
that marriages go for nothing in the other world?"
She spoke with a white face and brave eyes, and Ian was glad at
heart.
"I do not, Annie," he answered. "'The gifts of God are without
repentance.' He did not give you and Lachlan to each other to part
you again! Though you are not married yet, it is all the same so
long as you are true to each other."
"Thank you, sir; you always make me feel strong!"
Alister came from the back room.
"I think your mother sees it not quite so difficult now," he said.
The next time they went, they found them preparing to go.
Now Ian had nearly finished the book he was writing about Russia,
and could not begin another all at once. He must not stay at home
doing nothing, and he thought that, as things were going from bad to
worse in the highlands, he might make a voyage to Canada, visit
those of his clan, and see what ought to be done for such as must
soon follow them. He would presently have a little money in his
possession, and believed he could not spend it better. He made up
his mind therefore to accompany Annie and her mother, which resolve
overcame the last of the old woman's lingering reluctance. He did
not like leaving Alister at such a critical point in his history;
but he said to himself that a man might be helped too much; arid it
might come that he and Mercy were in as much need of a refuge as the
clan.
I cannot say NO worldly pride mingled in the chief's contempt for
the distiller's money; his righteous soul was not yet clear of its
inherited judgments as to what is dignified and what is not. He had
in him still the prejudice of the landholder, for ages instinctive,
against both manufacture and trade. Various things had combined to
foster in him also the belief that trade at least was never free
from more or less of unfair dealing, and was therefore in itself a
low pursuit. He had not argued that nothing the Father of men has
decreed can in its nature be contemptible, but must be capable of
being nobly done. In the things that some one must do, the doer
ranks in God's sight, and ought to rank among his fellow-men,
according to how he does it. The higher the calling the more
contemptible the man who therein pursues his own ends. The humblest
calling, followed on the principles of the divine caller, is a true
and divine calling, be it scavenging, handicraft, shop-keeping, or
book-making. Oh for the day when God and not the king shall be
regarded as the fountain of honour.
But the Macruadh looked upon the calling of the brewer or distiller
as from the devil: he was not called of God to brew or distil! From
childhood his mother had taught him a horror of gain by corruption.
She had taught, and he had learned, that the poorest of all
justifications, the least fit to serve the turn of gentleman,
logician, or Christian, was--"If I do not touch this pitch, another
will; there will be just as much harm done; AND ANOTHER INSTEAD OF
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