Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume XXII Part 2

"Yes," rejoined the angry uncle, "lands, tenements, hereditaments, shares, dividends, stock, furniture, bed and table linen."

"And table linen," echoed the entranced nephew.

"Yes; everything," continued the uncle; and calming down as he saw the white lips and blank despair of the youth, he added--"And to you I will leave and bequeath my natural-born daughter, Rachel Grierson."

And as he uttered these significant words, he watched carefully the face of the youth, where, however, all indications defied his perspicacity, inasmuch as blank astonishment was still the prevailing expression. But after some minutes the young man stuttered out--

"A legacy worthy of a n.o.bleman!"

Words that sounded beautifully, because they were true as regarded Rachel, whatever they might be as respected his secret intention; yet as the children vaticinate from the examination of each other's tongues, if the uncle had examined the organ, he might have discovered some of those blue lines which produce an exclamation from the young augurs.

"_Words_ worthy, too, of a n.o.bleman," cried the old man in a trembling voice; and holding out his hand, which shook under his emotion of delight at hearing his beloved Rachel so praised, he seized that of his nephew--

"Yes, Walter," he added, "you have by these words redeemed yourself, and I will take them as an offering of your willingness to accept my legacy; but, remember, I extort no promise, which might reduce the value of a young woman's affection,--a gift to be accepted for its own sake."

"I am content," said Walter.

"And I am satisfied," added the uncle. "But here is wine on the table,"

he continued, as he turned his eye in the direction of a decanter of good claret, just as if Rachel had, by her art of love, antic.i.p.ated what he wished at this moment. "Ah, Walter, if she shall watch your wants as she has done mine, you will live to feel that you cannot want _her_, and live; so fill up a gla.s.s for me, and one for yourself, that we may drink to the happiness of the dear girl when, after I am dead, she shall become your wedded wife."

"With all and sundry lands, tenements, hereditaments, and so forth,"

cried Walter, with a laugh which might pa.s.s as genuine, and which was responded to by a chuckle from the dry throat of the uncle, which certainly was so.

So the pledge was taken; and Walter Grierson went away, leaving the old merchant-burgess as happy as any poor mortal creature can be when so near the term of his departure. Such is our way of speaking; and yet we are forced to admit, that at no period of life, however near the ultimate, abating the advent of the great illumination which breaks like a new dawn upon the internal sense of a favoured few, can you say that the hold of this world upon the spirit is ever renounced. Whether the young man was as happy, we may not venture to say; but this we might surmise, even at this stage of our story, and in reference to the cla.s.sical proverb, that the b.a.s.t.a.r.d might be the beautiful Nisa, and the lawful heir the ill-favoured Mopsus.

These things we may leave to development; and with a caution to the reader not to be over-suspicious, we will follow our Nisa, Rachel Grierson, as she proceeds from the house of the merchant-burgess up the High Street, at a period of the evening of the same day when the shadows of the tall lands wrapped the crowds of loiterers and pa.s.sengers almost in utter darkness; not that she chose this time for any purpose of secrecy,--for she had no secret, except that solitary one which every young woman has, and holds, up to the minute of conviction, that she is engaged, after which it becomes a flame blown by her own breath,--but simply because it suited the routine of her duties. Her night-cloak kept her from the cold, and the panoply of her virtue secured her from insult; so, threading her way amidst the throng, she arrived at the head of the old winding street called the West Bow, where, at a projection a little to the north of Major Weir's Entry, she mounted a narrow stair.

On arriving at a door on the third landing-place, she tapped gently, and in obedience to a shrill voice, which cried "Come in," she lifted the latch, and entered a small room, where, at a bench, sat a very peculiar personage. This was no other than the famous Paul Bennett, an artist in jewellery, who at that time excelled all his compeers for beauty of design and exquisite refinement of minute elaboration. And this, perhaps, a good judge of mankind might have augured of him; for while his body was far below the middle size, his long thin fingers, tapering to a point, seemed to be suitable instruments intended to serve a pair of dark eyes so l.u.s.trous and sharp, that nothing within the point of the beginning of infinitesimals might seem to escape them. Nor was his pale face less suggestive of his peculiar faculties; for it was made up of fine delicate features, harmonized into regularity, and so expressive, that it seemed to change with every feeling of the moment, even as the flitting moonbeams play on the face of a statue. In addition to these peculiarities, his appearance was rendered the more striking, that, working as he did under a strong reflected light, cast down immediately before his face by a dark shade, the upper part of his person and a circle on the bench were in bright relief, while the other parts of the room were comparatively dark.

"Still at work, Paul," said Rachel, as she entered; "how long do you intend to work to-night?"

"Till the idea becomes dim, and the sense waxes thick," replied he, as he turned his eyes upon her.

"I have something to tell you," she continued, as she sat down on a chair between him and the fire, if that could be called such which consisted of some red cinders.

"Some other wonder," replied he; "another cropping out of the workings of fate."

Words these, as coming from our little artist, which require some explanation, to the effect that Paul was a philosopher, too, in his own way. Early misfortunes, which mocked the resolutions of a will never very strong, had played into a habit of thinking, and brought him to the conviction that every movement or change in the moral world, not less than in the physical, is the result of a cause which runs back through endless generations to the first man, and even beyond him. Paul was, in short, a fatalist; not of that kind which romance writers feign in order to make the character work through a gloomy presentiment of his own destiny, but merely a believer in a universal original decree, the workings of which we never know until the effects are seen. A fatalist of this kind almost every man is, less or more, in some mood or another; only, to save himself from being a puppet, moved by springs or drawn by strings, he generally contrives to except his _will_ from the scheme of the iron-bound necessity. But Paul would permit of no such exception.

The will, with him, was merely the _motive in action_; and as he compelled you to admit that no thought is, in man's experience, ever called into being, only developed from prior conditions, and that, even as to an idea, the doctrine _Nihil nisi ex ovo_ is true, and therefore that no man can manufacture a motive, so he took a short way with the maintainers of a moral liberty. This doctrine, so gloomy, so grand, yet so terrible, was, to Paul, a conviction, which he almost made practical; nay, he seemed to realize a kind of poetic pleasure from reveries, which represented to him the universe, with the sun and the stars, and all living creatures--walking, flying, swimming, or crawling--going through their parts in the great melodrama of destiny, no one knowing how, or why, or wherefore, yet every human being believing that he is master of his actions, at the very moment that he might be conscious that his belief is only a part of the great law of necessity. Then it seemed as if this delusion in which men indulge, and are forced to indulge, was an element of the farce introduced into the play, so as to relieve the mind from the heavy burden of contemplating so terrible a theory.

"Something to tell me, Rachel!" continued he; "and what may that be?"

"My father has told me to-day," replied she, "that he is to leave me all his fortune; and however grieved I may be at the thought of losing him, I am glad to think that it may be in my power to be of service to you, Paul, as my only relative on my mother's side."

"Service," muttered Paul to himself, while he looked into her face as wistfully as a lover, which indeed he was, though in secret. "And what is to become of Walter Grierson?" he asked.

"When he finds that the entire fortune is mine," replied she, "he will propose to marry me; and this is what my father wishes to bring about by putting the fortune in my power."

"So the events crop out from the long chain of causes," thought Paul; "but who shall tell the final issue? Look here, Rachel," he continued, as he laid his hand on a golden locket which lay before him in the shape of a heart, "I have made this to order;" and as he spoke he touched a spring, whereupon a lid opened, and up flew a pair of tiny doves, which, with fluttering wings of gold and azure, immediately saluted each other with their long bills, and piped a few notes in imitation of the cushat.

The touch of another spring immediately consigned them again to the cavity of the heart,--a conceit altogether of such refined manufacture and ingenuity of design, as to remind us of the saying of Cicero, that there is an exquisiteness in art which never can be known till it is seen fresh from the hand of genius.

"And who ordered that beautiful thing?" inquired Rachel.

"Walter Grierson," replied Paul, fixing his eyes upon her sorrowfully, as if he felt oppressed by that gloomy theory of his.

Nor did he fail to perceive the effect his few words had produced upon the heart of his cousin, where there was a fluttering very different from that of cooing turtles; for the fate of her happiness seemed to her to be suspended on the answer to a question, and that question she was afraid to put.

"Be patient, and learn to hear," continued the little philosopher. "Ere yet Cheops built the Pyramids, or Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, yea, before the first sensation tingled in the first nerve made out of the dust, the beginnings were laid of these events of this day and hour, and, in particular, of that one which may well astonish you and grieve you--viz., that the locket is intended for and inscribed to Agnes Ainslie."

"Agnes Ainslie!" repeated Rachel, with parched lips and trembling voice, "the daughter of Mr. John Ainslie, my father's agent, to whom I am even now going, by Mr. Grierson's command, to request him to call to morrow for the purpose of preparing the settlement!"

"A strange perplexity of events," said Paul. "But what is this mingling of threads to the great web of the universe, which is eternally being woven and unwoven, unaffected by the will of man? And then these small issues, the loss of a fortune by a man, and that of a lover by a woman, how mighty they are to the individual hearts and affections!"

"Mighty indeed," sobbed Rachel, who had loved Walter so long, and rejoiced to have it in her power to bestow a fortune upon him, and now found all her hopes dissolved into the ashes of grief and disappointment. "Mighty indeed; and these thoughts of yours are so dreary, how can one believe in them and live!"

"We are compelled to live," replied he, "even by that same decree which binds us to the infinite chain. Were it not so, man would imitate the day-flies, and die at sundown, that he might escape the dark night which reveals to him the mystery of his being, whereat he trembles and sobs; and all this is also in the decree."

"But if all these things are so," said Rachel, "what do you say of happiness? Is there no joy in the world? Are not the birds happy, when in the morning the woods resound with their song, and so, too, every animal after its kind? Are not children joyful when the house rings with their mirth? and have not men and women their pleasures of a thousand kinds? nay, might not I myself have been one of the happiest of beings, if, with the fortune which is to be left to me, that locket had been engraved with the name of Rachel Grierson in place of Agnes Ainslie?"

"Yes," replied he, "happiness is in the decree as well; and," he added with a smile, "it is always cropping out around us, but no one can manufacture the article. If you wait for it, you may feel it; if you run after it, you will probably not find it, because it is not ready by those eternal laws which, at their beginning, involved its coming up at a certain moment of long after-years. Then, at the best, pleasure and pain are mere oscillations; but the first movement is downwards, for we cry when we come into the world; and the last is also downwards, for we groan when we go out of it. It is the old rhyme--

'We scream when we're born, We groan when we're dying; And all that's between Is but laughing and crying.'"

A parade of philosophy all this which at another time might have had but a small effect upon a youthful mind, but Rachel was in the meantime occupied by looking at the inscription on the fatal toy; and we all know that the feeling of the dominant idea of the moment a.s.similates to its own hue the light or shade of all other ideas of a cognate kind; and there is in this process also a selection and rejection whereby all melancholy ideas cl.u.s.ter in the gloomy atmosphere, if we may so term it, of the prevailing depression, and all joyful ones come together by the attraction of a joyful thought; and so Rachel was impressed by views which, if they had been modified by the comforting doctrines of Christianity, might have enabled her at once to bear and to hope. Even when Paul had finished, she was still gazing on the locket. A moment or two more, and she laid it down with a deep sigh, saying, almost involuntarily, "If my name had been there, I would not have repined at the loss of all my expected fortune." Then, shaking hands with this peculiar being, whom she could not but respect for his ingenuity, as well as for a kindliness and sympathy which lay at the bottom of all his abstract theories, she left him to his work, at which he would continue till drowsiness made, as he said, the idea dim and the nerve thick.

Retracing her steps down the long dark stair, not a very efficient medium for the removal of impressions so unlike the results of our natural consciousness, Rachel Grierson found herself again among the bustling crowds of the High Street. Nor could she view these busy people in the light by which she saw them before entering the little dark room of the philosopher. Though she did not know the cla.s.sical word, she looked upon them as so many _automata_; and the long chain of causes came into her mind so vividly, that she found herself repeating the very words of Paul. Then there was the reference to her own individual fate; and was it not through the self-medium she saw all these people in so strange a light?--with Hope's lamp dashed down at her feet, and extinguished at the very moment when, by the communication of her father, she thought she had the means of recruiting it with a store of oil never to be exhausted till possession was accomplished. Still under these impressions, she came to the door of Mr. Ainslie's house. There were sounds of mirth and music coming from within; and so plastic is the mind when under a deep and engrossing feeling, that she found no difficulty in concentrating and modifying these sounds into joyful articulations from the very mouths of Walter Grierson and Agnes Ainslie themselves. Such are the moral echoes which respond to, because they are formed by the suspicions of, disappointed love. No longer for the moment were Paul's thoughts true. These happy beings inside were happy because they had the hearts and the wills to enjoy; but she could draw no conclusion that she herself could dispose her mind for the acceptance of the world's pleasures also when her gloom should be away among the shadows, and nature's innumerable enjoyments placed within her power.

Yet, withal, she could execute her commission, and upon the door being opened, she could enter in the very face of that mirth of which she fancied herself the victim.

On being shown into a parlour, she was presently waited upon by Mr.

Ainslie, who seemed to her to have come from the scene of enjoyment in the drawing-room. She could even fancy that he eyed her as in some way standing in the path of his daughter's expectations through Walter--a fancy which of course would gain strength from the somewhat excited manner in which he received the words of her commission, to the effect that he would repair the next forenoon to the house of the merchant-burgess, for the purpose of preparing his last will and testament. The notary agreed to attend, and thus, still construing appearances according to the a.s.similating bent of her mind, she departed for home. After going through the routine of her domestic duties, and caring for her invalid father, she retired to bed--that place of so-called rest, where mortals chew the cud of the thoughts of the day or of years. And how unlike the two processes, the physical and the mental!--in the one is brought up for a second enjoyment the green gra.s.s of nature, still fresh and palatable and nutritious; in the other, the seared leaves of memory, feeding unavailing regrets, and filling the microcosm with phantoms and dire shapes of evil, the types whereof never had an existence in the outer world. Walter Grierson was lost to her for ever, and the dire energies of fate, as described by the artist-philosopher, seemed to hang over her, claiming, in harsh tones, her will as a mere instrument in the working out of her own destiny.

Next day Mr. Ainslie called, and was for a long time closeted with Mr.

Grierson; but so careless was she now of the fortune about being left to her, and which she was satisfied would not now be a means of showing her affection for Walter, that she felt little interest in an affair which otherwise might have appeared of so much importance to her. Her attention was, notwithstanding, claimed by an incident. After the interview, the notary visited Walter Grierson in his room, where the young man seemed to have been waiting for him. In ordinary circ.u.mstances it might have appeared strange that a man of business, bound to secrecy, would divulge the terms of a will to any one, but far more that he should take means for apprising a nephew that he was deprived of any share of his uncle's means. Nor could she account for this interview on any other supposition than that Mr. Ainslie knew of the intentions of Walter towards his daughter, and that he took this early opportunity of intimating that a disinherited young man, of the grade of a merchant's clerk, would not, as a son-in-law, suit the expectations of an ambitious writer. Yet out of this interview there came to, if not drawn by, her fancy a glimmer of hope, inasmuch as, if the young man were rejected by the notary in consequence of the ban of disinheritance, he would be left to the attractions of her wealth; but this supposition involved the a.s.sumption that her triumph would be over a mind that was mercenary, and not over a heart predisposed to love; nay, her generosity revolted at the thought of gratifying her long-concealed pa.s.sion at the expense of the sacrificed love of another. That other, too, had a better right to the object than she herself, in so far that Agnes Ainslie's love had been returned, while hers had not. But these speculations were to be brought to the test by words and actions.

No sooner had Mr. Ainslie left than Rachel was visited in her private parlour by Walter Grierson himself. He had seldom taken that liberty before, for her secret pa.s.sion had been ruled by a stern virtue. A natural shyness, remote from coyness, demanded the conciliation of respect, though ready at a moment to pa.s.s into the generosity of confidence where she was certain of a return; but his presence before her might have been accounted for by his appearance, which was that of one whose excitement was only attempted to be overborne by an effort--a result more mechanical than spiritual. His manner, not less than his countenance, composed to gravity, was belied by the tremulous light of his eye; and as he seized her hand and pressed it fervently, she could feel that his trembled more than her own. Her manner was also embarra.s.sed, as it well might be, where so many conflicting feelings, some revived from old memories, and some produced by the singular events of the day and hour, agitated her frame.

"I am going to surprise you, cousin," he said, while he fixed his eye upon her, as if to watch the effect of his words.

Rachel forgot for a moment the philosophy of Paul--why should one be surprised when the thing that is to be is a result of a change in something else as old as Aldebaran, let alone "the sun and the seven stars?" She was indeed prepared for a surprise.

"It is just the old story of the heart," he resumed. "Our intercourse began so early, and partook so much of that of mere relations, that I never could tell when the mere social feeling gave place to another which I need not mention. You know, Rachel, what I mean."

She was silent because she was distrustful, yet her heart beat bravely in spite of her efforts; for was not this man the object of her love, and is not love moved with an eloquence which makes reason ashamed of her poor figures and modes?

"Yes," he went on, "I take it for granted that you know I am only labouring towards a confession. Yes, dear heart, for years I have considered you as the one sole object in all this world of fair visions formed to make me happy. You see I cannot get out of the ordinary mode of speech. The lover is fated to adjure, to praise, and to pet.i.tion always in the same set form of words; yet is not the confession enough?"

"So far," said she; "but I have never seen any evidence of all this;" as if she wanted more in the same strain--sweet to the ear, though distrusted by the reason.

"No more you have," he continued, "yet you know that love is often suspicious of itself. I have watched with my eye your movements and att.i.tudes when you thought I was not observing you. My ear has followed your voice through adjoining rooms when you thought I was listening to other sounds. I have admired your words, without venturing the response of admiration. Often I have wished to fold you in my arms when you dreamt nothing of my inward thoughts. In short, Rachel, I have loved you for years! Yes, I have enjoyed, or suffered, this gloating, yea, delightful misery of the heart when it feeds upon its own secret treasures, and trembles at the test which might dissolve the dream."