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THE END OF AN OLD SONG

The Setons left Glasgow in the end of May.

On the evening before they left Thomas and Billy made a formal farewell visit, on the invitation of Elizabeth and Buff, who were holding high revel in the dismantled house.

Mr. Seton had gone to stay with friends, who could be trusted to look after him very carefully, until the bustle and discomfort of the removal was over. Buff was to have gone with his father, but he begged so hard to be allowed to stay and help that in spite of Marget's opposition (she held her own views on his helpfulness), his sister gave in.

He and his two friends had enjoyed a full and satisfying week among wooden crates and furniture vans, and were sincerely sorry that the halcyon time was nearly over; in fact, Thomas had been heard to remark, "When I'm a man I'll flit every month."

Poor Thomas, in spite of the flitting, felt very low in spirits. He had done his best to dissuade the Setons from leaving Glasgow. Every morning for a week he had come in primed with a fresh objection. Had Elizabeth, he asked, thought what it meant to live so far from a station? Had Elizabeth thought what it meant to be at the mercy of oil-lamps? "Mamma" said that six weeks of Arran in the summer was more than enough of the country. Had Elizabeth thought that she would never get any servants to stay?

He did not conceal from them that "Mamma" thought the whole project "very daftlike." To judge from Thomas, "Mamma" must have expressed herself with some vigour, and Elizabeth could only hope that that placid lady would never know the use her son had made of her name and conversation.

But the efforts of Thomas had been unavailing, and the last evening had come.

Thomas and Billy, feeling the solemnity of the occasion needed some expression, did not open the door and run in as was their custom, but reached up and rang a peal at the bell, a peal that clanged like a challenge through the empty house and brought Ellen hurrying up the kitchen stairs, expecting a telegram at the very least. Finding only the familiar figures of Thomas and Billy, she murmured to herself, "What next, I wonder?" and leading the way to the drawing-room, announced the illustrious couple.

Buff greeted them with a joyous shout.

"Come on. I helped to fry the potatoes."

The supper had been chosen by the boys themselves, and consisted of sausages and fried potatoes, jam tartlets and tinned pineapple, with home-made toffee to follow; also two syphons of lemonade.

It was spread on a small table, the tablecloth was a kitchen towel, and there was only one tumbler and the barest allowance of knives and forks; but Buff was charmed with his feast, and hospitably eager that his guests should enjoy it.

"Come on," he said again.

But Thomas, gripping Billy's hand, hung back, and it was seen that he carried a parcel.

"I've brought Buff a present," he announced.

"Oh, Thomas!" said Elizabeth, "not another! After that lovely box of tools."

"Yes," said Thomas firmly. "It's a book—a wee religious book." He handed it to Elizabeth. "It's about angels."

Elizabeth did not look at her young brother, but undid the paper, opened the book and read:

"It came upon the midnight clear,

That glorious song of old,

From angels bending near the earth

To touch their harps of gold:

'Peace on the earth, good-will to men,

From heaven's all-gracious King!'

The world in solemn stillness lay

To hear the angels sing."

"How nice! and the pictures are beautiful, Thomas. It's a lovely present. Look at it, Buff!"

Buff looked at it and then he looked at Thomas. "What made you think I wanted a book about angels?" he demanded.

"Nothing in your behaviour, old man," his sister hastened to assure him. "D'you know you've never said Thank you!"

Buff said it, but there was a marked lack of enthusiasm in his tone.

"I didn't buy it," Thomas said, feeling the present needed some explanation. "Aunt Jeanie sent it at Christmas to Papa, and Papa wasn't caring much about angels, and Mamma said I could give it to Buff; she said it might improve him."

"I knew he didn't buy it!" shouted Buff, passing over the aspersion on his character. "I knew it all the time. Nobody would buy a book like that: it's the kind that get given you."

"Aunt Jeanie sent me the Prodigal Son," broke in Billy in his gentle little voice (he often acted as oil to the troubled waters of Buff and Thomas). "I like the picture of the Prodigal eating the swine's husks. There's a big swine looking at him as if it would bite him."

"Should think so," Thomas said. "If you were a swine you wouldn't like prodigals coming eating your husks."

"I don't think, Billy," said Elizabeth, looking meditatively at him, "that you will ever be a prodigal, but I can quite see Thomas as the elder brother——Ah! here comes Ellen with the sausages!"

It was a very successful party, noisy and appreciative, and after they had eaten everything there was to eat, including the toffee, and licked their sticky fingers, they had a concert.

Billy sang in a most genteel manner a ribald song about a "cuddy" at Kilmarnock Fair; Buff recited with great vigour what he and Elizabeth between them could remember of "The Ballad of the Revenge"; and Thomas, not to be outdone, thrust Macaulay's Lays into Elizabeth's hands, crying, "Here, hold that, and I'll do How Horatius kept the bridge."

At last Elizabeth declared that the entertainment had come to an end, and the guests reluctantly prepared to depart.

"You're quite sure you'll invite us to Etterick?" was Thomas's parting remark. "You won't forget when you're away?"

"Oh, Thomas!" Elizabeth asked him reproachfully, "have I proved myself such a broken reed? I promise you faithfully that at the end of June I shall write to Mamma and suggest the day and the train and everything. I'll go further. I'll borrow a car and meet you at the junction. Will that do?"

Thomas nodded, satisfied, and she patted each small head. "Good-bye, my funnies. We shall miss you very much."

When Elizabeth had seen Buff in bed she came downstairs to the dismantled drawing-room.

Ellen had tidied away the supper-table and made up the fire, and pulled forward the only decent chair, and had done her best to make the room look habitable.

It was still daylight, but just too dark to read with comfort, and Elizabeth folded her tired hands and gave herself up to idleness. She had been getting gradually more depressed each day, as the familiar things were carried out of the house, and to-night her heart felt like a physical weight and her eyes smarted with unshed tears. The ending of an old song hurts.

Sitting alone in the empty, silent room, a room once so well peopled and full of happy sound, she had a curious unsubstantial feeling, as if she were but part of the baseless fabric of a vision and might dissolve and "leave not a rack behind." ... The usually cheerful room was haunted to-night, memories thronged round her, plucking at her to recall themselves. It was in this room that her mother had sung to them and played with them—and never minded when things were knocked down and broken. Over there, in the corner of the ceiling near the window, there was still an ugly mark made by Walter and a cricket-ball, and she remembered how her father had said, so regretfully, "And it was such a handsome cornice!" and her mother had laughed—peals of laughter like a happy schoolgirl, and taken her husband's arm and said, "You dear innocent!" It was a funny thing to call one's father, she remembered thinking at the time, and did not seem to have any connection with the cornice. All sorts of little things, long forgotten, came stealing back; the boys' funny sayings—Sandy, standing a determined little figure, assuring his mother, "I shall always stay with you, Mums, and if anyone comes to marry me I shall hide in the dirty clothes basket."

And now Sandy and his mother were together for always.

Elizabeth slipped on to the floor, and kneeling by the chair as she had knelt as a child—"O God," she prayed, "don't take anybody else. Leave me Father and Buffy and the boys in India. Please leave them to me—if it be Thy will. Amen."

She was still kneeling with her head on her folded arms when Marget came into the room carrying a tray. She made no comment on seeing the attitude of her mistress, but, putting the tray on the table, she went over to the window, and, remarking that if they had to flit it was a blessing Providence had arranged that they should flit when the days were long, she proceeded to pull down the blinds and light the gas.

Then she leaned over her mistress and addressed her as if she were a small child.

"I've brocht ye a cup o' tea an' a wee bit buttered toast. Ye wud get nae supper wi' thae wild laddies. Drink it while it's hot, and get awa' to your bed, like a guid lassie."

Elizabeth uncoiled herself (to use her own phrase) and rose to her feet. She blinked in the gas-light with her tear-swollen eyes, then she made a face at Marget and laughed:

"I'm an idiot, Marget, but somehow to-night it all seemed to come back. You and I have seen—changes.... You're a kind old dear, anyway; it's a good thing we always have you."

"It is that," Marget agreed. "What aboot the men's breakfasts the morn's morning? I doot we hevna left dishes to gang roond." She stood and talked until she had seen Elizabeth drink the tea and eat the toast, and then herded her upstairs to bed.

* * * * *

One day in the end of June, Elizabeth fulfilled her promise to Thomas, and wrote to Mrs. Kirke asking if her two sons could be dispatched on a certain date by a certain train, and arrangements would be made for meeting them at the junction.

It was a hot shining afternoon, and the Setons were having tea by the burnside.

Mr. Jamieson (the lame Sunday-school teacher from the church in Glasgow) was staying with them for a fortnight, and he sat in a comfortable deck-chair with a book in his lap; but he read little, the book of Nature was more fascinating than even Sir Walter. His delight in his surroundings touched Elizabeth. "To think," she said to her father, "that we never thought of asking Mr. Jamieson to Etterick before! Lumps of selfishness, that's what we are."

Mr. Seton suggested that it was more want of thought.

"It amounts to the same thing," said his daughter. "I wonder if it would be possible to have Bob Scott out here? You know, my little waif with the drunken father? Of course he would corrupt the whole neighbourhood in about two days and be a horribly bad influence with Buff—but I don't believe the poor little chap has ever been in the real country. We must try to plan."

Mr. Seton sat reading The Times. He was greatly worried about Ulster, and frequently said "Tut-tut" as he read.

Buff had helped Ellen to carry everything out for tea, and was now in the burn, splashing about, building stones into a dam. Buff was very happy. Presently, Mr. Hamilton, the new minister at Langhope, was going to take him in hand and prepare him for school, but in the meantime he attended the village school—a haunt that his soul loved. He modelled his appearances and manners on the friends he made there, acquired a rich Border accent, and was in no way to be distinguished from the other scholars. At luncheon that day, he had informed his family that Wullie Veitch (the ploughman's son) had said, after a scuffle in the playground, "Seton's trampit ma piece fair useless"; and the same youth had summed up the new-comer in a sentence: "Everything Seton says is aither rideeclous or confounded," a judgment which, instead of annoying, amused and delighted both the new-comer and his family.

Things had worked out amazingly well, Elizabeth thought, as she sat with her writing-pad on her knee and looking at her family. Her father seemed better, and was most contented with his life. Buff was growing every day browner and stronger. The house was all in order after the improvements they had made, and was even more charming than she had hoped it would be. The garden was a riot of colour and scent, and a never-ending delight. To her great relief, Marget and Ellen had settled down with Watty Laidlaw and his wife in peace and quiet accord, and had even been heard to say that they preferred the country.

After getting Etterick into order, Elizabeth had worked hard at Langhope Manse.

The wedding had taken place a week before, and tomorrow Andrew Hamilton would bring home his bride.

Elizabeth, with her gift of throwing her whole self into her friends' interests, was as eager and excited as if she were the bride and hers the new home. True, much of it was not to her liking. She hated a dining-room "suite" covered in Utrecht velvet, and she thought Kirsty's friends had been singularly ill-advised in their choice of wedding presents.

Kirsty had refused to think of looking for old things for her drawing-room. She said in her sensible way that things got old soon enough without starting with them old; and she just hated old faded rugs, there was nothing to beat a good Axminster.

She was very pleased, however, to accept the Seton's spare furniture. It was solid mid-Victorian, polished and cared-for, and as good as the day it was made. The drawers in the wardrobes and dressing-tables moved with a fluency foreign to the showy present-day "Sheraton" and "Chippendale" suites, and Kirsty appreciated this.

Elizabeth had done her best to make the rooms pretty, and only that morning she had put the finishing touches, and looked round the rooms brave in their fresh chintzes and curtains, sniffed the mingled odours of new paint and sweet-peas, and thought how Kirsty would love it all. The store-room she had taken especial pains with, and had even wrested treasures in the way of pots and jars from the store-room at Etterick (to Marget's wrath and disgust), and carried them in the pony-cart to help to fill the rather empty shelves at Langhope.

So this sunny afternoon, as Elizabeth rose from her writing and began to pour out the tea, she felt at peace with all mankind.

She arranged Mr. Jamieson's teacup on a little table by his side, and made it all comfortable for him. "Put away the paper, Father," she cried, "and come and have your tea, and help me to count our blessings. Let's forget Ulster for half an hour."

Mr. Seton obediently laid down the paper and came to the table.

"Dear me," he said, "this is very pleasant."

The bees drowsed among the heather, white butterflies fluttered over the wild thyme and the little yellow and white violas that starred the turf, and the sound of the burn and the gentle crying of sheep made a wonderful peace in the afternoon air. Marget's scones and new-made butter and jam seemed more than usually delicious, and—"Aren't we well off?" asked Elizabeth.

Mr. Jamieson looked round him with a sigh of utter content, and Mr. Seton said, "I wish I thought that the rest of the world was as peaceful as this little glen." He helped himself to jam. "The situation in Ireland seems to grow more hopeless every day; and by the way, Jamieson, did you see that the Emperor of Austria's heir has been assassinated along with his wife?"

"I saw that," said Mr. Jamieson. "I hope it won't mean trouble."

"It seems a pointless crime," said Elizabeth.

"Buff, come out of the burn, you water-kelpie, and take your tea."

Buff was trying to drag a large stone from the bed of the stream, and was addressing it as he had heard the stable-boy address the pony—"Stan' up, ye brit! Wud ye, though?"—but at his sister's command he ceased his efforts and crawled up the bank to have his hands dried in his father's handkerchief.

It never took Buff long to eat a meal, and in a very few minutes he had eaten three scones and drunk two cups of milk, and laid himself face down-wards in the heather to ruminate.

"Mr. Jamieson," he said suddenly, "if a robber stole your money and went in a ship to South Africa, how would you get at him?"

Mr. Jamieson, unversed in the ways of criminals, was at a loss.

"I doubt I would just need to lose it," he said.

This was feeble. Buff turned to his father and asked what course he would follow.

"I think," said Mr. Seton, "that I would cable to the police to board the ship at the first port."

Buff rejected this method as tame and unspectacular.

"What would you do, Lizbeth?"

"It depends," said Elizabeth, "on how much money I had. If it was a lot, I would send a detective to recover it. But sending a detective would cost a lot."

Buff thought deeply for a few seconds.

"I know what I would do," he said. "I would send a bloodhound—steerage."