Читать книгу The Interloper - Violet Jacob - Страница 4

THE woman who lay in her grave by the sands had rested there for nearly thirty years when her son stood in the grass to read her name and the date of her death. The place had been disused as a burial-ground; and it cost Gilbert some trouble to find the corner in which Clementina Speid’s passionate heart had mixed with the dust from which, we are told, we emanate. The moss and damp had done their best to help on the oblivion lying in wait for us all, and it was only after half an hour of careful scraping that he had spelt out the letters on the stone. There was little to read: her name, and the day she died—October 5, 1770—and her age. It was twenty-nine; just a year short of his own. Underneath was cut: ‘Thus have they rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my goodwill (Ps. cix. 4).’

He stood at her feet, his chin in his hand, and the salt wind blowing in his hair. The smell of tar came up from the nets spread on the shore to windward of him, and a gull flitted shrieking from the line of cliff above.

He looked up.

He had not heard the tread of nearing hoofs, for the sea-sound swallowed everything in its enveloping murmur, and he was surprised to find that a person, from the outer side of the graveyard wall, was regarding him earnestly. He could not imagine how she had arrived at the place; for the strip of flat land which contained this burying-ground at the foot of the cliffs appeared to him to end in the promontory standing out into the ocean a half-mile further east. The many little tracks and ravines which cut downward to the coast, and by one of which the rider had descended to ride along the bents, were unknown to him. He had not expected to see anyone, and he was rather embarrassed at meeting the eyes of the middle-aged gentlewoman who sat on horseback before him. She was remarkable enough to inspire anyone with a feeling of interest, though not from beauty, for her round, plain face was lined and toughened by the weather, and her shrewd and comprehensive glance seemed more suited to a man’s than to a woman’s countenance. A short red wig of indifferent fit protruded from under a low-crowned beaver; and the cord and tassels, with which existing taste encircled riding-hats, nodded over one side of the brim at each movement of the head below. A buff waistcoat, short even in those days of short waists, covered a figure which in youth could never have been graceful, and the lady’s high-collared coat and riding-skirt of plum colour were shabby with the varied weather of many years. The only superfine things about her were her gloves, which were of the most expensive make, the mare she rode, and an intangible air which pervaded her, drowning her homeliness in its distinction.

Seeing that Gilbert was aware of her proximity, she moved on; not as though she felt concern for the open manner of her regard, but as if she had seen all she wished to see. As she went forward he was struck with admiration of the mare, for she was a picture of breeding, and whoever groomed her was a man to be respected; her contrast to the shabbiness of her rider was marked, the faded folds of the plum-coloured skirt showing against her loins like the garment of a scarecrow laid over satin.

She was a dark bay with black points, short-legged, deep-girthed; her little ears were cocked as she picked her way through the grass into the sandy track which led back in the direction of the Lour’s mouth and the bridge. The lady, despite her dumpish figure, was a horsewoman, a fact that he noticed with interest as he turned from the mound, and, stepping through a breach in the wall, took his way homewards in the wake of the stranger.

It was a full fortnight since he had come to Whanland. With the exception of Barclay and the Miss Robertsons, he had heard little and seen nothing of his neighbours, for his time had been filled by business matters. He knew his own servants by sight, and that was all; but, with regard to their functions, he was completely in the dark, and glad enough to have Macquean to interpret domestic life to him. He had made some progress in the understanding of his speech, which he found an easier matter to be even with than his character; and he was getting over the inclination either to laugh or to be angry which he had felt on first seeing him; also, it was dawning on him that, in the astounding country he was to inhabit, it was possible to combine decent intentions with a mode of bearing and address bordering on grossness.

As he went along and watched the rider in front, he could not guess at her identity, having nothing to give him the smallest clue to it; he was a good deal attracted by her original appearance, and was thinking that he would ask Miss Robertson, when he next waited on her, to enlighten him, when she put the mare to a trot and soon disappeared round an angle of the cliff.

The clouds were low; and the gleam of sunshine which had enlivened the day was merging itself into a general expectation of coming wet. Gilbert buttoned up his coat and put his best foot forward, with the exhilaration of a man who feels the youth in his veins warring pleasantly with outward circumstances. He was young and strong; the fascination of the place he had just left, and the curious readiness of his rather complicated mind to dwell on it, and on the past of which it spoke, ran up, so to speak, against the active perfection of his body. He took off his hat and carried it, swinging along with his small head bare, and taking deep breaths of the healthy salt which blew to him over miles of open water from Jutland opposite. The horse he had seen had excited him. So far, he had been kept busy with the things pertaining to his new position, but, interesting as they were, it occurred to him that he was tired of them. Now he could give himself the pleasure of filling his stable. He had never lacked money, for his father had made him a respectable allowance, but, now that he was his own master, with complete control of his finance, he would be content with nothing but the best.

He thought of his two parents, one lying behind him in that God-forgotten spot by the North Sea and the other under the cypresses in Granada, where he had seen him laid barely three months ago. It would have seemed less incongruous had the woman been left with the sun and orange-trees and blue skies, and the man at the foot of the impenetrable cliffs. But it was the initial trouble: they had been mismated, misplaced, each with the other, and one with her surroundings.

For two centuries the Speids of Whanland had been settled in this corner of the Eastern Lowlands, and, though the property had diminished and was now scarcely more than half its original size, the name carried to initiated ears a suggestion of sound breeding, good physique, and unchangeable custom, with a smack of the polite arts brought into the family by a collateral who had been distinguished as a man of letters in the reign of George I. The brides of the direct line had generally possessed high looks, and been selected from those families which once formed the strength of provincial Scotland, the ancient and untitled county gentry. From its ranks came the succession of wits, lawyers, divines, and men of the King’s service, which, though known only in a limited circle, formed a society in the Scottish capital that for brilliancy of talent and richness of personality has never been surpassed.

The late laird, James Speid, had run contrary to the family custom of mating early and was nearing forty when he set out, with no slight stir, for Netherkails, in the county of Perth, to ask Mr. Lauder, a gentleman with whom he had an acquaintance, for the hand of his daughter, Clementina. He had met this lady at the house of a neighbour and decided to pay his addresses to her; for, besides having a small fortune, not enough to allure a penniless man, but enough to be useful to the wife of one of his circumstance, she was so attractive as to disturb him very seriously. He found only one obstacle to the despatch of his business, which was that Clementina herself was not inclined towards him, and told him so with a civility that did not allay his vexation; and he returned to Whanland more silent than ever—for he was a stern man—to find the putting of Miss Lauder from his mind a harder matter than he had supposed.

But, in a few weeks, a letter came from Netherkails, not from the lady, but from her father, assuring him that his daughter had altered her mind, and that, if he were still constant to the devotion he had described, there was no impediment in his way. Mr. Speid, whose inclination pointed like a finger-post to Netherkails, was now confronted by his pride, which stood, an armed giant, straddling the road to bar his progress. But, after a stout tussle between man and monster, the wheels of the family chariot rolled over the enemy’s fallen body; and the victor, taking with him in a shagreen case a pearl necklace which had belonged to his mother, brought back Clementina, who was wearing it upon her lovely neck.

Whatever may have been the history of her change of mind, Mrs. Speid accepted her responsibilities with a suitable face and an apparent pleasure in the interest she aroused as a bride of more than common good looks. Her coach was well appointed, her dresses of the best; her husband, both publicly and in private, was precise in his courtesy and esteem, and there was nothing left to be desired but some sympathy of nature. At thirty-eight he was, at heart, an elderly man, while his wife, at twenty-seven, was a very young woman. The fact that he never became aware of the incongruity was the rock on which their ship went to pieces.

After three years of marriage Gilbert was born. Clementina’s health had been precarious for months, and she all but paid for the child’s life with her own. On the day that she left her bed, a couch was placed at the window facing seaward, and she lay looking down the fields to the shore. No one knew what occurred, but, that evening, there was a great cry in the house and the servants, rushing up, met Mr. Speid coming down the stairs and looking as if he did not see them. They found their mistress in a terrible state of excitement and distress and carried her back to her bed, where she became so ill that the doctor was fetched. By the time he arrived she was in a delirium; and, two days after, she died without having recognised anyone.

When the funeral was over James Speid discharged his servants, gave orders for the sale of his horses, shut up his house, and departed for England, taking the child with him under the charge of a young Scotchwoman. In a short time he crossed over to Belgium, dismissed the nurse, and handed over little Gilbert to be brought up by a peasant woman near the vigilant eye of a pasteur with whom he had been friendly in former days. Being an only son, Mr. Speid had none but distant relations, and, as he was not a man of sociable character, there was no person who might naturally come forward to take the child. He spent a year in travel and settled finally in Spain, where the boy, when he had reached his fifth birthday, joined him.

Thus Gilbert was cut off from all intercourse with his native country, growing up with the sons of a neighbouring Spanish nobleman as his companions. When, at last, he went to school in England, he met no one who knew anything about him, and, all mention of his mother’s name having been strictly forbidden at his home, he reached manhood in complete ignorance of everything connected with his father’s married life. The servants, being foreign, and possessing no channel through which they could hear anything to explain the prohibition, made many guesses, and, from scraps of their talk overheard by the boy, he discovered that there was some mystery connected with him. It was a great deal in his mind, but, as he grew older, a certain delicacy of feeling forbade his risking the discovery of anything to the detriment of the mother whose very likeness he had never seen. His father, though indifferent to him, endeavoured to be just, and was careful in giving him the obvious advantages of life. He grew up active and manly, plunging with zest into the interests and amusements of his boyhood’s companions. He was a good horseman, a superb swordsman, and, his natural gravity assimilating with something in the Spanish character, he was popular. Mr. Speid made no demands upon his affection, the two men respecting each other without any approach to intimacy, and, when the day came on which Gilbert stood and looked down at the stern, dead face, though his grief was almost impersonal, he felt in every fibre that he owed him a debt he could only repay by the immediate putting into effect of his wishes. Mr. Speid had, during his illness, informed him that he was heir to the property of Whanland, and that he desired him to return to Scotland and devote himself conscientiously to it.

And so he had come home, and was now making his way up to the bridge, wondering why he had not seen the figure of the strange lady crossing it between him and the sky. She must have turned and gone up the road leading from it to the cliffs and the little village of Garviekirk, which sat in the fields above the churchyard.

He looked at the shoe-marks in the mud as he went up the hill, following them mechanically, and, at the top, they diverged, as he had expected, from his homeward direction. As he stopped half-way and glanced over the bridge parapet into the swirling water of the Lour slipping past the masonry, the smart beat of hoofs broke on his ear. The mare was coming down towards him at a canter, the saddle empty, the stirrup-leather flying outwards, the water splashing up as she went through the puddles. Something inconsequent and half-hearted in her pace showed that whatever fright had started her had given way to a capricious pleasure in the unusual; and the hollow sound of her own tread on the bridge made her buck light-heartedly.

Gilbert stepped out into the middle of the way and held up his walking-stick. She swerved, stopped suddenly with her fore-feet well in front of her, and was going to turn when he sprang at the reins. As he grasped them she reared up, but only as a protest against interference, for she came down as quietly as if she had done nothing at which anyone could take offence. She had evidently fallen, for the bit was bent and all her side plastered with mud. He plucked a handful of grass and cleaned down the saddle before starting with her towards Garviekirk. There was no one to be seen, but there stood, in the distance, a roadside cottage whose inmates might, he thought, know something of the accident. He hurried forward.

The cottage-door opened on the side-path, and, as he drew near, he saw the mare’s owner standing on the threshold, watching his approach. She had been original-looking on horseback and she was now a hundred times more so; for the traces of her fall were evident, and, on one side, she was coated with mud from head to heel. Her wig was askew, her arms akimbo, and her hat, which she held in her hand, was battered out of shape. She stood framed by the lintel, her feet set wide apart; as she contemplated Gilbert and the mare, she kept up a loud conversation with an unseen person inside the cottage.

‘Nonsense, woman!’ she was exclaiming as he stopped a few paces from her. ‘Come out and hold her while this gentleman helps me to mount. Sir, I am much obliged to you.’

As she spoke she walked round the animal in a critical search for damage.

‘She is quite sound, madam,’ said Gilbert. ‘I trotted her as I came to make sure of it. I hope you are not hurt yourself.’

‘Thanky, no,’ she replied, rather absently.

He laid the rein on the mare’s neck. The lady threw an impatient look at the house.

‘Am I to be kept waiting all day, Granny Stirk?’ she cried.

There was a sound of pushing and scuffling, and an old woman carrying a clumsy wooden chair filled the doorway. She was short and thin, and had the remains of the most marked good looks.

The lady broke into a torrent of speech.

‘What do I want with that? Do you suppose I have come to such a pass that I cannot mount my horse without four wooden legs to help me up? Put it down, you old fool, and come here as I bid you—do you hear?’

Granny Stirk advanced steadily with the chair in front of her. She might have looked as though protecting herself with it had her expression been less decided.

‘Put it down, I tell you. God bless me, am I a cripple? Leave her head, sir—she will stand—and do me the favour to mount me.’

Gilbert complied, and, putting his hand under the stranger’s splashed boot, tossed her easily into the saddle. She sat a moment gathering up the reins and settling her skirt; then, with a hurried word of thanks, she trotted off, standing up in her stirrup as she went to look over at the mare’s feet. Granny had put down her burden and was staring at Gilbert with great interest.

‘Who is that lady?’ he inquired, when horse and rider had disappeared.

‘Yon’s Leddy Eliza Lamont,’ she replied, still examining him.

‘Does she live near here?’

‘Ay; she bides at Morphie, away west by the river.’

‘And how did she meet with her accident?’

‘She was coming in by the field ahint the house, an’ the horse just coupet itsel’. She came in-by an’ tell’t me. She kens me fine.’

It struck Gilbert as strange that, in spite of Lady Eliza’s interest as she watched him over the burying-ground wall, she had not had the curiosity to ask his name, though they had spoken and he had done her a service. He looked down at the mud which her boot had transferred to his fingers.

‘Ye’ve filed your hands,’ observed Granny. ‘Come ben an’ I’ll gie ye a drappie water to them.’

He followed her and found himself in a small, dark kitchen. It was clean, and a great three-legged caldron which hung by a chain over the fire was making an aggressive bubbling. A white cat, marked with black and brown, slunk deceitfully out of its place by the hearth as they entered. The old woman took an earthenware bowl and filled it. When he had washed his hands, she held out a corner of her apron to him, and he dried them.

‘Sit down a whilie to the fire,’ she said, pushing forward the wooden chair that Lady Eliza had despised.

‘Thank you, I cannot,’ he replied. ‘I must be going, for it will soon be dark; but I should like to pay you another visit one day.’

‘Haste ye back, then,’ she said, as he went out of the door.

Gilbert turned as he stood on the side-path, and looked at the old woman. A question was in her face.

‘You’ll be the laird of Whanland?’ she inquired, rather loudly.

He assented.

‘You’re a fine lad,’ said Granny Stirk, as she went back into the cottage.