Chapter VI: Part 6

"Well; what if the king should have been smitten with her beauty, having seen her accidentally in Edinburgh, where she was lately? and what, if his visit to Glasgow just now should be for the express purpose of seeing this fair maiden? and what, if I should not exactly approve of such a proceeding, seeing that the young lady in question has, as you know, neither father nor mother to protect her, both being dead?"

"Well, Sir Robert, and what then?" here interposed Mr. Morton, availing himself of a pause in the former's supposititious case.

"Why, then, wouldn't it be my bounden duty, worthy sir, as Provost of this city, to act the part of guardian towards this young maiden in such emergency, and to see that she came by no wrong?"

"Truly, it would be a worthy part, Sir Robert," replied the old merchant; "but the king is strong, and you may not resist him openly."

"Nay, that I would not attempt," replied the Provost. "I have taken quieter and more effectual measures. Made aware, though somewhat late, through a trusty channel, of the king's intended visit and its purpose, I have removed her out of the reach of danger, to where his Grace will, I rather think, have some difficulty in finding her."

"So, so. And this, then, is the true secret of the honour which has just been conferred on us!" replied Sir Robert's companion, with some indignation. "But the matter is in good hands when it is in yours, Provost. In your keeping we consider our honours and our interests are safe. I wish you a good day, Provost." And the interlocutors having by this time arrived at the foot of the High Street, where four streets joined, the old merchant took that which conducted to his residence, Sir Robert's route lying in an opposite direction.

From the conversation just recorded, the reader will at once trace a connection between Sir Robert Lindsay of Dunrod and he of the black charger who brought to Woodlands the fair damsel whom we left there. They were the same; and that fair damsel was the daughter of John Craig, late merchant of the city of Glasgow, who left an immense fortune, of which this girl was the sole heir.

In carrying the young lady to Woodlands, and leaving her there, Sir Robert, although apparently under the compulsion of circumstances, was acting advisedly. He knew Henderson to be a man of excellent character and great respectability; and in the secrecy and mystery he observed, he sought to preclude all possibility of his interference in the affair ever reaching the ears of the king. What he had told to old Morton, he knew would go no further; that person having been an intimate friend of the young lady's father, and of course interested in all that concerned her welfare.

The palace of a bishop was not very appropriate quarters for one who came on such an errand as that which brought James to Glasgow. But this was a circumstance that did not give much concern to that merry and somewhat eccentric monarch; and the less so, that the bishop himself happened to be from home at the time, on a visit to his brother of St. Andrews.

Having the house thus to himself, James did not hesitate to make as free use of it as if he had been at Holyrood.

It was not many hours after his arrival at the castle, that he summoned to his presence a certain trusty attendant of the name of William Buchanan, and thus schooled him in the duties of a particular mission in which he desired his services.

"Willie," said the good-humoured monarch, "at the further end of the Rottenrow of this good city of Glasgow--that is, at the western end of the said row--there stands a fair mansion on the edge of the brae, and overlooking the strath of the Clyde. It is the residence of a certain fair young lady of the name of Craig. Now, Willie, what I desire of you to do is this: you will go to this young lady from me, carrying her this gold ring, and say to her that I intend, with her permission, doing myself the honour of paying her a visit in the course of this afternoon.

"Make your observations, Willie, and let me know how the land lies when you return. But, pray thee, keep out of the way of our worthy knight of Dunrod; and if thou shouldst chance to meet him, and he should question thee, seeing that you wear our livery, breathe no syllable of what thou art about, otherwise he may prove somewhat troublesome to both of us. At any rate, to a certainty, he would crop thy ears, Willie; and thou knowest, king though I be, I could not put them on again, nor give thee another pair in their stead. So keep those thou hast out of the hands of Sir Robert Lindsay of Dunrod, I pray thee."

Charged with his mission, Willie, who had been often employed on matters of this kind before, proceeded to the street with the unsavoury name already mentioned; but, not knowing exactly where to find the house he wanted, he looked around him to see if he could see any one to whom he might apply for information. There happened to be nobody on the street at the time; but his eye at length fell on an old weaver--as, from the short green apron he wore, he appeared to be--standing at a door.

Towards this person Willie now advanced, discarding, however, as much as possible, all appearance of having any particular object in view; for he prided himself on the caution and dexterity with which he managed all such matters as that he was now engaged in.

"Fine day, honest man," said Willie, approaching the old weaver. "Gran wather for the hairst."

"It's just that, noo," replied the old man, gazing at Willie with a look of inquiry. "Just uncommon pleesant wather."

"A bit nice airy place up here," remarked the latter.

"Ou ay, weel aneuch for that," replied the weaver. "But air 'll no fill the wame."

"No very substantially," said Willie. "Some gran hooses up here, though. Wha's is that?" and he pointed to a very handsome mansion-house opposite.

"That's the rector o' Hamilton's," replied the weaver.

"And that are there?"

"That's the rector o' Carstairs'."

"And that?"

"That's the rector o' Erskine's."

"'Od, but ye do leeve in a godly neighbourhood here," said Willie, impatient with these clerical iterations. "Do a' the best houses hereawa belang to the clergy?"

"Indeed, the maist feck o' them," said the weaver. "Leave ye them alane for that. The best o' everything fa's to their share."

"Yonder's anither handsome hoose, noo," said Willie, pointing to one he had not yet indicated. "Does yon belang to the clergy too?"

"Ou no; yon's the late Mr. Craig's," replied the weaver; "ane o' oor walthiest merchants, wha died some time ago."

"Ou ay," said Willie, drily; "just sae. Gude mornin', friend." And thinking he had managed his inquiries very dexterously, he sauntered slowly away--still assuming to have no special object in view--towards the particular house just spoken of, and which, we need not say, was precisely the one he wanted.

It was a large isolated building, with an extensive garden behind, and stretching down the face of what is now called the Deanside Brae. On the side next the street, the entrance was by a tall, narrow, iron gate. This gate Willie now approached, but found it locked hard and fast. Finding this, he bawled out, at the top of his voice, for some one to come to him. After a time, an old woman made her appearance, and, in no very pleasant mood, asked him what he wanted.

"I hae a particular message, frae a very particular person, to the young leddy o' this hoose," replied Willie.

"Ye maun gang and seek the young leddy o' this hoose ither whars than here, then," said the old dame, making back to the house again, without intending any further communication on the subject.

"Do ye mean to say that she's no in the hoose?" shouted Willie.

"Ay, I mean to say that, and mair too," replied the old crone. "She hasna been in't for a gey while, and winna be in't for a guid while langer; and sae ye may tell them that sent ye."

Saying this, she passed into the house; and by doing so, would have put an end to all further conference.

But Willie was not to be thus baffled in his object. Changing his tactics from the imperative to the wheedling, in which last he believed himself to be exceedingly dexterous--

"Mistress--I say, Mistress," he shouted, in a loud, but coaxing tone; "speak a word, woman--just a word or two. Ye maybe winna fare the waur o't."

Whether it was the hint conveyed in the last clause of Willie's address, or that the old woman felt some curiosity to hear what so urgent a visitor had to say, she returned to the door, where, standing fast, and looking across the courtyard at Willie, whose sly though simple-looking face was pressed against the iron bars of the outer gate, she replied to him with a--

"Weel, man, what is't ye want?"

"Tuts, woman, come across--come across," said Willie, wagging her towards him with his forefinger. "I canna be roarin' out what I hae to say to ye a' that distance. I micht as weel cry it oot at the cross. See, there's something to bring ye a wee nearer."

And he held out several small silver coin through the bars of the gate. The production of the cash had the desired effect. The old woman, who was lame, and who walked by the aid of a short thick stick with a crooked head, hobbled towards him, and, having accepted the proffered coin, again asked, though with much more civility than before, what it was he wanted?

"Tuts, woman, open the yett," said Willie in his cagiest manner, "and I'll tell ye a' aboot it. It's hardly ceevil to be keeping a body speakin' this way wi' his nose thrust through atwixt twa cauld bars o' airn, like a rattin atween a pair o' tangs."

"Some folks are safest that way, though," replied the old woman, with something like an attempt at a laugh. "Bars o' airn are amang the best freens we hae sometimes. But as ye seem a civil sort o' a chiel, after a', I'll let ye in, although I dinna see what ye'll be the better o' that."

So saying, she took a large iron key from her girdle, inserted it in the lock, and in the next moment the gate grated on its hinges; yielding partly to the pressure of Willie from without, and partly to the co-operative efforts of the old woman from within.

"Noo," said Willie, on gaining the interior of the courtyard--"Noo," he said, affecting his most coaxing manner, "you and me 'll hae a bit crack thegither, guidwife."

And, sitting down on a stone bench that ran along the front of the house, he motioned to the old lady to take a seat beside him, which she did.

"I understand, guidwife," began Willie, who meant to be very cunning in his mode of procedure, "that she's just an uncommon bonny leddy your mistress; just wonderfu'."

"Whaever tell't ye that, didna misinform ye," replied the old woman drily.

"And has mints o' siller?" rejoined Mr. Buchanan.

"No ill aff in that way either," said the old woman.

"But it's her beauty--it's her extraordinary beauty--that's the wonder, and that I hear everybody speakin' aboot," said Willie. "I wad gie the price o' sax fat hens to see her. Could ye no get me a glisk o' her ony way, just for ae minute?"

"Didna I tell ye before that she's no at hame?" said the old dame, threatening again to get restive on Willie's hands.

"Od, so ye did; I forgot," said Mr. Buchanan, affecting obliviousness of the fact. "Whaur may she be noo?" he added in his simplest and _couthiest_ manner.

"Wad ye like to ken?" replied the old lady with a satirical sneer.

"'Deed wad I; and there's mae than me wad like to ken," replied Willie; "and them that wad pay handsomely for the information."

"Really," said the old dame, with a continuation of the same sneer, and long ere this guessing what Willie was driving at. "And wha may they be noo, if I may speer?"

"They're gey kenspeckled," replied Mr. Buchanan; "but that doesna matter. If ye canna, or winna tell me whaur Mistress Craig is, could ye no gie's a bit inklin' o' whan ye expect her hame?"

"No; but I'll gie ye a bit inklin o' whan ye'll walk oot o' this," said the old woman, rising angrily from her seat; "and that's this minute, or I'll set the dug on ye. Hisk, hisk--Teeger, Teeger!"

And a huge black dog came bouncing out of the house, and took up a position right in front of Willie; wagging his tail, as if in anticipation of a handsome treat in the way of worrying that worthy.

"Gude sake, woman," said Willie, rising in great alarm from his seat, and edging towards the outer gate--"What's a' this for? Ye wadna set that brute on a Christian cratur, wad ye?"

"Wadna I? Ye'd better no try me, frien', but troop aff wi' ye. Teeger," she added, with a significant look. The dog understood it, and, springing on Willie, seized him by one of the skirts of his coat, which, with one powerful tug, he at once separated from the body.

Pressed closely upon by both the dog and his mistress, Willie keeping, however, his face to the foe, now retreated towards the gate, when, just at the moment of his making his exit, the old lady, raising her staff, hit him a parting blow, which, taking effect on the bridge of his nose, immediately enlarged the dimensions of that organ, besides drawing forth a copious stream of claret. In the next instant the gate was shut and locked in the sufferer's face.

"Confound ye, ye auld limmer," shouted Willie furiously, and shaking his fist through the bars of the gate as he spoke, "if I had ye here on the outside o' the yett, as ye're in the in, if I wadna baste the auld hide o' ye. But my name's no Willie Buchanan if I dinna gar ye rue this job yet, some way or anither."

To these objurgations of the discomfited messenger the old lady deigned no word of answer, but merely shaking her head, and indulging in a pretty broad smile of satisfaction, hobbled into the house, followed by Tiger, wagging his tail, as much as to say, "I think we've given yon fellow a fright, mistress."

Distracted with indignation and resentment, Willie hastened back to the castle, and, too much excited to think of his outward appearance, hurried into the royal presence with his skirtless coat and disfigured countenance, which he had by no means improved by sundry wipes with the sleeve of his coat.

On Willie making his appearance in this guise, the merry monarch looked at him for an instant in silent amazement, then burst into an incontrollable fit of laughter, which the grave, serious look of Willie showed he by no means relished. There was even a slight expression of resentment in the manner in which the maltreated messenger bore the merry reception of his light-hearted master.

"Willie, man," at length said James, when his mirth had somewhat subsided, "what's this has happened thee? Where gottest thou that enormous nose, man?"

"Feth, your Majesty, it may be a joke to you, but it's unco little o' ane to me," replied Willie, whose confidential duties and familiar intercourse with his royal master had led him to assume a freedom of speech which was permitted to no other, and which no other would have dared to attempt.

"I hae gotten sic a worryin' the day," he continued, "as I never got in my life before. Between dugs and auld wives, I hae had a bonny time o't. Worried by the tane and smashed by the tither, as my nose and my coat-tails bear witness."

"Explain yourself, Willie. What does all this mean?" exclaimed James, again laughing.

Willie told his story, finishing with the information that the bird was flown--meaning Jessie Craig. "Aff and awa, naebody kens, or'll tell whaur."

"Off--away!" exclaimed the king, with an air of mingled disappointment and surprise. "Very odd," he added, musingly; "and most particularly unlucky. But we shall wait on a day or two, and she will probably reappear in that time; or we may find out where she has gone to."

On the day following that on which the incidents just related occurred, the curiosity of the good people in the neighbourhood of the late Mr. Craig's house in Rottenrow was a good deal excited by seeing a person in the dress of a gentleman hovering about the residence just alluded to.

Anon he would walk to and fro in front of the house, looking earnestly towards the windows. Now he would descend the Deanside Brae, and do the same by those behind. Again he would return to the front of the mansion, and taking up his station on the opposite side of the street, would resume his scrutiny of the windows.

The stranger was thus employed, when he was startled by the appearance of some one advancing towards him, whom, it was evident, he would fain have avoided if he could. But it was too late. There was no escape. So, assuming an air of as much composure and indifference as he could, he awaited the approach of the unwelcome intruder. This person was Sir Robert Lindsay.

Coming up to the stranger with a respectful air, and with an expression of countenance as free from all consciousness as that which had been assumed by the former--

"I hope your Grace is well?" he said, bowing profoundly as he spoke.

"Thank you, Provost--thank you," replied James; for we need hardly say it was he.

"Your Grace has doubtless come hither," said the former gravely, "to enjoy the delightful view which this eminence commands?"

"The precise purpose, Sir Robert," replied James, recovering a little from the embarrassment which, after all his efforts, he could not entirely conceal. "The view is truly a fine one, Provost," continued the king. "I had no idea that your good city could boast of anything so fair in the way of landscape. Our city of Edinburgh hath more romantic points about it; but for calm and tranquil beauty, methinks it hath nothing superior to the scene commanded by this eminence."

"There are some particular localities on the ridge of the hill here, however," said Sir Robert, "that exhibit the landscape to much better advantage than others, and to which, taking it for granted that your Grace is not over-familiar with the ground, it will afford me much pleasure to conduct you."

"Ah! thank you, good Sir Robert--thank you," replied James. "But some other day, if you please. The little spare time I had on my hands is about exhausted, so that I must return to the castle. I have, as you know, Sir Robert, to give audience to some of your worthy councillors, who intend honouring me with a visit.

"Amongst the number I will expect to see yourself, Sir Robert." And James, after politely returning the loyal obeisance of the Provost, hurried away towards the castle.

On his departure, the latter stood for a moment, and looked after him with a smile of peculiar intelligence; then muttered, as he also left the spot--

"Well do I know what it was brought your Grace to this quarter of the town; and knowing this, I know it was for anything but the sake of its view. Fair maidens have more attractions in your eyes than all the views between this and John o'Groat's. But I have taken care that your pursuit in the present instance will avail thee little." And the good Provost went on his way.

For eight entire days after this did James wait in Glasgow for the return of Jessie Craig; but he waited in vain. Neither in that time could he learn anything whatever of the place of her sojournment. His patience at length exhausted, he determined on giving up the pursuit for the time at any rate, and on quitting the city.

The king, as elsewhere casually mentioned, had come last from Bothwell Castle. It was now his intention to proceed to Stirling, where he proposed stopping for two or three weeks; thence to Linlithgow, and thereafter returning to Edinburgh.

The purpose of James to make this round having reached the ears of a certain Sir James Crawford of Netherton, whose house and estate lay about half-way between Glasgow and Stirling, that gentleman sent a respectful message to James, through Sir Robert Lindsay, to the effect that he would feel much gratified if his Grace would deign to honour his poor house of Netherton with a visit in passing, and accept for himself and followers such refreshment as he could put before them.

To this message James returned a gracious answer, saying that he would have much pleasure in accepting the invitation so kindly sent him, and naming the day and hour when he would put the inviter's hospitality to the test.

Faithful to his promise, the king and his retinue, amongst whom was now Sir Robert Lindsay, who had been included in the invitation, presented themselves at Netherton gate about noon on the day that had been named.

They were received with all honour by the proprietor, a young man of prepossessing appearance, graceful manners, and frank address.

On the king and gentlemen of his train entering the house, they were ushered into a large banqueting hall, where was an ample table spread with the choicest edibles, and glittering with the silver goblets and flagons that stood around it in thick array. Everything, in short, betokened at once the loyalty and great wealth of the royal party's entertainer.

The king and his followers having taken their places at table, the fullest measure of justice was quickly done to the good things with which it was spread. James was in high spirits, and talked and rattled away with as much glee and as entire an absence of all kingly reserve as the humblest good fellow in his train.

Encouraged by the affability of the king, and catching his humour, the whole party gave way to the most unrestrained mirth. The joke and the jest went merrily round with the wine flagon; and he was for a time the best man who could start the most jocund theme.

It was while this spirit prevailed that Sir Robert Lindsay, after making a private signal to Sir James Crawford, which had the effect of causing him to quit the apartment on pretence of looking for something he wanted, addressing the king, said--

"May I take the liberty of asking your Grace if you have seen any particularly fair maidens in the course of your present peregrinations? I know your Grace has a good taste in these matters."

James coloured a little at this question and the remark which accompanied it; but quickly regaining his self-possession and good-humour--

"No, Sir Robert," he said, laughingly, "I cannot say that I have been so fortunate on the present occasion. As to the commendation which you have been pleased to bestow on my taste, I thank you, and am glad it meets with your approbation."

"Yet, your Grace," continued Sir Robert, "excellent judge as I know you to be of female beauty, I deem myself, old and staid as I am, your Grace's equal, craving your Grace's pardon; and, to prove this, will take a bet with your Grace of a good round sum, that you have never seen, and do not know, a more beautiful woman than the lady of our present host."

"Take care, Provost," replied James. "Make no rash bets. I know the most beautiful maiden the sun ever shone upon. But it would be ungallant and ungracious to make the lady of our good host the subject of such a bet on the present occasion."

"But our host is absent, your Grace," replied the Provost pertinaciously; "and neither he nor any one else, but your Grace's friends present, need know anything at all of the matter. Will your Grace take me up for a thousand merks?"

"But suppose I should," replied James, "how is the thing to be managed? and who is to decide?"

"Both points are of easy adjustment, your Grace," said Sir Robert. "Your Grace has only to intimate a wish to our host, when he returns, that you would feel gratified by his introducing his lady to you; and as to the matter of decision, I would, with your Grace's permission and approval, put that into the hands of the gentlemen present. Of course, nothing need be said of the purpose of this proceeding to either host or hostess."

"Well, be it so," said James, urged on by the madcaps around him, who were delighted with the idea of the thing. "Now then, gentlemen," he continued, "the lady on whose beauty I stake my thousand merks is Jessie Craig, the merchant's daughter, of Glasgow, whom, I think, all of you have seen."

"Ha! my townswoman," exclaimed Sir Robert, with every appearance of surprise. "On my word, you have made mine a hard task of it; for a fairer maiden than Jessie Craig may not so readily be found. Nevertheless, I adhere to the terms of my bet."

The Provost had just done speaking, when Sir James Crawford entered the apartment, and resumed his seat at table. Shortly after he had done so, James, addressing him, said--

"Sir James, it would complete the satisfaction of these gentlemen and myself with the hospitality you have this day shown us, were you to afford us an opportunity of paying our respects to your good lady; that is, if it be perfectly convenient for and agreeable to her."

"Lady Crawford will be but too proud of the honour, your Grace," replied Sir James, rising. "She shall attend your Grace presently."

Saying this, the latter again withdrew; and soon after returned, leading a lady, over whose face hung a long and flowing veil, into the royal presence.

It would require the painter's art to express adequately the looks of intense and eager interest with which James and his party gazed on the veiled beauty, as she entered the apartment and advanced towards them. Their keen and impatient scrutiny seemed as if it would pierce the tantalizing obstruction that prevented them seeing those features on whose beauty so large a sum had been staked. In this state of annoying suspense, however, they were not long detained. On approaching within a few paces of the king, and at the moment Sir James Crawford said, with a respectful obeisance, "My wife, Lady Crawford, your Grace," she raised her veil, and exhibited to the astonished monarch and his courtiers a surpassingly beautiful countenance indeed; but it was that of Jessie Craig.

"A trick! a trick!" exclaimed James, with merry shout, and amidst a peal of laughter from all present, and in which the fair cause of all this stir most cordially joined. "A trick, a trick, Provost! a trick!" repeated James.

"Nay, no trick at all, your Grace, craving your Grace's pardon," replied the Provost gravely. "Your Grace betted that Jessie Craig was more beautiful than Lady Crawford. Now, is it so? I refer the matter, as agreed upon, to the gentlemen around us."

"Lost! lost!" exclaimed half a dozen gallants at once.

"Well, well, gentlemen, since you so decide," said James, "I will instantly give our good Provost here an order upon our treasurer for the sum."

"Nay, your Grace, not so fast. The money is as safe in your hands as mine. Let it there remain till I require it. When I do, I shall not fail to demand it."

"Be it so, then," said James, when, placing his fair hostess beside him, and after obtaining a brief explanation--which we will, in the sequel, give at more length--of the odd circumstance of finding Jessie Craig converted into Lady Crawford, the mirth and hilarity of the party were resumed, and continued till pretty far in the afternoon, when the king and his courtiers took horse,--the former at parting having presented his hostess with a massive gold chain which he wore about his neck, in token of his good wishes,--and rode off for Stirling.

To our tale we have now only to add the two or three explanatory circumstances above alluded to.

In Sir James Crawford the reader is requested to recognise the young man who discovered Jessie Craig, then the unknown fair one, by the side of the fountain in the little elm grove at Woodlands.

Encouraged by and acting on the adage already quoted,--namely, that "faint heart never won fair lady,"--he followed up his first accidental interview with the fair fugitive from royal importunity with an assiduity that in one short week accomplished the wooing and winning of her.

While the first was in progress, Sir James was informed by the young lady of the reasons for her concealment. On this and the part Sir Robert Lindsay had acted towards her being made known to him, he lost no time in opening a communication with that gentleman, riding repeatedly into Glasgow himself to see him on the subject of his fair charge; at the same time informing him of the attachment he had formed for her, and finally obtaining his consent, or at least approbation, to their marriage. The bet, we need hardly add, was a concerted joke between the Provost, Sir James, and his lady.

When we have added that the circumstance of Sir Robert Lindsay's delay in returning for Jessie Craig, which excited so much surprise at Woodlands, was owing to the unlooked-for prolongation of the king's stay in Glasgow, we think we have left nothing unexplained that stood in need of such aid.

THE BRIDE OF BELL'S TOWER.

Some time ago I made inquiry at the editor of _Notes and Queries_ for information as to the whereabouts of an old mansion called Bell's Tower, and whether it was occupied by a family of the name of Bower; but my inquiry was not attended with any success beyond the usual production of surmises and speculations. There was a place so called in Perthshire; but then it never was occupied by people of that name,--the Bowers being an old family in Angus, whose principal messuage was Kincaldrum. Yet I cannot be mistaken in the name, either of the house or the family, as connected with the occurrences of the tradition, the essentials of which have floated in my mind ever since I heard them from one to whom they were also traditional. Then the story has something of an antique air about it, as may be noticed from the application of adjectives to baptismal names, as Devil Isobel and Sweet Marjory,--by no means a modern usage, but easily recognised in analogues of our old poetry. We may say, at least, that whether the Bowers were a very or only a moderately ancient family, Bell's Tower was an old structure--the name being applied to the mansion, which was an addition to a peel or castle-house of many centuries--not without its battlements and barnkin, and all the other appurtenances of a strength, as such places were called.

Had we more to do than our subject requires with the _physique_ of this mansion--and we have something; for what romance in the moral world is independent of a _locale_, and of those lights and shadows that play where men live and act all the wondrous things they do?--we might be particular in our description; but our narrator's shade will be sufficiently conciliated, if we say that there was room enough, and ill-lighted chambers enough, and sufficiently tortuous breakneck stairs here and there, as well as those peculiar to castles, lobbies in all conscience long enough--not forgetting a blue parlour with some mysterious associations--to supply elements for genius to weave the many-coloured web of fiction. But we have a humbler part to play; and it begins here,--that Mrs. Bower had in the said blue parlour, a fortnight before our incidents, told her eldest daughter, whom we are, for the sake of the antique nomenclature--discriminative, and therefore kindly, if also sometimes harsh--to call Sweet Marjory, a piece of information, to her unexpected and strange,--no other than that Isobel, her sister, was the accepting and accepted of the rich and chivalrous youth, Hector Ogilvy, a neighbouring laird's son. Nor would it have appeared wonderful, if we had known more of the inside of that heaving breast, wherein a heart was too obedient to those magic chords, with their minute capillaries spread over the tympanum, that Marjory was as mute and pale as a statue of marble. But the truth really was, that Ogilvy had courted Marjory, and won her heart, and Isobel--Devil Isobel--had contrived means to win him to herself, at the expense of a sister's reputation for all the beautiful qualities that adorn human nature. And as all the world knows that both men and women hate those they injure, we may be at no loss to ascertain the feelings by which Isobel regarded Marjory. Nor shall those who know the nature of woman have any difficulty in supposing that not more carefully does nature guard in the bosom the physical organ of the affections, than she concealed the feelings which had for that fortnight eaten into the vital tissues of her being.

How swiftly that fortnight had flown for Isobel! how charged with heavy hours for Marjory! and to-morrow was the eventful day. What doings in Bell's Tower during this intervening time! what pattering of feet along the sombre lobbies! what gossiping among servants! what applications to the gate--comings and goings! and the rooms, how bestrewn with clippings of silk, and stray bits of artificial flowers! And, amidst all the triumphing, Isobel displayed her nature in spite of old saws and maxims, which lay upon brides conditions of reserve and humility, held to be so becoming in those who, as it were, occupy the place of a sacrifice; yea, if some tears are shed, so much better is custom obeyed. Then where could Marjory go, in the midst of this confusion of gaiety?--where, as the poet says, "weep her woes" in secret, and listen to the throbbings of a broken heart? Not in her own room, in the lower part of the castle tower, where her mother had still the privilege of chiding her for throwing the shadows of melancholy over a scene of happiness, and where Isobel would force an entrance, to show her, in the very spite of her evil nature, some bridal present from him who was still to the deserted one the idol of her heart. There was scarcely a refuge for grief, where joy was impatient of check, and, like all tyrants, would force reluctant conditions into a unanimity of compliance; but up these castle stairs, in the second room, there was one whom time had shut out from the sympathies of the world, so old, as to be almost forgotten, except by Marjory herself, who, all gentleness and love, delighted to supply vacant hearts with the fervours of her friendship, and to ameliorate evils by the appliances of her humanity.

With languid step she ascended the stair, and was presently beside her great-grandaunt, Patricia Bower. Twilight was dropping her wing, and the shadows were fast collecting round the square windows, which, narrow and grated, would scarcely at noonday let in light enough to enliven the human eye. There, solitary and in the gloom, sat the creature of the prior century, whose birth could only be arrived at by going through generations back ninety and five years before; but not gloom to her, to whom the light of memory was as a necromancer, arraying before the gleg eye of her spirit the images of persons and things and circumstances of the far past, with all the vividness of enchantment, and still even raising again those very loves and sympathies they elicited when they were of the passing hour. Yet the doings in this house of Bell's Tower at the time, so far removed from the period of the living archetypes of her dreams, had got to her ear, where still the word marriage was a charm, against which the dry impassable nerve resisted in vain.

"I will go to this marriage, Marjory," she said, as the maiden entered, and without appearing to notice her distress.

"No, aunt," replied Marjory, as she sat down opposite to her.

"And shall I not?" continued the ancient maiden, as her eyes seemed to come forward out of the deep sockets into which they had long sunk, and emitted an unearthly lustre. "And shall I not? It is four times a score of years bating five since I was at a bridal; and when all were waiting, ay, Marjory, expecting the young bridegroom, the door was opened, and four men carried in Walter Ogilvy's bleeding corpse, and laid him in the bridal hall; for he had been stabbed by a rival in the Craig Glen, down by there; and where could they take the body but to Bell's Tower, where his bride waited for him? But she did not go mad, Sweet Marjory; no, no."

And as the image grew more distinct in the internal chambers, so did the eyes shine more lustrously, like stars peering through between grey clouds; and the shrivelled muscles, obeying once more the excited nerve, imparted to her almost the appearance of youth. Gradually a humming tone essayed to take form in words; but the wavering treble disconcerted her, till, calming herself by some effort, she recited, in solemn see-saw--

"The guests they came from the grey mountain side,--
The bride she was fair, and the bride she was fain;
But where was the lover, who sought not his bride?
Oh! a maid she is now, as a maid she was then;
And her cheek it is pale, and her hair it is grey,
Since the long long time of her bridal day."

The last line descended into a quavering whisper.

With the effusion, adopted probably from an old ditty, and brought forth from its long-retaining chamber of the brain by the inspiration of one of her often-returning visions, the fervour of the tasked spirit died away, and, reclining her head, she sat before the wondering Marjory--who had heard, as a tale of the family, and applicable to Patricia herself, the circumstances she had related--as one suspended between death and life; nor did it seem that it required more than a rude vibration to decide to which of the two worlds she would in a few minutes belong. Only a short time sufficed to restore her to her ordinary composure, and, waving her shrivelled hand, she said--

"Open the door to the bartisan, Marjory, that I may have air, and see the moon, who, amidst all the changes of life, is ever the same to the miserable and the happy."

Marjory obeyed her; and as she looked forth, the moon was rising over the tops of the trees, as if to chase away the envious shades, ready to follow the departure of twilight. There was solace in her soft splendour for the melancholy of the youthful girl, which might be ameliorated by a turn of fortune, as well as for the sadness of her aged friend, which was not only beyond the influence of worldly change, but so like the forecast gloom of the grave, as if the inexorable tyrant, long disappointed, was already rejoicing in his victim. But no sooner was the door casement opened, than the sound of voices entered. Then Marjory stepped out on the bartisan, not to listen, for her spirit was superior to artifice; and, leaning over the bartisan, she soon recognised the voices of Isobel and Ogilvy; nor could she escape the words--

"I loved her for her own sake," said he, "before I loved you, Isobel; and now I love her as your sister. But I shall have no peace in my wedded life with you, save on the condition that you love her also; for my conscience tells me I have not done by Sweet Marjory what is deemed according to the honour of man. You see what your power has been, Isobel. Nor would I have spoken thus on the very evening before our wedding, were it not that I have heard you do not love her, nay, that you hate her."

Then Marjory heard Devil Isobel reply; and she knew by the voice that she was in anger, though she cunningly repressed her passion.

"Believe them not," said Isobel. "By the pale face of yonder moon, and all those bright stars that are coming out one by one to add honour upon honour to this evening, the last of my maiden life, I love sweet Marjory Bower; and I swear by Him who made all these heavenly orbs, that I shall love her as a sister ought."

"It pleases me much to hear my Isobel speak thus," said Ogilvy. "And hark ye, love, I have here a valuable locket, set with diamonds and opals--see, it contains the grey hair of my mother; and, will I or nill I, she will send this by me to Marjory as a love-token. Now I want to convey it to Sweet Marjory through you, because it will make you a party to the love-gift, and so bind us all in a circle of affection."

"Give it me," cried Isobel, fixing her piercing eye on the diamonds as they sparkled in the moonlight; "and, on the honour of a bride, I will give it to my sister, whom I love so dearly."

And Isobel continued to speak; but the movement of the lovers as they walked prevented Marjory from hearing more. Still she followed them with her weeping eyes, as their figures, clearly revealed to her by the moon, glided among the wide-standing trees of the lawn, and at length disappeared. The moon had now less solace for her. Her wound had been retouched by a hand of all others calculated to irritate, even by that of Ogilvy himself, who, she now knew, felt compunction for the cruelty of his desertion. His regret was too late to save her sorrow, but it was not too late to increase that sorrow; for the words by which he had uttered it reminded her, in their tone, of that unctuous luxury he had so often poured into her heart, and which, in their sincerity, were so unlike the dissimulation of her wicked sister. With a deep-drawn sigh she entered the bartisan casement, shut it after her, and having spoken some kindly words to her aunt, whom she kissed, she sought her way down the bastle stair to her own room below. There she threw herself upon a couch, not to seek assuagement, but only to give rest to limbs that would scarcely support her. Nor did the closed door keep from her ear those notes of preparation, coming in so many shapes; for there was, in addition to the customary rites of the great sacrifice, to be a sumptuous feast, at which, too, she would be expected to attend. Yet all these noisy tokens did not keep from her mind the tones of that remorse she had heard from the lips of Ogilvy, and she fondled them, in her misery, as one would the dead body of a dear friend on whose face still sat the look of love in which he died. By-and-by she heard once more the voice of Isobel, who had returned; and she trembled as she expected the visit in execution of her commission. The door opened, and there entered her sister, with a face, as it appeared in the light of the lamp she carried, beaming with the old exultation, mingled with the smile of a soft deceit.

"Look here, Sweet Marjory," she said, as she held out the golden trinket. "Saw you ever so lovely a piece of workmanship? But you cannot discern its value till you know it contains a lock of the hair of _my_ mother-in-law-to-be--Mrs. Ogilvy. That locket was given to me even now by my Hector, the bridegroom----"

"To give to me," sighed Marjory faintly.

"You lie for a false fiend," cried Devil Isobel. "He gave it to me, and to me it belongs."

"You may keep it," said Marjory; "but I heard Hector Ogilvy say to you that it was a gift from his mother to me, and you promised to him to deliver it."

Isobel's lips turned white and whiter, as her eye flared with the internal light struck out of the quivering nerve by the brain inflamed by fury. Nor was it the detection alone that produced these effects: she had construed Ogilvy's confession that he once loved Marjory into an admission that the latter was still dear to him, and she considered herself justified in her suspicion by the tones of his regret; then there had shot through her the pang of envy, when she heard that there was a gift for Marjory from the mother, and none to her. All these pent-up passions had been quickened into expression by Marjory's gentle detection; and as Marjory looked at her, she trembled.

"Do not be angry at me, Isobel," she said. "I did not go out upon the bartisan to hear you; and as for the gift, I do not want it."

But Marjory's simplicity and generosity, in place of appeasing her passion, only gave it a turn into a forced stifling, which suited the purpose of her dissimulation. In an instant the evil features, which, as a moral expression, had changed her into hideousness, gave way, and she stood before her sister the beautiful being who had enchanted Ogilvy out of his first and purest love.

"Come, Marjory," she said, as she grasped the faint hand of the almost unresisting girl. "Come."

And leading her by a half-dragging effort out of the room and along the passages, she took her to the large hall, where servants were busy laying the long table for the feast.

"There will be seventy here," she said, "and all to do honour to me. How would _you_ have liked it, Sweet Marjory? You do not envy me, though you look so sad? But oh! there is more honour for me. Come." And still, with the application of something like force, she led Marjory out by the front door towards the lawn, where a number of men were, with the light of pine torches, piling up fagots over layers of pitch. The glare of the torches was thrown over the dark bastle house, and under the relief of the deep shadows, where the light of the moon did not penetrate, was romantic enough even for the taste of Isobel, whose spirit ever panted for display. To add to the effect, the men were jolly; for their supply of ale had been ample, and the occasion of a marriage in the house of the Bowers warranted a merriment which was acceptable to her for whom all these expensive preparations were made.

"This is the marriage-pile, Marjory," said Isobel. "I am not to be put upon it after the manner of Jephthah's daughter; but it will blaze up to the sky, and tell the gods and goddesses that there is one to be honoured here on earth. How would _you_ have liked that honour, Marjory? But you are not envious. Come, there is more."

And as she was leading Marjory away, an exclamation from one of the men attracted their attention. On turning round, they saw the men's faces, lighted up by the torches, all directed to the bastle tower on which the glare shone full and red. Their merriment was gone, to give place to the feeling of awe; nor did a syllable escape from their lips. The eyes of the sisters followed those of the men, and were in like manner riveted.

"It is the wraith bride o' the peel," said the old forester. "She gaes round about and round about. My mither saw it thirty years syne, when the laird brought hame his leddy; and we ken he broke his leg in coming off his horse to help her down. I have heard her say

'There's evil for the house o' Bower,
When the bride gaes round the bastle tower.'"

"You are a lying knave," cried Isobel. "It is that old cantrup-working witch, Patricia Bower, who should have been burnt with tar-barrels and tormented by prickers fifty years ago. Nor ghost, nor ghoul, nor demon or devil, shall come between me and my happy destiny."

A speech which, spoken in excitement, was cheered by all the men but the unfortunate forester; for, as we have said, they were merry with ale. And they knew by report, as they now saw with their eyes, the beauty of the young woman, who, in addition to her natural charms, appeared, as they whirled the torches round their heads, and the cheers rose and echoed in the woods, to be invested with the dignity of a queen. But as this natural enthusiasm died down, they turned again their wondering eyes to the bastle house; and as the figure still went round the bartisan and round the bartisan, they looked at each other, and shook their heads with a motion which appeared very grotesque in the glare of the torches. At length it disappeared, and they began again to pile the fagots, now in silence, and not with the merry words and snatches of their prior humour, as if each of them had foreseen some evil which he could not define.

Meanwhile Isobel had again seized Marjory, to continue the round of her triumphs.

"We will now go to my boudoir, nor mind that witch," she said, "and I will show you all the presents I have got from my neighbours and friends. Oh! they are so fine, that did I not know that you are not envious, I would fear that you would tear my eyes out. Oh, but look, there is Ogilvy's horse standing waiting for him to carry him home, and I shall see him only this once before I am made his wife." Then, pausing and becoming meditative, she led her sister into the shade of a gigantic elm, the stem of which sufficed to conceal them from observers. "Kneel down," she continued in a stern tone.

"Why so?" replied Marjory, trembling with fear, yet obeying instinctively.

"Swear," cried Isobel, "that you will not, before Ogilvy, contradict what I shall say to him about his mother's gift. Swear."

"I swear," replied the sister.

And rising up, her hand was again grasped by Isobel, as she led her forward to where the horse stood. Nor had they proceeded many paces, when Ogilvy himself was observed coming forward. He could see them by the light of the torches, as they saw him; and upon the instant, Isobel, clasping Marjory in her arms, kissed her with all the fervency of love.

"How pleasant this is to me," said Ogilvy, as he came up equipped and spurred for his ride, "to see you so loving and sisterly!"

"Did I not swear by Dian and the stars I would love her?" said Devil Isobel; "and is she not called Sweet Marjory?"

"Sweet she is," said he, as he timidly scanned the face of his first love, and pressed her hand; but his countenance changed as he felt the silky-skinned hand of the girl tremble within his, as if it shrunk from the touch, and saw her blue eyes turned on the ground, and heard a sigh steal from her breast. A feeling that was new to him thrilled through the circle of his nerves, and made him tremble to the centre of his being. He had never calculated upon that strange emotion, nor could he analyze it: it was inscrutable, but it was terrible; it was not simply a return of his own love under the restraint of the new one, neither was it simple remorse, but a mixture of various thrills which induced no purpose, but only rendered him uncertain, feeble, and miserable. So engrossed for a moment was he, that he did not even seek the eye of Isobel, who was watching him in every turn of his countenance. Then he would seek some relief in words.

"You have my mother's love at least, Marjory," he said; and he could not help saying it. "And I shall be pleased to see you wear her gift, which she sent to you through me, who gave it to Isobel."

Marjory was silent, and Ogilvy turned his eye upon Isobel.

"She rejects it," said Isobel, "and wishes me to return it."

"Rejects it!" ejaculated the youth, as he again looked at Marjory.

Marjory was still silent, and her eyes were even more timidly turned to the ground.

"I did not regard the gift as valuable for the brilliants and opals," continued he, "but as conveying the love of my mother; and surely Marjory cannot reject that love."

Yet still was Marjory silent, for she had sworn.