Dare Lorimer's Heritage

Chapter I. First Meeting

— CHILDHOOD. MONCRIEFF (or Crieff, as she was universally called) stood upon the largest of the flat stepping-stones which spanned the laughing brook — the one which lay exactly in mid-stream, and com manded an exquisite peep both up and down the glen — looking about her meditatively, and swinging her white sun-bonnet in her hand. Sunbeams glanced in through the tender green with which summer had clothed the trees, and played upon the child's wealth of chestnut curls, which formed a bright halo around her head. They cast showers of liquid golden drops upon the dancing water, and darted quivering shafts of light into the heart of the dim wood. The child loved thus to stand alone in this still place, watching the ever-varying alternations of light and shade playing around and about it, listening to the ceaseless murmur of the brook, and the glad sweet notes of happy birds, and fancying they spoke to her a lan guage understood by none save them and herself.

She was dressed in a short white cotton frock, very simply made, which left exposed to view the long black stockings and neat laced boots. A cottager's DARE LORIMER'S HERITAGE. child could hardly be more plainly attired, yet there was an indescribable air about the little maiden, an air of dainty finish, a refinement of aspect, that pro claimed her, if not the child of wealth, at least one born to an inheritance of culture and intellect, which not all the gold of the Indies can buy. Crieff was a picturesque rather than a pretty child, though a keen observer might detect, in that piquant and characteristic face, germs that promised to develop into rare beauty with the dawn of womanhood. For the present, however, the main attraction of the face lay in the brightness of the hazel eyes with their sweeping lashes, the floating mass of chestnut curls, the well poised head, and air of high-bred grace, which showed the child to be possessed of character, if not actually dowered with present good looks.

She made a pretty enough picture, however, standing there in the midst of the laughing stream, though she was utterly un aware of the fact that her movements were closely scanned by a pair of dark blue eyes, as keen and observant as her own. In the whole course of her experience (and at ten years old our experiences seem sufficiently exhaustive) Crieff had never encountered any human being in this solitary place. She looked upon it almost as her own by right of discovery and appreciation, and would have resented an intrusion there as much as if it had been made within the actual precincts of her grand mother's property, on the confines of which this wood and glen lay. Yet, strange to say, on that particular bright summer's morning she was not really alone, and in the course of a few minutes more she became aware of this same fact, to her no small astonishment.

FIRST MFÆTING CHILDHOOD. 3 Slowly and leisurely, from behind the shelter of a large projecting rock, there emerged the figure of a boy — a boy in white flannels, fishing-rod in hand — who proceeded to whip the stream with a knowing air of scientific precision, without appearing to have the least idea that his movements were closely watched by the little maid in mid-stream. Crieff gazed at the apparition with wide-open eyes, which expressed a certain profound disapproval. She was decidedly of opinion that the boy had no business there, and that to fish in her favourite glen was au unwarrantable intrusion upon her own unwritten rights. But, having settled that point against him, there was nothing else in this individual boy which raised her small majesty's ire. Indeed she said to herself, after a prolonged inspection, that " as boys went, he was not so much amiss."

He was a well-grown lad — tall, broad-shouldered, and straight as a dart — graceful in his movements, with the grace that comes of perfect physical training. He had a finely formed head, which he carried with an air of unconscious pride. His face was deeply tanned, and the short yellow curls that peeped from beneath the brim of his straw hat shone in the sun like burnished gold. His features were good and regular, cast in a mould which Crieff designated as " square." The brow was broad and low, with a straight line of thick dusky eyebrow ; the mouth, too, was straight, and the chin and jaw were very square in outline. The nose was good, but widened at the nostrils in a way suggestive both of pride and temper ; and, although there was plenty of natural boyish gaiety in the ex pression of the face, it looked as if it could express a variety of opposite emotions beside.

DARE LOKIMEK'S HERITAGE. 4 " He looks as if he could be very angry if he were angry," was the verdict of the small critic standing so quietly on the stepping-stone. She did not know that the owner of the blue eyes had taken stock of her before, and began to speculate as to whether he would "jump" when he saw her first, and how long he would remain unconscious of her close proximity. A light of laughter began to awaken in her eyes, and a dimple showed itself in cheek and chin, though the lips did not relax from their lines of decorous gravity. And then all in a moment she found herself con fronted by a pair of frank, fearless eyes, which looked straight at her without a trace of surprise or dis composure. In after years, when their paths had met again, when storm clouds were rolling overhead, and troubles closing them round, that first meeting was often recalled by both, and recalled with a sense of tender pleasure.

The sunny beauty of the little wild glen, the liquid music of the stream, the golden light shimmering through the tender young green, the hush of the summer noon-tide — all seemed a fit setting for that first meeting, the meeting of two human beings, whose paths in life were destined to cross and recross, their lives to be strangely bound up one with the other. But at the moment there was nothing but childlike mischievous glee in one face, and a humorous appreciation of the situation in the other. The dark blue eyes and the hazel ones met in a long glance, and then a magnetic wave seemed to pass between the children, and both became instantaneously aware that the meeting was in some way welcome and entertaining. The boy took off his hat with a courtly air which impressed Crieff favourably (she loved to be FIEST MEETING CHILDHOOD. 5 treated as if she were grown up), and she returned his salutation by an inclination of the head that would not have discredited an empress.

"I beg your pardon— I am afraid I am trespassing," said he. " I am afraid you are too," she answered, advancing one step nearer. " But perhaps you will not tell of me," he added insinuatingly ; and she laughed as she asked, with a fine disregard of grammar, — " Why, who do you think I should tell ? " " Oh, the party this place belongs to. I daresay he is your father." " Oh dear no. This belongs to Lord Frampton. He isn't my father. My father is an Oxford Don (do you know what that is ?) I live with my grand mother. Lord Frampton is a funny old man. He is a friend of ours. He gave me my pony ; but I don't often see him. He generally comes when I'm in bed." "Then you are not trespassing yourself?" " No, I am not," very decidedly ; " I have a right to go here whenever I like, and to bring my friends.

But nobody gave you leave, so you are a trespasser." His eyes were alight with boyish fun. "I don't think I am now," he said, "I think I might claim the right of entrance as your friend. Don't you think so too ? " Crieff's chin went up in the air in a moment. She was a very particular and rather exclusive little lady, and did not make friends with any one in such a hurry as all that. She looked at the boy with a defiant scorn in her eyes, but something in the open face caused her lips to quiver and the muscles to relax, and finally she came stepping daintily over the stones until they stood on the same side of the stream. She did not allude to his impertinent speech, but began again on another subject. " Are you going to fish in this pool ? " "Well, perhaps I will. It looks rather a nicish sort of place."

" Would you mind telling me if you often catch anything ? " " Well, not so very often, to tell the truth," he answered, with a frank laugh. " Then I don't mind watching you for a little while," said the child in her decided way, seating herself upon the nearly horizontal trunk of a willow that overhung the stream. " I shan't stay if you catch anything. 1 should hate to see a nice happy, shiny fish pulled out of the water and killed. But I've noticed that fisher men hardly ever do catch anything. So I don't mind risking it for a little while. If you feel anything bite you can tell me, and I'll go away, unless you promise to throw it back into the water again as soon as you've taken it off the hook." The boy laughed as he threw his line, and said with a look not devoid of admiration, as he glanced at his young companion, — " Clarice talks like that sometimes, only it sounds silly and babyish when she says it ; but it doesn't when you do."

" Who is Clarice ? " asked Crieff with interest. "She's my sister. I've got two. Clarice is the younger one. I like Valda best." " Valda is a funny name. I haven't got any brothers or sisters. I sometimes think I should like a brother. Have you got any ? " " Yes, two." FIRST MEETING — CHILDHOOD. 7 " Do you like them ? " " Not particularly ; but I could like Bryan well enough if he would let me, and if he weren't always being thrown in my teeth." " I don't see how a brother can be thrown in your teeth ; you would bite him if he were," said Crieff, with great gravity. " Well, his good deeds as compared with my evil ones — if you like that better," said the boy, a dark look beginning to creep over his face. " He has never done anything wrong since he was in his cradle, and I've never done anything right.

And comparisons become odious in time, when one hears of nothing else from morning till night." " I should think everything would be tiresome like that," said Crieff. " But why don't you do anything right ? Are you very naughty ? I am sometimes ; but I can't bear grandmother to be displeased with me, so I try to feel good again. I get into passions, and I love to have my own way. What is it that you do?" " I get into passions too — frightful passions. Once they said I nearly killed Bryan — but I don't believe it. I believe it was all their humbug, because they wanted to get rid of me. They sent me away from home, and I liked being at school ; but one day I got into an awful rage with one of the masters — he was a bully and a sneak and a tyrant, but of course nobody believed that. I knocked him down, for he was a miserable little twopenny-halfpenny sort of a fellow — and of course I was expelled.

They wouldn't have me home after that. They were afraid I should con taminate the young saints there ; so they sent me to a beast of a tutor, but I made it too hot for him, and now they've just sent me to another old codfish of a fellow over here. He's not such a bad old boy, though he's a perfect duffer : and he says I'm quite fit to go to Eton as it is, and doesn't badger my life out over lessons. I'm to go to Eton next term, and there I hope I'll have some peace and some fun too. But so far I've been nothing but an outcast and black-sheep, and if they don't look out what they're about, I'll give them reason to complain. I won't stand this kind of thing for ever — no, that I won't ! " The boy's eyes flashed. His hand was clenched, and he seemed to be speaking rather to himself than to his companion.

Crieff had listened breathlessly to this not very coherent story, poured out with great rapidity when once the start was made ; and she came to the conclusion that it was rather interesting, and rather like things she had read in books. She had never met with harshness or injustice herself in her short life, and did not quite understand it, but she knew that other people had to put up with it some times, and it was always interesting to meet with the hero of such a story. " Do you mean that they won't have you at home, and that everybody is unkind, and that you are a sort of scape-goat, and are-punished whether you do wrong or not ? " she asked, her chin in her hand, and her eyes looking straight out at him, as though he were some strange being, hitherto unknown in the course of her limited experience.

A dusky flush crept into the boy's face beneath its tan, and he turned upon her with an honest light in his angry eyes. "No, I don't mean that. I'm not such a fool. People don't get a bad name for nothing, and I do FIRST MEETING— CHILDHOOD. 9 deserve some of what I've got, because I have the most detestable temper, and get into fearful passions, and I always did ever since I was small. But all the same I shouldn't be so bad if they didn't always take me the wrong way, and condemn me without a hearing. One does not care to try, when everybody is against one. There's only Valda at home who ever says a good word for me ; and they make me hate them when I'm amongst them, though I'd be fond of them if they would let me. It isn't that I don't do the things they say of me, but — but — Oh, I don't know how to say it.

And you would never understand." But Crieff did' not agree with him there. " I think I do understand," she said, with her decisive little air ; "I understand more than people think, because grandmother talks to me, and explains things. I want to be as wise as she is when I grow up, and I ask her to help me, and teach me. My grandmother is a very remarkable woman. She would help you if you belonged to her. She wouldn't do things to make you feel worse. Some people do, I know. I believe I know just how you feel sometimes." " I'm sure you don't," put in the boy in a low voice. " Oh, but I think I do," returned Crieff, with a little characteristic movement of her head, " for I can get into great passions sometimes, and the sort of things that nurse says only make me feel angrier and angrier ; but grandmother is quite different.

She never scolds, but she just looks at me all over, and her eyes seem to go through me ; and she says, ' I am sorry that my little granddaughter is growing to be a slave. I always hoped that she would grow up to win a position of command,' or something like that. The first time she said it, I didn't understand what she meant, and I thought it was horrid to be called a slave, and I said so ; but she looked at me through her gold glasses and said, 'Everyone is a slave who has not learnt how to control himself. So long as you let your passions get the better of you, so long you will be their slave, and unfit for any position of command, whatever your station and birth may entitle yon to expect. For no one who has not first conquered him self is fit to have the control of his fellow-creatures.' I made grandmother write that down one day, so that I might try and remember it.

It does help — at least it helps me, for I think I am rather proud, and I know I like to think of being mistress some day, and having people under me. And it would be dreadful not to be able to keep dignified and calm with them — as grand mother always does, whatever happens — and I hate to be a slave — even my own slave, if you know what I mean. Don't you think perhaps you would hate it too, if you thought of it in that way ? " The lad smiled slightly, yet his brow was still clouded. " It is all very well to talk," he said, " and I don't doubt your grandmother is a very excellent old lady ; but I suspect your passions and mine are very different kinds of things. What's sauce for the goose isn't always sauce for the gander," and the boy laughed a little bitterly, as a closer observer would have noted.

But Crieff was only a little maiden of ten, and moreover she was rather offended at hearing her grandmother spoken of in this very off-hand way as " an excellent old lady." She had been brought up so much with older people that the easy, slangy style of "young England" had hardly ever reached her ears. She did not particularly like the boy's conclusion FIRST MEETING — CHILDHOOD. about the goose and the gander, and thought there was something rather rude in his manner. So she drew herself up with a quaint touch of offended dignity and made no farther observation. The boy was thinking his own thoughts too, and made matters no better by appearing oblivious of her presence for a few moments. But presently he looked up with a start to say, — " Oh, by-the-by, what is your name, little girl ? " That completed his offence — to call her " little girl," to ignore her displeasure, and to ask her name — when he was a perfect stranger and a trespasser to boot !

Crieff was a remarkably fastidious young lady, and had decided ideas as to her own dignity, and the respect due to her. She rose to her feet, and made one step over towards the oj)posite bank ; but then she looked back, and meeting the frank, friendly glance of the boy's blue eyes, was half disarmed. " My nurse sometimes calls me Will o' the Wisp," she answered after a moment's hesitation, her face relaxing from its severity. "You haven't told me your name either." " At home they are fond of calling me — no — I'll not tell you that name, though perhaps it's the best. Some of the fellows called me Hotspur — that's a little better." " Good-bye then, Hotspur. I must go in to my dinner. Shall you fish here another day ? " "I will, if you'll come and talk to me, Miss Will o' the Wisp." But Crieff made no promise, and only skipped across the stones with a light laugh, and disappeared in the dim shadows of the whispering wood.

Chapter II. To The Rescue

YOU cowardly bully ! take that— and that — and that ! What do you mean, you cur— you scoundrel ! frightening and insulting a lady like that ? What ? You haven't had enough, haven't you ? I advise you to look out how you provoke me to hit you again ! " The boy's eyes were flashing, a lurid light seemed to have leaped into them, the handsome square-cut face was distorted by passion, or, to put it more correctly, was transformed thereby ; for there was nothing repulsive in the look it wore, but something so tense, so fierce, so instinct with blazing wrath, that it gave to him an aspect that was a little terrible. On the grass at his feet lay a burly, scowling lad, at least three years his senior, and both taller and stronger, whilst a little behind him, flushing and quivering with excitement, stood little Crieff, her sun bonnet off, her curls in wild disorder, her lips parted, and her eyes glowing in a fashion which showed her to be intensely excited.

The prostrate lad, though he had evidently felt the force of his opponent's fists, was not entirely subdued, for he raised his head, and uttered a short, sharp whistle. " Hotspur"— for Crieff knew no other name by which to call him — taking this as a sign of defiance, commenced inflicting fresh chastisement upon him. " Oh, don't," began the child, " I'm sure you've punished him enough," but just as she spoke there was heard the sound of a fierce growl close at hand. A wild-looking dog came bursting through the under wood, and in a second he had flown at Hotspur, and torn his arm in a manner terrible to behold. But the pain and the fierce anger it aroused only nerved the boy to a fury which gave him wonderful strength. Without a look or a thought of fear, he turned upon his new assailant, and dealt him such a blow upon the head, well planted between the eyes, that the creature dropped off howling and half-stunned, whilst the ill-favoured lad, hastily picking himself up, whistled to his dog, and the pair slunk off with as much haste as circumstances would allow, leaving the two younger children alone together, face to face for the second time.

" Oh, Hotspur," cried Crieff, in real distress, " how dreadfully that dog has bitten you ! " " I don't care a straw, so long as I thrashed that scoundrel. Tell me, what was he doing to you ? Had he hurt you ? Had he been long there ? Had he dared to lay hands upon you ? " " Oh no," answered Crieff proudly, " I don't think he would have dared. And I should have run away if it had come to that. He could never have found me if I had. But I didn't want to run. I hate to seem afraid, or to be afraid. He said I shouldn't pass till I'd kissed him ; and he was beginning to be very rude and insolent. But I didn't want him to see he frightened me ; and oh ! I was so glad when I saw you come. But oh, Hotspur, I do wish you hadn't been hurt. Let me bathe it for you in the water— the stream runs close by— and bind it up for yon.

And yon must come and see grandmother then. She will know what to do. I do hope the dog wasn't mad." Hotspur laughed ; but he let his eager little com panion lead him to the stream, and was glad to dabble his hot and bleeding arm in the cold, clear water. Crieff got both their pocket-handkerchiefs to make into a bandage. " It's a pity yours isn't cleaner," she said parenthetically, " but, I suppose, as you're a boy, you can't help that," and she bound them round the wounded arm deftly enough, when the bleeding had partially ceased. Hotspur laughed at the notion of treating the injury as anything serious, but Crieff was a determined little mortal, and was resolute that he should come and be doctored by her grandmother. " She will scold me if I do not bring you," she said with decision, " and I like you now.

I think you are very brave, so I should like you to see my home. Perhaps grandmother will let us be friends. She is rather particular, but if you are as nice as you look, I daresay she will. I never had a boy friend before, and I haven't had many girl ones. In books boys are generally the most interesting. I think you might be interesting if one knew you better." Hotspur laughed again and let himself be persuaded. He was a good deal taken by his little companion, and after the rather harsh experiences of a shadowed boyhood, the story of which he had told to Crieff previously, it was pleasant to be regarded as something better than the black sheep of the community. He also felt some natural curiosity to see in what manner of home this quaint little maiden dwelt, and what sort of a grandmother it was whose words seemed to be so greatly regarded.

So he let her lead him along, and very soon the pair passed within a small gate into a dense thicket of shrubbery, and Crieff turned to him and said, — " We are on grandmother's property now. When you get beyond the shrubbery you will see the house. I like it much better than Lord Frampton's. I have never seen a house I like so much." It was certainly a pretty place. Hotspur saw that at a glance, ag soon as they emerged from beneath the shadow of the trees. The house was old and quaint and home-like, with mullioned windows and twisted chimneys. It was curtained with creepers, many of them in bloom, and it stood in the midst of velvet lawns and brilliant flower-beds, everything about it being so exquisitely kept that one wondered if weeds ever ventured to appear along the gravel walks, or daisies to rear their saucy heads above the smooth shaven turf.

" There is grandmother," said Crieff eagerly, as they crossed the park-like meadow which separated them from the garden ; " she is getting flowers for the house. Grandmother always arranges her own bowls of roses herself ; nobody else can do it like her. She will wait for me when she sees me. She will want to know who you are. I shall tell her it is Hotspur. She will know who Hotspur is. I told her all about meeting you the day before yesterday. I always tell her everything." The child darted away from his side a few moments later, running up breathless with her eagerness to a tall and very handsome old lady, who seemed to greet her with a mingling of affection and stateliness not often met with in these days. The boy approached leisurely, taking in everything with his keen, resolute, blue eyes.

He did not appear the least shy or abashed, and when he neared the gate by which the lady of the house stood, he took off his hat, and replied to her greeting with great self-possession, apologising for the intrusion, like the thorough little gentleman he was. " I hear you have been bitten. You must let me look at your arm. I dislike injuries like that from strange dogs. Sometimes they lead to bad results. Come with me to the housekeeper's room. She and I both know something of these matters. I am grateful to you for coming to the rescue of my little granddaughter, who was evidently growing rather frightened." "I don't believe she would ever be really frightened," said the lad admiringly; "she has no end of pluck ; but it was a satisfaction to knock the fellow down. If I'd had a stick in my hand " " It was better you had not, I think, my boy," said the old lady very quietly, but with a glance which told Hotspur that she had heard something of his story from the little girl.

He coloured, but his frank eyes did not drop before hers. "Perhaps it was," he said, "I have a fearful temper of my own. It would take very little to make me kill a fellow when my blood was up. Sometimes I think that I shall do it one of these " But Mrs. Moncrieff — for that was the old lady's name— silenced him by a gesture. " Such things are better not said, my lad," she remarked very quietly. " Instead of talking about your fits of passion, try and feel ashamed of them. Try and conquer them. I always think that people who too frankly avow their faults have often a little lingering complacency with regard to them. No one ever admits to being mean, cowardly, untruthful. These are faults of which we are constitutionally ashamed, and if we see them in ourselves, we keep the knowledge a secret.

A passionate temper does not sound nearly so bad — indeed, there seems a certain manliness and high spirit about it, which makes us disposed to regard it as a venial fault. Yet, if passion once gets the whip hand, he will not easily let it go ; we shall be driven hither and thither at his will in a most miserable fashion, and it will be strange if we escape without some terrible and tragic stain, which will leave its mark on us for ever." Hotspur listened with attention. Nobody had ever spoken to him quite in this way before, so kindly, so truthfully, and so seriously. He thought for a moment, and then looked up and said fearlessly, — " Why, that is quite true, though I'm sure I never thought of it before. I'm not exactly proud of my temper — it's done me too much harm for that ; but I do think I've prided myself in not being ashamed to own to it ; and perhaps I have been a little proud of that, and the feeling that it is better to be passionate than a sneak or a fool.