Marjorie Bruce's Lovers

Introduction

. CHAPTER TAGE I. Toewood Faem 1 II. Toewood House 18 STORY. I. Maejoeie .... ... 27 II. Lady Dorothea 45 III. Toewood House 66 IV. Loed Castleton and his Fiancee . . 77 V. A Peettt Hoyden 89 VI. The Picnic CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. CHAPTER PAGE VII. A Walk in the Beech-teee Avenue . 113 VIII. Old Bell and her Bairn . . 132 IX. Marjoeie is Comforted . . . . 140 X. A Painful Rencontre .... 157 XI. A Stolen Kiss and its Consequences 171 XII. Mes. Vesey's Advice .... 195 XIII. Marjoeie in Love 209 XIV. A Peoposal on Hoeseback . . . 232 XV. John Bruce Loses his Temper. . . 257 XVI. Lord Castleton Makes a Steen Resolution 274 XVII. A Meeting in the Wood . . ' . .

INTRODUCTION.

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Chapter I. Torwood Farm

• Wife, my mind's made up, and, by the Lord, no man or woman born shall keep my lassie another year frae me.' So spoke old John Bruce of Torwood Farm as he sat at breakfast with his blooming, portly wife in their sunny parlour, one June morning ; and as he spoke he brought his strong fist down on the well-spread table with an angry force which set the old-fashioned china cups and saucers jingling, and would have shaken the nerves of almost any other woman than just that calm, sensible, healthy VOL. I. B one who sat opposite to him, and who, fortu nately for them both, had never been known to assert the possession of these troublesome organs. When John Bruce's mind was made up she knew, by the experience of nearly twenty years, that truly no man or woman born need expect to turn by opposition the current of his will ; so, though what he said disappointed her, she merely remarked, in her pleasant somewhat deep-toned voice, ' Well, well, father, you've settled it ; so we'll say no more about it,' and proceeded with steady hand to lift the cream-jug and pour a liberal supply of its contents into his third cup of tea; then, handing him the cup, she, with a perfectly unperturbed air, went on with her own hearty breakfast.

Spite of his sixty years John Bruce was a ruddy, hale man. His small blue eyes had lost not a whit of their humorous intelligence ; his rather short, stoutly-built figure none of its athletic strength; his blood ran as quickly through his veins now as when, a jovial bache lor of forty, he had, to the consternation of his jovial bachelor friends, brought home a young wife to Torwood Farm, where, for nigh a score of years previously, he had lived in rough plenty such as most farmers love; riding as good a horse as any man in the shire, laird or tenant ; following the hounds when the meet lay within convenient dis tance ; passing jolly evenings over often replenished tumblers of whiskytoddy, occasionally enjoyed in the company of a country gentleman of congenial tastes, usually in that of some farmer-friend.

The only son of an extravagant laird, whose heavily mortgaged estate had at his death been put into the market, realising little more than sufficed to stock a large sheep-farm, John Bruce was admitted by most of his neighbours to have peculiar claims to gentlemanhood, and a certain prestige distin guished his position from that of the neigh bouring farmers. Well born, fairly educated, a first-rate shot, a capital teller of humorous stories, and withal a Tory to the backbone, he, in his bachelor days especially, was sure of a hearty welcome at many a county mansion of his district. B A merry, social, hot-blooded fellow, he sel dom declined any opportunity of enjoyment, and consequently was looked upon by douce plodding folk as sure to come to ruin. Yet somehow all went well with him. His flocks were usually the most prolific, his crops the heaviest in the parish ; labourers toiled for him as they would do for no other master, far or near.

No more regular visitor had the factor of the Earl of Castleton's estates each rent-day. When, too, after long procrastination, it pleased this life-enjoying gentleman to try the matrimonial lottery, his customary good luck attended him. A very ' crown unto her hus band' was the wife he brought home. Strange to say, this couple, now cherishing a steady tender affection for each other, did not begin with any strong attachment. John Bruce, weary of bachelor joys, needed a wife, and thought well of this comely, sensible, modest-eyed young lady, of whom everybody thought well ; and she (her father, the parish minister, newly laid in his grave) sorely needed a home and protector, and thought Torwood Farm a bonny place, and its master a manly, kind-hearted, cheery gentleman ; and so they cast in their lot together, nor had ever afterwards cause to regret doing so.

No sooner was she settled down in her new home than she set herself to the task of bring ing into order the rather chaotic elements she found there. A good woman, strong and wise, reared in a pure moral atmosphere, and unable to breathe any other, there was no end to the good which the still, steady influence of her fair life effected on such as came into daily contact with it. Little by little she weaned her husband from his most unwise indulgences. She taught their servants habits of regularity, and made the farmhouse really a home. It may be, after all, that her husband's reformation was helped on by the girl-baby who came ere a year was out. Possibly he might have wearied of well-doing and fallen back into his old jolly, careless ways, had not the new strange joy of fatherhood filled his heart.

He learned for the first time what pure yet passionate love is when the baby-fingers closed around his. Long ere the child could speak he had yielded himself up a willing slave to her baby caprices. Her first inarticulate ut terances were the sweetest of music to his ear. As she grew up, a bonny, bright, way ward creature, the life and sunshine of her home, each succeeding year added a fresh link to* the chain which bound him in pleasant slavery. Meanwhile his wife, unwearyingly devoting herself to the performance of her many duties, perceived with a natural disappointment that these two were infinitely more to each other than she was to either of them. She did not complain, and nobody suspected her of this feeling. The girl loved her mother dearly, and respected her more than any other human being ; only, as was to be expected, her father's boundless indulgence and the assurance of her own power over him made her regard him with a peculiar fondness.

And now, having given you an uncere monious introduction to the Bruce family, I shall return to the point from which this simple story of mine started, merely premising that a proposal to send their daughter back for another year to the fashionable Parisian school where she was at present had called forth that heavy thump of the paternal fist and the energetic declaration with which this chapter opens. The morning was sunny, and the hay just then needed sunshine ; the window, thrown half open, admitted a pleasant breeze and a cheerful combination of farmyard noises — a cackling of hens, and quacking of ducks, and neighing of horses, and lowing of cattle; a cheery sound, too, of human footsteps and voices, for the parlour overlooked the chief farmyard, which in the morning was ever a lively scene.

From his seat at the breakfast-table John Bruce could see his men leading the horses to and from the great moss-grown trough, his maids driving the sleek-skinned cows from the byres to their pasture ; and the old farmer liked well such an outlook as this. Glancing at his wife's face, and seeing it perfectly good-humoured, his own grew the same, and he presently vouchsafed a remark, in quite a mild tone. ' I'm growing an old man, Mary,' he said, 'and it's but natural I should like to keep my lassie near me.' His wife's kind heart was touched. ' Yes, father, it's but natural,' she echoed, looking up at him, with the kindly half-smile which was seldom absent from her face ; ' only,' she added, after a momentary silence, with a look of care accompanying her words, ' Marjorie's but a fanciful young thing yet, and I'd fain have had her out of the way while Lord Castleton's at Torwood.

He's a fine-looking young fellow, and I don't like our Marjorie being constantly thrown in the way of meet ing him.' Mr. Bruce fidgeted in his chair, and threw an impatient glance at her. ' Tuts, woman ! ' he said, crossly. ' Lord Castleton's to marry his cousin, as you very well know. What harm will it do Madjre to meet him now and then ? I'll warrant she'd have a good laugh at us if she heard our conversation. Why, she speaks about him in her last letter in a joking way that shows plain enough her heart's whole.' A sur prised, grieved look from his wife stopped him. ' I never saw that letter, nor knew it had come to the house, father,' she said, gravely ; and as she spoke she sighed. The old man laughed in a confused way, ' I've let the cat out of the bag, wife,' he said. Then, drawing a letter out of his pocket, he handed it to her, and watched her as she read it. ' It isn't Marjorie's fault, anyway ; ' she never bade me keep it from you ; only, as it was but a silly bit scrawl, full of nonsense, I just meant to do so,' he said in a few moments, perceiving that her face grew very grave as she perused the crumpled closely written sheet.

To him this letter contained nothing but new proofs of the lassie's spirit ; to her it seemed full of dangerous self-will and un becoming levity. It was dated from Paris, and ran as follows: — 'Dearest Daddy, — Madame is going to write to mamma and you, advising you to send me back to this wearisome, wearisome educational treadmill for another year ; and so I send you this on the sly, to tell you I won't ever be friends with you if you even give a single moment's consideration to her proposal. ' I wouldn't stay a week, supposing you did send me back, so don't you try it. I am nearly eighteen now, and I know as much as I want to, and mean to have a real jolly time until I get married and settle down, as I suppose I must some day. I don't want to get married for years and years, and all that time I mean to stick close to you, dear old dad, and tease, and coax, and love you awfully.

I'll do everything I like, and you'll do everything I bid you ; and we'll have such happy times — won't we ? ' I hope you are behaving yourself and not flying up into rages every now and then, as you used to do. You know in this hot weather rages are dangerous indulgences for stout old gentlemen like you. Mind that you are beino very good to mamma, and that you are givins her her own way now and then, just for a great treat, for she is worth a score of easy, selfish folk like you and me ; arid by and by, when I have sown all my wild oats, I mean to be very good and wise, like her ; and then, dear old dad, surely our combined exertions will keep you in the way you should go However, don't be downcast, dear old man; I promise you that I shall be my own silly happy self for years and years first. ' By-the-bye, I am wearying terribly to see Lord Castleton.

Lady Dorothea gave me a carte he had sent her, and I gaze at it in unutterable admiration by the hour together. He has grown handsomer than ever in his two years of travel, and I know not how I can possibly escape falling a victim to his fascinations, even although I am well aware that he is to marry his cousin, Miss Lisle, and so keep her money-bags in the family. You will be glad to hear that Lady Castleton is once more allowing me to form one in Lady Dorothea's suite on our journey home, so you need have no anxiety about me. ' Good-bye, darling daddy. I weary so to see your dear red face and mamma's bonny one, and to trot about the old farm as I used to do. Write at once to madame, and tell her I'd like to stay with her, only you two need me at home. I didn't tell her I wanted to leave, of course — I always shirk disagreeables when I can, you know, and I can't deny that I'm a bit of a deceiver.

Yet you must believe me, for ever and ever, dear dad, your loving lassie, ' Marjorie. ' P.S. — Don't bother over what I've said about Lord Castleton. I was only joking. I am a damsel of low degree, and he is, woe is me, a being of a totally different order. I shall take good care of my susceptible heart.' Mrs. Bruce made not a single remark during the reading of this long letter, and when she had finished she folded it up and gave it into her husband's hand without a word, a grave shake of her head indicating her disapproval of its contents. The old man hastened to take up the cudgels in the cause of the absentee. 'Well, woman, what ails you ? What's wrong wi' the lassie's letter?' he asked, touchily, quite forgetting his own previous doubts and misgivings. Mrs. Bruce, thus questioned, did not shrink from speaking her mind.

In matters of con science she never feared to speak out. ' It isn't a pretty letter, father,' she said, gravely, and went on, quite disregarding his rising choler. ' It isn't a letter I would have written to my father when I was her age, and I'm thinking the Fifth Commandment's as binding now as it was then. Besides, I'm vexed that she should seek to deceive the lady we gave her in charge to, and she so kind and attentive, too.' Mr. Bruce interrupted impatiently. ' Tuts, tuts, woman ! you're like a' the unco' guid, desperate hard on young things. What's the harm o' sending a bit letter on the sly ? ' ' It's deceitful, father, and I'm heart-grieved our girl should stoop to deceit,' his wife returned, very gravely. The old man fidgeted in his chair and muttered a contemptuous exclamation, affecting to laugh as he did so.

Quite imperturbed, Mrs. Bruce went on: ' You may laugh at me if you like, father, but all your laughing will never change wrong to right — the straight road's shortest, as I'd like Marjorie to recollect. No good comes of crooked ways, and it little becomes us to en courage her in trying them. No, no, it isn't a pretty letter, and I'd never have written the like to my father though I had been but eight instead of eighteen.' She spoke with a certain air of patient, gentle dignity, and her words and look made an impression on her husband. A rover in forbidden paths, as he him self had been, he would fain, after all, that the lassie should tread the safe old ways her mother and her mother's kin had trodden be fore her, and a reflection of his wife's gravity showed itself on his face, though he answered with a joke. ' Well, well, wife, you'll mind your father was in the ministerial line, and black coats are ever a deal respected.

Maybe if Maja had had a douce minister for her father she'd have honoured him to your heart's content.' Mrs. Bruce smiled, and he went on with increasing good-humour : ' Ay, I daresay she'd have written mighty respectful letters to him, and have kept her confidences for her sweethearts, most likely. Be glad the lassie's as good a lassie as she is, Mary, and make allowance for her failings. She canna help taking after her hot-headed auld sinner of a father, can she ? 'Deed, to speak the plain truth you're so fond of, you're to blame for not having chosen a husband of quite a different stamp. If you had seen to her having a father of the grim orthodox sort I'll warrant she'd have turned out quite a paragon of perfection.' There was both justice and good-humour in this speech, Mrs. Bruce inwardly admitted, and she smiled as she shook her head in slightly rebuking fashion.

Modestly desiring to change the subject, as she saw from the twinkle in her husband's eyes thafhe was about to pursue his joke, she hastened to give him an agreeable bit of news which she had, until now, forgotten to communicate. ' There's another o' the brown queys calved, father,' she said. ' I wish ye'd step in to take a look at them and see if the calf's worth rearing. I can take it and another in hand yet, and leave plenty cream for Marjorie be sides.' The farmer looked well pleased and rose with alacrity. 'It's no fair to throw so many hungry young things on you either, Mary. I doubt your milk-money will be but little this year,' he said, casting a wavering, half-abashed glance at her as he lifted his big oaken stick and broad-brimmed white hat from a table by the window. ' And yet your offer's tempting, for I made well on my reared beasts last season,' he added, with a sigh.

Mrs. Bruce, rising from the breakfast table, came up to him and arranged his necktie, saying, with a smile : 'Well, well, father, when my pocket-money runs short I'll beg from you, and you'll never have the face to say me nay.' Her husband's face beamed assurance of his satisfaction. ' You're a wise woman and a wholesome natured, Mary, my dear,' he said, taking her hand and patting it affectionately. ' 'Deed, I mis"ht ha' orrae farther and fared worse than I did when I went to the Manse for a wife. If Madge grows just such a woman as her mother I'll be well content.' Then, with a parting nod of farewell, he left the room and set out on his second morning round ; a collie, which had been sleeping at his feet, starting up and following him. ' A wise woman and a wholesome-natured' indeed she was.

No one who had watched her through the long, quiet hours of that day — watched her with her husband, with her servants, with her beasts — writing wise, kind counsels to the troublesome little beauty her daughter ; carrying nourishing dainties prepared by her own hands to the sick bairn at the lone cot house on the hillside, where the shepherd's widow carried on a brave battle with poverty, and. thanks to Mrs. Bruce, seemed like to conquer in the end — could have denied the truth of that saying. Had my heroine, bonny, wilful, unwise Marjorie, been formed in a like mould her love-story would have been a veiy pleasant one to tell. Such as she is we must bear with her, and be thankful that, if far from a model woman, she is at least fair to look upon. merry as a kitten, pure as a June lily in the farmhouse garden, warm-hearted as ever yet was daughter of Eve. How the pretty damsel is found in such aristocratic company my next chapter must tell. VOL. I. c

Chapter II. Torwood House

First of all I shall go back to the days of the late Lord Castleton, the present lord's father. In early youth he was a sad prodigal, and contrived to get through an almost in credible number of thousands in the space of a very few years ; but, thanks to his estates being entailed, he found the road to ruin less easy than some similarly disposed young gen tlemen do. At the age of five-and-twenty, finding himself sorely straitened in circum stances, he set about repairing his fortunes, married a beautiful young heiress of no particular descent, paid his debts out of the fortune she brought him, and, retiring with her to the country, completely changed his course of life. Torwood House, a fine old mansion, in one of the southern counties of Scotland, became the chief home of the aforesaid young couple ; and there in course of time were born to them a son and daughter, Herbert and Do rothea.

Long ere the birth of their second child, Lord Castleton and his lady had found out their incompatibility of tastes and dispo sition, and every year of their married life made them more indifferent to each other. He had married her because she was rich and in other respects a desirable bride; but had she afterwards sought to win his love by patient, gentle, unwearying study of his incli nations, she might have succeeded. She, however, a romantic, enthusiastic girl of eighteen, had married him because under his prepossessing exterior she believed every con ceivable noble quality existed ; and when by slow degrees she learned to know him as he really was — a very selfish, very prosaic mortal, whose good looks and high animal spirits were his chief recommendation — in isore disappointment she turned away from him and sought elsewhere for the sympathy c of thought and feeling which her nature craved.

She had no lack of intellectual gifts, and in their cultivation she found solace and distraction. Footsore and weary, treading the dry and dusty highway of real life, she wandered into the pleasant dewy pastures of the ideal, and there selfishly continued to wander, utterly regardless of the claims which her husband and children had upon her. By-and-by she gained an honourable place in the world of letters — the critics acknowledged her as a powerful novelist, a poet of great promise. Her husband shrugged his broad shoulders and refused to congratulate her; nay, professed a still increasing indifference to everything but his children, his dogs and horses, and rural amusements; and so the breach between the married pair went on widening. And yet there was little outward sign of disunion in this household.

Lady Castleton, dwelling apart in dignified seclusion, exercised no restraint over the family life, which, thanks to Lord Castleton's fondness for his children, was a tolerably happy one. Years after he was laid in his grave these children — children no longer — cherished his memory with wonderful tenderness, and spoke regretfully of the merry times his indulgence had ensured them in their early youth ; and though folks said he spoiled them I am in clined to believe they were wrong. Honest love, be it ever so blundering, is a mighty agent in the development of our best qualities. One of the few likings Lord and Lady Castleton shared was a liking for their humble neighbours the Bruces of Torwood Farm. Ever since Marjorie Bruce could remem ber she had been in the habit of paying frequent visits to Torwood House.

She had misty memories of being carried there on her father's strong shoulder in days when her baby feet were not long in tiring ; her first rides on the diminutive Shetland pony her father gave her on her sixth birthday were along the quiet country road which, passing by the farmhouse, led next to one of the entrances to the mansion — a high, old fashioned gateway, flanked on either side by a clumsy pillar, on which a grim stone lion crouched frowning on all who passed by that way. Sometimes John Bruce would accom pany the little rider up to the great house ; sometimes he would but open the gate for her, and watch her lovingly as she rode away up the avenue. For the little girl there was ever a wel come of the most cordial kind from pretty little Lady Dorothea, whose favourite play fellow she had become.

Children of her youthful ladyship's rank were scarce in that neighbourhood, and her parents permitted her to make a friend of this well-bred, engaging little damsel, without troubling themselves about possible future embarrassments arising from the long-continued intimacy of a couple of girls so different in social standing. Neither did any misgivings arise in the minds of Marjorie's parents until it was too late to set matters right. Gratification at the honour done their darling was for a long time their chief feeling on the subject of this friendship, and the attentions which Lord Castleton was pleased to pay themselves naturally served to make them more anxious to show a due sense of his kindness. So when, after the earl's little son was sent off to a public school, leaving his sister to lonely studies under the tuition of an ac complished governess, her parents begged that her playmate Marjorie might pass the mornings with her and share her lessons, the offer was closed with at once.

As the governess declared that Lady Dorothea made much more satisfactory pro gress in her education now that she had Marjorie's companionship, this arrangement continued to exist unaltered year after year. Once Lady Castleton deigned to put the little students through a hasty examination, and on this occasion her verdict was that ' they were a pair of stupid, idle little chits, and that their governess deserved great credit for her patience in bearing with them.' Having once formed this opinion, she showed no further interest in their lessons, and, to their great satisfaction, they were left entirely to the care of their governess, who, being an earnest and capable teacher, by dint of much labour succeeded by-and-by in bringing them up to the average young lady mark in intellectual attainments, besides permitting in each of them the cultivation of one unmistakable taste.

Little Lady Dorothea ere she had quitted infancy drew with wonderful precision such objects as it pleased her to attempt repre senting. Marjorie Bruce loved music, and showed neither idleness nor stupidity when her tiny fingers found their way to the keys of the piano, which to her fellow-student was an instrument of torture ; and, good masters being found for them when their governess pronounced them ready to profit by their instructions, each of the girls had at an early age made uncommon progress in her chosen study. Lord Castleton's demonstrative fondness for his children lasted steadily all those years of their early youth ; and when, after a short illness, he died about two years and a half before my story opens, he left a sad blank in the household. Many changes followed. Lady Castleton departed on a solitary tour over the Conti nent ; the new lord, his college studies not uncreditably concluded, set off for the East in the company of an adventurously-minded couple of college chums ; and Lady Dorothea was consigned to a Parisian school, where special arrangements were made for the con tinuance of her art-education.

Marjorie Bruce, forsaken for a time by her aristocratic friends, ran wild about the farm, and enjoyed herself immensely, riding, driving, playing at dairymaid's work, and alternately provoking and charming everybody around her. At the end of three months, however, Lady Dorothea, grieving still on account of her father's loss, and missing terribly in her new quarters the freedom of her old home, pleaded so pitifully for the companionship of her friend, Marjorie, that her mother exerted herself to secure it for her, and succeeded in overcoming the Bruces' scruples about the wisdom of giving further educational advan tages to a girl in her rank. Marjorie herself wished to go, and so of course in the end she went, and was received with open arms by her young ladyship. Much to the wonder of their fellow-pupils, the sisterly intimacy of the old days was steadily maintained during their stay at school.

There, too, Marjorie found favour in the eyes of nearly all her associates, spite of their aristocratic prejudices. The girl spoke with perfect frankness of all the details of her home life, and was proudly careful to disclaim all pretensions to social equality, yet carried her pretty head with such a natural grace, and was so lively and fearless and unmistakably well bred, that she found a vantage-ground of her own. And now, their school life over, the girls were coming home for good — Lady Dorothea happy in the prospect of ' coming out ' next season, Marjorie vaguely anticipating all manner of pleasant things. Lady Castleton's household was to re-settle at Torwood House, where the young lord was shortly expected; so the girl felt secure of abundant present amusement and distraction. Without further preface I shall now go on to tell you her love-story. STORY.

CHAPTER I. MARJORIE.

It was a sultry June afternoon, and every door and window in the farmhouse stood open. ' Beauty, Beau-ty, Beau-ty ! ' sang out old John Bruce's strong voice as he went up and down the passages calling his daughter, and there was infinite pride and tenderness in his very way of uttering her foolish pet name. A gentleman lounging on the parlour sofa, a cigar in his mouth, marked this, and, cu rious to see into what sort of fair woman the pretty slip of a girl he remembered had now developed, listened with interest for an answer to this call. It came presently. From somewhere in the lower regions a fresh girlish voice cried, ' Coming, old dad, coming!' in a tone scarcely less fond ; and then Mr. Bruce re-entered, and, sitting down in his usual seat, an old fashioned easy-chair by the hearth, bade his visitor go on smoking, and proceeded to fill himself a fresh pipe, the parlour being also the smoking-room, by Miss Marjorie's special desire. ' She preferred being choked to being deserted by the men-folk,' she had emphatically declared . ' You are very fond of each other, you two, Mr. Bruce,' the stranger remarked, smiling in an amused way.