By Adverse Winds

Chapter I

F it has been the reader's fortune to visit the "grey metropolis of the North," as Edin burgh is designated by Lord Tennyson in a vein of rather negative compliment, he will doubtless have passed through the Grange, one of its southern suburbs. The Grange, then, is the locale of the greater portion of the events described in this highly veracious chronicle. As to the date of theh occurrence, let it be the year of grace 1868, though why "grace " — theologice dictu — should have more abounded in that year than in others, comes not within my province to solve. Season — one of the two ante-Tule months of winter, sufficiently early for the leaves, well tanned to an autumnal brown, not to be all torn from the trees by the blustering gales of the last September equinox, yet sufficiently late for Blackford Hill, the Braids, and the more distant peak of scarred Cairkettan in the Pentland Range, to be powdered with a thin layer of snow, lying here and there upon the deep emerald "ground" of the grassy slopes, like Valenciennes lace on green Irish poplin.

Among the fascinating mysteries of the Arabian Nights, who does not recall, from the roseate remembrances of boy hood, the envious wonder excited, by the magical ivory tube of Prince Ali, in the youthful mind so fettered by its pitifully prosaic modern environment. Through this medium, the happy possessor could see all that was transpiring at the moment on any spot of the globe he chose. Through the pantiscope of the novelist, in like manner, I would ask the reader, wheresoever he be, to observe, in the highway termed Grange Loan, but standing well back from the lodge-gates, within spacious and wooded grounds, a certain large, old fashioned, whitewashed family mansion. Ramblingly irregular was it in every part, with its quaint crow-stepped gables and corner turrets, its clustered chimneys and long narrow windows heavily mullioned and " transomed," all betokening the hybrid style of architecture prevalent in Scotland when last century was in its teens.

" A monstrous abortion," says the purist in architecture, exploding into a fit of real or simulated indigna tion over the debasement in native Scotch taste that followed the Union in 1707. "A cosily comfortable and romantic old home," say we (who of course are destitute of any preten sions to correct architectural taste, but who know what comfort is), with nooks and corners enough in its towers and its attics, its corridors and its cellars, for a whole colony of ghosts of the discreet orthodox type to dwell together in that becoming peace and unity so lauded by the Psalmist. Increasing the penetrative power of our mystic glass, let us direct our gaze through the low wide doorway, the massive jambs and lintels of which are curiously carven with heraldic devices, whose antiquity, if ugliness were the criterion, deserved to date back to the paleolithic period, and would inevitably have despatched any well-principled antiquary, with a properly-developed bump of veneration, into the seventh heaven of ecstasy.

Yonder flying scroll of the architrave, which, underneath a coat-of-arms representing a wonderfully BRAID PARK AND THE PROFESSOR 9 obese Uon holding a complacent-looking lamb in its mouth, announced in ancient characters, well-nigh effaced by age and weathering, the motto, " Haude wele, haine wele," was of itself an antiquarian treasure, as being a relic of a still older mansion. Passing on into the entrance hall, graced with numerous trophies and implements of sport and the chase, among others more than one set of " antlers royal," let us — exercising the same sovereign right of ingress as before — in spirit glide through the second door on the right-hand side. Nay, sooth to say, unless we employ that method of admittance, we stand a strong chance of remaining on the wrong side of it. Securely fastened by lock and bar is the natural means of entrance into the apartment — to all and sundry an emphatic intimation, akin to the Irishman's broad hint with a shdlelah, that Kenneth Armitage, the master of the mansion, and the celebrated Professor of Historical Jurisprudence in the University of Edinburgh, did not desire to be disturbed.

Albeit seated in that room in the house most secure from interruption — for as soon would any of the household at Braid Park have thoughtlessly invaded the privacy of the Professor's study, as some harum-scarum pet of the mess have dared to intrude upon " Chinese Gordon's " tent when the signal of the white handkerchief lay at the entrance — still the fact remained, he had taken additional precautions against intrusion. Human nature at its best has always a latent substratum of curiosity. That estimable young female, Pandora, did not pre-empt the fee-simple of the frailty for all time. There is still a tidy residuum left for the consolation of posterity, to prevent us committing moral felo de se in despair over each other's perfection. Curiosity is one of those ethical motes we never detect in our own nature, but inevitably discern in the character of our next-door neighbour.

So with regard to the Professor's door. Sufficient the circumstance of a door customarily unfastened, to be closed and locked, to infect nine persons out of every ten with an intolerable itch of inquisitiveness as to the reason why. You and I, worthy reader, though of course our moral balance is otherwise as true as that of the most impeccable saint in the calendar, and though we may not have another redeeming vice in our whole constitution, are, I wot, as far as such matters are concerned, only poor human nature after all. Therefore we ask, Why had the Professor locked his door ? Is the answer to be found within the apartment ? Let us see ! In the middle of the floor stands a heavy mahogany escritohe of Louis Quatorze style, with arm-chair to match. Seated at this, his elbows resting on the writing-desk, his face buried in his hands, and his whole attitude betokening extreme dejection, is Professor Kenneth Armitage.

What is wrong ? Malaise, ennui, or the torture of speculative thought ? Alas ! no. The Professor ranked among those favoured few who, as De Quincey says, in the lottery of life, have been fortunate enough to draw the dual prize of a keen intellect and a system innocent of even a suspicion of dyspepsia. His busy life, moreover, and above all his mind so many-sided in its points of interested impact with the prime problems in science, philosophy, and literature, left him no leisure to make the acquaintance of the Eumenides of the fashionable and idle haut ton • while, in fine, years ago he had once for all faced the pregnant questions each man worth his salt must put to himself concerning life, death, and futurity. The solutions he had then arrived at satisfied him stdl, his mind being neither so sensitively original nor so irresolutely Protean as to discern in each progressive development of human thought any exigent necessity to revise its decisions.

Significant, nevertheless, in a marked degree, is his whole attitude, as that of a man in the Briarean grip of intolerable mental anguish. What we can see of him reveals a figure of medium stature, deep-chested, strongly yet compactly built, retaining, too, despite the wear and tear of fifty years, much of the htheness and suppleness of youth • a head finely shapen, THE PROFESSOR'S TROUBLE 11 squarely and firmly set on his broad shoulders, exhibiting, especially in the region of the occiput, a particularly marked development. As he raises his head from time to time to make a note on the paper lying before him, he presents to view a countenance instinct with strong decision of character and vhile individuality, in the sharp, clear-cut features un concealed by any vestige of hirsute embellishment; in the deep lines of the small, firmly-compressed mouth with its underlip so delicately yet so decidedly curved • in the clear grey eyes, so transparently honest in theh gaze, yet so pierc ingly penetrative in the glance they dhect upon the world at large ; in the nose slightly aquiline in shape, overhanging the depression at the root of which, and mounting sheer and square from it, rises the high pile of forehead, surmounted by a thin thatch of grizzled hah.

A sufficiently " noticeable man with large grey eyes " — to employ Wordsworth's description of Coleridge — was Professor Kenneth Armitage at any time. The more so now, when the normal leonine appearance of his impressive personality was heightened by a resemblance to the same noble animal at bay — a quality, the advent of trouble had infused into his mien. Upon the strong, steadfast features whereon hon determination was written in uneffaceable characters, there was likewise inscribed to-day the signmanual of profound grief. The forehead deeply furrowed, the brows so contracted as to form, in care -lines above the nose, the letter "A," all betokened a sorrow of no everyday incidence. From the cavernous old fireplace gleamed fitful flashes of ruddy light over the serried ranks of books in the magnificent library, while the long, almost horizontal rays of a winter's sun at its setting cast fantastic shadows upon the furniture and carpet, and over the marble busts of Socrates, Grotius, Pufendorf, and Kant, resting on scaghola pillars in various parts of the room.

But to mark the weirdness of any such effects, the master of Braid Park had seemingly no eye to-day. From the terraced lawn, upon which the Ubrary windows looked out, came the sounds of merry shouts and laughter. There, playing battledore and shuttlecock, were a girl and boy — she a tiny, fair-tressed fairy of six summers, instinct with all the grace and glee, the love, the laughter, and the light of childhood; he a lad of some ten years, strangely beautiful and strangely like the lonely figure we have been watching. But not a glance did that figure direct towards them. Longer grew the shadows and deeper the gloom of the dying day without, ruddier the play of the fire-flame within. But of these, or of the lapse of time, the Professor took no note. He still sat with his face buried in his hands, motionless as a statue — save for the nervous tapping of his left foot on the carpet — silent as the Sphinx, save for a low groan wrung from him unwittingly at times by the extremity of his anguish.

Thus had he sat for hours past, and thus did the winged hours pass over him now. Stdl this mortal conflict con tinued, between a strong nature and its weaker self shrinking from abnegation and sacrifice. At last the Professor rose. Taking in his hand the papers filled with long lines of figures, which had been lying before him on the desk, he began to pace slowly the floor of his library, glancing ever and anon at the slip of calculations. To every man, once at least in his span of existence, there occur certain events, be they physical, moral, or spiritual, that constitute the supreme crisis of his life. If he rise superior to circumstances, and remain true to his own ideal of constancy and consistency, his nature is strengthened and sublimated and assumes proportions nobler than before. If, on the con trary, he permit himself to refuse the cup of self-sacrifice, he has slain the delicate flower of his own self-respect, and not the sorrow and expiation of a lifetime can revivify it. Kenneth Armitage was face to face with such a crisis. Would he succeed or would he succumb?

Chapter II

BBBjBHBJS WELVE years before, in common with the |e^ jg^ra majority of his sex, the Professor had con ilaSOl I^Vvt? eluded, that the words of Scripture, "It is ;|Ip«5jj WJW n°t good for man to be alone," contained Pallll :%e^! enunciation of a cardinal and saving truth, as far as social happiness was con cerned. To work out his own social salvation, therefore, he proceeded to wed the only daughter of a wealthy Northumber land squire whose family was orthodoxly ancient. In addition to her personal attractions, by no means inconsiderable, the lady stid further enhanced her value in the scale of matri monial appraisement by the possession in her own right of a fortune of thirty-five thousand pounds. Heavens ! to many an impecunious suitor, viewing the case through such spectacles, the Hottentot Venus would rival the perfections of the Venus de Medicis !

With his wife's fortune, the Professor had made certain exceedingly fortunate investments, or, on the time-honoured principle — supposed to be characteristic of the select superla tives of this world — of naming a spade a spade, call them rather lucky speculations. Amongst others were two Aus tralian ventures, to wit, the Bank of Queensland and the Scottish Australasian Pastoral and Preserving Company. Now, though Kenneth Armitage was by nature the very man to tender sage advice to his friends never to place all theh eggs in one basket, with the usual inconsistency of such hyper sagacious individuals, he had actually been guilty of that very folly himself. So temptingly rapid had been the increase in the amount of the dividends accruing from these two particular investments, that the Professor, lending an ear for once in his life to the demon of greed, had gradually, and against his better judgment, withdrawn the greater part of his own and his wife's fortune from other and safer investments to augment the number of his shares in the companies named.

For years all had gone well. Now, however, the inevitable Nemesis of folly had overtaken him. First the Bank of Queensland had failed, leaving an immense deficit of liabdities over assets ; then, owing to prolonged droughts in Australia, the Scottish Australasian Pastoral and Preserving Company had been compelled to follow suit. From the liquidators of both institutions had come heavy calls upon the shares, representing in the aggregate many thousands of pounds, far beyond the Professor's ability to meet. Kenneth Armitage was a ruined man ! To satisfy the demands everything he possessed must be sold — his house, his library, his small ornamental estate in Perthshire, his furniture ; and even then a deficiency might remain. Save honour, all was lost, but that must be conserved at all costs.

None the less bitter was the sacrifice, though he had the consciousness he was acting the part of an honest man. Honour is a jewel, no doubt, but its preservation won't give a man his daily bread, when his means of subsistence have been swept away. That his old home should pass into the hands of others, was the matter over which the iron entered most deeply into the Professor's soul — the old place, consecrated by all the highest and holiest memories of chdd hood's, boyhood's, and manhood's years ; the old home where his ancestors for five generations had centred their best and noblest affections, round whose walls history itself had THE HOME OF THE ARM IT AGES 15 entwined many a memorable experience of the Jacobite risings of 1715 and 1745; the old home to whose halls he had brought his fair young bride but a few years before, and installed her there as at once its mistress and its sunshine ; the old home also from whose halls — their sunshine for him for ever departed — he had borne, only three years before, all that was earthly of her, to sleep in the quiet Grange Cemetery.

Yes ! the pang was bitter, bitter as death itself, to let the old home go — that home he had hoped in turn to hand down to his son, and for the loss of which that son, when he arrived at the years of discretion, would be justified in blaming him. All these considerations passed through the Professor's mind. But to Kenneth Armitage the resolution was unalterable, to resign all he possessed, that the pale, pure flower of his honour, hitherto stainless, might stdl remain without taint. Such was the cause of the hand-to-hand conflict he had been waging with self since the previous day. No inkling had the world been permitted to glean of the momentous struggle. Proud, cold, and impassive, Kenneth Armitage would have felt immeasurably lowered in his own estimation — to him the most exacting of aU tyrants — had he, by either word or deed, permitted even his most intimate friends to know of his troubles.

To his stern, self-contained nature, the most contemptible among men was he who perpetually wore his heart upon his sleeve for the daws of society to peck at. The aphorism of Rochefoucauld he had early laid to heart as containing not the least striking of social truths, that the misfortunes of our friends impart even to the best of us a kind of placid satisfaction that we are not as they. His lecture to his class that day was delivered with the most complete command over all his faculties. He displayed aU his usual keen original insight into first principles, as well as his wonted gUttering dialectic. In fact, no one seeing Professor Armitage thus engaged, would have deemed his mind to be concerned with aught but the duties of his position, nor observe in his manner any difference from the usual dignified courtesy which was his wont.

Yet did not he feel all that day, whether in classroom or Senate-hall, in his carriage or on the streets of Edinburgh, that he had seemed to be moving about in a dream, and as if all around were unsubstantial shadows, the only reality being the words that were continually ringing changes in his ear, " You are ruined, you are homeless, you are ruined, you are home less." Then his day's work done — and well done, he had returned home to fight the battle of resistance to self over again. Resolute man as he was, the flesh is a " kittle chiel to ding," and presented all sorts of compromises and subterfuges whereby the wholesale ruin might be averted. Now, how ever, he was about to put an end to all suspense by communi cating with the legal agents of the Bank of Queensland and the Scottish Australasian Pastoral and Preserving Company, announcing that as far as the sale of his estate and effects admitted, he would endeavour to meet the calls, amounting in all to twenty thousand pounds.

More he could not do. He likewise was writing to his own lawyers, ordering them to place all his property in the market. If the die were cast, the sooner the irrevocable crossing of the Rubicon were got over the better, though to him the future was dark indeed. While thus employed he became so deeply engrossed that he faded to hear a knock at the library door. Once, twice, thrice it sounded, each time louder than the preceding. At last the Professor's attention was attracted. "Who is there?" he cried, without unlocking the door, wishing if possible to avoid interruption during his present state of mind. "It's me, Profassor," replied a voice from "beyond the oak," with that sublime vagueness whereinto most of us fall under similar circumstances. AN UNWELCOME INTERRUPTION 17 " What's wrong — what's the matter — what do you wish ?

" replied the Professor, to whom the " me " apparently presented sufficiently definite characteristics to be recog nised. "It's a maitter o' great importment, sir." The Professor, muttering a hasty expression of annoyance opened the door, but stood in the entrance to bar ingress. The knock had proceeded from the old butler, Robin Campbell (better known as Rab Caummle), a chirpy, cheery, pawky-looking piece of antiquity, whose silvery hair and stooping carriage conveyed the impression of greater age than was warranted by the twinkling black eyes and the ruddy, moon-like face, clean shaven like his master's. Rab was a character in his way. A Scotch servitor of that old school represented by the illustrious Caleb Balderston, his state ments, where the honour of the house to which he was attached were concerned, had to be taken with a very large grain of salt indeed.

Two generations of Armitages had he served, since as a boy of ten he donned their livery. An altogether privileged personage he therefore considered himself, nor were his claims disallowed, for his fidelity to the [family was almost canine in its implicitness. That an Armitage could do wrong was as physically and morally impossible in his eyes, as that a "paycock could hatch a wild juke's nest." Had circumstances demanded, he would cheerfully have risked life and limb for the object of his idolatry — the Professor, whom as a boy he had carried on his shoulders. This was the personage, the "me" of the response from behind the door, who now addressed the Professor in reply to the impatient query of the latter, " Well, Robin ? " " I'm verra sorry for disturbin' ye, Profassor, i' yer speci fications."

Rab's fondness for long words was as ineradicable as Mrs. Malaprop's, while his genius for twisting them from their proper signification was quite as awe-inspiring as hers ; " but here's Maister Lindesay corned in and he winna gang until he sees ye, he says." " Tell him I can see no one to-day." " I reformed him, Profassor, that ye were engaged, but he still threipit that he maun see ye." " He has probably come for his daughter, Miss Kate, who is out playing with Master Robert on the lawn. Take him at anyrate to see my sister, Miss Armitage." The door was again closed upon the perturbed visage of the consequential old servitor, and the Professor resumed his perambulation of the apartment, uttering a sigh of relief that he had thus succeeded in devolving the duties of hospitality on his sister, who, since his wife's death, had done the honours of the household.

The gentleman in question, Mr. Thomas Lindesay, was an Australian squatter and wool -king. Currently reported a millionaire, though that term in reality afforded but a faint idea of his vast wealth, he was, at the date of which we speak, a star of the first magnitude in Edinburgh society. By birth a Scotchman, after more than forty years' absence in the Antipodes, he had returned to his native land ostensibly for the education of his only child — the girl-playmate of the Professor's son — but in reality to allay his own violent home sickness. That " absence makes the heart grow fonder," is not a dainty poetical conceit, but a psychological fact every wanderer from the shadow of his paternal Lares and Penates can testify. In place of growing feebler with years, the sentiment increases in intensity.

Thomas Lindesay was by no means a sentimental individual. But he could grow sentimental enough over the " bonny hills o' Scotland," and "Caledonia stern and wild," and the like, by the colonial camp-fire of a night, until others of his party, who had not the unspeakable felicity of being born in the " Land o' Cakes " christened him " Old Caledonia " in consequence. From the Armitage household, with whom they occupied ENTER THOMAS LINDESAY 19 the position of next-door neighbours, having brought letters of introduction to the Professor from mutual friends in New South Wales, the new-comers had received no small amount of kindness. Edinburgh people, to put the matter delicately, are a trifle arctic in theh first dealings with strangers, before the sunshine of theh native geniality has thawed the frosty chdl of theh manners.

Through the Professor's instrumentality, the Lindesays had obtained an entrie to a stratum of society in the "grey metropolis " to which otherwise even his enormous wealth might not have been potent enough to furnish the sesame. Another tap at the door — very hesitating and deprecatory, again interrupted the Professor in his walk. Again the door was opened, this time somewhat angrily. Almost synchronous with the indignant question, "What is it now, Robin ? " came the effusive expostulation — "It is na' me, Profassor, I'm fair distressed wi' a' this interruppin' o' yer mediations, but Maister Lindesay begs that ye'U jist dissent tae see him for twa meenits by the clock, on a maitter o' great conquesance tae ye a'." " Good gracious, didn't you tell him what I said ? " " Ou ay, Profassor, but ye micht as weel gang and fleech wi' a stane dyke tae gang owre the fundamentals tae ye, as tae get Maister Lindesay tae listen tae reason.

He seems sair forfeuchan (worried) owre something, puir body, and if ye could jist see him, Profassor, for ae meenit, I'm thinkin' " — " Humph ! what can he want ? Can't I have seclusion in my own house when I am worried — I mean busy with work ? Light the gas and show him in, then, Robin, if he must come." Rab, having lit the gas and drawn the curtains, thus giving to the room an appearance of warm, cosy comfort, departed with alacrity on his mission. His interests, as well as his inclination, were bound up in his master granting the interview requested. The wizard influence of the almighty dollar had been at work. A golden lubrication in the shape of a sovereign, with which by the way the Australian Crœsus was at all times pretty lavish to Rab, had tickled his palm and loosened his tongue to plead the cause of the visitor.

Chapter III Mhb-bbbb

H0M AS LINDESAY had carried his point, llfe/Tl Ekmf' and gained admission to the Professor. In pCyj iTvvi a m"lutes ushered him into the in^P 1[___tM library — a tall, handsome, imposing-looking wl "iP§ Cp*s3 °^ man) orl whose frank, open countenance <Sb£^-^_SSs-5 bonhomie and generosity were written large. The Professor was visibly in no very amiable frame of mind. He was, however, innately too much of a gentleman not to receive his visitor with courtesy, though the latter could see he was somewhat ruffled at the pertinacity where with the interview had been solicited. After the first greetings, therefore, Lindesay at once broached the object of his visit. " I must apologise, Professor Armitage, for intruding upon you, and for persisting in intruding when you denied me admission, but I hope you wdl acknowledge, when you hear them, that my motives justified the course."

The Professor merely bowed coldly without reply. The fact of the visit being regarded as an intrusion he could not deny, nor did he care to simulate the contrary. Whether the purpose of it would palliate the offence was as yet a moot point. Thomas Lindesay saw this, but respected the Professor all the more for it. In these latter days, when man's chief end according to society's catechism is to glorify himself, and to seem to be what he is not, all the more refreshing is it to meet a man who dares to be natural. With the knowledge he possessed, he could read the lines of worry and care which the anxieties of the past few days had imprinted on the Professor's features. For the man who could thus suffer in sdence, grimly and doggedly, seeking from the world neither consolation nor alleviation, a welhng tide of sympathy arose in Lindesay's heart.

"Professor Armitage, you have been exceedingly kind to me and to mine since we returned from AustraUa." The Professor only bowed his head in sdent acknow ledgment. " But for you, Professor, my social position in Edinburgh would have been very different from what it is. I know it, nor am I ashamed to admit the fact." Again the Professor bowed, but this time not so coldly as before. Somewhat soothing is it even to a man on the brink of ruin and with his mind deeply engrossed with his own affairs, to discover that the expression of gratitude is not one of the dead languages. The big-hearted Australian squatter at this point, however, began to get out of his depth and to flounder about in sore straits. He wished to do the Professor a kindness, but oh ! the achievement thereof was being made terribly hard by the irresponsive manner of the intended beneficiary.

" A plague on these stiff old - country manners," Lindesay muttered to himself ; " in Australia a man would have scented my purpose by this time, and met me half-way." He stammered, coughed, hemmed, and hawed, but Armitage never assisted him, unless a cold, deprecatory minimising of the value of his services to Lindesay could be called such. To the squatter the ordeal was nothing short of refined torture. He would rather have broken to saddle the most refractory colt ever created, than have faced the experience again. The perspiration began to stand in large beads on his face. He wished himself five thousand leagues away from LINDESAY'S BLUNDER 23 that room, confronted as he was with the very incarnation of calm, coUected, exasperatingly frigid courtesy. Never could he have believed any mortal man could remain so coldly impassive when another was seeking to help him.

To come to do this worthy deed, his big kind heart had urged the squatter on, and the same big heart now came to the rescue of his floundering " society manners," as he called them. " Professor," said he at last, as he nervously rubbed the nap of his felt hat the wrong way, " I have little of that polish derived from lifelong association with the best society. We don't enjoy such privileges three hundred miles back in the bush. I may be doing the right thing in the wrong way. Pardon my ignorance," he continued, with a pathetic inflection in his tones, " but — but — I know — I mean — I heard — of — of — your — aw — your — ahem — difficulties — do let me help you." Poor maladroit Thomas Lindesay ! Could any offer of service be more clumsily, almost insultingly, expressed? It was the Professor's turn now to lose his self-command, but from a different cause — a keen sense of resentment at what he considered intermeddling.