CHAPTER X. I HEAR AN OLD SONG.

CHAPTER X.

I HEAR AN OLD SONG.

When we sailed at daybreak next morning I had the glow of satisfaction with my own doings which is a safe precursor of misfortunes. I had settled my business with the Free Companions, and need look for no more trouble on that score. But what tickled my vanity was my talk with Ringan and Lawrence at the Monacan lodge and the momentous trust they had laid on me. With a young man's vanity, I saw myself the saviour of Virginia, and hailed as such by the proud folk who now scorned me. My only merits, as I was to learn in time, are a certain grasp of simple truths that elude cleverer men, and a desperate obstinacy which is reluctant to admit defeat. But it is the fashion of youth to glory in what it lacks, and I flattered myself that I had a natural gift for finesse and subtlety, and was a born deviser of wars. Again and again I told myself how I and Lawrence's Virginians--grown under my hand to a potent army--should roll back the invaders to the hills and beyond, while the Sioux of the Carolinas guarded one flank and the streams of the Potomac the other. In those days the star of the great Marlborough had not risen; but John Churchill, the victor of Blenheim, did not esteem himself a wiser strategist than the raw lad Andrew Garvald, now sailing north in the long wash of the Atlantic seas.

The weather grew spiteful, and we were much buffeted about by the contrary spring winds, so that it was late in the afternoon of the third day that we turned Cape Henry and came into the Bay of Chesapeake. Here a perfect hurricane fell upon us, and we sought refuge in a creek on the shore of Norfolk county. The place was marshy, and it was hard to find dry land for our night's lodging. Our provisions had run low, and there seemed little enough for two hungry men who had all day been striving with salt winds. So, knowing that this was a neighbourhood studded with great manors, and remembering the hospitality I had so often found, I left Shalah by the fire with such food as remained, and set out with our lantern through the woods to look for a human habitation.

I found one quicker than I had hoped. Almost at once I came on a track which led me into a carriage-road and out of the thickets to a big clearing. The daylight had not yet wholly gone, and it guided me to two gate-posts, from which an avenue of chestnut trees led up to a great house. There were lights glimmering in the windows, and when I reached the yard and saw the size of the barns and outbuildings, I wished I had happened on a place of less pretensions. But hunger made me bold, and I tramped over the mown grass of the yard, which in the dusk I could see to be set with flower-beds, till I stood before the door of as fine a mansion as I had found in the dominion. From within came a sound of speech and laughter, and I was in half a mind to turn back to my cold quarters by the shore. I had no sooner struck the knocker than I wanted to run away.

The door was opened instantly by a tall negro in a scarlet livery. He asked no questions, but motioned me to enter as if I had been an invited guest. I followed him, wondering dolefully what sort of figure I must cut in my plain clothes soaked and stained by travel; for it was clear that I had lighted on the mansion of some rich planter, who was even now entertaining his friends. The servant led me through an outer hall into a great room full of people. A few candles in tall candlesticks burned down the length of a table, round which sat a score of gentlemen. The scarlet negro went to the tablehead, and said something to the master, who rose and came to meet me.

"I am storm-stayed," I said humbly, "and I left my boat on the shore and came inland to look for a supper."

"You shall get it," he said heartily. "Sit down, and my servants will bring you what you need."

"But I am not fit to intrude, sir. A weary traveller is no guest for such a table."

"Tush, man," he cried, "when did a Virginian think the worse of a man for his clothes? Sit down and say no more. You are heartily welcome."

He pushed me into a vacant chair at the bottom of the table, and gave some orders to the negro. Now I knew where I was, for I had seen before the noble figure of my host. This was Colonel Beverley, who in his youth had ridden with Prince Rupert, and had come to Virginia long ago in the Commonwealth time. He sat on the Council, and was the most respected of all the magnates of the dominion, for he had restrained the folly of successive Governors, and had ever teen ready to stand forth alike on behalf of the liberties of the settlers and their duties to the Crown. His name was highly esteemed at Whitehall, and more than once he had occupied the Governor's place when His Majesty was slow in filling it. His riches were large, but he was above all things a great gentleman, who had grafted on an old proud stock the tolerance and vigour of a new land.

The company had finished dining, for the table was covered with fruits and comfits, and wine in silver goblets. There was sack and madeira, and French claret, and white Rhenish, and ale and cider for those with homelier palates. I saw dimly around me the faces of the guests, for the few candles scarcely illumined the dusk of the great panelled hall hung with dark portraits. One man gave me good-evening, but as I sat at the extreme end of the table I was out of the circle of the company. They talked and laughed, and it seemed to me that I could hear women's voices at the other end. Meantime I was busy with my viands, and no man ever punished a venison pie more heartily. As I ate and drank, I smiled at the strangeness of my fortunes--to come thus straight from the wild seas and the company of outlaws into a place of silver and damask and satin coats and lace cravats and orderly wigs. The soft hum of gentlefolks' speech was all around me, those smooth Virginian voices compared with which my Scots tongue was as strident as a raven's. But as I listened, I remembered Ringan and Lawrence, and, "Ah, my silken friends," thought I, "little you know the judgment that is preparing. Some day soon, unless God is kind, there will be blood on the lace and the war-whoop in these pleasant chambers."

Then a voice said louder than the rest, "Dulcinea will sing to us. She promised this morning in the garden."

At this there was a ripple of "Bravas," and presently I heard the tuning of a lute. The low twanging went on for a little, and suddenly I was seized with a presentiment. I set down my tankard, and waited with my heart in my mouth.

Very clear and pure the voice rose, as fresh as the morning song of birds. There was youth in it and joy and pride--joy of the fairness of the earth, pride of beauty and race and strength, "_My dear and only love_" it sang, as it had sung before; but then it had been a girl's hope, and now it was a woman's certainty. At the first note, the past came back to me like yesterday. I saw the moorland gables in the rain, I heard the swirl of the tempest, I saw the elfin face in the hood which had cheered the traveller on his way. In that dim light I could not see the singer, but I needed no vision. The strangeness of the thing clutched at my heart, for here was the voice which had never been out of my ears singing again in a land far from the wet heather and the driving mists of home.

As I sat dazed and dreaming, I knew that a great thing had befallen me. For me, Andrew Garvald, the prosaic trader, coming out of the darkness into this strange company, the foundations of the world had been upset. All my cares and hopes, my gains and losses, seemed in that moment no better than dust. Love had come to me like a hurricane. From now I had but the one ambition, to hear that voice say to me and to mean it truly, "My dear and only love." I knew it was folly and a madman's dream, for I felt most deeply my common clay. What had I to offer for the heart of that proud lady? A dingy and battered merchant might as well enter a court of steel-clad heroes and contend for the love of a queen. But I was not downcast. I do not think I even wanted to hope. It was enough to know that so bright a thing was in the world, for at one stroke my drab horizon seemed to have broadened into the infinite heavens.

The song ended in another chorus of "Bravas." "Bring twenty candles, Pompey," my host called out, "and the great punch-bowl. We will pledge my lady in the old Beverley brew."

Servants set on the table a massive silver dish, into which sundry bottles of wine and spirits were poured. A mass of cut fruit and sugar was added, and the whole was set alight, and leaped almost to the ceiling in a blue flame. Colonel Beverley, with a long ladle, filled the array of glasses on a salver, which the servants carried round to the guests. Large branching candelabra had meantime been placed on the table, and in a glow of light we stood to our feet and honoured the toast.

As I stood up and looked to the table's end, I saw the dark, restless eyes and the heavy blue jowl of Governor Nicholson. He saw me, for I was alone at the bottom end, and when we were seated, he cried out to me,--

"What news of trade, Mr. Garvald? You're an active packman, for they tell me you're never off the road."

At the mention of my name every eye turned towards me, and I felt, rather than saw, the disfavour of the looks. No doubt they resented a storekeeper's intrusion into well-bred company, and some were there who had publicly cursed me for a meddlesome upstart. But I was not looking their way, but at the girl who sat on my host's right hand, and in whose dark eyes I thought I saw a spark of recognition.

She was clad in white satin, and in her hair and bosom spring flowers had been set. Her little hand played with the slim glass, and her eyes had all the happy freedom of childhood. But now she was a grown woman, with a woman's pride and knowledge of power. Her exquisite slimness and grace, amid the glow of silks and silver, gave her the air of a fairy-tale princess. There was a grave man in black sat next her, to whom she bent to speak. Then she looked towards me again, and smiled with that witching mockery which had pricked my temper in the Canongate Tolbooth.

The Governor's voice recalled me from my dream.

"How goes the Indian menace, Mr. Garvald?" he cried. "You must know," and he turned to the company, "that our friend combines commerce with high policy, and shares my apprehensions as to the safety of the dominion."

I could not tell whether he was mocking at me or not. I think he was, for Francis Nicholson's moods were as mutable as the tides. In every word of his there lurked some sour irony.

The company took the speech for satire, and many laughed. One young gentleman, who wore a purple coat and a splendid brocaded vest, laughed very loud.

"A merchant's nerves are delicate things," he said, as he fingered his cravat. "I would have said 'like a woman's,' had I not seen this very day Miss Elspeth's horsemanship." And he bowed to her very neatly.

Now I was never fond of being quizzed, and in that company I could not endure it.

"We have a saying, sir," I said, "that the farmyard fowl does not fear the eagle. The men who look grave just now are not those who live snugly in coast manors, but the outland folk who have to keep their doors with their own hands."

It was a rude speech, and my hard voice and common clothes made it ruder. The gentleman fired in a second, and with blazing eyes asked me if I intended an insult. I was about to say that he could take what meaning he pleased, when an older man broke in with, "Tush, Charles, let the fellow alone. You cannot quarrel with a shopman."

"I thank you, George, for a timely reminder," said my gentleman, and he turned away his head with a motion of sovereign contempt.

"Come, come, sirs," Colonel Beverley cried, "remember the sacred law of hospitality. You are all my guests, and you have a lady here, whose bright eyes should be a balm for controversies."

The Governor had sat with his lips closed and his eyes roving the table. He dearly loved a quarrel, and was minded to use me to bait those whom he liked little.

"What is all this talk about gentility?" he said. "A man is as good as his brains and his right arm, and no better. I am of the creed of the Levellers, who would have a man stand stark before his Maker."

He could not have spoken words better calculated to set the company against me. My host looked glum and disapproving, and all the silken gentlemen murmured. The Virginian cavalier had as pretty a notion of the worth of descent as any Highland land-louper. Indeed, to be honest, I would have controverted the Governor myself, for I have ever held that good blood is a mighty advantage to its possessor.

Suddenly the grave man who sat by Miss Elspeth's side spoke up. By this time I had remembered that he was Doctor James Blair, the lately come commissary of the diocese of London, who represented all that Virginia had in the way of a bishop. He had a shrewd, kind face, like a Scots dominie, and a mouth that shut as tight as the Governor's.

"Your tongue proclaims you my countryman, sir," he said. "Did I hear right that your name was Garvald?"

"Of Auchencairn?" he asked, when I had assented.

"Of Auchencairn, or what is left of it," I said.

"Then, gentlemen," he said, addressing the company, "I can settle the dispute on the facts, without questioning his Excellency's dogma. Mr. Garvald is of as good blood as any in Scotland. And that," said he firmly, "means that in the matter of birth he can hold up his head in any company in any Christian land."

I do not think this speech made any man there look on me with greater favour, but it enormously increased my own comfort. I have never felt such a glow of gratitude as then filled my heart to the staid cleric. That he was of near kin to Miss Elspeth made it tenfold sweeter. I forgot my old clothes and my uncouth looks; I forgot, too, my irritation with the brocaded gentleman. If her kin thought me worthy, I cared not a bodle for the rest of mankind.

Presently we rose from table, and Colonel Beverley summoned us to the Green Parlour, where Miss Elspeth was brewing a dish of chocolate, then a newfangled luxury in the dominion. I would fain have made my escape, for if my appearance was unfit for a dining-hall, it was an outrage in a lady's withdrawing-room. But Doctor Blair came forward to me and shook me warmly by the hand, and was full of gossip about Clydesdale, from which apparently he had been absent these twenty years. "My niece bade me bring you to her," he said. "She, poor child, is a happy exile, but she has now and then an exile's longings. A Scots tongue is pleasant in her ear."

So I perforce had to follow him into a fine room with an oaken floor, whereon lay rich Smyrna rugs and the skins of wild beasts from the wood. There was a prodigious number of soft couches of flowered damask, and little tables inlaid with foreign woods and jeweller's work. 'Twas well enough for your fine gentleman in his buckled shoes and silk stockings to enter such a place, but for myself, in my coarse boots, I seemed like a colt in a flower garden. The girl sat by a brazier of charcoal, with the scarlet-coated negro at hand doing her commands. She was so busy at the chocolate making that when her uncle said, "Elspeth, I have brought you Mr. Garvald," she had no hand to give me. She looked up and smiled, and went on with the business, while I stood awkwardly by, the scorn of the assured gentlemen around me.

By and by she spoke: "You and I seem fated to meet in odd places. First it was at Carnwath in the rain, and then at the Cauldstaneslap in a motley company. Then I think it was in the Tolbooth, Mr. Garvald, when you were very gruff to your deliverer. And now we are both exiles, and once more you step in like a bogle out of the night. Will you taste my chocolate?"

She served me first, and I could see how little the favour was to the liking of her little retinue of courtiers. My silken gentleman, whose name was Grey, broke in on us abruptly.

"What is this story, sir, of Indian dangers? You are new to the country, or you would know that it is the old cry of the landless and the lawless. Every out-at-elbows republican makes it a stick to beat His Majesty."

"Are you a republican, Mr. Garvald?" she asked. "Now that I remember, I have seen you in Whiggamore company."

"Why, no," I said. "I do not meddle with politics. I am a merchant, and am well content with any Government that will protect my trade and my person."

A sudden perversity had taken me to show myself at my most prosaic and unromantic. I think it was the contrast with the glamour of those fine gentlemen. I had neither claim nor desire to be of their company, and to her I could make no pretence.

He laughed scornfully. "Yours is a noble cause," he said. "But you may sleep peacefully in your bed, sir. Be assured that there are a thousand gentlemen of Virginia whose swords will leap from their scabbards at a breath of peril, on behalf of their women and their homes. And these," he added, taking snuff from a gold box, "are perhaps as potent spurs to action as the whims of a busybody or the gains of a house-keeping trader."

I was determined not to be provoked, so I answered nothing. But Miss Elspeth opened her eyes and smiled sweetly upon the speaker.

"La, Mr. Grey, I protest you are too severe. Busybody--well, it may be. I have found Mr. Garvald very busy in other folks' affairs. But I do assure you he is no house-keeper, I have seen him in desperate conflict with savage men, and even with His Majesty's redcoats. If trouble ever comes to Virginia, you will find him, I doubt not, a very bold moss-trooper."

It was the, light, laughing tone I remembered well, but now it did not vex me. Nothing that she could say or do could break the spell that had fallen on my heart, "I pray it may be so," said Mr. Grey as he turned aside.

By this time the Governor had come forward, and I saw that my presence was no longer desired. I wanted to get back to Shalah and solitude. The cold bed on the shore would be warmed for me by happy dreams. So I found my host, and thanked him for my entertainment. He gave me good-evening hastily, as if he were glad to be rid of me.

At the hall door some one tapped me on the shoulder, and I turned to find my silken cavalier.

"It seems you are a gentleman, sir," he said, "so I desire a word with you. Your manners at table deserved a whipping, but I will condescend to forget them. But a second offence shall be duly punished." He spoke in a high, lisping voice, which was the latest London importation.

I looked him square in the eyes. He was maybe an inch taller than me, a handsome fellow, with a flushed, petulant face and an overweening pride in his arched brows.

"By all means let us understand each other," I said. "I have no wish to quarrel with you. Go your way and I will go mine, and there need be no trouble."

"That is precisely the point," said he. "I do not choose that your way should take you again to the side of Miss Elspeth Blair. If it does, we shall quarrel."

It was the height of flattery. At last I had found a fine gentleman who did me the honour to regard me with jealous eyes. I laughed loudly with delight.

He turned and strolled back to the company. Still laughing, I passed from the house, lit my lantern, and plunged into the sombre woods.

“One work. Many languages. One reading experience.”