It is another mercy, too, that in our age we learn to make the best of what aforetime might be ill to thole, as Bell made fine new garments out of old ones faded by turning them outside in and adding frills and flounces. Bud’s absence early ceased to be deplorable, since it wakened cheerful expectations not to be experienced had she stayed at home; gave rise to countless fond contrivances for her happiness in exile; and two or three times a-year to periods of bliss, when her vacations gave the house of Dyce the very flower of ecstasy. Her weekly letters of themselves were almost compensation for her absence. On the days of their arrival, Peter the post would come blithely whistling with his M.C. step to the lawyer’s kitchen window before he went to the castle itself, defying all routine and the laws of the Postmaster-General, for he knew Miss Dyce would be waiting feverishly, having likely dreamt the night before of happy things that—dreams going by contraries, as we all of us know in Scotland—might portend the most dreadful tidings.

Bud’s envelope was always on the top of his budget. For the sake of it alone (it sometimes seemed to Peter and those who got it) had the mail come splashing through the night,—the lawyer’s big blue envelopes, as it were, had got but a friendly lift through the courtesy of clerks in Edinburgh, and the men on the railway train, and the lad who drove the gig from Maryfield. What were big blue envelopes of the business world compared with the modest little square of grey with Lennox Dyce’s writing on it?“Here’s the usual! Pretty thick to-day!” would Peter say, with a smack of satisfaction on the window-sash. Ah, those happy Saturdays! Everybody knew about them. “And how’s hersel’?” the bell-ringer would ask in the by-going, not altogether because his kindly interest led to an eye less strict on his lazy moods in the garden. One Fair day, when Maggie White’s was irresistible, it rang so merrily with drovers, and he lost the place again, he stopped the lawyer on the street to ask him what Miss Lennox thought of all this argument about the Churches, seeing she was in the thick of it in Edinburgh.

“Never you mind the argument, Will,” said Daniel Dyce,—“you do your duty by the Auld Kirk bell; and as for the Free folk’s quarrelling, amang them be’t!”

“But can you tell me, Mr D-D-Dyce,” said Wanton Wully, with as much assurance as if he was prepared to pay by the Table of Fees, “what’s the difference between the U.F.’s and the Frees? I’ve looked at it from every point, and I canna see it.”

“Come and ask me some day when you’re sober,” said the lawyer, and Wanton Wully snorted.

“If I was sober,” said he, “I wouldna want to ken—I wouldna give a curse.”

Yet each time Bud came home she seemed, to the mind of her Auntie Bell, a little farther off from them—a great deal older, a great deal less dependent, making for womanhood in a manner that sometimes was astounding, as when sober issues touched her, set her thinking, made her talk in fiery ardours. Aunt Ailie gloried in that rapid growth; Aunt Bell lamented, and spoke of brains o’ertaxed and fevered, and studies that were dangerous. She made up her mind a score of times to go herself to Edinburgh and give a warning to the teachers; but the weeks passed, and the months, and by-and-by the years, till almost three were gone, and the Edinburgh part of Lennox’s education was drawing to a close, and the warning visit was still to pay.It was then, one Easter, came The Macintosh.

Bell and Ailie were out that afternoon for their daily walk in the woods or along the shore, when Mr Dyce returned from the Sheriff Court alert and buoyant, feeling much refreshed at the close of an encounter with a lawyer who, he used to say, was better at debating than himself, having more law books in his possession and a louder voice. Letting himself in with his pass-key, he entered the parlour, and was astonished to find a stranger, who rose at his approach and revealed a figure singular though not unpleasing. There was something ludicrous in her manner as she moved a step or two from the chair in which she had been sitting. Small, and silver-grey in the hair, with a cheek that burned—it must be with embarrassment—between a rather sallow neck and sunken temples, and wearing smoked spectacles with rims of tortoise-shell, she would have attracted attention anywhere even if her dress had been less queer. Queer it was, but in what manner Daniel Dyce was not the person to distinguish. To him there was about it nothing definitely peculiar, except that the woman wore a crinoline, a Paisley shawl of silken white, and such a bonnet as he had not seen since Grandma Buntain’s time.

“Be seated, ma’am,” said he; “I did not know I had the honour of a visitor,” and he gave a second, keener glance, that swept the baffling figure from the flounced green poplin to the snow-white lappet of her bonnet. A lady certainly,—that was in the atmosphere, however odd might be her dress. “Where in the world has this one dropped from?” he asked himself, and waited an explanation.

“Oh, Mr Dyce!” said the lady in a high, shrill voice, that plainly told she never came from south of the Border, and with a certain trepidation in her manner; “I’m feared I come at an inconvenient time to ye, and I maybe should hae bided at your office; but they tell’t me ye were out at what they ca’d a Pleading Diet. I’ve come about my mairrage.”“Your marriage!” said the lawyer, scarcely hiding his surprise.

“Yes, my mairrage!” she repeated sharply, drawing the silken shawl about her shoulders, bridling. “There’s naething droll, I hope and trust, in a maiden lady ca’in’ on a writer for his help about her settlements!”

“Not at all—not at all, ma’am,” said Daniel Dyce. “I’m honoured in your confidence.” And he pushed his spectacles up on his brow that he might see her less distinctly and have the less inclination to laugh at such an eccentric figure.

She broke into a torrent of explanation. “Ye must excuse me, Mr Dyce, if I’m put-about and gey confused, for it’s little I’m acquent wi’ lawyers. A’ my days I’ve heard o’ naething but their quirks, for they maistly rookit my grandfaither. And I cam’ wi’ the coach frae Maryfield, and my heart’s in a palpitation wi’ sic briengin’ and bangin’ ower heughs and hills—” She placed a mittened hand on a much-laced stomacher, and sighed profoundly.

“Perhaps—perhaps a glass of wine—” began the lawyer, with his eye on the bell-pull, and a notion in his head that wine and a little seed-cake someway went with crinolines and the age of the Paisley shawl.

“No, no!” she cried extravagantly. “I never lip it; I’m—I’m in the Band o’ Hope.”

The lawyer started, and scanned her again through his glasses, with a genial chuckling crow. “So’s most maiden ladies, ma’am,” said he. “I’m glad to congratulate you on your hopes being realised.”

“It remains to be seen,” said the visitor. “Gude kens what may be the upshot. The maist deleeberate mairrage maun be aye a lottery, as my Auntie Grizel o’ the Whinhill used to say; and I canna plead that mine’s deleeberate, for the man just took a violent fancy the very first nicht he set his een on me, fell whummlin’ at my feet, and wasna to be put aff wi’ ‘No’ or ‘Maybe.’ We’re a puir weak sex, Mr Dyce, and men’s sae domineerin’!”

She ogled him through her clouded glasses: her arch smile showed a blemish of two front teeth amissing. He gave a nod of sympathy, and she was off again. “And to let ye ken the outs and ins o’t, Mr Dyce, there’s a bit o’ land near Perth that’s a’ that’s left o’ a braw estate my forebears squandered in the Darien. What I want to ken is, if I winna could hinder him that’s my fiancÉ frae dicin’ or drinkin’ ’t awa’ ance he got me mairried to him? I wad be sair vexed at ony such calamity, for my family hae aye been barons.”

“Ance a baron aye a baron,” said the lawyer, dropping into her own broad Scots.

“Yes, Mr Dyce, that’s a’ very fine; but baron or baroness, if there’s sic a thing, ’s no great figure wantin’ a bit o’ grun’ to gang wi’ the title; and John Cleghorn—that’s my intended’s name—has been a gey throughither chiel in his time by a’ reports, and I doubt wi’ men it’s the aulder the waur.”

“I hope in this case it’ll be the aulder the wiser, Miss—” said the lawyer, and hung unheeded on the note of interrogation.

“I’ll run nae risks if I can help it,” said the lady emphatically; “and I’ll no’ put my trust in the Edinburgh lawyers either: they’re a’ tarred wi’ the ae stick, or I sair misjudge them. But I’m veesitin’ a cousin owerby at Maryfield, and I’m tell’t there’s no’ a man that’s mair dependable in a’ the shire than yoursel’, so I just cam’ ower ains errand for a consultation. Oh, that unco’ coach! the warld’s gane wud, Mr Dyce, wi’ hurry and stramash, and Scotland’s never been the same since— But there! I’m awa’ frae my story; if it’s the Lord’s will that I’m to marry Johnny Cleghorn, what comes o’ Kaims? Will he be owner o’t?”

“Certainly not, ma’am,” said Mr Dyce, with a gravity well preserved considering his inward feelings. “Even before the Married Women’s Property Act, his jus mariti, as we ca’ it, gave him only his wife’s personal and moveable estate. There is no such thing as communio bonorum—as community of goods—between husband and wife in Scotland.”

“And he canna sell Kaims on me?”

“No; it’s yours and your assigns ad perpetuam remanentiam, being feudal right.”

“I wish ye wad speak in honest English, like mysel’, Mr Dyce,” said the lady sharply. “I’ve forgotten a’ my Laiten, and the very sound o’t gars my heid bizz. I doubt it’s the lawyer’s way o’ gettin’ round puir helpless bodies.”

“It’s scarcely that,” said Mr Dyce, laughing. “It’s the only chance we get to air auld Mr Trayner, and it’s thought to be imposin’. Ad perpetuam remanentiam just means to remain for ever.”

“I thocht that maybe John might hae the poo’er to treat Kaims as my tocher.”

“Even if he had,” said Mr Dyce, “a dot, or dos, or tocher, in the honest law of Scotland, was never the price o’ the husband’s hand; he could only use the fruits o’t. He is not entitled to dispose of it, and must restore it intact if unhappily the marriage should at any time be dissolved.”

“Dissolved!” cried the lady. “Fegs! ye’re in an awfu’ hurry, and the ring no’ bought yet. Supposin’ I was deein’ first?”

“In that case I presume that you would have the succession settled on your husband.”

“On Johnny Cleghorn! Catch me! There’s sic a thing as—as—as bairns, Mr Dyce,” and the lady simpered coyly, while the lawyer rose hurriedly to fumble with some books and hide his confusion at such a wild conjecture. He was relieved by the entrance of Bell and Ailie, who stood amazed at the sight of the odd and unexpected visitor.

“My sisters,” said the lawyer hastily. “Miss—Miss—I did not catch the name.”

“Miss Macintosh,” said the stranger nervously, and Bell cried out immediately, “I was perfectly assured of it! Lennox has often spoken of you, and I’m so glad to see you. I did not know you were in the neighbourhood.”

Ailie was delighted with so picturesque a figure. She could scarcely keep her eyes off the many-flounced, expansive gown of poplin, the stomacher, the ponderous ear-rings, the great cameo brooch, the long lace mittens, the Paisley shawl, the neat poke-bonnet, and the fresh old face marred only by the spectacles, and the gap where the teeth were missing.

“I have just been consultin’ Mr Dyce on my comin’ mairrage,” said The Macintosh; and at this intelligence from a piece of such antiquity Miss Bell’s face betrayed so much astonishment that Dan and Ailie almost forgot their good manners.

“Oh! if it’s business—” said Bell, and rose to go; but The Macintosh put a hand on her sleeve and stayed her.

“Ye needna fash to leave, Miss Dyce,” said she. “A’thing’s settled. It seems that Johnny Cleghorn canna ca’ a rig o’ Kaims his ain when he mairries me, and that was a’ I cam’ to see about. Oh, it’s a mischancy thing a mairrage, Miss Dyce; maist folk gang intill’t heels-ower-hurdies, but I’m in an awfu’ swither, and havena a mither to guide me.”

“Keep me!” said Miss Bell, out of all patience at such maidenly apprehensions, “ye’re surely auld enough to ken your ain mind. I hope the guidman’s worthy.”

“He’s no’ that ill—as men-folk gang,” said The Macintosh resignedly. “He’s as fat’s creish, and has a craighlin’ cough, the body, and he’s faur frae bonny, and he hasna a bawbee o’ his ain, and sirs! what a reputation! But a man’s a man, Miss Dyce, and time’s aye fleein’.”

At such a list of disabilities in a husband the Dyces lost all sense of the proprieties and broke into laughter, in which the lady joined them, shaking in her arm-chair. Bell was the first to recover with a guilty sense that this was very bad for Daniel’s business. She straightened her face and was about to make apologies, when Footles bounded in at the open door, to throw himself at the feet of The Macintosh and wave a joyous tail. But he was not content there. In spite of her resistance, he must be in her lap, and then, for the first time, Bell and Ailie noticed a familiar cadence in the stranger’s laugh.

Dan rose and clapped her on the back. “Well done, Bud!” said he. “Ye had us a’; but Footles wasna to be swindled wi’ an auld wife’s goon,” and he gently drew the spectacles from the laughing eyes of his naughty niece!

“Oh, you rogue!” cried Auntie Ailie.

“You wretch!” cried Auntie Bell. “I might have known your cantrips. Where in the world did you get these clothes?”

Bud sailed across the room like a cutter yacht and put her arms about her neck. “Didn’t you know me?” she asked.

“How could I know you, dressed up like that? And your teeth—you imp! they’re blackened; and your neck—you jad! it’s painted; and—oh, lassie, lassie! Awa’! awa’! the deil’s ower grit wi’ ye!”

“Didn’t you know me, Aunt Ailie?” asked Bud.

“Not in the least,” said Ailie, taking the droll old figure in her arms. “Perhaps I might have known you if I didn’t think it was to-morrow you were coming.”

“It was to have been to-morrow; but the measles have broken out in school, and I came a day earlier, and calculated I’d just hop in and surprise you all. Didn’t you guess, Uncle Dan?”

“Not at first,” said he. “I’ll admit I was fairly deceived, but when you talked about being in the Band of Hope I saw at a shot through The Macintosh. I hope you liked my Latin, Bud.”