THESE days passed on in suspense and anxiety to Mrs. Catherine. Uncertain what to believe or disbelieve, concerning the young man in whose fortunes she was so deeply interested, her strong spirit chafed and struggled in its compulsory inactivity. Nor did Lewis’s report of Mrs. Duncombe’s friends, in any degree still her anxiety. Fashionable ladies stood low in Mrs. Catherine’s opinion at all times; and her strong nationality aggravated tenfold her dislike to fashionable ladies in Paris—French or semi-French. Had it not been for Alice, Mrs. Catherine herself would have been on her way to Paris ere now. But unwilling to send the girl abruptly home, and riveted besides by a hundred little ties, which made her absence from the Tower (she had not left it since her sorrowful journey, thirty years’ ago, from Sholto’s island grave) seem an impossibility; she waited—we are constrained to admit, not patiently—for further tidings, inclined to hope sometimes that Mr. Foreman’s benevolent surmise might be well-founded; and anon, cast down, and venting her grief in a show of bitter indignation at “the prodigal that could sell his birthright.”

Many solitary hours were spent during that anxious fortnight (for mails travelled tardily thirty years ago) in the little room—and many wrestlings of secret, silent prayer these narrow walls were witness to. Jacky, gliding hither and thither in her elfin ubiquity, could hear Mrs. Catherine’s step shake the floor; and listened in tremulous awe and reverence sometimes to those often-repeated words, the burden of Mrs. Catherine’s anxiety: “Isabel Balfour’s one son—that might have been your firstborn, Sholto Douglas!” But Jacky, with a sentiment of honor peculiar to herself, kept her knowledge of Mrs. Catherine’s trouble, jealously within her own mind, and in the intervals of her heterogeneous occupations, and no less heterogeneous studies, wove dreams of that young Laird of Strathoran, over whom Mrs. Catherine prayed and mourned—and creating for his especial service, some such wondrous vassal as the Genii of Aladdin, conjured Sholto Douglas back to life and lands again, and made the prodigal his heir and son.

Little Bessie, Alice Aytoun’s maid, did not know what to make of that strange, thin, angular girl, with her dark keen face, and eccentric motions, and singular language. Bessie, plump, rosy and good-humored, looked on in wondering silence as Jacky sat on the carpet in the library, bent almost double over some mighty old volume from those heavy and well-filled shelves—was inclined to laugh sometimes, yet checking herself in mysterious reverence, revolved in her mind the possibility of Mrs. Catherine’s frequent epithet “you elf”—having in it some shadow of truth. Bessie had read fairy tales in her day, and knew that in these authentic histories there were such things as changelings—could this strange Jacky be one? The flying footsteps, and bold leaps and climbings, which Bessie did not venture to emulate, gave some color to the supposition, so did these out-of-the-way studies and singular expressions; but Jacky withal was not malicious, nor evil-tempered, and Bessie paused before condemning her. On consulting Johnnie Halflin on the subject, she found him as much puzzled as herself.

“For ye see,” said Johnnie, “she was never at the schule—and look till her reading! I was three—four year at it mysel, the haill winter; for ye ken in this part, Bessie, it’s no’ like a toun—there’s the beasts to herd all the summer and other turns, till the shearing’s by; but I wad rather hae a day’s kemping with that illwilly nowt that winna bide out o’ the corn, than sit down to the books wi’ Jacky. She kens best herself where she learnt it.”

“And look how she speaks,” ejaculated Bessie.

“Speaks! ye have not heard her get to her English—it’s like listening to the leddies. No Mrs. Catherine ye see, for one canna think what words she says—ye just ken when ye hear her, that ye maun do what ye’re bidden in a moment; but Jacky! ye would think she got it a’ out of books—whiles, when ye anger her—”

“Eh, Johnnie! yonder she is, coming fleeing down the hill,” cried little Bessie in alarm, as a flying figure paused on a ridge of the steep eminence above them, and drew itself back for a final race to the bottom. “Look! ye would think she never touched the ground.”

“Whist, whist,” said Johnnie, apprehensively, “she can hear ony sound about the place, as quick as Oscar, and Oscar’s the best watch in the parish—be quiet, Bessie.”

The youthful gossips were standing, during their gloaming hour of leisure, at the back of a knot of outhouses, barns, and stables, and Jacky came sweeping down upon them out of breath.

“Are you there, Johnnie Halflin? is that you, Bessie? Has my mother been in the barn yet?—whisht, there she’s speaking.”

“No, it’s Jean,” said the lad; “the cow’s better, and Jean said she would never let on there had been onything the matter wi’t, or else the puir beast would be killed wi’ physic. Ye needna tell on her, Jacky—ye wadna like to harm a bonnie cow like yon, yoursel.”

“And we’ll no’ tell on you,” added Bessie.

“I’m no caring,” was the quick response, “whether ye tell on me or no—only if you do, Bessie, I’ll never be friends with ye again; and if you do, Johnnie, ye’ll catch grief. Guess where I’ve been.”

“Scooring ower the hills on a heather besom,” said Johnnie, “seeking the fairies—they say ye’re one yoursel.”

A sweep of Jacky’s energetic arm sent Johnnie staggering down the path.

“I have been down at Robert Melder’s mill, and there’s a bairn there—a little girl—Bessie, ye never saw the like of it!”

“Is’t a’ dressed in green, and riding on a white powny?” said Mrs. Catherine’s youthful servingman, returning to the charge.

“Ye’re a fuil,” retorted Jacky, flushing indignantly, “how do the like of you ken what’s true and what’s a fable? There was a lady once, that led a lion in her hand—you dinna ken what that means—and if there were gentle spirits lang syne in the air, what do you ken about them? Bessie, come with me the morn, and see the little bairn. I like to hear her speak; she says words like what you hear in dreams.”

Jacky’s companions indulged in a smothered laugh.

“Has she wings?” asked the lad.

“I will throw ye into the Oran, Johnnie Halflin,” cried Jacky, in wrath; “if ye do not hold your peace in a minute. Miss Anne saved her life, and she speaks a strange language that naebody kens; and she’s from a strange country; and she’s like—”

“Oh, I saw her mysel,” interrupted Johnnie, “a bit wee smout, wi’ her frock burning—saved her life! how grand we’re speaking! I could have done’t mysel, a’ that Miss Anne did, and made nae work about it—only I had Merkland’s horse to haud.”

“I have seen a face like it,” said Jacky, thoughtfully, “a’ but the eyes.”

“Eh, and isna Mr. Ross a fine young gentleman?” said little Bessie. Bessie was glad to seize upon the first tangible point.

“How would ye like to bide constant in Strathoran, Bessie,” said Johnnie Halflin, “down bye at Merkland? Eh, disna Mr. Lewis gie weary looks up at the easter tower?”

Bessie bridled, and drew herself up with pleased consciousness, as her mistress’s representative.

“I wonder at ye, Johnnie! how can ye speak such nonsense?”

“Is’t Miss Aytoun Mr. Lewis looks up for?” inquired Jacky.

Her companions answered with a laugh.

“I think,” said the boy, “for my ain part, that there’s not a young leddy in a’ Strathoran like Miss Aytoun. She’s out-o’-sight bonnier than Miss Anne.”

Jacky pushed him indignantly away.

“A fine judge you are. Like a big turnip your ain sel. A clumsy Swede, like what they give to the kye. But, Bessie, do you think Mr. Lewis is in—” Jacky hesitated, her own singular romance making it sacrilege to speak the usual word in presence of those ruder comrades: “do ye think Mr. Lewis likes Miss Alice? he’s no courting her?”

Bessie smiled, blushed, and looked dignified.

“O, Jacky, how do I ken?”

“Does Miss Alice like him?”

“Jacky, what a question! Miss Alice disna tell me.”

Jacky looked at her inquisitively, and finishing her share of the conversation in her own abrupt fashion, shot into the byre to see the ailing cow, from whence she soon after stole into the Tower, where an irksome hour of compulsory stocking-knitting, in the comfortable housekeeper’s-room of Mrs. Euphan Morison, awaited Mrs. Euphan’s reluctant daughter. The room was a very cosy room in all things, but its disagreeable odor of dried and drying herbs; and Jacky, after a reproof from her mother, so habitual that it had sunk into a formula, took her customary seat and work. Bessie joined her, by-and-bye, with some little piece of sewing that she had to do for Miss Aytoun, and Johnnie Halflin, less dignified, betook himself to the kitchen fire, to read, or joke, or doze the evening out.

The time drew near when Mrs. Catherine’s doubts concerning Archibald Sutherland were to be solved. The strong old lady grew nervous on these dim mornings, and opened her letter-bag with a tremor in her hand; but when the latest day had come, there was still no letter from Paris. Impatiently she tossed them out. There were two or three letters of applicants for her vacant farm, the closely-written sheet of home-news for Alice, business-notes of various kinds, but nothing from the prodigal, whose interests lay so near her heart. She lifted them all separately again, turned out the bag—in vain. Her clear eye had made no blunder in its first quick investigation. Mrs. Catherine’s brow darkened. Alice hardly dared to approach timidly, and withdraw her own letter from the little heap. Not that the face of her kinswoman expressed anger, but it bore the impress of some unknown mental struggle, which Alice, in the serene light of her girlish happiness, did not even know by name.

So Alice stole up stairs to the fireside of her bright dressing-room, to read the long mother’s letter, overflowing with tender counsel and affection, and to weave fair dreams—dreams of joy and honor to that gentle mother, and all things pleasant and prosperous to James—round one unacknowledged centre of her own. Pleasant are those bright dream-mists of youthful reverie, with their vague fairy-land of gladness—pleasant to weave their tinted web, indefinitely rich and glorious, over that universe of golden air, with its long withdrawing vistas—the wealthy future of youth.

But Mrs. Catherine sat still alone, her head bent forward, her keen eyes looking into the blank depths of a mirror on the wall, as though, like the hapless lady in the tale, she could read the wished-for tidings there. The door opened slowly. Jacky, with some strange intuitive knowledge of her mistress’s anxiety, had been on the outlook from the window of the west room, and had now glided down stairs to report. Mrs. Catherine raised her head sharply as the girl’s prefatory “If you please!” fell on her ear.

“What ist’, you elf?”

“If you please,” continued Jacky, “it’s Mr. Ferguson, the Strathoran factor, gallopping up the waterside like to break his neck!”

Mrs. Catherine started to her feet.

“Take him to the library—I will be down myself in a moment. Are you lingering, you fairy? Away with you!”

Jacky vanished, and Mrs. Catherine walked hastily through the room.

“He will have gotten tidings!” And then she was still for a moment, in communion with One mightier than man, nerving herself for the “tidings,” whatever they might be.

Jacky stood at the open door as Mr. Ferguson gallopped up, but he did notice the unusual haste with which he was hurried into the library. A cold dew was on his honest forehead; regret and grief were in his kindly heart; the familiar ordinary things about him bore a strange look of change. The difference was in his own agitated eyes, but he did not think of that. Mrs. Catherine stood before him, calm and stern, in the library.

“Mr. Ferguson, you have gotten tidings?”

The firm, strong figure reeled in Mr. Ferguson’s dizzy eyes.

“Mr. Ferguson, you are troubled. Has the prodigal done his worst? Sit down and calm yourself. I am waiting to hear?”

The factor sat down. Mrs. Catherine did not, but, clasping her hands tightly together, stood before him and waited.

“I have bad news, Mrs. Catherine,” said Mr. Ferguson; “worse news, a hundred times, than ever I suspected—than ever you could expect. Strathoran is fallen—ruined! No hope—no possibility of saving him! It is all over!” And the strong man groaned.

“How and wherefore?” said Mrs. Catherine, sternly.

“He has sold his estate—parted with his home and his land to some titled sharper in Paris. Sold! he has done worse—still more dishonorable and fatal than that, he has gambled it away; what his father spent years to redeem, and set free for him, he has staked on the chances of a game. Bear with me, Mrs. Catherine, if I speak bitterly. The young man has disappointed all my hopes—ruined himself—what will become of him?”

Mrs. Catherine stood with her head bowed down, but otherwise firmly erect, and silent.

“What will he do?” repeated the distressed factor, “what can he do? land and name, fortune and character, all lost. What has he left, as he says, but despair—with his prospects too, his fair beginning. O, it is enough to make a man distracted! What have they done, that unhappy race, that they should be constantly thus—father and son, a wise man and a prodigal, the one wasting his substance and his inheritance, the other denying himself the lawful pleasures of a just life to win it back again.”

“Comfort yourself, Robert Ferguson,” said Mrs. Catherine, bitterly, as drawing forward a chair with emphatic rapidity, she seated herself at the table, “there will be no son of the name again to waste years in building up the house of Strathoran: their history has come to an end—fitly ended in a rioter and a prodigal.”

The factor looked up deprecatingly, the very words which his excitement brought to his own lips, sounding harsh from another’s.

“Mrs. Catherine, Mr. Archibald is young. When other lads were leaving school or entering college, he was launched upon the world his own master, with a great income and a large estate.—You know how easily the light spirit of youth is moved, but you cannot know how the way of a young man is hedged in with temptations—Mrs. Catherine!” the factor raised his hand in appeal.

“Speak not to me,” said Mrs. Catherine, “I know! yes truly, I know more than you think, or give me credit for. Temptations! and what is obedience that has never been tried, or strength that has not been exercised in needful resistance? I bid ye listen to me, Robert Ferguson—was there not a test appointed in Eden? and would you set youself to say that the fool of a woman (that I should say so, who am of her lineage and blood!) might be justified for her ill-doing, because the fruit hung fair upon the tree, and tempted the wandering eye of her? Think better of my judgment and bring no such pleas to me.”

“What can I bring? What can I say?” said Mr. Ferguson, in a low voice. “Is he to be left to live or die, as he best can, in yon strange country? Are we to let him sink into a professional gamester, like the men who have ruined him? I speak wildly.—He would never do that. I myself must seek, in some other place, a livelihood for my family; and I will get it; for my work is clear before me, and it is known that I can do what I undertake; but for him, Mrs. Catherine, with no friend in this wide world but yourself, who can give him efficient help—with not an acre but these poor lands of Loelyin and Lochend, which are still entailed; and, worse than all that, with his best years lost, his principles unsettled, and a stain upon his name—what is to become of him?”

“He will drink the beverage he has brewed,” said Mrs. Catherine, harshly. “He will have the reward of the waster, as I have told you before now. Let him take his wages—let him want now, as he has sinfully wasted. It is his righteous hire and reward.”

“And you can see that, can think of that, and not stretch out a hand to him?” cried the factor, nervously, as he rose from his chair. “Except my hand and my head, Mrs. Catherine Douglas, I have no inheritance; and your estate yields gold to you, greater every year; but, before I see want come to Strathoran’s son, I will labor night and day. The professions are open to him yet.—His mother’s uncle was a Lord of Session; his father’s cousin was the greatest physician in Edinburgh. I bid you good morning, Mrs. Catherine. I have to write to Mr. Archibald, without loss of time.”

“Sit down upon your seat, this moment,” said Mrs. Catherine, authoritatively, “and do not speak to me like a fool, Robert Ferguson. Let me hear Archie Sutherland’s story, the worst and the best of it; and spend a pound of your own siller on the rioter, at your peril! As if I did not know one lad at the college was enough for any man. Sit down upon your seat, and tell me the whole story, as I bid you, this moment; or I vow to you, that your young advocate, if he had his gown the morn, shall get no pleas of mine!”

Mr. Ferguson sat down, well pleased, and taking out a letter, laid it silently before Mrs. Catherine. The letter was long, blurred, uneven, and written, as it seemed, in hurried intervals, with breaks and incoherent dashes of the pen between. It was not either very clear or very coherent; but it told how rent and distracted the writer’s heart and spirit were, and what a ceaseless struggle raged and contended there. The large soft folds of Mrs. Catherine’s shawl shook as if a wind had stirred them, but she did not speak; the moisture gathered thick beneath her large eyelid, but was not shed, for Mrs. Catherine was not given to tears. At last she closed the letter carefully, occupying much more time in the operation than was necessary, and endeavored to assume her former caustic tone to hide her graver emotions. “A fine story to come to a gentlewoman withal! well, Mr. Ferguson, and what is it your purpose that I should do for your rioter?”

“I do not know—I have not been able to think,” said the factor, himself moved even to weeping: “that something must be done, and that immediately, is clear. If I had not been coming to you for assistance, Mrs. Catherine, I should have come for advice, for how to proceed I cannot see.”

There was a considerable pause—at length, Mrs. Catherine started from her seat and resumed her quick pacing of the room.

“Wherefore are we losing time—send a message home, to Woodsmuir to bid them put up a change of apparel for you; ride into Portoran and get what siller will be needful—do not be scrupulous—and go your ways this very day, or, if it be too far spent, at the latest the morn, to the prodigal. I would go myself, but the witless youth, as I see by his letter, is feared for me, and you can maybe travel with less delay. Bring him home. Strathoran can shelter him no longer, but the dwelling-place of Sholto Douglas can never be closed upon Isabel Balfour’s son. I say to you, lose no time, Robert Ferguson.” Mrs. Catherine rang the bell energetically. “Write to your wife about the needful raiment. Archie Sutherland has slept in young Robert’s cradle. She will not grudge the trouble.”

Mr. Ferguson did not wait to reflect, but with all speed, drew paper and ink towards him and began to write.

“Let Andrew or Johnnie be ready in a moment to ride to Woodsmuir,” said Mrs. Catherine, as Jacky appeared at the door; “and tell your mother to send in refreshments for Mr. Ferguson. Begone, you imp—what are you waiting for?”

“If you please,” said Jacky, “it’s Mr. Foreman himsel in the gig—will I bring him in?” and, without waiting for an answer, the girl disappeared.

“Mr. Foreman himself,” repeated Mrs. Catherine. “What new trouble is coming now?—they are ever in troops.”

Mr. Ferguson raised his head uneasily and paused in his writing. The excited curiosity of both suggesting some further aggravation of the great misfortunes they already knew.

Mr. Foreman entered the room gravely, and with care in his face—greeted Mrs. Catherine in silence, and starting, when he saw Mr. Ferguson, asked; “It is true, then?”

“True?—Ay, beyond doubt or hoping,” said Mrs. Catherine, bitterly. “The prodigal has made an end of his house and name. I was right, Mr. Foreman, and you were wrong. The hairy fool had been sent on no less an errand than to see the value of the prey. Grant me patience!—how am I to see daily before me, some evil animal, such as could herd with cattle like you, reigning in the house of the Sutherlands?”

“How have you heard, Mr. Foreman?” said the factor, anxiously. “Has Mr. Archibald written to you himself?”

“No,” said Mr. Foreman, “I have got my information from a most disagreeable source. I received a letter to-day from the solicitors of Lord Gillravidge, touching the conveyance of the property. Have you the intelligence direct from Mr. Sutherland? I came up immediately to let Mrs. Catherine know.”

“I have a letter,” said Mr. Ferguson. “It is indeed all over. He has lost everything except the entailed lands of Loelyin and Lochend, and the farm of Woodsmuir, upon which my own house stands, and it, you know, is mortgaged to its full value. All the rest is gone. Mr. Archibald is ruined.”

There was a pause again, broken only by the sound of Mrs. Catherine’s footsteps, as she walked heavily through the room.—These grave, kind men, Archibald Sutherland’s factor and agent, who had known him all his life, were almost as deeply affected with his sin and misfortune as though he had been an erring son. Mr. Foreman broke the silence by asking:

“What do you intend to do?”

“Mrs. Catherine advises me to start immediately for Paris,” said Mr. Ferguson. “We all of us know how bitterly Mr. Archibald will reproach himself, now that all self-reproach is unavailing. I will endeavor to bring him home—to the Tower, I mean; and then—I do not well know what we are to do. But we must try to rouse his mind (it is a vigorous one, if it were but in a purer atmosphere,) to shape out for itself another course. I was about to ride into Portoran to make immediate preparation for my journey.”

“Your letter, Mr. Ferguson,” said Mrs. Catherine, as Jacky again appeared at the door. “Let Andrew—is it Andrew?—lose no time! Here, you elf! Have you anything else to advise, Mr. Foreman? I myself would start in a moment, but that I think Mr. Ferguson would do it better. The lad’s spirit is broken, doubtless, and I might be over harsh upon him. Give me Archie’s letter.”

Mrs. Catherine’s large grey eyelid swelled full again, and she seated herself at the table.

“I have nothing else to advise,” said Mr. Foreman, abstractedly. “I think it is very wise, and you should start at once, Mr. Ferguson. But—” The lawyer paused. “Is it not possible to do anything? Could no compromise be made? Better mortgage the land (it was mortgaged heavily enough in his grandfather’s time—I remember how old Strathoran was hampered by paying them off,) than suffer it to pass altogether out of his hands. Could nothing be done? Mrs. Catherine, if such an arrangement were possible, would you not lend your assistance?”

Mrs. Catherine raised her eyes from the letter.

“To what end or purpose? That he might have the freedom of losing the land again, if it were won back to him by the spending of other folks’ substance? George Foreman, it is not like your wisdom to think of such a thing. A penniless laird—a shadow, and no substance—with a false rank to keep up, and nothing coming in to keep it up withal? I will not hear of it! Gentlemen, I have made up my mind; out of yon hot unnatural air of artificial ill, the lad must come down to the cold blast of poverty, if he is ever to be anything but a silken fule, spending gear unjustly gotten, in an unlawful way. I say I will have no hand in giving back plenty and ease to Archie Sutherland, till he has righteously wrought and struggled for the same. Bring him back to my house, Robert Ferguson. He has lost the home and the lands of his fathers. Let him see them in the hands of an alien, and then let him gird his loins to a right warfare, and win them back again. With God’s blessing, and man’s labor, there is nought in this world impossible. I hope to live to see him win back his possessions, as I have seen him lose them. If he does not, he deserves them not.”

“Write to him so,” said Mr. Ferguson, eagerly. “It is the spur he needs. Let me have a letter, so hopeful and encouraging, to carry with me, Mrs. Catherine. Mere reproach would do evil, and not good. You are perfectly right. A struggle—a warfare—that is the true prescription. Write to Mr. Archibald yourself—it will have more effect than anything I can say.”

Mr. Foreman sighed, and felt almost inclined to withdraw his adherence from those reformers who aim at the abolition of entails. At length, and slowly, he signified his consent.

“Yes—yes: Mrs. Catherine is right. I believe it is the wisest way. But—”

Mr. Foreman paused again. A strange master in Strathoran—the kindly union of the country broken in upon by one who, if they judged rightly, had done grievous ill to Archibald Sutherland. A painful film came over the lawyer’s eyes. It seemed like treason to the trust reposed in him by “Old Strathoran” thus to suffer his son’s downfall.

“You are losing time,” said Mrs. Catherine. “Robert Ferguson, the day is wearing on. Ye will not be able to leave Portoran the night. Start with the first coach the morn’s morning. Do not tarry a moment. Mind how long the days will be to a spirit in despair; and come to me when you are returning from Portoran if there is time. I will write to the unhappy lad.”

Thus dismissed, both gentlemen took their leave, the factor receiving a parting adjuration to “take sufficient siller—be not scrimpit. Ye will have many charges in so long a journey; and, as I have said, Robert Ferguson, lay out a pound of your own siller upon this dyvour at your proper peril! I will visit your iniquity upon the head of your young advocate, if ye venture to do such a thing.—Mind!”

Mrs. Catherine seated herself at her library table as the factor and the lawyer rode away together, and began to write to Archibald Sutherland—a hurried letter, swiftly written. It ran thus:

Mr. Ferguson returned to the Tower on his way to Woodsmuir, and received this letter, with many messages and charges besides, especially addressed to Isabel Sutherland, whom Mrs. Catherine, in the excitement of her grief for Archibald, had almost forgotten. Mr. Ferguson was to leave Portoran with the night-coach for Edinburgh; and, again, the perforce quietude of waiting fell upon the aged lady of the Tower.