Elinor Macartney Lane

“ And she turned her face toward mine.
"I'm just yours for the asking, Jock."
I drew her to me, and we kissed each other beneath the starlit blue, with the sea wind blowing our hair and the gipsy singing coming, in broken bits of melody, up through the gorse and heather.
I made a song of it after, in my limping verse, which Nancy found one day, and laughed at, I remember:
The gipsies are out, I can see their lights moving,
Race answers to race, 'neath the stars and the blue;
They are living and laughing and mating and loving,
As I stand in the midnight with you, love, with you! ”

“ The pain makes me say things I would rather not say. Oh, I wonder if another man in all the world ever hurt a woman's pride as you have hurt mine!"
"Katrine," Frank said, "God knows I never intended to tell you! There was always the thought in my mind that you should never know, but you hurt me so, I forgot. Oh, Katrine, forgive me!"
"I am grateful," she interrupted, in her hurried, generous way, "grateful for the kind thought for me; but I am angry, too, so angry that I don't dare trust myself," she smiled through her tears, the funny, heart-breaking smile. She gathered up her music. ”

“ Oh, can you ever forgive the words I've said to you this morning? Will ye think rather that I'd choose to see ye dead than gone with me in the way I've asked? That I'd rather die myself than take ye; and that I love you, love you enough to give you up! And it's I," he went on in a bitter self-scorn, "who have prated of honor, and the conduct of gentlemen, who have made a beast of myself before the best woman who ever lived! Who through selfishness have tried to make her life a blacker ruin than I've made my own! Can you forget it, Nancy? ”

“ Ravenel started to Bar Harbor without him. June drifted into July, and still he lingered at the plantation.
And all the summer days were spent with Katrine Dulany. At first he believed that he would probably tire of the whole affair quickly. He was surprised to find that he did not. He found her always new. There was an elusive quality to her, days when she would barely permit him to touch her hand, when she dazzled him by the audacity of her thinking; her indifference to him, to him who was in no way accustomed to indifference in women. ”

“ McMurtrie, the end of his dinner carried in a bag, and myself were upon the Mauchline road.
The crawling of the coach through the darkness, the insane waits for horses, the many necessary but time-consuming details told upon my distraught mind to such an extent that when I descended at the door of the inn I felt an old and broken man. The memory of another ride which I had taken was heavy upon me, my teeth chattered, the horror showing in my face so plainly that Dame Dickenson read my thought on the instant, and coming forward, plucked me by the sleeve. ”

“ Katrine shook her head; but to Ravenel's astonishment she began to wear an amused smile as he repeated McDermott's tale to her bit by bit.
"I understand," she explained, "my father saved him from a horrible attack of the measles in New York. They thought for weeks that he would die."
"But why," Frank demanded, "didn't he say just that?"
"He couldn't!" Katrine stated, as simply and uncritically as a child. "You see, he has the soul of an artist, and there's something about a man of thirty dying of measles impossible for the artistic temperament to contemplate. Ah!" ”

“ My heart went out to all this suffering, but death so near increased my anxiety for my own child, and when the news was brought me on the following morning that Isabel had passed away during the night, the fear for Nancy rose high in me, and I became like a crazed creature, wandering from one room to another, with half-begun prayers to God upon my lips and a feeling of utter helplessness heavy on my soul. ”

“ Katrine stood, hand-clasped, looking straight into Dermott's eyes. But what she saw was an old garden in Carolina, wind-blown pines, the scarlet creepers around an old bench, and a man with blanched face and restless eyes; what she heard, underneath Dermott's voice, were words from the past:
"I might lie to you, but the thing that separates us is family pride, family pride. I am going away to-day, going because I do not dare to stay!"
"Nothing else in life could hurt Mr. Ravenel as this thing will if proven," she said, at length. ”

“ THE DEFENSE
On the day that Magendie took the case I had a taste of another kind of lawing than Pitcairn's, for the London man, to speak in a common phrase, oiled everybody. He poured oil over Carew; he drenched Hugh Pitcairn in it; smoothed the jury with it, and I learned to the full the legal value of the unantagonistic mind. After this he turned a light on the case from the other side, giving it an entirely different appearance, holding up the slateful of charges against Danvers, and sponging them carefully off one by one, until I was amazed at his abilities. ”

“ So you will see sorrow is no new thing to me. I do not question it. I have had in my life three perfectly happy months, perfectly happy. It is as much as a woman can expect, perhaps, and though it kill me, though it kill me, I shall never regret having known and loved you." She paused a minute. "When one has to die it is best to go quickly, is it not? When there is some terrible thing in life to do, it were best done quickly as well. Good-bye," she said, putting out her hand.
He shook his head. "If I touch you I shall not go. Oh, Katrine, Katrine, Katrine! ”

“ As we sat in dispute over it, upward of an hour later, I heard Nancy go to her room without coming in to wish us a good night, and a second later Danvers Carmichael stood in the doorway. It was good for us older men to see the lad, and at the sight of him I was out under the stars of Landgore; the sound of gipsy singing, the salt from the sea, and the odor of blown hawthorn were in the room, and I was young again with Marian Ingarrach folded in my arms. The brooding look was gone from his eyes and his face bore a strange illumination. ”

“ An affair with the daughter of his overseer, a very young person, was a manifest impossibility for him, Francis Ravenel; his pride and such honor as he had where women were concerned forbade it. But even as he reached this decision the voice of gold came back to him:
"And the night for love was given—
Darling, come to me!"
How she could love a man! He recalled her gesture when she said: "I will tell you everything"! The glance through the lashes—"I've a fancy for my own way"! the forgetting of his presence for the song-singing and the sunset, coming back to talk with him; a pleading child! ”

“ Nancy laughed.
"'Tis grace itself compared to the awkwardness of mine," the duke returned with a dry smile.
"The first thing I ever heard of you," she began, "was that you were known by common repute as the 'Lying Duke of the Highlands.'"
The duke bowed.
"I have heard from high and low that you have neither the code of a gentleman nor the common honesty of business affairs. It is even argued that you have not the moral perception to see your own lack in such matters."
The duke looked at her steadily for a moment again and his lips curled back into a smile. ”

“ For an instant she regarded him with startled attention, her eyebrows drawn together, both hands brought suddenly to her throat.
"My letters," she repeated, "my letters!" And then, her quick intuition having told her all, "How could you do it? Oh, how could you do it?" she cried, the tears in her eyes and the quick sobs choking her speech. "It was you who sent me abroad to study! It is you to whom I am indebted for all: Josef, the Countess, my voice! Ah, you let a girl write her heart out to you, to flatter your—Oh, forgive me!" choking with the sobs which had become continuous, "forgive me!" ”

“ I, Nancy Stair-Carmichael, have learned that verse-making and verse-singing and the publicity that goes with them do not make me a finer woman; I have learned that my woman's body is not strong enough for the mental excitement of that existence, and to be a daughter, a wife and a mother, as well, and that God in his goodness sent a certain great poet into my life to show me that gift is nothing beside womanhood. ”

“ It mayn't be in just the way that I used to do; but nobody else could ever be to me what you have been. I don't believe a woman, a real woman, ever loves twice in her life, do you?" She asked the question with the manner distinctively her own, of comradeship, of wanting to touch souls even on this question most vital to them both.
"I hope it's true of you, Katrine."
The gray sea broke in white lines on the shore beneath them; the gulls uttered shrill, clattering cries above their heads, before Katrine rose. ”

“ It is altogether hopeless to set in cold words the charm of her as she stood before me that morning in her white frock, her hair in a bunch of curls on top of her head and some posies in her hand. I have seen many pretty women in my time, some few handsome ones, but Nancy Stair is the only one I ever saw who deserved to be described as beautiful. ”

“ Mrs. Ravenel admitted, a fine sense of humor marked by the grudging tone in which she spoke. "I remember that only yesterday I was in a rage because the roses were not further open to welcome you home."
"Nature is unappreciative," he returned; and the gray eyes with the level lids looked into the blue ones with the level lids, and both laughed.
For a space Mrs. Ravenel contemplated him, the ecstasy of motherhood illuminating the glance.
"You are quite the handsomest human being I ever saw, Frank—though I think I said something like that before." ”

“ Talk of Danvers fell between Sandy and me quite naturally at this time, and one night, when I was praising his boy to him with much enthusiasm, he answered with a laugh:
"Of course you like him! Why shouldn't you? You're of a piece, the two of you. You are both primeval creatures, not far removed in your love-making from the time when men lived in caves, and if they wanted a woman they knocked her down with a club and carried her home, and the wooing was over." ”

“ Frank threw his cigar away and moved nearer to her, holding out his hand with an odd combination of "make-believe" and real pleading in his voice.
"Katrine, dear," he said, "take me to live in that land of yours. I want to let down the bars of the gate you don't know where you found, and go up the pine driveway to meet Colonel Newcome. I want all that it means to have those people for intimate friends."
"One must make one's own 'Land,'" Katrine answered. "And besides," with a curious, lovable puckering of her eyelids, "men mustn't dream things. Men must do." ”

“ My mind's ill redd up for marriage with any one. I've had too much freedom, perhaps; and while one side of my nature, probably the strongest one, loves Danvers Carmichael, I am drawn to the writer of these lines, this Burns man, in a way I can not tell; and at the very foot of the matter I am mightily taken up with the power of John Montrose. It's no highly moral, is it?" she asked, with an amused smile, "to feel ye could be in love with two—three men at once? But my nature's many sided, and on one of these sides I find a most 'treacherous inclination' toward his Grace of Borthwicke." ”

“ When those we love have hurt us or injured us, to study why it was done: what inherited weakness in them, what fault of their environment brought it about, to study to understand, that's the real Christianity."
In the starry watches of the night, wide-eyed and grief-shaken, Katrine took the lesson to heart both for father and lover; learned it with heart and head as well; saw the disarming of criticism, the tolerance, the selflessness which it would bring, and knew that it was good.
But, she demanded of herself, was she large-souled enough to acquire such tolerance toward Francis Ravenel? ”

“ Sign it," said Nancy.
"I am willing," the duke answered, with an odd smile; "but, little girl, a man doesn't insult another man and then crawl out of the consequences of his act by letter. Have I your permission to effect this thing in a bit more masculine way? I promise a retraction of my conduct, and that I shall be humble enough——"
"And there will be no duel?"
"There will be no duel," Borthwicke answered, and, subtle creature that he was, he saw by the look in Nancy's face how much his yielding had gained for him with her, and seized the occasion. ”

“ He had just encountered Frank riding like the wind, his face haggard and drawn, and at the sight of Katrine's distress he drew conclusions, with rage and a dancing madness in his eye.
"If ye've hurt her, Frank Ravenel, if I find when I come back ye've hurt her, you'll answer to me for it! God! how you will answer to me!" he cried.
There is this about life: that frequently when we think the worst has happened it is but the forerunner of worse to come. ”

“ Nancy answered, with a smile.
He looked at her in silence, with an amused expression in his face.
"I like you," he said at length, and a dare-devil look came into his eyes, a look which showed at once his strength and his weakness. "I like your fearlessness as well as your honesty. I can mate your frankness by my own. I have long desired to know what is said of me, and have a mind to make a compact with you, if you will. I hear lies on every side. They are the stuff of which my daily bread is baked. Come," he cried, "a bargain between us. ”

“ His second coming was a fortnight later. In the afternoon Katrine had been reading by the fire an old Italian tale of love and death. It seemed hardly an epoch-making experience in her life, and yet there had come to her, like the letting in of sudden light, the knowledge that love was beyond and above reason, as religion is, as life itself, of which love is the cause. She had worked to forget, had been taught how to forget, yet she knew she had not forgotten, and that her listlessness since her visit to Mrs. Van Rensselaer had been chiefly worry lest trouble should come to Frank. ”

“ On toward midnight I was awakened by Dickenson clamoring at my door, telling me that Nancy lay delirious, with a high fever, calling for me. Making what haste I could, I reached the poor child, to find her tossing from one side of the bed to the other, uttering hoarse cries, with neither intelligence in her glance nor recognition of either my presence or my voice. McMurtrie's attitude, after his examination, drove me wild with fear. "It's like to be a long case," he said. "I want ye to get Dr. Cameron from Glasgow. ”

“ You had been taught no self-control. Women had spoiled you. You had never had to consider others. I want to be perfectly frank with you about it all. I never deceived you in word, tone, or look. I shall not begin now. You were my ideal man in everything. You know," she paused, an amused smile upon her lips and her lids lowered, "you know I thought Henry of Agincourt, Wolfe Tone, and Robert Bruce must have been like you, and I was grateful to the good God for letting me live in your time and country." ”

“ Sandy broke in with a smile. "She will go as woman to man. There's a mighty differ."
"You see, Dandy," said I, trying to smooth the talk a bit, "although she's my own, there's sure no harm in my saying that she is an extraordinary creature. That she has great beauty a blind man could see; but that's the least of her, for she has the heart and the principles of the purest and the best. But, oh, laddie, in her dealings with men she has the knowledge of the deil himself. Mayhap she'll cry a bit, or flout the duke, or laugh at his ways. ”

“ But he played the game by a masterly method, and drew nearer to Anne, looking into her eyes with the devotion which he knew so well how to assume, despising himself as he did so. But after the last brava had been given and he had put his mother into the brougham, saying, abruptly, that he preferred to walk, his heart and head came to an unexpected encounter. He stood alone, unnoting the passers-by, oblivious of the superfluous praise of Katrine's voice which he heard in the broken talk, looking into the distant sky at the two great towers of Notre Dame. ”

“ I go with Jamie," she added, slipping her arm through his, "for ye must learn that genius ever goes before wealth and titles," and with a laugh she and Jamie Henderlin went out before us.
After dinner we sat outside for a while, Sandy and I smoking, as Nancy and Jamie talked of the outer world and the celebrities of London and Paris. The lamps from the little settlement on the burn twinkled through the trees, while farther off the lights from the town of Edinburgh shone soft and silvery beneath the glimmering moon. ”

“ The storm must have suited his mood in some way, for Dermott McDermott chose to walk through it, arriving at Katrine's door breathless and flushed, the fur of his coat gleaming with ice and snow. Here he found a glowing fire, with the old mahogany settle on one side and the green grandmother's chair on the other; the dull glow of old tapestry; flowers; the odor of mignonette; and Katrine herself, in a scarlet gown, delighted as a child at his coming. ”

“ As we sat thus, Dame Dickenson heard the sound of voices, and came from the house to welcome me with a smile, though the tears were in her eyes as she spoke her words of welcome.
Her life of ease and freedom from money-care had changed her greatly, and with her black silk frock, her lace kerchief and cap, she seemed quite like some old gentlewoman. I tried, knowing the inadequacy of words, even while speaking, to thank her for my wonderful child, when she interrupted me. ”

“ Frank had seldom resisted temptation. This one he did not even try to resist, and he placed his hand over hers.
"Katrine," he said, "I am not a particularly good man, but the gods have willed that we meet—meet in strange moods and a strange way. I am a better man to-night than I have ever been in my life. It's the music, maybe, or the fringed gentian, or the whippoorwills." There was love-making in every tone of his voice. "Whatever it is, it makes me want to help you. ”

“ Nancy answered gently.
"Oh," he cried at this, "can't you see that a woman surrenders herself when she loves? She gives as gladly as a man takes, and is happy to have him for her lord and master. Not that he wishes to rule her, for 'twould be the thought of his life that her every desire should be filled, but she must be willing to yield."
"Ye'd have made a grand Turk," Nancy broke in, and there was a glint of humor in her tone as she spoke the words.
"I think," Danvers answered, "you'll find me asking only what most men expect to get." ”

“ It is an unhappy love-affair. I understand." Here he smiled his critical, unfathomable, remote smile. "You are not yet eighteen, and have been capable of a great sorrow! Child," he said, "thank God for it! You have a voice of gold. We will make of that sorrow diamonds and rubies and pearls to set in the voice, so that the world will stand at gaze before you. When you have real insight you will know that nothing was ever taken from us that more was not put in its place."
"Master," she said, with something of his own abruptness, "may I talk to you a little, a very little, about myself?" ”

“ I seem to go mad, to lose all self-control if you are not happy. And I came to tell you that it isn't true, that talk about marriage. I know it. I knew it when I taught you all the foolishness about family and position, and helped you to have the pride of Lucifer. Ah," she cried, "I suffered enough to know it isn't true! There is just one thing on earth that makes marriage endurable: a great and overmastering love. Marriage is the one thing about which for the good of the race, for the good of the race," she repeated, "we have a right to be divinely selfish." ”