James Grant

“ Bewilderment first, and then anger, appeared in the proud face of Fotheringhame, who certainly seemed not to know what to think, and grew very pale. Then he smiled, sadly and bitterly, with something of anger making his lip quiver.
'Surely, Annabelle,' said he, slowly, as if to gain time to think, 'you, with your superior grace and beauty, assured position, and the indefinable charm you possess for all, and more than all for me, need fear no woman?'
'Jealousy is stronger than fear, and I am humiliated enough to be jealous. ”

“ It was the first general action that Cecil had ever been in, and the field to him looked awful, in the sweet bright morning sunshine; and the idea occurred to him, that if it be true—and we cannot doubt it—that to the Creator the fall of a sparrow is not a matter of indifference, what must that of a human being be? Yet, there they lay in thousands, butchered, hacked, and in some instances torn out of the semblance of humanity, by cannon shot and shell.'
'Here we are!' said Guebhard, gruffly, cutting short his reflections. ”

“ Hew was smoking on the terrace one forenoon, deep in the study of his betting-book—a study that did seem a very pleasant one, if one might judge from the expression of his face—when he saw Mr. John Balderstone, the faithful and jolly old factor and friend of the family, coming ambling up the long avenue, top-booted, on his favourite old roadster, an easy-going bay, high in the forehead, round in the barrel, and deep in the chest, as John averred, 'all that a roadster should be;' and he dismounted at the entrance door with the air of a man who felt himself at home and sure of a welcome. ”

“ Mary's bright little face was dimpling and rippling all over with pleasure, triumph and exultation—all the more so, when she saw that Leslie Fotheringhame was a man of whom any woman might be proud, more than ordinarily handsome, with an unmistakable tone, air, and bearing, that doubtless came of his early Lancer training; and now they were all conversing together with apparent ease; for although Mrs. Garth knew what the wishes and orders of Sir Piers were regarding Mary and Cecil Falconer, she did not conceive that they extended to the precluding of recognition in a public place. ”

“ He had covered his horse with a blanket, and made a pillow of his holsters, and, with the flaps of his Servian forage cap tied over his ears, lay there sleepless and heedless of whether he was kicked, or trampled upon, by his charger's hoofs, or the hoofs of others, while ever and anon the deep thunder grumbled over the spur of the Balkans, and the red lightning flashes lit up vividly, for a moment, the waters of the fast-flowing Morava, and a strange tower close by—a tower of human skulls, erected to commemorate a victory over the Servians by the Turks under Comourgi. ”

“ My darling Mary, you are the apple of my old eye, and I should like to see you safe and sound under Hew's protection, ere the last bugle sounds for me, and summons me away to the Land of the Leal; Hew, save yourself, is the nearest to me in blood now that my Piers is gone, finding his grave I know not where—know not where!' he added in a broken voice, as he recalled the real or fancied, but terrible vision he had seen years ago, now. 'If money can bring happiness you and Hew should certainly have something very like it,' said he, returning to the charge. ”

“ Fighting in a cause for which—and in that of a prince for whom—he cared nothing; fighting in battle as a weaker spirit might have betaken itself to alcohol to drown the past and give oblivion to the present, poor Cecil had found his way to Servia, and had that day done wonders, setting little store on the lives of those he fought against—the barbarous and brutal Turks—and certainly none whatever on his own life. ”

“ I am lost!' cried Cecil, leaping from the table and buckling on his sword, as he looked hurriedly around him for concealment, defence, or escape.
His evident emotion and admission that he had pursuers renewed at once the inborn mistrust of the Servian household, who all shrank from him. Despite his uniform and the gold cross of Takovo, they imagined he must be a culprit, and felt neither disposed to conceal nor defend him. Even the gentle hostess eyed him now with horror, mistrust and affright. ”

“ A nervous agony of mind and a great terror fell upon Mary—a terror that with Cecil's hopeless and aimless departure, none knew for where, a long and dull life lay before her, without the society of him for whom she seemed only now to have begun to exist—he so winsome, manly, chivalrous, and all her own. ”

“ Garth, who deemed herself quite as much a part of the Cameronians as the adjutant or the big-drum, and who had been vibrating, bubbling, and brimming over with pleasure all night, now felt her satisfaction culminate when the aged Sir Piers, with the courtly gallantry of the old school, led her forth as his partner, and looked round in vain for Hew and Mary, as a vis-à-vis, whose place was speedily supplied by Dick Freeport and a young lady whose interest he was exciting on the subject of his ring with the blue stone. ”

“ No one among us knows the depth or intensity of the tenderness we have for anyone we love or value, till on the eve of losing them, perhaps for ever; and the great solemn dread that falls on the heart—even as the shadow of death. And Mary, by a deep and solemn presentiment, seemed to feel this, when, after a protracted interview, during which the same broken-voiced and loving assurances were reiterated again and again, at Mrs. Garth's emphatic request she rose to leave Cecil. ”

“ They wore old and tattered garments of no particular colour, sandals of raw hide, were black-bearded, cunning, and forbidding in aspect—looking every inch like what the Montenegrins are in reality, savage barbarians, who in battle mutilate the fallen, and who never crave mercy, nor yield it, for when one is severely wounded, to save him from the enemy, his own comrades cut off his head.
As the language of these pleasant people is a dialect of the Servian, Cecil had not very much difficulty in making them comprehend the dilemma in which he found himself. ”

“ Evil tidings fly fast: thus on the very night of Cecil's departure, through the general, his household became aware of the fate that had befallen the unfortunate.
Looking like a saint in her pure white nightdress, Mary sat on the edge of her bed, weeping bitterly after Mrs. Garth had left her, and refusing all the earnest yet commonplace comfort that Annabelle Erroll strove to give her. ”

“ There are few women in this world who do not resolve firmly and act vigorously when the tender interests of their hearts are affected; thus Mary had somewhat stepped out of her path, at all hazards, to see and console in his affliction the man who loved her, and whom, she had begun to fear, she might never meet again.
What course events might take she knew not, but she knew well that she had been pitilessly told to expect the worst: thus a great pity filled her soul, side by side with her love for Cecil. ”

“ On the summit waved the Servian tricolour, pale-blue and red together, with the white outside.
Around on every side spread lovely gardens. As he approached this famous frontier city, the scene of so many bloody sieges, Cecil could not but smile, in these our days of vast projectiles, at remembering how great a feat it was thought of the Scoto-Austrian Marshal Loudon, when in 1789 he opened his first parallel there, at one hundred yards from the glacis. ”

“ To the general, whom he viewed, so far as his friend Cecil Falconer was concerned, as a stupid, obstinate, proud, and avaricious old man, he was specially welcome, as the patient listener to his prosy reminiscences of India, of battles and marches, of pig-sticking, shooting expeditions, and potting man-eaters, all of which Fotheringhame heard with respect and feigned interest, that he might the more freely enjoy the society of Annabelle, and of Mary, whom he really loved for the affection she bore his lost friend. ”

“ The curiosity of Ottilie was piqued, but Theodore was in no mood to gratify it.
To Margarita, Cecil was a species of interesting enigma. He had some sorrowful past, which he carefully kept from her; she felt that instinctively, and she was never weary of hearing him tell of the places he had been in—India, Scotland, England, and Italy—and smiled sweetly and softly at his descriptions of distant lands, that she had only heard of at school. She knew that he was accomplished, and the superior in education and ideas of any man she had yet met ”

“ Between these two, when the countess was not present, we are compelled to admit that the conversation sometimes waxed perilous, notwithstanding Cecil's resolute platonism, when the large liquid eyes of Margarita, under their thick dark fringes, met his, and her scarlet lips, which we have said were rather sensuous, quivered and smiled, with an expression all their own; and one of those perilous times was when, somehow, they fell on the subject of love—a natural one enough between a handsome young fellow and a beautiful woman. ”

“ All is over with me. We have both been rash in loving each other so tenderly, without the consent of Sir Piers, your guardian; but our rashness has ended roughly, cruelly, and sorrowfully, especially for me. I have dreamed a happy dream in loving and being beloved by you—a dream the recollection of which will brighten all that remains to me of life, in the desolate path that lies before me.' ”

“ Where Hew goes, you will go; our old life will be gone; a new one will open to you, and I shall be a lonely, old, old man, lonely as when, years ago, I lost Piers!'
'But I am not yet married to Hew,' said Mary, kissing both his withered cheeks, from which the red tan of the Indian sun had long since vanished. ”

“ Cecil Falconer, for the volunteer was he, though in that blood-stained foreign uniform few would have recognised the once fashionable Cameronian officer, was sorely changed in aspect. He was browner visaged, bearded to the eyes, yet his face was worn and lined, and his eyes seemed sunk and keen, with the wolfish expression worn by those of men who are daily facing peril and death. ”

“ You have yet to learn, dearest Mary, that with too many in this world the growth of love is unlike every other growth: it often expands and blooms strongest amid sorrow and gloom and the chill blasts of adversity.'
'I am afraid, Sir Piers,' said Mrs. Garth on one occasion, 'the girl is simply breaking her heart!'
'Simply breaking her fiddlestick!' growled the general, who was terribly worried by the whole situation; 'yet I should not be angry with poor little Mary,' he added in a gentler tone; 'God is very good! ”

“ True. You never talked to me in this way before,' he continued, raising his voice and starting to his feet; 'but I tell you, that if you dare to countenance that fellow Falconer——'
'Oh, uncle, don't break my heart by talking thus!'
'Stuff! hearts don't break, though bones do. Let there be no clandestine correspondence, still less any meetings; but I trust to your honour, Mary—I trust to your honour, child.'
She blushed deeply, painfully, for she had an appointment with Cecil that very afternoon. She remained silent, and Sir Piers interpreted her silence his own way. ”

“ A fortnight had passed since the general's ukase had gone forth, and yet almost daily, by accident, design, or tacit understanding, Cecil and Mary met, and had the joy of lingering in each other's society, and riveting still closer the links of love that bound them to each other, but not without a dread of being watched or discovered by Hew, whose favourite haunts, however, lay far apart from theirs. ”

“ As for Cecil, the very demon of restlessness seemed to have taken possession of him. Save when on duty, the Cameronians never saw him, and he was never happy save when, if not with Mary, searching for her in those lounges where; in the limited circle of the Modern Athens—the City of Idlers—everyone is almost sure to meet everybody else.
But he had one special annoyance to contend with. All the regiment knew that he had been the general's special guest at Eaglescraig, and deemed it strange that at all his dinners and dances given to them now, he was never present. ”

“ Cecil was then in one of his saddest moments. In his hand was a tiny packet, and gently and tenderly he fingered it, for it contained the withered daisies culled from his mother's grave; and his heart grew very full as her image came vividly to memory with all the idolatrous love she had for him, her only son.
'Thank God she knows nothing of all this shame and misery! Yet, who can say—perhaps?' he muttered, and cast his eyes upward for a moment.
An essayist tells us that 'memory is the peculiar domain of the individual. ”

“ It filled her with a nameless dread, and as women, in joy as in sorrow, generally seek the sympathy of each other, now in her jealousy, pain, and mortification, it was natural of Annabelle Erroll to confide in her friend and gossip Mary, while, in gusts of pride and anger, she sometimes failed to appear when Fotheringhame came to visit her, or received him with a coldness that certainly seemed to excite in him pain, surprise, and pique. ”

“ Disobey me, and I hand over your fortune to Hew; it shall never be made ducks and drakes of by a gambler and adventurer! By your father's will (how often am I to tell you this?) it is absolutely in my power to disinherit you, if you wed without my consent.'
'A most cruel and illegal will!'
'Devised to save you from yourself, and with a strange prevision of that which was to come.'
'Unjust! why should the dead be so loth to lose their grasp on, their power over, the living?'
'Your father's great dread was fortune-hunters, lest you should be sought—as Falconer seeks you—for your money. ”

“ The offer was not an inviting one, but Cecil thanked the general for his gracious notice of his service, and for the rank and cross conferred upon him; and the former then rode off to his head-quarters, accompanied by Count Palenka.
He was a short, thick-set man, reserved and haughty in manner and bearing, and covered with Russian orders and medals, won in no petty wars. His eyes were small, the lids heavy; his nose was large; his complexion a ruddy bistre colour, and his hair and thick moustache were somewhat of a mouse-skin hue. ”

“ He was, in fact, too young to feel quite despairing yet. His spirit rose with the exhilaration induced by a rapid ride; and he at last began to think with ardour of the mess of the old corps, seeing his name in the public prints—the exultation and commendation of his pluck and bravery by Leslie Fotheringhame, Dick Freeport, and others—even his story going the round of the men's barrack; and more than all, of what would be the emotions of Mary Montgomerie! ”

“ Through the long weary hours of the night she often lay dry-eyed and feverish, without a tear coming to relieve her overcharged heart, for she and Cecil seemed parted now and for ever, as surely as if death had done so. ”

“ The conversation soon drifted back to the great Servian victory, and the narrow escape of Count Palenka and the general.
'How courageous it was of you to risk your life to save theirs; how self-devoted to give Tchernaieff your horse!' said the countess.
'It is not often a soldier has two such strokes of good luck at once,' replied Cecil.
'Had you no fear for your own life—no dread of dying?' asked the countess.
'No, madam.'
'Why?' asked Margarita, who had scarcely spoken yet.
'Because it is as natural to die as to live—to die as to be born ”