Hamish Channing

“ Hamish Channing's laugh was interrupted by Mrs. Bede Greatorex--"that woman" as Roland had just disrespectfully called her. Mr. and Mrs. Channing had been slowly threading their way to her, a difficult matter from the impeding crowd. She welcomed them with both hands. Hamish, a favourite of hers, was the courtly, sunny Hamish as of yore; making the chief attraction of whatever society he might happen to be in. ”

“ Hamish Channing. You have no children of your own.”
“No,” said Hamish, laughing, “but my turn may come some day. Dear Lady Augusta, if Roland has his faults, he has his good qualities. Look on the bright side of things. Look forward with hope to the time that you shall see him home safe and well again. It will be sure to come.”
“You speak as if you believed it would.”
“Of course I do,” said Hamish. “And every one finds me a true prophet.”
They were then passing the Hazledon Charity. At the iron gates of the inclosure, talking to an old man, stood the Rev. William Yorke. ”

“ The excuse that Constance and Arthur had, throughout, found for Hamish in their hearts was, that he had taken the bank-note out of latent affection to Mr. and Mrs. Channing.
“You are wrong, every one of you,” said Mr. Huntley, when he had listened to what they had to say. “You must send neither letter nor messenger. It will not do.”
Hamish looked at him. “Then what can we send, sir?
“Don’t send at all.”
“Not send at all!” repeated Hamish.
“Certainly not,” said Mr. Huntley. “You have no positive proof as yet that the child is dead. It will be alarming them unnecessarily.” ”

“ The accident was indeed a singular one, which left that letter in the rack: and even the thought that there should have been a second from Marseilles never occurred to them. All these, and other details, Hamish Channing would have to wait for. He could afford to do so--holding that new letter of relief in his hand, which stated that Charles was eager to continue his journey homewards, so that they would probably be in London soon after its receipt.
"Oh, Hamish, it is good!" cried Roland, who had sat listening with all his heart and eyes. "It's like a great bright star come down from Heaven. ”

“ Channing trained their children.
“What’s the matter, sir?” asked Hamish, smoothing his brow, and suffering the hopeful smile to return to his lips. “Judith says some outrageous luck has arrived; come express, by post.”
“Joke while you may, Hamish,” interposed Mrs. Channing, in a low voice; “I shrink from telling it you. Can you not guess the news?”
Hamish looked round at each, individually, with his sunny smile, and then let it rest upon his mother. “The very worst I can guess is not so bad. We are all here in our accustomed health. ”

“ Father, I assure you that not a stone has been left unturned to find him; alive, or—or dead. You could not have done more had you hastened home; and it has been so much suspense and grief spared to you.”
Mr. Channing relapsed into silence. Hamish glanced uneasily to that ever-advancing clock. Presently he spoke.
“My mother must be told before Tom comes home. It will be better that you take the task upon yourself, father. Shall I send her in?”
Mr. Channing looked at Hamish, as if he scarcely understood the meaning of the words. From Hamish he looked to the clock. “Ay; go and send her.” ”

“ Hamish Channing,” graciously said Lady Augusta. “Will you accompany us?”
Hamish shook his head. “I wish I could; but I have already wasted more time than I ought to have done.”
“It will not cost you five minutes more,” urged Lady Augusta. “You shall only just take us into the hall; I will release you then, if you must be released. Three ladies never can go in alone—fancy how we should be stared at!”
Constance bent her pretty face forward. “Do, Hamish, if you can!”
He suffered himself to be persuaded, stepped into the barouche, and took his seat by Lady Augusta. ”

“ Do not forget to see Hamish.”
“Yes, I must be off,” said Arthur, coming out of his reverie with a start. He had waited to hear about the seal. And now flew towards the cathedral.
“I wish it had not happened!” he ejaculated. “I know Galloway does not suspect me or Yorke: but still I wish it had never happened!”
CHAPTER XX. — THE LOOMING OF AN AWFUL FEAR.
Hamish Channing sat in his private room; his now; for, in the absence of Mr. Channing, Hamish was master. The insurance office was situated in Guild Street, a principal street, near to the Town Hall. ”

“ I'd work my arms off for that darling little Nelly and for her too, for Hamish's sake."
"I don't believe he is dying at all," said Gerald. "Reviews kill him, indeed! it's altogether preposterous. Women talk wretched nonsense in this world."
Without so much as a parting Goodnight, Gerald struck across the street and disappeared. By the time he arrived at chambers, his mind had fully persuaded itself that there was nothing serious the matter with Hamish Channing; and he felt that he could like to shake Winny (who had been his informant) for alarming him. ”

“ But the costs are not to fall upon me; all are to be paid out of the estate.”
“That’s good news!” ejaculated Hamish, his face radiant, as he nodded around.
“My darling boys,” resumed Mr. Channing, “you must all work and do your best. I had thought this money would have made things easier for you; but it is not to be. Not that I would have a boy of mine cherish for a moment the sad and vain dream which some do—that of living in idleness. God has sent us all into the world to work; some with their hands, some with their heads; all according to their abilities and their station. ”

“ A very small income had been settled on Ellen when she married; the larger portion of her fortune was to accrue to her on her father's death. Whether it would be much, or little, or any, under the altered state of affairs, it was impossible now to say.
But it was not on the secretaryship that Hamish Channing depended for fame and fortune. A higher and dearer hope was his. That Hamish possessed in a high degree that rarest of all God's gifts, true genius, he had long known. Writers of talent the world has had, and had in abundance, men and women; of real genius but few. ”

“ This first attempt proved it indisputably to Hamish Channing. The story was unconnected, the plot scarcely distinguishable, and there were very grave faults besides, offending against morality and good taste. Not one reader in fifty, and that must be some school-girl, inveterate after novels, could get through the first volume. Certainly, in plunging into a long work of fiction, Gerald Yorke had mistaken his vocation. How entirely different this crude and worthless book was from the high-class work Hamish was writing, his cheeks glowed to contemplate. Not in triumph over Gerald ”

“ Laying his arm with an affectionate gesture round the boy’s neck, Hamish drew him towards the parlour. It was a square, light, cheerful room. Not the best room: that was on the other side the hall. On a sofa, underneath the window, reclined Mr. Channing, his head and shoulders partly raised by cushions. His illness had continued long, and now, it was feared, had become chronic. A remarkably fine specimen of manhood he must have been in his day, his countenance one of thoughtful goodness, pleasant to look upon. Arthur, the second son, had inherited its thoughtfulness, its expression of goodness ”

“ Tom and Charles had gone on before. Panting, breathless, almost knocking down Annabel, came Tod Yorke, terribly afraid of being marked late.
“Take care, Tod!” exclaimed Hamish. “Are you running for a wager?”
“Don’t keep me, Mr. Hamish Channing! Those incapable servants of ours never called us till the bell began. I have had no breakfast, and Gerald couldn’t find his shirt. He has had to come off in his dirty one, with his waistcoat buttoned up. Won’t my lady be in a rage when she sees him?”
Getting up and breakfasting were generally bustling affairs at Lady Augusta’s ”

“ In all matters where the minds and feelings, the inward, silent hopes and fears, are deeply touched, it cannot be but that we are sensitively alive to the opinions of our fellow men, and swayed by their judgment. As Hamish Channing read and re-read, learning the cruel sentences almost by rote, his heart failed within him. For the time being, he thought he must have erred in supposing the book so good; that it must be a foolish and mistaken book, deserving only of their sharp criticism ”

“ Heaven is not in the habit of saying to man by way of reminder when he gets up in a morning, "I am looking at you:" but it has told us such a thing as that every secret word and thought and action shall be brought to light, whether it be good or whether it be evil. Gerald ignored that, after the fashion of this busy world; and was perfectly self-complacent under the ignoring.
Only upon such a mind as Hamish Channing's, with his nervous attributes of genius, his refined sensitiveness, could the review have brought home its worst bitterness. Fortunately such minds are very rare. ”

“ Hamish Channing's until tonight. I daresay she'll have dinner ready for you. Afterwards you can call at the rooms, and settle with the landlady what you will want got in."
The change in Mrs. Yorke's face was like magic; a glad brightness overspread it. Once when she was ill in lodgings at Helstonleigh, before her husband removed her into Gloucestershire, her eldest child being then an infant, Hamish Channing's wife had been wonderfully kind to her. To hear that she was going to her seemed like a haven of refuge in this wilderness of a London, which she had never until now visited. ”

“ If Arthur Channing had cherished faith in one living being more than in another, it was in his elder brother. He loved him with a lasting love, he revered him as few revere a brother; and the shock was great. He would far rather have fallen down to guilt himself, than that Hamish should have fallen. Tom Channing had said, with reference to Arthur, that, if he were guilty, he should never believe in anything again; they might tell him that the cathedral was a myth, and not a cathedral, and he should not be surprised. ”

“ Hamish came in. Arthur, not caring to exhibit his emotion for every one’s benefit, retired to a distant window. “My father is in, all comfortable,” said Hamish. “Mother, are you sure you have everything?”
“Everything, I believe.”
“Well—put this into your private purse, mother mine. You’ll find some use for it.”
It was a ten-pound note. Mrs. Channing began protesting that she should have enough without it.
“Mrs. Channing, I know your ‘enoughs,’” laughed Hamish, in his very gayest and lightest tone. “You’ll be for going without dinner every other day, fearing that funds won’t last. ”

“ Channing’s renewed health that people had to speak of. Helstonleigh, from one end to the other, was ringing with the news of Arthur’s innocence; and Charley’s return was getting wind.
They reached Guild Street at last. Mr. Channing entered and shook hands with his clerks, and then took his own place in his private room. “Where are we to put you, now, Hamish?” he said, looking at his son with a smile. “There’s no room for you here. You will not like to take your place with the clerks again.”
“Perhaps I had better follow Roland Yorke’s plan, and emigrate,” replied Hamish, demurely. ”

“ Perhaps no man, with the sweet and sunny temperament of Hamish Channing, possessing the same Christian principles, could be otherwise than happy. He did not remember ever to have done ill wilfully to mortal man, in thought, word, or deed. ”

“ Arthur didn’t. Go and ask the post-office.”
“But the seal?” Hamish was beginning in a friendly tone of argument. Roland bore him down.
“Who cares for the seal? I don’t. If Galloway had stuck himself upon the letter, instead of his seal, and never got off till it reached the cousin Galloway’s hand, I wouldn’t care. It tells nothing. Do you want to find your brother guilty?” he continued, in a tone of scorn. “You did not half stand up for him, Hamish Channing, as I’d expect a brother to stand up for me. Now then, you people! Are you thinking we are live kangaroos escaped from a menagerie? ”

“ Ellen Channing left him and sat down in the other room to wait; and this will afford the opportunity for a word of explanation. Amidst the very very many people in all classes of life, high and low, on whom a certain recent panic had wrought its disastrous effects, was Hamish Channing. The bank, of which he had been manager in Helstonleigh, was drawn into the vortex by the failure of another bank, and went in its turn. Honourable men had to do with it; they sacrificed their own property in the emergency, and not a creditor suffered; every one was paid in full. ”

“ We cannot always have our senses about us, as the saying runs. Some of us, I fear, enjoy that privilege rarely, and the very best lose them on occasion. But that Arthur Channing’s senses had deserted him, he would not have pursued a line of conduct, in that critical moment, which was liable to be construed into an admission, or, at least, a consciousness of guilt. In his anxiety to avert suspicion from Hamish, he lost sight of the precautions necessary to protect himself, so far as was practicable. ”

“ Not for the death, Gerald: but the quitting me and Nelly."
"I'm not yet what Hamish and Arthur are, safe to be heard up there when they ask for a thing," again interrupted Roland, jerking his head upwards: "but I do pray that from the day that bad base man hears of Hamish Channing's death, he'll be haunted by his ghost for ever. My goodness! I'd not like to have murder on my conscience. It's as bad as the fellow who killed Mr. Ollivera."
Gerald Yorke rose. Ellen asked him to wait and see Hamish, but he answered, in what seemed a desperate hurry, that he had an engagement. ”