Miss Douglas

“ The steed along the drawbridge flies, Just as it trembled on the rise; Not lighter does the swallow skim Along the smooth lake’s level brim; And when Lord Marmion reached his band, He halts, and turns with clinched hand, And shout of loud defiance pours, And shook his gauntlet at the towers. “Horse! horse!” the Douglas cried, “and chase!” But soon he reigned his fury’s pace: “A royal messenger he came, Though most unworthy of the name.
St. Mary mend my fiery mood! Old age ne’er cools the Douglas blood, I thought to slay him where he stood. ”

“ From the spirit of determination, which left an impress on the beautiful features of Lady Rosamond, Lady Douglas apprehended no need of interference. She knew that Lady Rosamond would fulfil her father's wishes. She was aware that the affectionate daughter would return his confidence, even at the greatest sacrifice a woman can make. The noble nature of Lady Douglas felt deep sympathy for her gentle relative—a vague uneasiness filled her mind. Some moments later when Lady Rosamond appeared in a rich and elegant dinner costume not a trace of emotion was visible. ”

“ Where's a heroine like Judith?"
There was something so simple and so earnest in Doug's manner and voice that the red died out of Charleton's face and he said, "I'm with you on that point, Douglas."
"Peter told me once," Douglas went on, "that the Greek race was the finest in the world in their minds and their looks and in every way, until the Greek women got promiscuous. That as soon as that happened the race began to decay. And he said that there isn't a nation in the world any stronger than the virtue of its women."
"How old are you, Douglas?" asked Mr. Fowler. ”

“ Douglas. "Go back at the last moment, and the breakfast ready, and the carriages waiting, and every one at the church, and your trousseau not even paid for on the strength of the credit of this marriage! My dear Lauraine, you must be a perfect idiot!"
The girl's face grows cold, her hand falls to her side. "I dare say I am," she says bitterly. "I feel it now."
"Your nerves are shaken—you are getting hysterical," exclaims Mrs. Douglas. "Of course it is a very trying time, my dear. You must have some sal volatile before you start. ”

“ Love—feeling—emotion, or, it might be, passion?
Laughter and voices came from the trail above. Douglas with several of the visiting party emerged into the white light of the moon. Douglas called his sister’s name and Janet and Donald moved up the hill to join them.
After the sound of their footsteps died in the distance there was a rustle in the bushes near the path as a slender, childish figure, clad in blue overalls and cotton shirt, glided into the soft moonlight. She stood leaning forward with the grace of some wild thing, her heavy hair flowing about her shoulders. ”

“ Douglas. You know you're not fit to marry Marion Wolton!
Fletcher. I know I love her.
Douglas. For how long?
Fletcher. I can't say, but neither can you.—And besides, she loves me!
Douglas. Would she if she knew you?
Fletcher. [Smilingly.] Oh, come, Rhodes, drop it! I don't care a damn what I have done. I'm going to marry her! I haven't made any bones about myself. I've told her I've been a bad lot!
Douglas. Oh, yes, I know, you've confessed probably to having been "fast;" that nearly always appeals to a woman, heaven knows why; I suppose it's the instinct for reformation in them. ”

“ Not so Douglas, who was still elated by the persuasion that he had succeeded in kindling within Rosilia the first dawnings of affection. Nor was he wrong in his conjecture; though Rosilia had been warned of his errors, and trembled at the thought of a connection with this too dangerous man, her heart had involuntarily surrendered.
In the full blaze and prime of life was Douglas,
"Even in the heyday of impetuous youth!
. . . . . . . . . the blaze of gaudy years—"
possessing every personal recommendation, every brilliant qualification to allure and captivate. ”

“ Beauty and amiability were not the entire gifts of Mary Douglas. She was endowed with attainments of no ordinary stamp. Though young, she displayed uncommon ability in many different branches of education; shewing some skill as a composer and musician, also a talent for composition and poetry. With simple earnestness she placed her hand lovingly upon her father's shoulder, exclaiming "Papa, dear, I have come to watch you arrange those lovely flowers." "Well, my dear, you are welcome to remain. I am certainly complimented by such preference. ”

“ I will make her think that you are [Pg 221] the doctor from the asylum come to take Miss Douglas back with you."
"Did Orton Campbell really intend such an outrage?" asked Richard Dewey, in a tone of horror.
"Yes, if Miss Douglas wouldn't consent to marry him."
"Go, then, and lose no time."
Jones knocked at the door, which was opened by Mrs. Bradshaw in person. She naturally regarded Jones with surprise, not anticipating so early a call.
"How is Miss Douglas?" he asked.
"Very contrary," answered the landlady. "I can't get her to eat. It's my belief she means to starve herself." ”

“ Douglas shook his head. "How can I see? You are very beautiful. You have the strength of a fine boy. You have a splendid mind. You have a very special gift in handling animals. You are gay and brave-hearted and lovable. Why in the world should I feel that life isn't fair to you?"
"Don't you see?" wringing her hands together. "I have all that, and no chance to use any of it so that it's put to any sort of big use at all. I'm buried alive!"
"Oh!" Douglas gasped. He had indeed seen Judith's trouble. All the vital beauty, the splendid talents—was marriage to him a big use of them? ”

“ William Douglas was a New England man of the brooding type, sent by force of circumstances into the ranks of United States army surgeons. He had married Anne's mother, who had passionately loved him, against the wishes of her family, and had brought the disinherited young bride out to this far Western island, where she had died, happy to the last—one of those rare natures to whom love is all in all, and the whole world well lost for its dear and holy sake. ”

“ Douglas comes back from southern Illinois where he has been speaking. He is going to address a Chicago audience. It is not likely that they will hoot him now. After some difficulty I find him. His face lights up with a certain gladness as he sees me. But he is a dying eagle that ruffles its feathers when food is offered it; then sinks back upon its broken wing when it sees that it cannot eat. What is my friendship now to him? What is any earthly thing to him? He bears the sorrows of earth without the consolation that any Heaven can cure them. ”

“ Michael, and I bade adieu to my fair one, coming away I remember by the window instead of the door."
"How—why?"
"I don't know, man," laughed Douglas; "but so we often left our billets in French Flanders. But I assure thee, lad, that under all this gaiety my heart is as heavy as thine; for I vow to thee, that the recollection of Annie with her beseeching blue eyes, her dark clustering hair and pallid cheek, the touching cadence of her voice, and the words she said to me are imprinted on my heart as if the hand of Heaven had written them there. ”

“ It would take a lot of week-enders to pay for it and I bet she no more thinks about it than she does about the air she breathes. Now she wants to bring Douglas out and you know she wouldn’t be willing to let her come out like a poor girl—no sirree! Douglas would have to have all kinds of clothes and all kinds of parties. She would have to come out in a blaze of glory if her mother has a finger in it. Girls who come out that way don’t have such a lot on the ones who just quietly crawl out—like I did, f’instance. ”

“ Douglas patted her shoulder in silence. It was inexpressibly sweet to have her there.
"A girl has a brain, as well as a man," she went on. "She doesn't want to be just a servant to a rough old rancher. She wants to live by her brain as well as he does. What's the use of a woman being fine if that's all her fineness comes to? You can say she hands it on to her children. But she don't. It's something she acquires and it's lost—in the scrubbing pail."
Douglas listened with the whole of his mind. Judith's sobs had ceased now, and she went on, slowly. "It's not that I'm against children. ”

“ The tensity of Judith's expression did not relax. "I've told you why. I cannot bear to think of killing love by marriage. And it always works so. Always. And yet, O Douglas, I love you, love you!"
Douglas threw back his head with a sudden breath, swept Judith into his arms and kissed her, kissed her with all the ardor of years of repression. Judith clung to him as if she could not let him go. And yet, when he lifted his face from hers, she said, none the less firmly because her voice was husky:
"But, Douglas, I won't marry you!" ”

“ Douglas was a remarkable man, both in character and in person. In age he may have been about fifty, with a strong-jawed, rugged face, a grizzling moustache, peculiarly keen gray eyes, and a wiry, vigorous figure which had lost nothing of the strength and activity of youth. He was cheery and genial to all, but somewhat offhand in his manners, giving the impression that he had seen life in social strata on some far lower horizon than the county society of Sussex. ”

“ I'm a nervous man about Charleton," grinned Douglas. "Come now, Dad! Why should you be sore at the idea?"
"Lots of reasons! I hate a man who thinks he's enough superior to me to tell me how to behave. And I feel sore as a pup that my son should be bringing such a man into the Valley. All the folks will say you are criticizing them. I'm not going to let you do it, Douglas!"
Douglas gave a short laugh, which was echoed by Judith. ”

“ Douglas’s quick and proud intelligence was amazed to find his father so weak and so incompetent under misfortune. All his boyish life he had looked up to the slender, handsome man, whom he himself so much resembled, on a solider, more substantial scale, as the most indulgent of fathers, the princeliest of hosts, the best of shots and riders, chief indeed of the Falloden clan and all its glories, who, like other monarchs, could do no wrong. ”

“ To Douglas, whose whole upbringing and subsequent life had been amongst the dreariest of surroundings, there was something about it all peculiarly fascinating. The air of pleasant abandonment, the subtle aroma of gaiety allied with irresponsibility, the strange food and wine, well cooked and stimulating, delighted him. His sole desire now was for a companion. If only those men—artists, he was sure they were—would draw him into their conversation. ”

“ The limited circle of island society suggested that Miss Lois had been hunting the loon with a hand-net—a Northern way of phrasing the wearing of the willow; but if the New England woman loved William Douglas, she was not conscious of it, but merged the feeling in her love for his child, and for the memory of Alida. True, she was seven years older than he was: women of forty-one can answer whether that makes any difference.
On a brilliant, sparkling, clear June morning William Douglas went down to the little Roman Catholic church and married the French girl. ”

“ Douglas good-humouredly submitted to be hugged by three long-chinned spinsters whom he recognised as his aunts, and warmly saluted five awkward purple girls he guessed to be his sisters:{117} while Lady Juliana stood the image of despair, and, scarcely conscious, admitted in silence the civilities of her new relations.'
The three elderly spinsters are the Laird's sisters—Miss Jacky, who is esteemed the most sensible woman as well as the greatest orator in the parish, Miss Grizzy the platitudinous, and Miss Nicky, who is not wanting in sense either ”

“ Douglas to go with him for a turn at the mountain hares or for a day's salmon-fishing on the Mudal—in short, if only he could get back to his old life again, with fair skies over him, and fresh blowing winds around him, and wholesome blood running cheerily through his veins? And then the chance, at some hour or other of the long day, of meeting Meenie, and finding the beautiful, timid, Highland eyes fixed on his: 'Are you going along to the inn, Ronald?' he could almost hear her say. ”

“ Mary Douglas was careful to avoid any allusion to circumstances which might call up a sudden host of by-gone fancies which, ere this, should be consigned to the remotest regions in the realm of utter oblivion. She was now the friend and sympathizer of Lady Rosamond Bereford, not the childish maiden as when first introduced, but a lovely, gifted, talented and accomplished woman, whose mind matured with her years. Time has not lain heavily on her hands, she having labored assiduously in exercising those talents committed to her keeping. ”

“ She looked very demure in her great apron but her eyes were dancing with the remembrance of her morning’s escapade.
“You look very perky this morning, honey,” said Douglas, as she packed a basket of turnovers and cheese cakes with great care not to crush those wonders of culinary art.
“You look tolerable perky yourself,” retorted her sister. Just as the sophomores and seniors of a college seem to fraternize, so it is often the case with the first and third members of a family. [187] Douglas and Nan hit it off better with one another than they did with either Helen or Lucy. ”

“ Douglas began to read her evening portion out of each of her many volumes, and Ann sat watching the flames leap, and thinking, thinking.
"Mother," she said suddenly, "you said a little while ago that I was spoiled as a child, but I wasn't. Dear me, I was a regular burden bearer, and Mark christened me 'The Patient Cuddy'! You see, I was hampered with always having a small brother to lug about; I could never harden my heart enough to leave them at home. An only girl in a family of brothers has really a harassed existence. It would have been different if Rosamund had lived. ”