CHAPTER XLIX.

FILIAL RESPONSE.

One thing then was clear to Donal, that for the present he had nothing

to do with the affair. Supposing the earl’s assertion true, there was

at present no question as to the succession; before such question could

arise, Forgue might be dead; before that, his father might himself have

disclosed the secret; while, the longer Donal thought about it, the

greater was his doubt whether he had spoken the truth. The man who

could so make such a statement to his son concerning his mother, must

indeed have been capable of the wickedness assumed! but also the man

who could make such a statement was surely vile enough to lie! The

thing remained uncertain, and he was assuredly not called upon to act!

But how would Forgue carry himself? His behaviour now would decide or

at least determine his character. If he were indeed as honourable as he

wished to be thought, he would tell Eppy what had occurred, and set

himself at once to find some way of earning his and her bread, or at

least to become capable of earning it. He did not seem to cherish any

doubt of the truth of what had fallen in rage from his father’s lips,

for, to judge by his appearance, to the few and brief glances Donal had

of him during the next week or so, the iron had sunk into his soul: he

looked more wretched than Donal could have believed it possible for man

to be--abject quite. It manifested very plainly what a miserable thing,

how weak and weakening, is the pride of this world. One who could be so

cast down, was hardly one, alas, of whom to expect any greatness of

action! He was not likely to have honesty or courage enough to decline

a succession that was not his--even though it would leave his way clear

to marry Eppy. Whether any of Forgue’s misery arose from the fact that

Donal had been present at the exposure of his position, Donal could not

tell; but he could hardly fail to regard him as a dangerous holder of

his secret--one who would be more than ready to take hostile action in

the matter! At the same time, such had seemed the paralysing influence

of the shock upon him, that Donal doubted if he had been, at any time

during the interview, so much aware of his presence as not to have

forgotten it entirely before he came to himself. Had he remembered the

fact, would he not have come to him to attempt securing his complicity?

If he meant to do right, why did he hesitate?--there was but one way,

and that plain before him!

But presently Donal began to see many things an equivocating demon

might urge: the claims of his mother; the fact that there was no near

heir--he did not even know who would come in his place; that he would

do as well with the property as another; that he had been already

grievously wronged; that his mother’s memory would be yet more

grievously wronged; that the marriage had been a marriage in the sight

of God, and as such he surely of all men was in heaven’s right to

regard it! and his mother had been the truest of wives to his father!

These things and more Donal saw he might plead with himself; and if he

was the man he had given him no small ground to think, he would in all

probability listen to them. He would recall or assume the existence of

many precedents in the history of noble families; he would say that,

knowing the general character of their heads, no one would believe a

single noble family without at least one unrecorded, undiscovered, or

well concealed irregularity in its descent; and he would judge it the

cruellest thing to have let him know the blighting fact, seeing that in

ignorance he might have succeeded with a good conscience.

But what kind of a father was this, thought Donal, who would thus

defile his son’s conscience! he had not done it in mere revenge, but to

gain his son’s submission as well! Whether the poor fellow leaned to

the noble or ignoble, it was no marvel he should wander about looking

scarce worthy the name of man! If he would but come to him that he

might help him! He could at least encourage him to refuse the evil and

choose the good! But even if he would receive such help, the foregone

passages between them rendered it sorely improbable it would ever fall

to him to afford it!

That his visits to Eppy were intermitted, Donal judged from her

countenance and bearing; and if he hesitated to sacrifice his own pride

to the truth, it could not be without contemplating as possible the

sacrifice of her happiness to a lie. In such delay he could hardly be

praying “Lead me not into temptation:” if not actively tempting

himself, he was submitting to be tempted; he was lingering on the evil

shore.

Andrew Comin staid yet a week--slowly, gently fading out into

life--darkening into eternal day--forgetting into knowledge itself.

Donal was by his side when he went, but little was done or said; he

crept into the open air in his sleep, to wake from the dreams of life

and the dreams of death and the dreams of sleep all at once, and see

them mingling together behind him like a broken wave--blending into one

vanishing dream of a troubled, yet, oh, how precious night past and

gone!

Once, about an hour before he went, Donal heard him murmur, “When I

wake I am still with thee!”

Doory was perfectly calm. When he gave his last sigh, she sighed too,

said, “I winna be lang, Anerew!” and said no more. Eppy wept bitterly.

Donal went every day to see them till the funeral was over. It was

surprising how many of the town’s folk attended it. Most of them had

regarded the cobbler as a poor talkative enthusiast with far more

tongue than brains! Because they were so far behind and beneath him,

they saw him very small!

One cannot help reflecting what an indifferent trifle the funeral,

whether plain to bareness, as in Scotland, or lovely with meaning as

often in England, is to the spirit who has but dropt his hurting shoes

on the weary road, dropt all the dust and heat, dropt the road itself,

yea the world of his pilgrimage--which never was, never could be, never

was meant to be his country, only the place of his sojourning--in which

the stateliest house of marble can be but a tent--cannot be a house,

yet less a home. Man could never be made at home here, save by a

mutilation, a depression, a lessening of his being; those who fancy it

their home, will come, by growth, one day to feel that it is no more

their home than its mother’s egg is the home of the lark.

For some time Donal’s savings continued to support the old woman and

her grand-daughter. But ere long Doory got so much to do in the way of

knitting stockings and other things, and was set to so many light jobs

by kindly people who respected her more than her husband because they

saw her less extraordinary, that she seldom troubled him. Miss

Carmichael offered to do what she could to get Eppy a place, if she

answered certain questions to her satisfaction. How she liked her

catechizing I do not know, but she so far satisfied her interrogator

that she did find her a place in Edinburgh. She wept sore at leaving

Auchars, but there was no help: rumour had been more cruel than untrue,

and besides there was no peace for her near the castle. Not once had

lord Forgue sought her since he gave her up to Donal, and she thought

he had then given her up altogether. Notwithstanding his kindness to

her house, she all but hated Donal--perhaps the more nearly that her

conscience told he had done nothing but what was right.

Things returned into the old grooves at the castle, but the happy

thought of his friend the cobbler, hammering and stitching in the town

below, was gone from Donal. True, the craftsman was a nobleman now, but

such he had always been!

Forgue mooned about, doing nothing, and recognizing no possible help

save in what was utter defeat. If he had had any faith in Donal, he

might have had help fit to make a man of him, which he would have found

something more than an earl. Donal would have taught him to look things

in the face, and call them by their own names. It would have been the

redemption of his being. To let things be as they truly are, and act

with truth in respect of them, is to be a man. But Forgue showed little

sign of manhood, present or to come.

He was much on horseback, now riding furiously over everything, as if

driven by the very fiend, now dawdling along with the reins on the neck

of his weary animal. Donal once met him thus in a narrow lane. The

moment Forgue saw him, he pulled up his horse’s head, spurred him hard,

and came on as if he did not see him. Donal shoved himself into the

hedge, and escaped with a little mud.