as were most of these cottagers. The young master told his tale with little loss of words, and met with the hearty and ready assent of his horrified listener.
“I’ll no’ fail ye, Maister Huntley; neither will the Laidlaws. I’ll bring them up by the darkening; ye may reckon upon them and me,” said the laborer; “and what use burdening yoursel’ with mair, unless it were to show respect. There’s enow, with ane of you lads to take turns, and us three.”
“Not at the darkening—at midnight, Willie; or at earliest at eleven, when it’s quite dark,” said Huntley.
“At eleven! mid nicht! I’m no heeding; but what will we say to the wives?” said Willie, scratching his head in momentary dismay.
“Say—but not till you leave them—that you’re coming to serve Norlaw in extremity,” said Huntley; “and to make my brothers and me debtors to your kindness forever.”
“Whisht about that,” said Willie Noble; “mony a guid turn’s come to us out of Norlaw;—and Peggie’s nae like the maist of women—she’ll hear reason. If we can aince win owre Tweed, we’re safe, Maister Huntley; but it’s a weary long way to there. What would you say to a guid horse and a light cart? there’s few folk about the roads at night.”
Huntley shrunk with involuntary horror from the details even of his own arrangement.
“I’ll take care for that,” he said, hurriedly; “but we could not take a carriage over Tweed, and that is why I ask this help from you.”
“And kindly welcome; I wish to heaven it had been a blyther errand for your sake,” said the man, heartily; “but we maun take what God sends; and wha’s to keep the officer quiet, for that’s the chief of the haill plan?”
“I’ve to think of that yet,” said Huntley, turning his face towards home with a heavy sigh.
“I’d bind him neck and heels, and put him in Tyne to cool himsel’!” said Willie, with a fervent effusion of indignation. Huntley only bade him remember the hour, shook his hard hand, and hurried away.
It was a painful, troubled, unhappy evening, full of the excitement of a conspiracy. When Huntley and Patrick communicated with each other it was impossible to say, for they never seemed to meet alone, and Patrick had taken upon himself the hard duty of keeping Elliot company.
The minister and his daughter departed sadly in the twilight, knowing no comfort for the family they left. And Mr. Blackadder returned gloomily from his visit to the attorney, bringing the news that he had no authority to stop proceedings till he consulted with his principal, after which, in good time, and with a look and grasp of Huntley’s hand, which were full of meaning, the good farmer, too, took his wife away.
Then came the real struggle. The officer kept his watch in the dining-room, to which he had shifted from some precautionary notion, and sat there in the great chintz easy-chair, which the hearts of the lads burned to see him occupy, perfectly content to talk to Patie, and to consume soberly a very large measure of toddy, the materials for which stood on the table the whole evening. Patie discharged his painful office like a hero. He sat by the other side of the table, listening to the man’s stories, refusing to meet Huntley’s eye when by chance he entered the room, and taking no note of the reproachful, indignant glances of Cosmo, who still knew nothing of their plans, and could not keep his patience when he saw his brother entertaining this coarse intruder in their sorrowful affairs.
Huntley, meanwhile, moved about stealthily, making all the arrangements. It was a considerable discouragement to find that the officer had made up his mind to spend the night in the dining-room, where Marget, with a swell and excitement in her homely form, which, fortunately, Elliot’s eyes were not sufficiently enlightened to see, prepared the hair-cloth sofa for his night’s repose. He was sober, in spite of the toddy, but it seemed more than mortal powers could bear, keeping awake.
It was midnight; and Huntley knew by Marget’s face that his assistants were in attendance, but still they scarcely ventured to say to each other that every thing was ready for their melancholy office.
Midnight, and the house was still. Yet such a perturbed and miserable stillness, tingling with apprehension and watchfulness! The widow had left her sorrowful retirement up-stairs; she stood outside on the gallery in the darkness, with her hands clasped close together, keeping down all natural pangs in this unnatural hardship. Marget, who was strong and resolute, stood watching breathless at the closed door of the dining-room, with a great plaid in her hands, which nobody understood the occasion for. No one else was to be seen, save a train of four black figures moving noiselessly up the stairs. At every step these midnight emissaries took, Marget held her breath harder, and the Mistress clasped her hand upon her heart with an agonizing idea that its throbs must be heard throughout the house. A single faint ray of light directed their way to the room where the dead lay; all beside was in the deepest darkness of a stormy night—and once more with a merciful noise pattering loud upon the trees without, came down the deluge of the thunder storm.
It was at this moment that Cosmo, sitting in his own room, trying to compose his heart with a chapter in his Bible, saw, for he could not hear, his door open, and Huntley’s face, pale with agitation, look in.
“Come!” said the elder brother, who was almost speechless with strong excitement.
“Where?” cried the amazed boy.
Huntley held up his hand to bar speaking.
“To bury my father,” he answered, with a voice which, deep in solemn meaning, seemed, somehow, to be without common sound, and rather to convey itself to the mind, than to speak to the ear.
Without a word, Cosmo rose and followed. His brother held him fast upon the dark gallery, in a speechless grip of intense emotion. Cosmo could scarcely restrain the natural cry of terror, the natural sob out of his boy’s heart.
It went down solemnly and noiselessly, down the muffled stair, that something, dark and heavy, which the noiseless figures carried. At the foot of the stairs, Patie, his own pale face the only thing there on which the light fell fully, held with a steady, patient determination, and without a tremble, the little rush light, hid in a lantern, which guided their descent, and in the darkness above stood the Mistress, like a figure in a dream, with her hands pressed on her heart.
Then a blast of colder air, a louder sound of the thunder-rain. The two brothers stole down stairs, Huntley still holding fast by Cosmo’s arm—and in another moment the whole procession stood safe and free, in the garden, under the blast of big rain and the mighty masses of cloud. So far, all was safe; and thus, under shelter of the midnight, set forth from his sad house, the funeral of Norlaw.
CHAPTER VIII
That night was a night of storms. When the heavy rain ceased, peals of thunder shook the house, and vivid lightning flashed through the darkness. When the funeral procession was safe, Marget fastened her plaid across the door of the dining-room as a precaution, and went up stairs to attend to the Mistress. She found the widow kneeling down, where she had stood, leaning her hands and her face against the railings of the gallery, not fainting, perfectly conscious, yet in a condition in comparison with which a swoon would have been happiness. Her hands clung tight and rigid about the rails. She had sunk upon her knees from pure exhaustion, and kept that position for the same reason. Yet she was terribly conscious of the approach of Marget, afraid of her in the darkness, as if she were an enemy. The faithful servant managed to rouse her after great pains, and at last was able to lead her down stairs, to the gathered fire in the kitchen, where the two sat in the darkness, with one red spark of fire preserving some appearance of life in the apartment, listening to the blast of rain against the window, watching
