第54章

He sat down instantly, saying,'Eh, mem! it's sair to bide;' meaning, no doubt, the conflict between his inclination to tell her all, and his duty to be silent.

The dressing was soon finished, his hair combed down over it, and Robert looking once more respectable.

'Now, I think that will do,' said his nurse.

'Eh, thank ye, mem!' answered Robert, rising.'Whan I'm able to play upo' the fiddle as weel 's ye play upo' the piana, I'll come and play at yer window ilka nicht, as lang 's ye like to hearken.'

She smiled, and he was satisfied.He did not dare again ask her to play to him.But she said of herself, 'Now I will play something to you, if you like,' and he resumed his seat devoutly.

When she had finished a lovely little air, which sounded to Robert like the touch of her hands, and her breath on his forehead, she looked round, and was satisfied, from the rapt expression of the boy's countenance, that at least he had plenty of musical sensibility.As if despoiled of volition, he stood motionless till she said,'Now you had better go, or Betty will miss you.'

Then he made her a bow in which awkwardness and grace were curiously mingled, and taking up his precious parcel, and holding it to his bosom as if it had been a child for whom he felt an access of tenderness, he slowly left the room and the house.

Not even to Shargar did he communicate his adventure.And he went no more to the deserted factory to play there.Fate had again interposed between him and his bonny leddy.

When he reached Bodyfauld he fancied his grandmother's eyes more watchful of him than usual, and he strove the more to resist the weariness, and even faintness, that urged him to go to bed.Whether he was able to hide as well a certain trouble that clouded his spirit I doubt.His wound he did manage to keep a secret, thanks to the care of Miss St.John, who had dressed it with court-plaster.

When he woke the next morning, it was with the consciousness of having seen something strange the night before, and only when he found that he was not in his own room at his grandmother's, was he convinced that it must have been a dream and no vision.For in the night, he had awaked there as he thought, and the moon was shining with such clearness, that although it did not shine into his room, he could see the face of the clock, and that the hands were both together at the top.Close by the clock stood the bureau, with its end against the partition forming the head of his grannie's bed.

All at once he saw a tall man, in a blue coat and bright buttons, about to open the lid of the bureau.The same moment he saw a little elderly man in a brown coat and a brown wig, by his side, who sought to remove his hand from the lock.Next appeared a huge stalwart figure, in shabby old tartans, and laid his hand on the head of each.But the wonder widened and grew; for now came a stately Highlander with his broadsword by his side, and an eagle's feather in his bonnet, who laid his hand on the other Highlander's arm.

When Robert looked in the direction whence this last had appeared, the head of his grannie's bed had vanished, and a wild hill-side, covered with stones and heather, sloped away into the distance.

Over it passed man after man, each with an ancestral air, while on the gray sea to the left, galleys covered with Norsemen tore up the white foam, and dashed one after the other up to the strand.How long he gazed, he did not know, but when he withdrew his eyes from the extended scene, there stood the figure of his father, still trying to open the lid of the bureau, his grandfather resisting him, the blind piper with his hand on the head of both, and the stately chief with his hand on the piper's arm.Then a mist of forgetfulness gathered over the whole, till at last he awoke and found himself in the little wooden chamber at Bodyfauld, and not in the visioned room.Doubtless his loss of blood the day before had something to do with the dream or vision, whichever the reader may choose to consider it.He rose, and after a good breakfast, found himself very little the worse, and forgot all about his dream, till a circumstance which took place not long after recalled it vividly to his mind.

The enchantment of Bodyfauld soon wore off.The boys had no time to enter into the full enjoyment of country ways, because of those weary lessons, over the getting of which Mrs.Falconer kept as strict a watch as ever; while to Robert the evening journey, his violin and Miss St.John left at Rothieden, grew more than tame.

The return was almost as happy an event to him as the first going.

Now he could resume his lessons with the soutar.

With Shargar it was otherwise.The freedom for so much longer from Mrs.Falconer's eyes was in itself so much of a positive pleasure, that the walk twice a day, the fresh air, and the scents and sounds of the country, only came in as supplementary.But I do not believe the boy even then had so much happiness as when he was beaten and starved by his own mother.And Robert, growing more and more absorbed in his own thoughts and pursuits, paid him less and less attention as the weeks went on, till Shargar at length judged it for a time an evil day on which he first had slept under old Ronald Falconer's kilt.