Margaret Oliphant - The Ladies Lindores. Volume 3 of 3

Meanwhile Miss Barbara and her young companion had been driving up and down in the pony-carriage in a state of great excitement. They had passed the Town-house half-a-dozen times, always looking for the reappearance of John; but he, as was to be expected, had come out and gone away in the interval between. Miss Barbara had maintained during the whole time a lively monologue, scarcely interrupted by her young companion. "I've heard what they daured to say," Miss Barbara cried; "as if one of my family would stoop to soil his fingers with any Tinto of them all! What were the Torrances but bonnet-lairds till old Torrance married the railway man's daughter? But I never thought they would have dared to do anything against an Erskine. Times are changed. (Go round by the Stone Bridge, Nora; it's an easier road for the pony.) What would my father have said if he had heard a descendant of his evened with one of that race? That's what your Radicalism comes to."

"But death is the same, whether it comes to a saint or – a bully; and life has to be protected," said Nora, fired with political ardour.

"Life – and death. They're grand words to use: a drunk man falling over a steep bank that it was the wonder of the whole country-side he had not gone over years and years before."

Nora did not say any more. She was not so warm a partisan as Miss Barbara's companion ought to have been. She drove along quietly, taking no further part in the talk, which the old lady maintained alone. "How can I go in to my peaceful house and eat my comfortable dinner, not knowing but my own flesh and blood may be shut up in a jail?" she said. Then she added quickly, "There's that lad, young Rintoul. I'm not fond of any of his family; but I suppose he's a gentleman. He'll go in and ask what has happened. Fast – to your right hand, Nora. Now draw up. He sees what I mean. Lord Rintoul," added Miss Barbara, "I have a favour to ask of you. You may have heard my nephew John Erskine's name bandied about these late days. He's been in the Town-house before the sheriff and the procurator-fiscal this hour and a half or more. It's not for me to ask the town-bodies about what has happened. Will you go and bring me word?"

Rintoul stood silent for a moment before he made any reply. Her voice seemed to have called him from painful reflections of his own, the chain of which he could not in a moment break. He gave her a half-bewildered look, then turned to Nora, who looked at him more gently, with sympathetic eyes. How haggard he looked, and worn! – he who had been so ruddy and manly, only too much flesh and blood, almost too little inclination to be moved by emotion or sentiment, – was all this because of the sudden death of his brother-in-law, a man for whom he cared nothing? Nora was extraordinarily impressed by Rintoul's changed appearance. Miss Barbara, preoccupied by her own anxieties, scarcely noticed him at all.

"In the Town-house with the sheriff? What does that mean?"

"I forgot you were English," said Miss Barbara with a touch of contempt. "It means some examination of witnesses anent the death of Pat Torrance, your brother-in-law. What my nephew should have to do with it, I cannot tell you. It's just that I would have you inquire."

"He can have nothing to do with it," said Rintoul; and then he stopped short, and the momentary animation died out of his face. He shivered as he stood in the sunshine, which was as warm as September ever is in Scotland. "It must be a mistake; we have heard nothing of this," he said. "I am sure Carry – would be averse to any fuss. It was such a thing for her that there was no coroner's inquest. I made sure we were all safe. You must be mistaken," he said.

"Lord Rintoul," said Nora, who was given to opposition, "though there is no coroner's inquest, there must be justice; and if they think Mr Erskine has anything to do with it – "

"He has nothing to do with it," said Rintoul, with petulant impatience. Miss Barbara stretched her hand over Nora to grasp his, but this gesture seemed to drive him back into himself. He withdrew a little from the side of the pony-carriage, and made a pretence of not seeing the old lady's outstretched hand. Miss Barbara was shocked, and gave him a curious look; but she was not prepared for disrespect, and did not expect it. She went on more eagerly than before —

"And here I am helpless," she said. "I cannot go in myself. I will not send Nora. Will you do my errand, Lord Rintoul? Bring me word, not here, but to my house. I am going home."

He gave a little bow of assent, and stood on the pavement looking after them as they drove away. He stood longer than was necessary for that, till they had disappeared round the corner of the High Street, till the children about – of whom there was always a large supply in Dunearn – began to gape at him with expectations of amusement. "Look at the man glowering frae him," these spectators cried, and a small pebble tumbled along the flags where he stood – a harmless experiment to see if there was any fun in him. He did not notice this, nor any other outside occurrence, but after a while got slowly under way again, as if the operation was difficult, and went on to the Town-house. When he got there, he went in reluctantly, with evident disinclination. The attendant who had talked to Rolls made way for him respectfully. The other people about opened the doors and took off their hats to the young potentate. A small case which was going on at the time was even suspended while the sheriff, not nearly so great a man, answered his lordship's questions in his own person. "Yes, there has been an examination," the sheriff said. "The circumstances are very suspicious. I have thought it best to order that young Erskine should be detained till there can be a more complete investigation. That, it is to be hoped, will clear the matter up; but if not – "

Lord Rintoul's fair and ruddy countenance was dark with anxiety and pain. "You cannot mean," he said, "that you believe Erskine – "

"I believe nothing but what there is evidence for," the sheriff said. "We are not men of theories, Lord Rintoul. Experience shows every day that men do the most unlikely things. I hear he's shown an animus , – and there are two or three points very strange. I saw it my duty to give orders that he should be detained – "

"You have sent him to prison, do you mean?" There was a sharp tone as of personal anguish in Rintoul's voice. "But you'll admit him to bail? My father, I, Millefleurs, any gentleman in the country – "

"Will be his bail? I doubt if it's a bailable offence: but if Lord Lindores were willing to do that, no doubt it would have a good effect. However, nothing can be done before the investigation," said the sheriff; "a day or two will do the young man no harm."

This was all he could elicit. The sheriff was a man who had a great idea of his office, and it was not often that he had a case so interesting and important. The attendants thought Lord Rintoul had been drinking, as he stumbled out. He went along the quiet street with an uncertain step, now and then taking off his hat that the air might refresh him. He, too, stopped at Mr Monypenny's door, as Rolls had done a very short time before. It was afternoon now, and the shadows were lengthening as he reached Miss Barbara's house. What a sunny glimpse there was from door to door, across the little hall to the garden, where the brightness of the autumn flowers made a flush of colour! Rintoul saw a figure against the light which was not Miss Barbara's. There was in him a forlorn desire for consolation. "Don't tell Miss Barbara I am here just yet," he said hastily to the maid, and opened the glass-door, beyond which Nora stood among all the geraniums and mignonette. There was no agitation about her. She was not sufficiently interested in John Erskine to be deeply troubled by the idea of annoyance to him as his old aunt was, or alarmed by a passing shadow upon his name. She was serene and calm in this quiet world of flowers and greenness where no trouble was. She welcomed him with a smile. "Miss Barbara is very anxious," she said. "She has gone up-stairs to rest, but I am to let her know when you come."