by Neil Munro
CHAPTER XXII -- THE LONELY LADY
When Petullo's work was done of an evening it was his practice to sitwith his wife in their huge and draughty parlour, practising the goodhusband and the domestic virtues in an upright zealous manner, such asone may read of in the books. A noble thing to do, but what's the goodof it when hearts are miles apart and the practitioner is a man of rags?Yet there he sat, strewing himself with snuff to keep himself awake,blinking with dim eyes at her, wondering for ever at her inscrutablenature, conversing improvingly upon his cases in the courts, or uponhis growing fortune that he computed nightly like a miser. Sometimes, inspite of his drenchings of macabaw, sleep compelled him, and, humped inhis lug-chair, he would forget his duty, yet waken at her every yawn.And she--she just looked at him as he slept! She looked--and loathedherself, that she--so clean, so graceful, so sweet in spite of all hersin--should be allied with a dead man. The evenings passed for her onfettered hours; but for the window she had died from her incubus, or atleast stood up and shrieked and ran into the street.
But for the window! From there she saw the hill Dunchuach, so tranquil,and the bosky deeps of Shira Glen that she knew so well in duskyevenings and in moonlight, and must ever tenant, in her fancy, withthe man she used to meet there. Often she would turn her back upon thatwizened atomy of quirks and false ideals, and let her bosom pant tothink to-night!--to-night!--to-night!
When the Chamberlain and Montaiglon were announced she could havecried aloud with joy. It was not hard in that moment of her elation tounderstand why once the Chamberlain had loved her; beside the man towhom her own mad young ambition manacled her she seemed a vision ofbeauty none the worse for being just a little ripened.
"Come awa' in!" cried the lawyer with effusion. "You'll find themistress and me our lones, and nearly tiring o' each other's company."
The Chamberlain was disappointed. It was one of those evenings when Mrs.Petullo was used to seek him in the woods, and he had thought to findher husband by himself.
"A perfect picture of a happy hearth, eh?" said he. "I'm sweared tospoil it, but I'm bound to lose no time in bringing to you my goodfriend M. Montaiglon, who has taken up his quarters at the Boar's Head.Madam, may I have the pleasure of introducing to you M. Montaiglon?" andSim Mac-Taggart looked in her eyes with some impatience, for she hungjust a second too long upon his fingers, and pinched ere she releasedthem.
She was delighted to make monsieur's acquaintance. Her husband had toldher that monsieur was staying farther up the coast and intended to cometo town.. Monsieur was in business; she feared times were not what theywere for business in Argyll, but the air was bracing--and much to thesame effect, which sent the pseudo wine merchant gladly into the handsof her less ceremonious husband.
As for Petullo, he was lukewarm. He saw no prospects of profit from thisdubious foreigner thrust upon his attention by his well-squeezed clientthe Baron of Doom. Yet something of style, some sign of race in thestranger, thawed him out of his suspicious reserve, and he was kindenough to be condescending to his visitor while cursing the man who senthim there and the man who guided him. They sat together at the window,and meanwhile in the inner end of the room a lonely lady made shamefullove.
"Oh, Sim!" she whispered, sitting beside him on the couch and placingthe candlestick on a table behind them; "this is just like oldtimes--the dear darling old times, isn't it?"
She referred to the first of their _liaison_, when they made their lovein that same room under the very nose of a purblind husband.
The Chamberlain toyed with his silver box and found it easiest to getout of a response by a sigh that might mean anything.
"You have the loveliest hand," she went on, looking at his fingers,that certainly were shapely enough, as no one knew better than SimonMac-Taggart. "I don't say you are in any way handsome,"--her eyesbetrayed her real thought,--"but I'll admit to the hands,--they're dearpets, Sim."
He thrust them in his pockets.
"Heavens! Kate!" he protested in a low tone, and assuming a quiteunnecessary look of vacuity for the benefit of the husband, who gazedacross the dim-lit room at them, "don't behave like an idiot; faithfulwives never let their husbands see them looking like that at anotherman's fingers. What do you think of our monsher? He's a pretty enoughfellow, if you'll not give me the credit."
"Oh, he's good enough, I daresay," she answered without looking aside amoment. "I would think him much better if he was an inch or two taller,a shade blacker, and Hielan' to boot. But tell me this, and tell meno more, Sim; where has your lordship been for three whole days? Threewhole days, Simon MacTaggart, and not a word of explanation. Are younot ashamed of yourself, sir? Do you know that I was along the riversideevery night this week? Can you fancy what I felt to hear your flageoletplaying for tipsy fools in Ludovic's room? Very well, I said: let him!I have pride of my own, and I was so angry to-night that I said I wouldnever go again to meet you. You cannot blame me if I was not thereto-night, Sim. But there!--seeing you have rued your cruelty to me andmade an excuse to see me even before him, there, I'll forgive you."
"Oh! well!" drawled the Chamberlain, ambiguously.
"But I can't make another excuse this week. He sits in here every night,and has a new daft notion for late suppers. Blame yourself for it, Sim,but there can be no trysts this week."
"I'm a most singularly unlucky person," said the Chamberlain, in a tonethat deaf love alone could fail to take alarm at.
"I heard a story to-day that frightened me, Sim," she went on, taking upsome fine knitting and bending over it while she spoke rapidly, alwaysin tones too low to carry across the room. "It was that you have beenhanging about that girl of Doom's you met here."
The Chamberlain damned internally.
"Don't believe all you hear, Kate," said he. "And even if it was thecase,"--he broke off in a faint laugh.
"Even if what?" she repeated, looking up.
"Even if--even if there was anything in the story, who's to blame? Yourgoodman's not the ass he sometimes looks."
"You mean that he was the first to put her in your way, and that he hadhis own reasons?"
The Chamberlain nodded.
Mrs. Petullo's fingers rushed the life out of her knitting. "If Ithought--if I thought!" she said, leaving the sentence unfinished.No more was necessary; Sim MacTaggart thanked heaven he was not matedirrevocably.
"Is it true?" she asked. "Is it true of you, Sim, who did your best tomake me push Petullo to Doom's ruin?"
"Now, my dear, you talk the damnedest nonsense!" said Simon MacTaggartfirmly. "I pushed in no way; the fool dropped into your husband's handslike a ripe plum. I have plenty of shortcomings of my own to answer forwithout getting the blame of others."
"Don't lie like that, Sim, dear," said Mrs. Petullo, decidedly. "Mymemory is not gone yet, though you seem to think me getting old. Oh yes!I have all my faculties about me still."
"I wish to the Lord you had prudence; old Vellum's cocking his lugs."
"Oh, I don't care if he is; you make me desperate, Sim." Her needlesthrust like poignards, her bosom heaved. "You may deny it if you like,but who pressed me to urge him on to take Drim-darroch? Who said itmight be so happy a home for us when--when--my goodman there--when I wasfree?"
"Heavens! what a hangman's notion!" thought the Chamberlain to himself,with a swift side glance at this termagant, and a single thought of calmOlivia.
"You have nothing to say to that, Sim, I see. It's just too late in theday for you to be virtuous, laddie; your Kate knows you and she likesyou better as you are than as you think you would like to be. We were sohappy, Sim, we were so happy!" A tear dropped on her lap.
"Now heaven forgive me for my infernal folly!" cried out the soul of SimMacTaggart; but never a word did he say aloud.
Count Victor, at the other end of the room, listening to Petullo uponwines he was supposed to sell and whereof Petullo was supposed to bea connoisseur, though as a fact his honest taste was buttermilk--CountVictor became interested in the other pair
. He saw what it took youngereyes, and a different experience from those of the husband, to observe.
"Cognac,"--this to M. le Connoisseur with the rheumy eye--"but yes, itis good; your taste in that must be a national affair, is it not? Ourbest, the La Rochelle, has the name of a Scot--I think of Fife--upon thecask;" but to himself, with a glance again at the tragic comedy in thecorner of the couch, "_Fi donc!_ Mungo had reason; my gentleman of thedark eye is suspiciously like _cavaliere servante_."
The Chamberlain began to speak fast upon topics of no moment, dreadingthe consequence of this surrender on the woman's part: she heard nothingas she thrust furiously and blindly with her needles, her eyes suffusedwith tears courageously restrained. At last she checked him.
"All that means, Sim, that it's true about the girl," said she. "I triedto think it was a lie when I heard it, but now you compel me to believeyou are a brute. You are a brute, Sim, do you hear that? Oh God! oh God!that ever I saw you! That ever I believed you! What is wrong with me,Sim? tell me, Sim! What is wrong with me? Am I different in any way fromwhat I was last spring? Surely I'm not so old as all that; not a greyhair in my head, not a wrinkle on my face. I could keep like that fortwenty years yet, just for love of Sim MacTaggart. Sim, say something,for the love of Heaven! Say it's a lie. Laugh at the story, Sim! Oh,Sim! Sim!"
The knitting needles clicked upon each other in her trembling hands,like fairy castanets.
"Who will say that man's fate is in his own fingers?" the Chamberlainasked himself, at the very end of patience. "From the day I breathed Igot no chance. A clean and decent road's before me and a comrade for it,and I'm in the mood to take it, and here's the glaur about my feet! Iwonder what monsieur there would do in a plight like mine. Lord! I envyhim to be sitting there, and never a skeleton tugging at his sleeve."
Mrs. Petullo gulped a sob, and gave a single glance into his face as hestared across the room.
"Why do you hate that man?" she asked, suddenly.
"Who?" said he smiling, and glad that the wild rush of reproach waschecked. "Is it monsher? I hate nobody, my dear Kate, except sometimesmyself for sin and folly."
"And still and on you hate that man," said she convinced. "Oh no! notwith that face, with the face you had a second ago. I think--oh! I canguess the reason; he has been up in Doom Castle; has he been gettinground Miss Milk-and-Water? If he has, he's far more like her than youare. You made me pauperise her father, Sim; I'm sorry it was not worse.I'll see that Petullo has them rouped from the door."
"Adorable Kate!" said the Chamberlain, ironically.
Her face flamed, she pressed her hand on her side.
"I'll not forget that, Sim," said she with a voice of marvellous calm,bracing herself to look indifferently across the room at her husband."I'll not forget many things, Sim. I thought the man I was to raise fromthe lackey that you were ten years ago would have some gratitude. No,no, no, Sim; I do not mean that, forgive me. Don't look at me likethat! Where are you to be to-morrow night, Sim? I could meet you at thebridge; I'll make some excuse, and I want you to see my new gown--such agown, Sim! I know what you're thinking, it would be too dark to see it;but you could strike a light, sweetheart, and look. Do you mind whenyou did that over and over again the first time, to see my eyes? I'm notgoing to say another word about--about Miss Milk-and-Water, if that'swhat angers you. She could never understand my Sim, or love the veryworm he tramps on as I do. Now look at me smiling; ain't I brave? Wouldany one know to see me that my heart was sore? Be kind to me, Sim, oh!be kind to me; you should be kind to me, with all you promised!"
"Madame is smiling into a mist; alas! poor M. Petullo!" thought CountVictor, seeing the lady standing up and looking across the room.
"Kate," said the Chamberlain in a whisper, pulling unobserved at hergown, "I have something to say to you."
She sat down again in a transport, her cheeks reddening, her eyesdancing; poor soul! she was glad nowadays of the very crumbs ofaffection from Sim MacTaggart's table.
"I know you are going to say 'Yes' for to-morrow night, Sim," saidshe triumphant. "Oh, you are my own darling! For that I'll forgive youeverything."
"There's to be no more nonsense of this kind, Kate," said theChamberlain. "We have been fools--I see that quite plainly--and I'm notgoing to carry it on any longer."
"That is very kind of you," said Mrs. Petullo, with the ring of metalin her accent and her eyes on fire. "Do you feel a great deal of remorseabout it?"
"I do," said he, wondering what she was to be at next.
"Poor man! I was aye sure your conscience would be the death of you someday. And it's to be the pretext for throwing over unhappy Kate Cameron,is it?"
"Not Kate Cameron--her I loved--but Mrs. Petullo."
"Whom you only made-believe to? That is spoken like a true Highlandgentleman, Sim. I'm to be dismissed with just that amount of politenessthat will save my feelings. I thought you knew me better, Sim. Ithought you could make a more plausible excuse than that for the dirtytransaction when it had to be done, as they say it must be done sometime with all who are in our position. As sure as death I prefer the oldcountry style that's in the songs, where he laughs and rides away. ButI'm no fool, Sim; what about Miss Milk-and-Water? Has she been hearingabout me, I wonder, and finding fault with her new jo? The Lord help herif she trusts him as I did!"
"I want you to give me a chance, Kate," said the Chamberlaindesperately. Petullo and the Count were still intently talking; thetragedy was in the poor light of a guttering candle.
"A chance?" she repeated vaguely, her eyes in vacancy, a broken heartshown in the corners of her mouth, the sudden aging of her countenance.
"That's it, Kate; you understand, don't you? A chance. I'm a boy nolonger. I want to be a better man--" The sentence trailed off, forthe Chamberlain could not but see himself in the most contemptible oflights.
"A better man!" said she, her knitting and her hands drowned in her lap,her countenance hollow and wan. "Lord keep me, a better man! And am I tobe any the better woman when my old lover is turned righteous? Have youno' a thought at all for me when I'm to be left with him that's not myactual husband, left without love, hope, or self-respect? God help poorwomen! It's Milk-and-Water then; that's settled, and I'm to see you atthe kirk with her for a lifetime of Sundays after this, an honest woman,and me what I am for you that have forgotten me--forgotten me! I was asgood as she when you knew me first, Sim; I was not bad, and oh, my God!but I loved you, Sim Mac-Taggart!"
"Of all that's damnable," said the Chamberlain to himself, "there'snothing beats a whining woman!" He was in a mortal terror that hertransports could be heard across the room, and that would be to spoilall with a vengeance.
"God pity women!" she went on. "It's a lesson. I was so happy sometimesthat it frightened me, and now I know I was right."
"What do you say, my dear?" cried out Petullo across the room,suspiciously. He fancied he had heard an over-eager accent in herlast words, that were louder spoken than all that had gone before.Fortunately he could not make out her face as he looked, otherwisehe would have seen, as Montaiglon did with some surprise, a mask ofTragedy.
"I'm giving Mr. MacTaggart my congratulations on his coming marriage,"said she quickly, with a miraculous effort at a little laugh, and theChamberlain cursed internally.
"Oh! it's that length, is it?" said Petullo with a tone ofgratification. "Did I no' tell you, Kate? You would deny't, and now youhave the best authority. Well, well, it's the way we a' maun gang, asthe auld blin' woman said, and here's wishing you the best o' luck!"
He came across to shake hands, but the Chamberlain checked himhurriedly.
"Psha!" said he. "Madame's just a little premature, Mr. Petullo; theremust be no word o' this just now."
"Is it that way?" said Petullo. "Likely the Baron's thrawn. Man, hehasna a roost, and he should be glad--" He stopped on reflection thatthe Frenchman was an intimate of the family he spoke of, and hastilyreturned to his side without seeing the pallor of his wife.
&n
bsp; "And so it was old Vellum who clyped to you," said the Chamberlain tothe lady.
"I see it all plainly now," said she. "He brought her here just to puther in your way and punish me. Oh, heavens, I'll make him rue for that!And do you fancy I'm going to let you go so easily as all that, Sim?Will Miss Mim-mou' not be shocked if I tell her the truth about hersweetheart?"
"You would not dare!" said the Chamberlain.
"Oh! would I not?" Mrs. Petullo smiled in a fashion that showed sheappreciated the triumph of her argument. "What would I not do for mySim?"
"Well, it's all by, anyway," said he shortly.
"What, with her?" said Mrs. Petullo, but with no note of hope.
"No, with you," said he brutally. "Let us be friends, good friends,Kate," he went on, fearing this should too seriously arouse her. "I'llbe the best friend you have in the world, my dear, if you'll let me,only--"
"Only you will never kiss me again," said she with a sob. "There can beno friendship after you, Sim, and you know it. You are but lying again.Oh, God! oh, God! I wish I were dead! You have done your worst, SimonMacTaggart; and if all tales be true--"
"I'm not saying a word of what I might say in my own defence," heprotested.
"What _could_ you say in your own defence? There is not the ghost of anexcuse for you. What _could_ you say?"
"Oh, I could be pushed to an obvious enough retort," he said, losingpatience, for now it was plain that they were outraging every etiquetteby so long talking together while others were in the room. "I was toblame, Heaven knows! I'm not denying that, but you--but you--" And hisfingers nervously sought in his coat for the flageolet.
Mrs. Petullo's face flamed. "Oh, you hound!" she hissed, "you hound!"and then she laughed softly, hysterically. "That is the gentlemanfor you! The seed of kings, no less! What a brag it was! That is thegentleman for you!--to put the blame on me. No, Sim; no, Sim; I will notbetray you to Miss Mim-mou', you need not be feared of that; I'll lether find you out for herself and then it will be too late. And, oh! Ihate her! hate her! hate her!"
"Thank God for that!" said the Chamberlain with a sudden memory of thepurity she envied, and at these words Mrs. Petullo fell in a swoon uponthe floor.
"Lord, what's the matter?" cried her husband, running to her side, thencrying for the maid.
"I haven't the slightest idea," said Sim MacTag-gart. "But she lookedill from the first," and once more he inwardly cursed his fate thatconstantly embroiled him in such affairs.
Ten minutes later he and the Count were told the lady had come round,and with expressions of deep sympathy they left Petullo's dwelling.