David Balfour
Page 26
CHAPTER XXV
THE RETURN OF JAMES MORE
I was called on the morrow out of a late and troubled slumber by aknocking on my door, ran to open it, and had almost swooned with thecontrariety of my feelings, mostly painful; for on the threshold, in arough wrapraseal and an extraordinary big laced hat, there stood JamesMore.
I ought to have been glad perhaps without admixture, for there was asense in which the man came like an answer to prayer. I had been sayingtill my head was weary that Catriona and I must separate, and lookingtill my head ached for any possible means of separation. Here were themeans come to me upon two legs, and joy was the hindmost of my thoughts.It is to be considered, however, that even if the weight of the futurewere lifted off me by the man's arrival, the present heaved up the moreblack and menacing; so that, as I first stood before him in my shirt andbreeches, I believe I took a leaping step backward like a person shot.
"Ah," said he, "I have found you, Mr. Balfour." And offered me hislarge, fine hand, the which (recovering at the same time my post in thedoorway, as if with some thought of resistance) I took him bydoubtfully. "It is a remarkable circumstance how our affairs appear tointermingle," he continued. "I am owing you an apology for anunfortunate intrusion upon yours, which I suffered myself to beentrapped into by my confidence in that false-face, Prestongrange; Ithink shame to own to you that I was ever trusting to a lawyer." Heshrugged his shoulders with a very French air. "But indeed the man isvery plausible," says he. "And now it seems that you have busiedyourself handsomely in the matter of my daughter, for whose direction Iwas remitted to yourself."
"I think, sir," said I, with a very painful air, "that it will benecessary we two should have an explanation."
"There is nothing amiss?" he asked. "My agent, Mr. Sprott--"
"For God's sake moderate your voice!" I cried. "She must not hear tillwe have had an explanation."
"She is in this place?" cries he.
"That is her chamber door," said I.
"You are here with her alone?" he asked.
"And who else would I have got to stay with us?" cries I.
I will do him the justice to admit that he turned pale.
"This is very unusual," said he. "This is a very unusual circumstance.You are right, we must hold an explanation."
So saying, he passed me by, and I must own the tall old rogue appearedat that moment extraordinary dignified. He had now, for the first time,the view of my chamber, which I scanned (I may say) with his eyes. A bitof morning sun glinted in by the window pane, and showed it off; my bed,my mails, and washing dish, with some disorder of my clothes, and theunlighted chimney, made the only plenishing; no mistake but it lookedbare and cold, and the most unsuitable, beggarly place conceivable toharbour a young lady. At the same time came in on my mind therecollection of the clothes that I had bought for her; and I thoughtthis contrast of poverty and prodigality bore an ill appearance.
He looked all about the chamber for a seat, and finding nothing else tohis purpose except my bed, took a place upon the side of it; where,after I had closed the door, I could not very well avoid joining him.For however this extraordinary interview might end, it must pass ifpossible without waking Catriona; and the one thing needful was that weshould sit close and talk low. But I can scarce picture what a pair wemade; he in his great coat which the coldness of my chamber madeextremely suitable; I shivering in my shirt and breeks; he with verymuch the air of a judge; and I (whatever I looked) with very much thefeelings of a man who has heard the last trumpet.
"Well?" says he.
And "Well" I began, but found myself unable to go further.
"You tell me she is here?" said he again, but now with a spice ofimpatiency that seemed to brace me up.
"She is in this house," said I, "and I knew the circumstance would becalled unusual. But you are to consider how very unusual the wholebusiness was from the beginning. Here is a young lady landed on thecoast of Europe with two shillings and a penny halfpenny. She isdirected to yon man Sprott in Helvoet. I hear you call him your agent.All I can say is he could do nothing but damn and swear at the meremention of your name, and I must fee him out of my own pocket even toreceive the custody of her effects, You speak of unusual circumstances,Mr. Drummond, if that be the name you prefer. Here was a circumstance,if you like, to which it was barbarity to have exposed her."
"But this is what I cannot understand the least," said James. "Mydaughter was placed into the charge of some responsible persons, whosenames I have forgot."
"Gebbie was the name," said I; "and there is no doubt that Mr. Gebbieshould have gone ashore with her at Helvoet. But he did not, Mr.Drummond; and I think you might praise God that I was there to offer inhis place."
"I shall have a word to say to Mr. Gebbie before done," said he. "As foryourself, I think it might have occurred that you were somewhat youngfor such a post."
"But the choice was not between me and somebody else, it was between meand nobody," I cried. "Nobody offered in my place, and I must say Ithink you show a very small degree of gratitude to me that did."
"I shall wait until I understand my obligation a little more in theparticular," says he.
"Indeed, and I think it stares you in the face, then," said I. "Yourchild was deserted, she was clean flung away in the midst of Europe,with scarce two shillings, and not two words of any language spokenthere: I must say, a bonny business! I brought her to this place. I gaveher the name and the tenderness due to a sister. All this has not gonewithout expense, but that I scarce need to hint at. They were servicesdue to the young lady's character which I respect; and I think it wouldbe a bonny business too, if I was to be singing her praises to herfather."
"You are a young man," he began.
"So I hear you tell me," said I, with a good deal of heat.
"You are a very young man," he repeated, "or you would have understoodthe significancy of the step."
"I think you speak very much at your ease," cried I. "What else was I todo? It is a fact I might have hired some decent, poor woman to be athird to us, and I declare I never thought of it until this moment! Butwhere was I to find her, that am a foreigner myself? And let me pointout to your observation, Mr. Drummond, that it would have cost me moneyout of my pocket. For here is just what it comes to, that I had to paythrough the nose for your neglect; and there is only the one story toit, just that you were so unloving and so careless as to have lost yourdaughter."
"He that lives in a glass house should not be casting stones," says he;"and we will finish inquiring into the behaviour of Miss Drummond,before we go on to sit in judgment on her father."
"But I will be entrapped into no such attitude," said I. "The characterof Miss Drummond is far above inquiry, as her father ought to know. Sois mine, and I am telling you that. There are but the two ways of itopen. The one is to express your thanks to me as one gentleman toanother, and to say no more. The other (if you are so difficult as to bestill dissatisfied) is to pay me that which I have expended and bedone."
He seemed to soothe me with a hand in the air.
"There, there," said he. "You go too fast, you go too fast, Mr. Balfour.It is a good thing that I have learned to be more patient. And I believeyou forget that I have yet to see my daughter."
I began to be a little relieved upon this speech and a change in theman's manner that I spied in him as soon as the name of money fellbetween us.
"I was thinking it would be more fit--if you will excuse the plainnessof my dressing in your presence--that I should go forth and leave you toencounter her alone?" said I.
"What I would have looked for at your hands!" says he; and there was nomistake but what he said it civilly.
I thought this better and better still, and as I began to pull on myhose, recalling the man's impudent mendicancy at Prestongrange's, Idetermined to pursue what seemed to be my victory.
"If you have any mind to stay some while in Leyden," said I, "this roomis very much at your disposal, and I can easy find ano
ther for myself:in which way we shall have the least amount of flitting possible, therebeing only one to change."
"Why, sir," said he, making his bosom big, "I think no shame of apoverty I have come by in the service of my king; I make no secret thatmy affairs are quite involved; and for the moment, it would be evenimpossible for me to undertake a journey."
"Until you have occasion to communicate with your friends," said I,"perhaps it might be convenient for you (as of course it would behonourable to myself) if you were to regard yourself in the light of myguest?"
"Sir," said he, "when an offer is frankly made, I think I honour myselfmost to imitate that frankness. Your hand, Mr. David; you have thecharacter that I respect the most; you are one of those from whom agentleman can take a favour and no more words about it. I am an oldsoldier," he went on, looking rather disgusted-like around my chamber,"and you need not fear I shall prove burthensome. I have ate too oftenat a dyke-side, drank of the ditch, and had no roof but the rain."
"I should be telling you," said I, "that our breakfasts are sentcustomarily in about this time of morning. I propose I should go now tothe tavern, and bid them add a cover for yourself and delay the meal thematter of an hour, which will give you an interval to meet your daughterin."
Methought his nostrils wagged at this. "O, an hour," says he. "That isperhaps superfluous. Half an hour, Mr. David, or say twenty minutes; Ishall do very well in that. And by the way," he adds, detaining me bythe coat, "what is it you drink in the morning, whether ale or wine?"
"To be frank with you, sir," says I, "I drink nothing else but spare,cold water?"
"Tut-tut," says he, "that is fair destruction to the stomach, take anold campaigner's word for it. Our country spirit at home is perhaps themost entirely wholesome; but as that is not come-at-able, Rhenish or awhite wine of Burgundy will be next best."
"I shall make it my business to see you are supplied," said I.
"Why, very good," said he, "and we shall make a man of you yet, Mr.David."
By this time, I can hardly say that I was minding him at all, beyond anodd thought of the kind of father-in-law that he was like to prove; andall my cares centred about the lass his daughter, to whom I determinedto convey some warning of her visitor. I stepped to the dooraccordingly, and cried through the panels, knocking thereon at the sametime: "Miss Drummond, here is your father come at last."
With that I went forth upon my errand, having (by two words)extraordinarily damaged my affairs.
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