Chapter XVII: Mr. Snobleigh

From the illuminated marble vestibule, I plunged out into the darkness of the night, and goaded by my fierce and terrible thoughts, was rushing down the avenue, when in my confusion I stumbled against a marble Psyche, that stood in the centre of the carriage-way, about a pistol-shot from the door, and fell, stunned and almost breathless beside the pedestal.

I thought of my feeble mother about to be torn from the roof that had sheltered her so long; I thought of my brave father now beneath the sod, and of his fathers in that old ancestral burial-place, where 'shaded by sepulchral yew,' lay the warriors and the patriarchs of our tribe, and where I would never lie; I thought of all that had been, but could never be again; the stirring past, with all its shadowy glory; the humiliating present with all its bitterness; the dark and dubious future with all its doubts and fears; and a storm--a devouring fever--raged within me!

Placing my hands upon my temples, I pressed my hot and throbbing brow upon the cold marble pedestal, and endeavoured to reflect and to breathe.

The three windows of the drawing-room, which in the French fashion, were constructed to open down to the Portsoy marble steps that descended to the lawn, were all unclosed, as the heat of the atmosphere was great, and the luxury, lights, and music within made me scan for a moment this magnificent apartment from the place where I lingered. It was crowded by objects of _virtû_, and the subdued lights of the crystal chandeliers, and chaste girondoles, fell on antique Sevrès and China vases; on oriental jars and Dresden china plateaux; on the Warwick vase in verde antique; on velvet hangings draperied up with gold; on Dianas and Apollos, &c.; on Rosso de Lavanti marble pillars; on bronzes and Medician vases, glittering antique buhl and or-molu tables, and all that might please the eye, or gratify the whim of a moment.

The notes of a piano--one of Errard's best--and the voice of a female singing, came towards me, and I raised myself from the ground on my elbow to listen. My heart beat wildly. The air was soft and sad and touching; and--though then unknown to me--it was the divine _Spirito Gentil_ from the opera of Donizetti. She who sang was Laura, and my ears drank in every gentle note; the fierce conflict of pride and passion died away within me; my heart was melted by the gentler emotions that Laura's influence roused, and I could have wept--but not a tear would come.

I could see her figure, with Clavering standing beside her, patting time with his gloved hand, and turning over the leaves of the address to Leonora. I wished him any place but there.

Laura looked charming!

From the crystal girandoles that stood on the little carved brackets of the piano, the light fell in bright rays over her black silk dress, which, in its darkness, contrasted strongly with the pure whiteness of her beautiful neck and delicate hands. Her face was full of sweetness and animation, and her soft voice so delightfully modulated, was full of an enthusiasm that lent her usually pale cheek a flush, as she sang that winning Italian air with all its requisite pathos.

'Aw--vewy well--she does sing diwinely!' said a voice near me. 'Alboni--even little Piccolomini herself, could not surpass her.'

'Hush--pray,' said another.

'Aw--now it is ended--bravo!'

Close by me were Mr. Mac Fee the sheriff, and Mr. Snobleigh, smoking each a choice cuba, and hovering so near the marble Psyche, that I dared not move, lest I should be observed and suspected of eaves-dropping.

'A dooced bad cigaw,' said Snobleigh, endeavouring to light a refractory cabana, and swaying about in a manner that sufficiently indicated how the fumes of the champagne had mounted into that vacuum where his brains should have been; 'dem--I think your 'Ighland air spoils them; and aw--aw--you admire Laura--eh; aw--now it draws; a fine girl--say yes--why the devil don't you say yes?'

'Beautiful--and you are tender in that quarter?' simpered the servile Mac Fee.

'Aw--yes, and have some devilish serious thoughts of matrimony, too.'

'Marriage is a serious thing, Mr. Snobleigh.'

'Aw--yes--demmed serious when one marries age, ugliness, or aw--poverty; but with, with a charming young person like Miss Everingham--it alters the case entirely. But don't you observe, old fellow, that Laura talks too much of that aw--aw--peculiar individual--that species of outlaw, as Mr. Snaggs names him--'

'Young Mac Innon?'

'Dem! yes--but to teaze me of course. What is that now? Fanny Clavering at her aw--aw--everlasting song--

"I dare not seek to offer thee
A timid love like mine--"

'Like hers indeed--aw--aw--ha! ha! it has been offered to half the fellows in the Household Brigade. Curse that pink champagne--it makes one so devilish shaky in the aw--legs. Yes--Laura has talked so much about this 'Ighland colt, Mac Innon, ever since the shooting-match, that I--aw don't half like it. In fact, Clavering--a good judge of both horses and aw--women--swears that she loves him.'

'You cannot be serious?'

'Aw--yes, frightfully serious. But only think of a girl like Laura troubling her--aw head about such a wild Highland Sawney Bean? I should like to see him handling my yacht, the _Bruiser_, in a stiff nor'-easter off Cowes; taking the mettle out of a four-in-hand team; aw--making up his book on the Derby; widing the winnaw at the Oaks; knocking the balls about at billiards, or aw--aw--getting a child of Judah to fork out the tip, or achieving anything else that savours of town life, or of civilization. The chawming Laura in love with him indeed; 'pon my soul the idea is--aw too absawd!'

'Absurd, indeed,' chorused Mr. Mac Fee.

'Absawd--my dear fellow, absawd!' added Snobleigh, as he staggered away, followed by the obsequious Mac Fee.

Laura spoke of me frequently, and Clavering thought she loved me!

Loved me--could it be credible, or was it the mere jest of a heedless heart, that linked our names together--a linking that, in love, has a nameless charm to the young, the timid, the tender, and the true. What a tumult was raised in my breast by this casual revelation! I scarcely dared to breathe. If aught was wanting to increase the bitterness of the struggle waged by pride and love within me, it was the words of the thoughtless Snobleigh.

But these bright hopes of a vague and joyous future--and all their train of burning thoughts and ardent aspirations, were doomed to be crushed and forgotten for a time, by the terrible tidings awaiting me at my desolate home.

Midnight was close at hand, when, turning away from this abode of luxury and splendour, where every comfort that wealth can procure surrounded the cold and selfish Sir Horace and his pampered household, I bent my steps towards the mountains, and by a narrow path through a dark and moonless copsewood--or rather, an old primeval forest of the Middle Ages, I hastened towards Glen Ora.

I had much to reflect on, and above all the flood of bitter and anxious thoughts that rolled like a dark and tempestuous sea around me, I saw the image of Laura Everingham; for, boy like, and full of mountain poetry, legendary lore, and old enthusiasm, to me she naturally became a goddess, and the guiding-star of all my hopes and aspirations; while serving to temper with something of reason the fiery anger with which I was tempted to regard the cruelty and harshness of her father; who, like too many of our new Highland proprietors, was but the slave of mammon and the tool of a cunning factor.

While threading my way--somewhat hastily I confess--through a deep and savage cairn, which was terrible of old as the shade of a mysterious spirit--a rushing sound, a crashing of branches struck my ear, and something white passed near me, like a sunbeam, or a flash of fire.

'The white stag!' I exclaimed, in a breathless voice, and involuntarily grasped my dirk, while the perspiration started to my brow; for by an old tradition in the glen, it was affirmed, that whenever danger was near the race of Mac Innon, a _white stag_ crossed the Braes of Loch Ora.

'My mother! my mother!' was my next thought, and like a mountain deer, I sprang away to reach the old jointure-house of our family.