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 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 BY 
 
 LESLIE KEITH, 
 
 Author of 
 ''The Indian Unck;' '''Lisbeth,'' ''The Chilcotes^' etc. 
 
 In Two Volumes. 
 Vol. I. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 RICHARD BENTLEY & SON, 
 
 PUBLISHERS IN ORDINARY to HER MAJESTY. 
 
 1898. 
 
 (/J// rig/its reserved.)
 
 {This story appeared previously in the meekly edition of" The Tii
 
 
 
 •■Vi.. 
 
 Wf,V;i)«*.v -^ 
 
 S^ THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 WONDER at you, John Gillespie! 
 You're surprised at liis success, and 
 yet it's to you he's beholden for it." 
 
 Everybody gazed at old Mrs. Laidlaw, who 
 is accustomed to dominate any society in 
 which she happens to find herself; each, no 
 doubt, looked the surprise he felt, though 
 upon no countenance was it so plainly depicted 
 as upon that of the minister himself — the Eev. 
 Dr. Gillespie, of the orthodox kirk — portly, 
 affable, with a well-filled waistcoat and a 
 twinkling eye. The twinkle died away as he 
 
 VOL, I. 1 
 
 ^^ywuyi
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 arclied his fine brows^ and pursed his hand- 
 some lips. 
 
 "I — my dear madam?" he remonstrated 
 mildly ; " I really fear I must be so rude as 
 to contradict you. I have not exchanged so 
 much as a word with the young man ; for 
 though I did call, as in duty bound, to extend 
 him the right hand of fellowship " — he spread 
 out his plump white fingers, as if to prove 
 their readiness to embrace the stranger's — " I 
 was informed that he was out. At a case, 
 I believe." 
 
 Charlie Nairn sniggered, and the others 
 smiled. Then some one said — 
 
 "It is quite well known that he hadn't a 
 single patient for a year after he settled here. 
 They say he was nearly starved out." 
 
 "And, blessed as I am with a singularly 
 robust constitution," the doctor went on after 
 an impressive pause, which imposed silence, 
 just as if he w^ere in the pulpit, " I have had 
 no occasion to require his professional ser- 
 vices. For the matter of that" — he glanced 
 at Charlie, who immediately blushed up to
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 the roots of his red hair — ''we have an ex- 
 'cellent practitioner in Shawbridge. Therefore, 
 my dear friend, I scarcely perceive the logic 
 of your argument." 
 
 " Hoot-toot ! logic here or logic there, 
 you've answered your own question, minister." 
 She grasped the arms of her easy-chair, one 
 of very ample dimensions, and, looking round, 
 fixed the company with her dull black eyes. 
 ^' When I was young — that's not yesterday 
 — the men that were foremost with the women 
 were the men that could fight and hold their 
 own. A lass thought the more of her sweet- 
 heart if he could use his elbows to get to the 
 front, even if he had to push a neighbour in 
 the dirt to clear his road. But times have 
 changed, boldness has gone out of fashion ; it's 
 your martyr that's master now. Persecute a 
 man, and the women are ready to set him up 
 for a saint with a halo round his pow. And 
 that's just what you've done, doctor, you and 
 the lave of you. You've turned your backs on 
 the lad ; you've passed him by on the other 
 side ; you've sent for that old gowk, Nairn —
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 ay, Charlie, my man, I see you're there ; but 
 your uncle knows fine what I think of him. 
 Many's the time I've said to him — ' When I'm 
 weary of living and ready to die, Tom Nairn ^ 
 you may come chapping at my door, with your 
 doctor's long face and your bit bag of drugs, 
 but no' a day sooner.' And it's thanks to 
 your good constitution, John Gillespie, and 
 not to your common sense, you're here this 
 day, for you've tempted Providence by neg- 
 lecting a lad of parts that Shawbridge should 
 have been proud to w^elcome. And now that 
 he's got his foot in at the Castle, and all the 
 w^omen — and your ain lass the first — are ready 
 to lie down and let him tread upon them, it's 
 your day to sing small." 
 
 "Why Mrs. Laidlaw singled out the minister 
 as the object of her attack w^as a mystery no 
 one souo-ht to solve. In matters such as these 
 she "Was a law to herself. But all knew that 
 since it pleased her to espouse the cause of 
 young Dr. Sutherland, his battle was as good 
 as won. She was self-appointed dictator, and 
 ruled by right of being in a sense the foundress
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 of Shawbridge. Fifty aud more years before, 
 when, as a well-dowered bride from Glasgow, 
 Janet Stewart liad settled in her husband's old 
 home on what was then a ofreen liaii^h em- 
 braced by a silver river, she had been quick to 
 perceive the capabilities of the place. Her 
 money and her energy went to the building 
 of the first tall chimney that with its reek 
 defiled the fair face of heaven ; aud Laidlaw's 
 mill laid the foundation of Shawbridge's pros- 
 perity. The mansion still remains, though 
 the mill has been handsomely rebuilt, but not 
 a vestige of the garden that once made a 
 silence round it. It is jostled on either side 
 by buildings of a meaner type, the scamped 
 work of to-day's haste, and stands out, a 
 voiceless protest against the vandalism that 
 has converted a peaceful village into a hideous, 
 insanitary, overcrowded manufacturing town. 
 In less than three generations the evil has 
 been wrought ; the kingdom of the curlew 
 and the sheep is loud with the rattle of looms ; 
 the encircling hills, \vhicli seem to withdraw 
 their skirts in disdain of idl this human bustle,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER, 
 
 are dotted with the priDcely villas of men who' 
 have made it their mission to clothe half the- 
 Avorld, and are proud of it. From the inky 
 and nnsavourv Shaw the fish have fled — the 
 angler no lono-er haunts its banks. 
 
 But what matter ? Mrs. Laidlaw is the 
 richest person in a rich community, and it 
 is the part of policy to keep on her good 
 side. Besides, Bridge House is the ver}'' 
 hub of Shawbridgc. The town traffic flows 
 by its doors ; history makes itself before your 
 e^es as you stand at the big bay window of 
 this informal club. It is the debating-ground 
 of the town quality ; the lecture-hall, where 
 an uncrowned queen keeps her subjects in 
 order. 
 
 ''So it is I who am the scapegoat ! " said 
 the minister, as he hooked his arm within 
 that of Horace Little. He chuckled softly, 
 in not ungratified amusement. The minister, 
 as has been said, is a fine figure of a man ; 
 'tis whispered that he smiles benignantly on 
 the uninstructed tourist, who mistakes him 
 for a species of j)i'esbyterian bishop, and
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 perhaps he likes to walk with Horace Little, 
 to whom Nature has been ungenerous in her 
 dealings. 
 
 " It was your turn to-day, and you got it 
 pretty hot, there's no denying. But you see, 
 doctor " — the banker looked before him with 
 an unmoved face — "your sermon, yesterday, 
 was — well, perhaps — just a little — eh ? " 
 
 " Eh ! " echoed Dr. Gillespie, sharply. '' So 
 the sermon was amiss, was it ? " Then the 
 twinkle came into his eye. *' That's because. 
 Nancy wasn't there to look after me." 
 
 "And you forgot, naturally, to turn the 
 pile. Is Miss Nancy still nursing poor old 
 Cunnino;ham ? " 
 
 " She still deprives me of her company 
 for his." 
 
 " He gets no better ? " 
 
 "He doesn't die." 
 
 "And the young doctor is in attend- 
 ance ? " 
 
 " Exactly," said Dr. Gillespie. " The young 
 doctor — the young man whose career I am 
 supposed to have blighted — is in attendance.
 
 8 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 You have no daughter, Little; if you had, 
 she would be as other women are." 
 
 "She would not be half so good as Miss 
 Nancy," said the banker, gallantly. 
 
 The minister shook his head in polite 
 dissent. 
 
 " She's well enough, the lassie," he said ; 
 and though his heart might have been 
 bursting with pride, his Scotch reticence 
 would not have let him say more. " But 
 you don't understand women, Little. How 
 should you — a mere onlooker at the drama 
 of marriage'? Nancy is a good girl;— a good 
 daughter as daughters go — but it's a cam- 
 steerie sex ; hold the reins as you will, it 
 takes the bit between its teeth." 
 
 " Talking of women," said the banker, 
 seeing his friend's good-nature was a little 
 ruffled, " did you ever hear the story of 
 Mrs. Laidlaw's mother'? It was Jamieson 
 •who used to tell it — your predecessor here. 
 It seems that Mrs. Stewart came to visit 
 her daughter, and was seized, while here, 
 with illness. The doctor shook his head,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 prognosticating the worst, and Jamieson was 
 .sent for — to administer those consolations 
 that are your privilege. Shown into the 
 patient's room, he found her sitting up in 
 bed in full flow of talk. He drew Laidlaw 
 aside and whispered, ' Isn't there some mis- 
 take ? — she's talkinor so vio-orouslv.' ' Oh, 
 my dear fellow,' said Laidlaw — you remember 
 ithe meek, depressed bit of a creature he 
 was ? — ' don't go by that. Her mother died 
 in the middle of a sentence.' " 
 
 The minister laughed. 
 
 " Our ofood friend will take care that the 
 sentence is complete," he said. " We shall 
 all get our paiks. Yours will be the hand 
 held out for the tawse, to-morrow, Little." 
 
 "Then I hope I shall bear up under the 
 punishment as bravely as you," The banker 
 spoke in mock seriousness. 
 
 The two shook hands at the latter's door. 
 The twinkle came back to the minister's eye 
 as he turned away. He played again with 
 rthe thought that amused him. 
 
 " And vet it is I — T who have thwarted a
 
 lo THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 fellow- creature in liis eflforts to live ! I wha 
 have played the part of persecutor ! She 
 talked of the halo of martyrdom, I remember. 
 I wonder if Nancy has discovered that halo ? " 
 He was not too deeply absorbed in his 
 reflections to be keenly observant of all that 
 passed around him. It was the hour for the 
 mills to " scale," and Shaw Street was flooded 
 with a rough crowd of lads, and girls wearing 
 white aprons and little woollen shawls upon 
 their heads. The girls linked arms, making 
 conquest of the entire pavement, and those 
 who had business in the street concerned 
 themselves to take the middle of the road. 
 If you live in a manufacturing centre, you 
 soon learn to give way to might. The 
 minister, however, kept blandly on his course ; 
 he smiled indulgently on the jostling crew, 
 and his salutations were answered by nods of 
 varying curtness. The doctor was like the 
 steeple of his own kirk — a landmark to be 
 respected. The same young women — or the 
 better-disposed of them at least — who now 
 wore daidlies and clothed their rouoh heads-
 
 THE MISCHJEF-MAKER. ir 
 
 in tartan, appeared in the front gallery on 
 Sundays in the very best silks and feathers 
 which Stewart, the draper in the High Street, 
 could produce. The minister did not rebuke 
 this finery, nor did he suggest that broken 
 boots-and gay ribbons were ill met. Had he 
 not a daughter of his own ? So they let him 
 have his share of the pavement — the only 
 privileged man, and unlinked their arms that 
 he might pass. Others fared less well. With 
 the tail of his eye the minister saw Charlie 
 Nairn dive into Mackie, the chemist's, as the 
 horde advanced. Charlie, recently taken on 
 as " creeshie " at Laidlaw's Mill, was their- 
 legitimate butt : Mrs. Mellison, too, hurrying 
 home from a round of calls, and uncomfortably 
 conscious of wearing her best, was the subject 
 of much outspoken criticism and comment. 
 Her blushes roused the doctor's sympathy as 
 he raised his hat, and he was tempted to turn 
 and escort her home. A pity to be so sensi- 
 tive — these rou£!;h children of Nature meant 
 no harm. For himself, he basked in an 
 atmosphere of general good- will. As he
 
 »12 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER, 
 
 turned out of Shaw Street into Church Walk, 
 leaving the noisy band behind him, his steps 
 became slower, his fine figure seemed to bulk 
 larger. He was in his own domain. Over 
 the low wall he could see the crowding OTave- 
 stones — so near to the life and youtrh of 
 Shaw Street, and 3^et wra23ped in an eternal 
 loneliness. 
 
 How many of his own flock had he followed 
 there since, twenty years before, he had laid 
 Jiis own young wife in the corner under the 
 ■weepiDg willow l)y the further wall ! There 
 was a time when he had found himself unable 
 *o pass the spot without lingering to pluck a 
 weed from the grass-sown mound, or train a 
 tendril of the encircling ivy ; he did not pause 
 now, and he left the guardianship of the grave 
 to Nancy. But he still thought of the first 
 Nancy, and there were times when he took 
 ii kind of solemn pleasure in his own con- 
 stancy. It had been such a certainty in men's 
 mouths that he would marry again. His eye 
 travelled to the church, and his thoughts to 
 the many couples he had united there, and
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 13. 
 
 the little ones he had baptized. The barn- 
 like building — haiied afresh each spring, with 
 a stumpy uplifted finger pointing skywards,, 
 was as he had found it, with bulging galleries, 
 narrow window-slits, and high-walled pews. 
 His aspirations did not lie in the way of 
 restoration ; an '' anti-scrape " society, had 
 such existed in Shawbridge, would have found 
 him a zealous member. A new church mio-ht 
 
 O 
 
 have demanded new sermons. 
 
 The manse was a few minutes' walk from 
 the church, and well away from the saddening 
 influence of the churchyard. A plain, sub- 
 stantial house, with comfort beaming from its 
 every eye. The sparkle of firelight making 
 red gleams among the laurel bushes, gladdened 
 his heart, for now that the sun had dipped 
 westward, the spring day was raw and cold. 
 
 " Is my daughter at home ? " he asked, as 
 Sarah, the housemaid, ran to open the door in 
 anticipation of his latch-key. 
 
 " No, sir, not yet." 
 
 "Ah I" said the minister, gravely, as he 
 hung up his hat.
 
 14 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 "Miss Nancy was in at four o'clock, and 
 she said, as Mr. Cunningham was not quite 
 so well, slie might be late. And please, sir, 
 I've taken the tea into the study, and the 
 kettle's singfinsf." 
 
 He thanked her graciously as he turned 
 into the comfortable room. Sarah knew and 
 respected all her master's little weaknesses. 
 It was one of them to brew his own tea. She 
 also took pride in keeping bright the little 
 silver skillet in which he sometimes warmed 
 a posset when Nancy had gone to bed. If 
 Nancy remonstrated, and insisted on minis- 
 tering to him herself, he would tell her with 
 a quite genuine sigh that jwhen she was a 
 child he had been a lonely man, and had 
 fallen into bachelor ways. 
 
 " And, since you will leave me before long, 
 isn't it a pity you should insist on my un- 
 learning them, my dear ? " 
 
 Nancy would sometimes declare that there 
 was nothing less likely in the world than 
 that she should leave him ; but one knows 
 what a girl means by such vehemence. It
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 15 
 
 is all very natural and riglit and pretty until 
 her liour strikes, and then it is no longer papa 
 to whom she vows eternal devotion. There 
 was certainly no immediate suitor in view, and 
 since Nancy had declined the hand of young 
 George Black, Shawbridge, instructed by 
 Mrs. Laidlaw, had pronounced the girl proud 
 and particular. But young men will not be 
 deterred by any old woman from admiring 
 a handsome lass ; and in the meantime Dr. 
 Gillespie continued to " infuse " his own tea, 
 and concoct those little warm drinks that 
 sweetly woo sleep. 
 
 As he sat down in his capacious easy-chair 
 — it was considerably more worn than the 
 sad-hued theological books on the shelves — 
 and measured the spoonsful from the silver 
 caddy, his thoughts reverted to the stranger 
 whom Mrs. Laidlaw had insisted on placing 
 in the calendar of the persecuted. 
 
 Certainly no one looked less like saint or 
 martyr than the broad-browed, vigorous, 
 black-haired young gentleman, who came 
 soliciting Shawbridge's suffrages, and seemed
 
 i6 
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 determined to secure tliem by force if neces- 
 sary. The role liad been better filled by the 
 sickly looking person — companion or patient 
 — who was said to share his home. Still, 
 women see with other eyes than men ; and 
 was it possible that Nancy, too, had had a 
 glimpse of that halo ?
 
 m 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 HIS was the position of affairs wlien we 
 — Sutherland and I — had been settled 
 for a year or more in Shawbridge. Perhaps it 
 was our own "blame," as they say in these 
 parts, that we were both isolated and iscnored. 
 We came as strangers, without introductions, 
 and indeed, with what the medical men 
 already established there were pleased to 
 •consider hostile intentions on Sutherland's 
 part. They resented his trespass on ground 
 already pretty thickly covered. He smacked of 
 foreign schools and new science ; he was an 
 ■f^ffence to their older-fashioned methods, their 
 haphazard kill or cure ventures. 
 
 For a long time Sutherland did not under- 
 -stand that he was not M'antcd ; when it was 
 
 VOL. I. '2 
 
 X
 
 i8- THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 forced upon liim he straightened his broad- 
 shoulders and laughed. 
 
 "They'll want me yet,." he said. 
 
 Nobody was considerate enough to tell us 
 that the road to social success lay through 
 Mrs. Laidlaw's front parlour ; but, if we had 
 been told, it would have been without avail,, 
 for Sutherland's back is of the cast-iron order, 
 made without a hins^e ; and as for me. ill-health 
 has always permitted me the privileges and' 
 consolations of a bachelor, to whom a lady's^ 
 drawing-room is a terra incognita. 
 
 It may be as well to say here that I, Henr}^ 
 Fowler, have no part or lot in this chronicle 
 beyond being Sutherland's friend. I drifted 
 into his life when it was immeasurably to my 
 benefit to have his companionship, and some- 
 how — to his credit rather than to mine — wc 
 have remained comrades ever since. In one 
 jtarticular our lots are similar : we are both 
 singularly friendless and relationless, but while 
 he — the bold David — was born to conquer his 
 world, a sickly constitution turned me early 
 into an idler without Jonathan^? alleviations tC'
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 19 
 
 support the sitiuation. Perhaps the modest 
 competence which just serves to keep me, has 
 been, as Sutherhmd puts it, my curse — a 
 greater ban to progress than a feeble habit of 
 body, but it has always seemed to me enough 
 to look on while he works. His vitality saps 
 mine, 
 
 I was a small boy when Mrs. Sutherland 
 consented, at the request of my guardians, to 
 take charge of me, and for j^ears we three 
 drifted about England, Scotland, and the Con- 
 tinent, chiefly in search of sunshine for her. 
 She was the widow of an officer who fell in 
 the Indian Mutiny, she herself escaping in a, 
 boat by night down the Ganges with her 
 infant son. Her nerves never recovered that 
 terrible experience, but her pension, and a little 
 annuity she had besides, enabled her to carr}- 
 out her whim for travel. She was a curiously 
 impulsive person who never paused to revise 
 her judgments : her prejudices and fears were 
 easily aroused and <]uickly acted on, and we 
 were tlierefore quite accustomed to strike 
 camp and take the road Mt a moment's notice.
 
 2.0 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Archie aud I picked up a desultory educa- 
 tion as best we could. He learned what he 
 cared to learn very easily ; what he didn't 
 choose to acquire he left alone, his mother 
 never interfering. As for me, I have always 
 loved a book, and was never so pleased as 
 when I could escape the discipline and routine 
 of school life, and browse unhindered in pas- 
 turage of my own selecting. We made few 
 acquaintances save those rolling stones of 
 travel, as easily thrown aside as acquired, 
 since we stayed nowhere long enough to strike 
 root ; but I desired no other friend than 
 Archie. Friendship is less important to him : 
 he is enough for himself. 
 
 His self-reliance was, I think, fostered by the 
 vagrant life we led ; it was so early necessary 
 for him to think and act independently. I 
 have often noticed that his curiously one-sided 
 judgment of women was based upon his know- 
 ledge of his mother's character. That most 
 women are illogical is probably true, but 
 Sutherland would have it that they were 
 nothing but a bundle of impulses and emotions,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. at 
 
 scarcely admitting that they had minds, 
 any more than canary birds. For all that, he 
 was an excellent son, patient and good- 
 humoured, even to the packing and unpacking 
 of the innumerable overflovvinor boxes and 
 bundles, novels and work-bags, we dragged 
 about on our travels, and the carrying out, as 
 well as he knew how, of her changing caprices. 
 She was untidy, unmethodical, and helpless, 
 and in the intervals between the departure of 
 one maid and the arrival of another — she 
 never could keep a servant — he became as 
 neat-handed and useful as a daufjhter. 
 
 She died when he was twenty, and I some 
 two 3^ears more. Her illness was liutierino- 
 and she fretted at the confinement ; we were 
 then living at a chalet in Switzerland, where 
 she had fancied the air a month or two 
 earlier ; she now insisted that if she could 
 but be taken to Bournemouth she would 
 certainly recover. But her removal was out 
 (jf the question, and she grew in time to 
 acce2:)t her fate. 
 
 We were both in the hare sunnv salon
 
 2 2 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 — converted into the sick-room — one spring 
 evening ; but Archie, who had been on duty 
 at her bedside the previous night, had fallen 
 asleep. She lay looking at him in silence ; 
 perhaps he reminded her of her husband ; 
 certainly I have never been able to trace in 
 him any look of his mother. He was as tall 
 then as he is now, though not so broad- 
 shouldered, and looked very big, huddled 
 uneasily in the springless easy- chair. His 
 black hair fell in a heavy lock over his 
 forehead, which bulges over the eyebrows ; 
 his mouth was close set, his chin square, 
 and even in sleep his head was tossed back, 
 exposing the firm round throat. To me, he 
 looked more stern and self-reliant than usual, 
 since his eyes were veiled — there is a kindly 
 tolerance in their dark-blue depths that re- 
 deems his face — but the gaze of the dying 
 may see deeper than that of the living ; 
 women have fine intuitions which escape 
 us, let Archie mock as he will ; how else, 
 while I was enviously admiring his strength, 
 should his mother have perceived the seed
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 23 
 
 of weakness iu him, iinguessed by me ? Was 
 it by ri^rlit of the louof dormant motherliood 
 in Ler — awakened at last — slie read him so 
 well ? 
 
 She beckoned me to her. 
 
 " You will stay with him % " she whispered. 
 
 " If he will let me. So Ions: as he tolerates 
 
 J) 
 
 ane. 
 
 " That will be always ; he has immense 
 patience with weakness," she said, with un- 
 tilattering candour. "You may help him — 
 (repay him," 
 
 " How ? " 
 
 " He is strong ; but he has one defenceless 
 spot. He thinks he despises women, but one 
 ■day he will fancy himself in love, and he will 
 make a mistake — men of his type always 
 do. Make your friendship of so much value 
 to him that he will choose between it and 
 love — choose ijou. He will neither be haj^py 
 himself, nor make the woman happy whom 
 he marries." 
 
 She asked no pledge of me, and better so, 
 for the rio;ht answer woukl liavc been hard
 
 2 4 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 to give. Mv faithfulness to him she mifjht 
 well take for granted ; but to stand between 
 him and love, even mistaken love 
 
 She died in her son's arms the next day^ 
 seven years ago this very month ; and, so 
 far, her predictions have remained unfulfilled ; 
 not a petticoat has hazarded our peace. 
 
 The whole of her income, except a sum of 
 about £2500, died with Mrs. Sutherland, 
 but Archie's plans were all matured. He 
 had long ago made up his mind that ho 
 would be a doctor, and the time had now 
 come. He was his own master, ownin^r 
 allegiance to no one. Of his mother's few 
 relations he knew nothing — I have always 
 suspected that she was not proud of them. 
 On his father's side, there were uncles and 
 cousins — people of some social standing and 
 importance — but we had never met any of 
 them, except one, whose overtures Mrs. 
 Sutherland discouraged, for he was ad- 
 mittedly the black sheep of the family. 
 Archie and I had a sneaking liking for this 
 reprobate — Colonel Tom Carnegie — but it
 
 THE iMISCHIEF-MAKER. 25 
 
 occurred to ueither of us to ask liis advice 
 at this epoch. Indeed, it is not Sutherland's 
 way to seek advice of anybody. 
 
 " I mean to use this money to fit myself 
 as well as 1 can, theoretically, for the pro- 
 fession," he said ; " the practice can take 
 care of itself. We'll 00 to Edinburirh. One 
 ought to be patriotic — and so long as you 
 can poke your nose inside a book, you'll be 
 happy anywhere. We'll get an introductioa 
 to the Advocate's Library — a perfect dungeoa 
 of learning, I'm told — and you can burrow 
 there to your heart's content." 
 
 So to the proud capital of the North we- 
 went, and thereafter, when Archie had matri- 
 culated, for a long year or more, to Paris, 
 and for another to Vienna. Our way of 
 living was simple to the verge of austerity,, 
 and our joint income sufficed. 
 
 When Sutherland considered himself suf- 
 ficiently equipped, we turned our faces- 
 homewards again, taking a run through 
 Germany on our way to have a look at the- 
 hospitals there. How we finally cam<^ to
 
 .26 THE MISCHIEF-AIAKER. 
 
 fix ou SliawbridQ:e as the scene of liis 
 practice it would take too long to tell. I 
 was for a larger, more central place, but 
 Archie had his answer ready. Shawbridge 
 was yearly adding to its size and import- 
 ance ; better begin in a progressive place, 
 where one could advance with the tide, 
 than be stranded in an older civilization. 
 
 We spent a couple of nights in the Angler's 
 Arms. The landlord, who took us for south- 
 country tourists, offered us a day's fishing in 
 the Locliy — a tributary of the Shaw, not then 
 poisoned by the refuse from the mills. 
 
 "You go," said Sutherland, who usually 
 settled my plans as well as his own. " It 
 isn't incumbent on you to catch anything. 
 You can buy a creelful on your way through 
 the town. All you want is leave to moon 
 about with a book bulging each pocket." 
 
 " And what may you intend to do with 
 yourself, since I'm conveniently disposed of ? " 
 
 " Take a look round to see how the land 
 lies, and interview the agents." 
 
 He was well pleased, in his cool, calm way,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 27 
 
 Avlieu we met ia the evenino- and sat clowu to 
 the fish with which I was fortunate enough 
 to save our reputation in the hmdlord's eyes ; 
 ijut he said little till we were alone — then it 
 all came out. 
 
 " I've seen the risjht thiuo; — a corner house 
 — no one else within a quarter of a mile. It's 
 at tlie junction of South PJace — eligible resi- 
 dential quarter, I've caught the house-agent's 
 lingo, you see — and Hill Street — shops of the 
 better class — grocers, butchers, and a publican 
 or two — no doctor despises a publican as a 
 patient. Fowler, whatever you may think of 
 his mode of earning money. I'm not squeamisli 
 myself — he's honest and liberal in the spending 
 of it." 
 
 " Go on. I concede the publican. May he 
 require all the remedies in the pharmacopceia, 
 and call on you to administer them." 
 
 " It has been a doctor's house for years, so 
 it has the right tradition. The old chap died 
 some weeks since — doesn't seem to have done 
 much, but one may alter that. His widow 
 will sell the connection for a trifle. It's a
 
 38 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 great thing, Fowler, to succeed ii doctor — 
 worth a year's rent. Where patients have 
 gone before they'll go again, there's a sort of 
 instinct about it. It gives them confidence.. 
 I mio^lit rent the finest brand-new villa and 
 not do half as well as in this old b;irrack."' 
 
 " What about opposition ? " 
 
 *' Nairn is the only man to be feared. An. 
 Aberdonian, old type — but he takes with the 
 county — the deferential, sympathetic. ' I am 
 your humble servant ' kind of manner. Sort 
 of thing that goes down with some." 
 
 " Then you won't take," I said, with a 
 laugh, thinking of his thrust-up chin and 
 masterful air. 
 
 "It takes all sorts to make even a manu- 
 facturing world," he answered confidently. 
 " Depend on it, there are some who would, 
 think none the better of you for crinorine 
 Next to Nairn there's Black. Far more brains 
 — a capital fellow as far as knowledge goes,. 
 but lacks the courage of his opinions. A man 
 who hesitates has no business in the pro- 
 fession."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 29 
 
 " How did you learn all this ? " I asked 
 wonderingly. 
 
 " Pooh ! used my eyes and ears. In a place 
 like this everybody talks. There are others, 
 of course, the ground is pretty thick with 
 them ; but there's nothing much to fear from 
 any one of them. At least, I think," he 
 ended modestly — for with all his confidence 
 iic is not conceited — ■" I've as good a chance 
 as any of them, given time and opportunity." 
 
 He could not have better credentials, and 
 one has only to look at him to see that he is 
 a gentleman. T, at least, had everv faith in 
 his success, and, like a fool, lay tossingly awake 
 in the suffocating feather bed, picturing his 
 brilliant future, and my own small share in it 
 as spectator. He occupied an adjoining room, 
 but when I wandered there in search of 
 sympathy, ready for furtlier talk, he was fast 
 asleep. What a thing it is to have an abso- 
 lutely faultless constitution and perfectly 
 l3alanced nerves !
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 E went over the house next day, it had 
 all the qualities Sutherland gave it ; 
 it was w^ell built, the rooms of good size and 
 j)roportion, the situation excellent. The widow 
 of the late occupier — a depressed person with 
 a lid that drooped like a furtive wink — made 
 no difficulties about movino' out : she was 
 2;oino- to make her home with a married 
 daughter in the North, and would take her 
 bits of sticks with her. Shabby and frowsy 
 enough they were to awaken suspicions as to 
 the value of the connection she was eager to' 
 sell, but Sutherland would listen to no cautions. 
 When we once more found ourselves in Hill 
 Street, it was as virtual tenants of the house
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 31 
 
 in South Place, and prospective citizens of 
 Shawbriclge that we walked its pavement. 
 
 Sutherland ordered his brass plate that 
 afternoon, and the next day, alive with zeal, 
 insisted on our immediate return to Edinburgh 
 to buy the necessary furniture, carrying me 
 with him, solely, it would seem, to be a witness 
 of his extravao-ance. I have heard him called 
 
 O 
 
 a man who loved money, but never was there 
 a more mistaken estimate of character. In- 
 fluence and power he certainly desired : to 
 succeed where others had failed, to do still 
 better what had been done well was his am- 
 bition ; but monev he looked on as a mere 
 medium for ^ainino- his ends. One must live 
 in a certain style ; be free of sordid cares if 
 one's mind were to be given to one's work : 
 beyond that, wealth was to him valueless. 
 His openhanded charities, had he ever cared 
 to publish them, might have told a different 
 tale ; but until he dies — a poor man — no 
 one else but T, and perhaps one other, will 
 remember how far from him it was to 
 hoard.
 
 32 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 We went to a well-known furniture ware- 
 house in George Street — that stately, wind- 
 swept thoroughfare so disdainful to outward 
 seeming of the trade that has invaded its 
 borders, that the rattle of a cab upon its 
 granite roadway rudely jars the silence, and 
 the very comers and goers on the pavement, 
 few as they number, are an insult to its 
 ■dignity. 
 
 Familiar as it was in our student days, it 
 took a new aspect now that we no longer 
 scurried over its bleak, oast-windy expanse on 
 our way somewhere else, but came to patronize 
 it with a pocket full of gold. 
 
 " Upon my word, it does seem a liberty," 
 said Sutherland. "Like driving a bargain in 
 Pompeii. It has caught the trick of a past 
 civilization. You step back a century or two 
 in leaving Princes Street for this." 
 
 For all that, in a dark-browed shop on its 
 shady side, where the wind lurks like an 
 assassin with unsheathed blade, we found the 
 'latest designs in tables and chairs, made 
 yesterday, but guaranteed to outlast our joint
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. n 
 
 lives. Sutlieiiancrs purchases made a big in- 
 road in liis l3ank account. He AS'ould have • 
 everything of the best and' most solid. The 
 dining-room, consulting room, and hall, were 
 his chief care. He was fastidious over the 
 choice of the oak sideboard and chairs ; and 
 the Turkey carpet cost the salesman an hour's 
 capering. The consulting-room was fitted 
 with all the latest appliances ; the entrance 
 did equal credit to his taste and judgment, 
 with its well-chosen engravings, harmonious 
 rugs, and handsome stair-carpet ; a grand- 
 father's clock, warranted antique, was destined 
 to mark t he hours for us, and an iron-hinged 
 chest, elaborately carved, and with a history 
 we did not choose to consider apocryphal, 
 kept it company. 
 
 ^'1 did think of a smoking-dcn," he said, 
 as we went down Hanover Street in searcli of 
 lunch; "but there's the surgery and your 
 quarters, if you haven't made them too finick- 
 ing. Choice enough, and nobody to turn up 
 a nose at the smell." 
 
 His own bedroom was the smalk^st in the 
 
 VOL. I. 3
 
 34 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 house, and fitted witli an almost austere sim- 
 plicity. Ours ^Yas, as will l^e seen, a man's 
 house, pure and simple : everything for use, 
 and not a single nicknack or frippery. Per- 
 haps he recalled, as I did, the labour entailed 
 in packing and unpacking the Japanese fans, 
 the art pots and scarves, with which his 
 mother burdened our travels. 
 
 "Not but what I suppose I shall marry 
 some day," he used to say ; " there's an 
 unwritten tradition in the profession that you 
 must be either married or a widower at the 
 least to get on — heaven knows why ! " 
 
 " An odd reason for marrying." I thought 
 of his mother's words. 
 
 "As good a reason as another. A man 
 needn't ill-treat his wife, Ijecause he chooses 
 her from some other motive than the idiotic 
 one that he's in love with her." 
 
 " Is it so idiotic ? " 
 
 " It would be for me. A doctor marries for 
 professional rather than personal reasons. A 
 wife is either a help or a fettering hindrance. 
 A girl with her head screwed on the right way,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 35 
 
 "witli plenty of tact, and a little money of her 
 own if she likes. It must he a galling thing 
 for a woman, Fowler, to owe every penny to 
 her hushaud : to come whispering and blushing 
 for the price of a pair of stockings or a new 
 bonnet." 
 
 " The w^oman you describe wouldn't think 
 it hateful ; she would exact as a right rather 
 than petition as a beggar. If that's your ideal 
 wife, Sutherland, may you be long in finding 
 her." 
 
 " She isn't to be come across every day," he 
 said, with a laugh ; " and, if it will ease your 
 mind, old man, I haven't found her yet." 
 
 But I had no fears, AVe settled down, as I 
 say, as a bachelor household. Not a shade or 
 shadow of womankind — even in the guise of 
 the ubiquitous charwoman — crossed our thres- 
 jiold. On this point Sutherland had expressed 
 himself with unusual strenc-th. 
 
 " Wliat — is the sex to have no admittance — 
 €ven as a patient ? " 
 
 " A patient is sexless," he rebuked me ; 
 "but your housekeeper would refuse to be
 
 o 
 
 6 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 considered simply as a case. At the first 
 brush she would shelter herself behind her 
 womanhood, and we should be made to feel 
 brutes ! " 
 
 "By all means let us dispense with her, 
 then. Write above your surgery door, ' Thus 
 far and no further.' We have neither of us, 
 I'm afraid, much skill in cookery, but tinned 
 foods are plentiful " 
 
 "We shan't be reduced to that pass. I've 
 a man in my mind's eye who has nothing to 
 learn from any woman. But of course you 
 remember Burton % " 
 
 I remembered Burton. For one prosperous 
 half year in our chequered travels he had been 
 the guide, philosopher, friend of our little party 
 — in other words, cook, housemaid, valet, 
 personal conductor — a man of men, sparing of 
 words but larg-e of deeds. Our anxieties Avere 
 at an end when Sutherland triumphantly 
 tossed the telegram in which Burton accepted 
 the situation across the table to me. 
 
 Burton, I may say here, highly approved of 
 our arrangements. We provided him with a
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 37 
 
 button boy, ;iu ornamental appendage who 
 beguiled his time by flattening his nos<i 
 ■against the window-pane, looking out for 
 patients who never came. Burton ruled us 
 with mild firmness, and guarded our pos- 
 sessions with zeal. The drawing-room, swe})t 
 but ungarnished, he iTSed as a nursery for his 
 struo-oiino- seedlinsr c;eraniums ; the sun stream- 
 mz in on them unrebuked, encouraofed their 
 faint eff'orts to live ; indeed, the red pots with 
 their weedy green-stuft', the pile of crocks, 
 garden tools, waterino-.can dribblino- on the 
 bare boards, are still the impressions that 
 remain most strongly with me, regarding "the 
 mistress's room." The phrase was Burton's, 
 bestowed in derision, perhaps, for he was an 
 even more pronounced woman hater than 
 either of his employers. 
 
 Looking back on them, those were happy 
 days enough, though it seems to me now the 
 insanest folly to have thouglit that Sutherland 
 had but to show himself to conquer ; to walk 
 over tlie ground unopposed. He certainly 
 did nothinci' to ini-Tatiate liimself. Medical
 
 38 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 etiquette, it appears, tlemand'ed that lie slioulcl 
 call upon liis fellow practitioners : this little 
 ceremony he either forgot or neglected. He 
 imported his drugs fro-m London, and openly 
 declared his satisfaction in being able to make 
 experiments and WTite prescriptions unham- 
 pered by the criticism of the local 'chemist. 
 He was tinctured with foreis^n methods and 
 ideas, dangerous to the health of the com- 
 munity, in view of the established Sawbones', 
 who cluno; to the time-honoured remedies- 
 handed down from their fathers, and looked 
 upon the progressive younger school with pro- 
 found distrust. Who was he — a new-comer — 
 that he should sniff and poke, and make 
 disparaging remarks about the drainage of 
 Hill Street ? He earned the enmity of no 
 fewer than three cow-dealers by his officious 
 use of the lactometer. Alas, alas, he was 
 alt02;ether wrono^ and in diso;race ; too fine a 
 gentleman for Shawbridge, where nothing was 
 a:ood enouo'h for him. Let him o^o back to his 
 Vienna and his Paris ! 
 
 Over his head the storm passed harmlessly ;
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 39 
 
 we had no dear friend to repeat all the tittle- 
 tattle that busied itself with our concerns, and 
 if he guessed that he had made himself 
 obnoxious to Shawbrido-e, he was able to show 
 himself quite indifferent to its contempt. He 
 had no reason, so far as I know, to regret his 
 choice, thouo'h the waitinej time must have 
 been far more fretting to his eager spirit than 
 it was to me, anxious as I often was about the 
 future. Since others wanted nothing of him, 
 I had the more. 
 
 It was a happy time, as I have said, though 
 Sutherland's carefully administered capital 
 must have been meltino- like snow in March. 
 While he secured but a stray case here and 
 there — for the connection of the late doctor 
 proved worthless — the mere gleanings of 
 another's harvest, to keep hope alive, he read 
 and studied continually. He would not go 
 out in the daytime in case of missing a patient, 
 and we fell into the way of taking exercise 
 after dark, so that we scarce knew more than 
 the nioht side of Shawljrido;e. Never for a 
 moment did he lose siujlit of his aim, and I
 
 40 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 liave heard him say in Later years that that 
 leisure time did more for him than a thousand 
 patients could have accomplished. I know it 
 gave him a quicker sympathy with others who 
 could less well afford to wait. 
 
 One day, shortly after our arrival, the 
 Established Kirk minister rang our bell with 
 a sonorous peal that echoed in the empty 
 upper rooms. Burton was able conscientiously 
 to say that we were out (we were smoking in 
 the back garden). Mr. McPherson, of the 
 U.P.'s, also called, l)earing with him a card 
 for a " social swarry " — innocent wile to draw 
 us into his fold. Burton presented it solemnly 
 on a salver with the strong cups of tea he 
 brouo-ht out to the students seated under the 
 Aveeping ash. We made its umbrageous shade 
 our study during that first long, hot summer. 
 There was also a lean Anglican curate, almost 
 as despised as ourselves, who made a bid for 
 us ; and a black-avised Roman, who came 
 openly seeking a subscription for the Irish 
 mendicants, to whom he ministered. 
 
 Him Sutherland invited in ; gave him a
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 41 
 
 donatiou and ordered refreslimeiits. He was 
 a Celt, witli tlic vivacity and wit of his race, 
 much beaten down by circumstances, l)ut ready 
 to spring up under encouragement. He 
 became a frequent and amusing visitor, and 
 that is uo doul^t how we came to have the 
 /jvil reputation of being Papists. 
 
 The levier of rates and the collectors for 
 innumerable charities were our only other 
 visitors. 
 
 Once onl}-, Sutherland spoke of his position. 
 He had been summoned, in the night to see 
 a patient at the Angler's Arms — a visitor who 
 had taken suddenly ill. The case promised to 
 be one of some interest, and it awoke all his 
 professional zeal ; 1jut when he returned next 
 day to the iun he was told that Dr. Nairn had 
 Ijeen called in, as the gentleman expressed a 
 wish to consult the medical man wlio attended 
 the family at Kossie Ciistle, Lord Minterly 
 'being an acquaintance of his. Sutherland 
 fi.'lt the aifront bitterly. His dark eyes 
 smouldered fire ; tlie perpendicular lines on 
 liis forehead seemed to be cut deeper as ]i(i
 
 42 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 walked up and down the room pouring out 
 his ano'cr. 
 
 "Well," lie said grimly, ''it makes no- 
 difference. I mean to fidit the thins: out. 
 They shall never say I sneaked away Ijecause 
 they chose to boycott or to bully me. Short 
 of starvation, nothing will make me budge. 
 When my last coin is spent, I dare say I can 
 get an assistantship somewhere or other, but 
 that day isn't yet. I've been making a cal- 
 culation, Fowler, and with ordinary prudence 
 we can stand the siege for another six months 
 or more. By that time we'll see who wins." 
 
 " The luck will turn," I cried, inspired by 
 his confidence. And, indeed, having, as it 
 were, flung his challenge in the face of fate, 
 that fickle dame, after the manner of her sex, 
 began to relent towards him ; let her favours 
 be but despised and she is ready to lavish 
 them. 
 
 A week or two later and we had left the 
 year of leanness behind us. Sutherland was 
 sent for to the Castle : a. groom in hot haste 
 driving over to fetch him. A young' gentle-
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 man visitiua; there liad met with an accident 
 while duck-shootiuo-, AVoukl the doctor come 
 at ouce ? " 
 
 " You reinemljer him, of course ? " Suther- 
 land asked, tossing the note over to me, as he 
 dived out of his smoking-jacket. "Young- 
 Coventry : the wonder is how he came to 
 remember me." 
 
 It did not seem to me so very wonderful. 
 This young sprig of the aristocracy had de- 
 tained us for a week in a dull little German 
 town where we had meant to halt for a mere 
 hour or two. Accident brought us under the 
 same roof, and Coventry, who was suffering 
 from a sharpish attack of fever, hearing of the 
 English doctor's presence in the hotel, begged 
 his services. 
 
 " I have every reason to remember liim. 
 He kept us in that God-forsaken little hole 
 for eight days, and ran us up a tremendous 
 hotel liill — and you wouldn't charge him any- 
 tliincr." 
 
 "And this," said Sutherland, " is the reward 
 of that virtuous action."
 
 44 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 He was off and downstairs three steps at 
 a time, before I could reply ; but I flung one 
 of his slippers after him for luck. There are 
 moments when one can afford to be super- 
 stitious. 
 
 The tide had turned. Sutherland was de- 
 tained several days at the Castle, and during 
 that time three people called at the surgery 
 and went away manifestly disappointed. 
 
 Perhaps it would scarcely have consoled 
 Sutlierland to hear that only one of them had 
 ■a decent coat to his back. A patient was in- 
 finitely more to him than his fee. 
 
 When he got home, however, I was able to 
 •tell him with triumph that Mrs. Laidlaw had 
 sent for him three times. 
 
 " And who is Mrs. Laidlaw^ ? " he asked. 
 
 Nothing could better illustrate our isolation 
 than the fact that I was unable to enlighten 
 him. 
 
 We had been a whole year in Shawbridge, 
 and we did not know Mrs. Laidlaw !
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Y dear cliikl, I'm afraid this is very 
 irregular. It is quite agaiDst all pre- 
 cedent that the daiio-hter of the Manse should 
 spend herself and be spent in the service of 
 
 dissent " 
 
 "But we never think of Mr. Cunningham 
 as a Dissenter," said Nancy Gillespie, standing 
 behind her ftither's chair with a hand on his 
 shoulder ; " we don't label our friends — they're 
 just our friends." 
 
 " Well, w^ell ! and how is the patient ? " 
 
 " Not so well," said Nancy, gravely. '' That 
 
 is, lie is recovering from his illness, but liis 
 
 sight is certainly fading. To-day when he 
 
 tried to read, a verse, he said, ' Surely the da}-
 
 46 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 must be very grey and dark ; ' and you know 
 liow bright it lias beeu." 
 
 "Weakness might account for that." 
 
 " Yes ; but it has been gradually getting 
 worse, and I can't help thinking the doctor is 
 anxious, though he says nothing." 
 
 " Ah, the new doctor ! " the minister sat up 
 suddenly and spoke with animation. "What 
 a thino; it is to have a headstronsc dauo'hter !" 
 
 " I don't feel as if I had anything to 'fess," 
 said Nancy, smoothing the hair over the tiny 
 Ijald spot on the minister's crown. 
 
 " Yes, yes," he went on. " You were 
 headstrong from your nursery days, when you 
 insisted on making little Frank Cunningham 
 your constant playmate." 
 
 "Don't scold me for that," the girl laughed. 
 " I consider it an instance of wonderful dis- 
 crimination on my jmrt to have chosen Frank 
 as my friend, instead of the little Ramsey s you 
 were always inviting to jam teas. Think of 
 George Ramsey. What would my proper 
 papa have said if I had insisted on sticking to 
 him ? "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 47 
 
 "I'm afraid Frank CuuuiDgliam scarcely 
 better justifies your clioice." 
 
 " Oil, father, don't say that!" she coloured 
 faintl}'. " Frank may be a little thoughtless : 
 but he will never disgrace his people like poor 
 George." 
 
 " I can't think why you never liked girls," 
 said her father, testily.' 
 
 " Well, I never did — much," she said re- 
 flectively, as if seeking a reason, and finding 
 none. " Besides ; wasn't it better, dear, that 
 the children of the two Manses should play 
 together, and so make a bond between their 
 fathers, than that there should be alienation 
 and bitterness, as there might have been ? If 
 our friendship — Frank's and mine — made that 
 impossible, you will not grudge it ? " 
 
 " My child," said the minister, whimsically, 
 "you can scarcely ask me to believe that you 
 were animated l)y any such motive as the 
 healing of schism at tlic tender age of five. 
 You were no more than that, I believe, 
 when I first discovered you dragging young 
 Cunningham out of the duck-pond."
 
 48 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Yes," said the girl, Laughing. " I Lelieve 
 it was that clucking that melted mv heart to 
 him. He looked such a poor, drouket little 
 object, and he cried so bitterly — and then, it 
 was partly my fault that he fell in. And now 
 that he's away in London and can't look after 
 his father, I think he would rather I did it 
 than any one else." 
 
 " So it's for Frank's sake ? " Dr. Gillespie 
 frowned. 
 
 " No," she said fraiikly ; " not altogether. If 
 there were no Frank I should still love to 
 serve Mr. Cunningham. Oh, ftither, you don't 
 know how patient he is — and so grateful for 
 the least little thing." 
 
 "You ou^dit to know — you have been at 
 his bedside daily for weeks — weeks during 
 which I have had to do without you." 
 
 '•' Only for a little time in the afternoon," 
 she murmured. " There are so many of his 
 own people to help." 
 
 " And, to add to your iniquities, you must 
 needs call in this new sprig of a doctor." 
 
 She had come round from behind his chair, 
 
 I
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. . 49 
 
 and as she stood by the mantelpiece, her hat 
 swinging in one hand, the Hght fell clearly on 
 her face. He watched her keenly. 
 
 " Oh, that was a mere accident .! When Dr. 
 Nairn fell ill, there was nobody else to send 
 for. ]\Iargaret Baird was watching too, and 
 she ran to fetch him. She said her husband 
 would approve." 
 
 " There was Dr. Black." 
 
 " At the other side of the town ! I suppose," 
 her mouth took a humorous curl, " some kind 
 person has been saying unpleasant things." 
 
 "The unpleasant things have all fallen on 
 your father's shoulders. I am told it is / who 
 have hindered this young man from acquiring 
 a practice in Shawbridge. I am told that I 
 have neglected him, turned my back on him ; 
 hinted, Ijy my example, that he \vas un- 
 worthy of confidence, and, as if that was not 
 enough, I am twitted with the fact that 
 my own daughter is among the first of his 
 worshippers." 
 
 " I recognize the voice of Mrs. Laidlaw. . 
 What an aljsurd old creature she is ! " Nancy 
 
 VOL. I. 4
 
 50 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 was half provoked, lialf amused. " Wor- 
 shipper, indeed ! " 
 
 " So he doesn't strike you in the light of a 
 victim " 
 
 " A victim ? " Her clear brows lifted them- 
 selves. " If that is the part Mrs. Laidlaw has 
 assimed him, she'll find he won't fit it. He 
 struck me as cool, clear-headed, perfectly able 
 to look after himself — a man who knows his 
 business and does it." 
 
 " And — good looking, perhaps ? You will 
 remember, my dear, that this person whose 
 ambition I am supposed to have thwarted had 
 not the courtesy to return my call. He took 
 his walks, I am told, mostly at night, and 
 shut himself up during the day. A singular 
 personality. 
 
 "That's because he hadn't any patients, I 
 dare say, or was waiting at home for them. 
 Perhaps he was studying. I don't think I 
 noticed him particularly in the few glimpses 
 I've had of him. He's dark and tall — but I'll 
 look specially next time and be able to tell 
 you if he is handsome."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 51 
 
 " You have as good as told me already." 
 " Oh, but, indeed, I was quite takeu up 
 with what he said about poor Mr. Cunniugham. 
 He has sent to Edinburgh for a specialist. 
 They are to consult together to-morrow,'' her 
 face became wistful, her grey eyes full of 
 trouble. "To become blind — never to see 
 the sun ao-ain — nor the faces of friends — oh, 
 father, it is a pitiful fate ! " 
 
 " Let us hope that help may yet avail," 
 said the minister, with less than his usual 
 fluency. He was a man who always found it 
 easier to pipe for the dancers than to wail 
 with the mourners, and sorry as he was for 
 his neifrhbour's affliction, his daughter's o-rief 
 seemed a little superfluous. And at the 
 bottom of his heart, an old and vague un- 
 easiness was astir. For a long time Nancy 
 had not spoken of Frank Cunningham, and he 
 had hoped she had forgotten him ; n(jw it 
 seemed, she thought of him still \yith the 
 same aS^ection that had made her choose him 
 as her childhood's friend. 
 
 The minister had never felt much sympathy
 
 5-2 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 for that clioice : lie liad been drawn — a little 
 reluctantly — by his daughter's clinging hand, 
 across the invisible boundary line that divided 
 the Established Kirk Manse from the Free ; 
 but in the long years of a perfectly peaceful 
 rivalry, he had come to respect, as all men 
 respected his neighbour, the shy, gentle 
 scholar, who wished ill to no living thing. 
 But Frank was another affair : he had not 
 even a right to his name, for, so far as was 
 known, he was no kin to the minister, and 
 was merely a son by adoption. 
 
 One day, many years before, there had 
 come a letter to the Free Church Manse that 
 had agitated the minister strangely ; his 
 housekeeper was scarcely less perturbed wdien 
 he told her to prepare for so young a visitor. 
 A nursery, and never a mistress to the Manse ! 
 
 " My ward," he explained confusedly, when 
 liis ruling elder found him in his study watch- 
 ing \h.Q, sleeping child : the books which 
 visually cumbered the old sofa had been 
 tumbled to the floor to make a nest for the 
 Itaby, and Sunday's sermon was still a mere
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. qr. 
 
 chaos of notes. " My ward," not all Elder 
 Proudie's careful mining could extract more. 
 But, a little later, when the young thing had 
 made a place in a lonely man's heart it was — 
 "my son" — of whom he spoke with gentle, 
 pride. His people respected the ministers 
 silence about the past of wliich, with all its 
 possible tender associations for him, they 
 knew nothing, for he was already verging 
 towards middle life when he came to Shaw- 
 bridge. If speculation were rife, no one 
 ventured to question him, and Frank the 
 nameless, became Frank Cunningham on thr 
 lips of all and in the hearts of some. 
 
 He was a fragile child, with a curious, 
 sensitive dark face, that ripened into an odd 
 kind of beauty, and he had a natural quick- 
 ness of parts that made it easy for him to 
 outstrip his fellow scholars at the grammar 
 school. But if he was the dominie's pride 
 and the parents' example, he was not a boys' 
 boy, and there was not a lad on the same 
 bench who did not thirst to thrash him. That 
 he came off at their hands as well as he did
 
 SI THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 was iu part owing to the ffigis the maid of the 
 J\Ianse threw round him. This brave, bright 
 lass, with the pink cheeks like the apple 
 blossom in the minister's orchard, and the 
 soft grey eyes like the sky above it on an 
 April evening, was queen among them, to be 
 awkwardly propitiated with gifts of apj)les 
 and '^ gundy," and whom she chose to protect 
 went safe. Frank was her friend ; from the 
 first that was an understood thing ; he went 
 to her in all his scrapes, and she rescued him 
 as she had rescued him from the duck-pond, 
 a good deal frightened and a little muddy, 
 perhaps, but not much the worse. 
 
 Dr. Gillespie was thinking of these things 
 w^hen Nancy left him to run up and put away 
 her hat and jacket : he recalled the numberless 
 times he had seen the two white pinafores, 
 the dark head and the flaxen, bobbing up and 
 down among the berry bushes, or swinging on 
 the apple-tree bough, or playing soldiers with 
 the kemp grass stalks in the meadow, a war 
 game in which Nancy forbore to press her 
 victories, or, sitting on the same bench,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 55 
 
 ueitlier pair of cliubby legs reacliing the 
 ground, studying the fearsome pictures in tlie 
 Apocrypha — a Sunday afternoon's business 
 this. He remembered his indignation when 
 Nancy, sought in vain at the church l3en's 
 expiring tinkle, was found to have strayed 
 over to the Free's, and how little her father 
 thought this breach was atoned for by seeing 
 Frank's black curls in the Manse pew as he 
 looked down from the pulpit on the following 
 Sunday. Always together, as boy and girl, 
 as lad and lass ; Nancy the first to whom lie 
 showed the gold medals he carried off for 
 Greek and the Humanities in his opening year 
 iit Edinburgh University, Nancy to whom, 
 before any other, he confided his intention of 
 going to London to make his way in literature 
 iind journalism. 
 
 Dr. Gillespie was a righteous man in the 
 main, and it shamed him to own, even to 
 himself, that he disliked the lad even more 
 when he came home from college witli his 
 blushing honours thick upon him, than wlien 
 he had cried and stamped liis little foot because
 
 56 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 he could not climb trees like sturdy Nancy, 
 or fling the indiarubber ball half so far, for 
 he knew that while women may pity and 
 compassionate physical or moral weakness, 
 they surrender before success. Or was it, 
 perhaps, the stal) of wounded vanity he felt 
 when the student, whose praise was in pro- 
 fessors' mouths, fixed him with that queer, 
 inscrutable dark gaze, as he looked up from 
 the Manse pew on the very first Sunday after 
 his return ? The sermon on the talents was 
 an old one, but the congregation took it quite 
 comfortably, knowiug all its points in advance ; 
 only for the first time with this alien presence 
 in his flock, the minister realized, half humor- 
 ously, AvhoUy pathetically, that he w\as liable 
 to have very commonplace thoughts on every- 
 day subjects. 
 
 " Frank," he said, quite sharply, meeting 
 the young man in the churchyard; "you 
 should have been sitting under your -father 
 this day — your first Sunday at home." 
 
 *' So I was, this morning," Frank answered. 
 Then he gave a little laugh. "By an odd
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 57 
 
 coincidence, the dad ^vas preaching upon the 
 talents, too," he said ; and to the sore and 
 angry divine his black eyes seemed to dance 
 witli mockino- mischief. 
 
 '■'Nancy is coming over to pour out tea for 
 us in honour of the occasion, she is pleased to 
 say. AVon't you come too, doctor ? not to 
 honour the occasion, but to honour my fatlier 
 and me." 
 
 But the doctor turned away abruptly, with 
 a curt refusal. He was habitually good- 
 natured, and he liked to stand in the church- 
 yard — liis market-place for greetings — and to 
 receive his people's homage, but the young- 
 man's presence ruffled him, it took the savour 
 out of his weekly incense. Let Xancy go ; 
 ay, but would not Nancy go, whether he 
 vv^illed it or not ? 
 
 When Frank went forth to conquer the 
 world, Dr. Gillespie hoped that the past would 
 die, but Nancy kept it alive and aflame by 
 her tenderness for Fraidv's fother. The old, 
 shy, silent minister was stricken when his 
 boy left him. Tic had dreamed of a [)rop.
 
 58 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 for Lis age ; a voice to succeed him in the 
 pulpit, but he uttered no word of reproach. 
 
 "Each man's life is his own; as his soul 
 is his own, to work out as he may its salva- 
 tion. Be true to the highest within you, 
 dear lad, and your success will be the joy of 
 my declining years, as your presence has been 
 the light of my home." 
 
 In his emotional, half-foreign way, Frank 
 kissed the old hands that blessed him ; he 
 kissed Nancy's full red lips also, as he had 
 not kissed them since some childish recon- 
 ciliation after cpiarrel — a pledge, as she took 
 it, in her innocent way, to bind her friendship 
 faster. So she and the old minister, left 
 lonely, talked of him together, read his eager 
 letters, and praised his l)rilliant outset, and 
 found a thousand o'ood reasons to answer 
 the pain in their hearts when it soon became 
 dimmed. Frank had not forgotten them — 
 oh, never, never — but the far country is a 
 lono- way off, and to those who live in its 
 whirl, the past recedes like a landscape at 
 the wrong end of the perspective glass.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 59 
 
 Home lies yonder still, safe and uiiclianged, 
 but liow few save the beaten and tlie van- 
 quislied go back to it. 
 
 « « « * * 
 
 When Nancy came down again and began 
 to helj:* the young housemaid in her pre- 
 parations for supper, the minister brightened. 
 He was of a sociable disposition, and did 
 not often yield to reflective moods. Nancy, 
 too, looked a thoroughly heart-whole young 
 woman as she moved about between study 
 and kitchen — where Ann Rutherford presided 
 — drawing curtains, ligliting the lamp, and 
 kneeling to apply a match to the fire. A 
 fire was an indulu'ence ofiered to the minister's 
 l(jve of comfort, and so was the supper-tray, 
 set C(jsily on the taljle at his elbow. 
 
 " If you were a properly brought up father," 
 slie said, coaxing the newspaper with gingerly 
 fingers to attack the firewood, "you would 
 go into the dining-room and sit at one end 
 of the tabic while I sat at the other, with 
 the cold mutton between us. These picnic 
 meals are ruining Ann's temper."
 
 6o THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Tlie minister snifFed tlie savoury odour that 
 penetrated from tlie kitclien, and tlianlvcd 
 heaven she was not as other daughters. 
 " And, after all," thought he, " there are a 
 great many young women in London, and a 
 young man's fancy sometimes strays." It 
 was on the tip of his tongue to ask the latest 
 news of Frank, but he pulled himself up short. 
 AVhy send her thoughts down that undesiraljlc 
 track % 
 
 " Little was inquiring for you to-day," he 
 said. " He has a high opinion of you, Nancy." 
 
 " Oh, we mutually admire each other — Mr. 
 Little and L He likes me because I am 
 young, aud I like him because he is old and 
 sage on all points but one. He goes to Mrs.. 
 Laidlaw's symposiums." 
 
 "That reflects on your father, Nancy." 
 
 "Yes ; it reflects on my father," she laughed.. 
 " Why do you go there, I wonder, you men ? 
 Is it because you like to be scolded and 
 lectured? But we could do that at home., 
 you know 1 " 
 
 " Mrs. Laidlaw is a power in the land, my
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 6r 
 
 dear. She is bv far the laro-est heritor in 
 the parish." 
 
 " And the poorest giver ! " said the girl, 
 . with quick scorn. 
 
 " Nevertheless, your friend, the new doctor, 
 would do well to propitiate her. If she takes 
 Jiini up, as she appears inclined to do, he is 
 a made man." 
 
 Nancy began to laugh. 
 
 "Now I will tell you a story," she said. 
 " JMargaret Baird whispered it to me to-day 
 in the dressing-room, when Mr. Cunningham 
 M'as sleeping — of course I won't be answerable 
 for the truth of it. Your Mrs. Laidlaw sent 
 for Dr. Sutherland " 
 
 " And he didn't go % " incredulity was in 
 the minister's voice. 
 
 " The first time he was at the Castle ; the 
 second time he was also at the Castle ; the 
 tliird he was at the Free Church Manse. 
 AVhen the messenger followed Iiim there 
 he went to the back door. lie's uncon- 
 ventional you see. 
 
 " ' AVhat is the matter with your mistress ? ' 
 lie asked.
 
 62 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Poor old Andrew shuffled and shuffled, and 
 at last, as if the answer lay in his feet, he 
 said he ' jaloused there was naethiuo- wranir. 
 The mistress was in her usual.' 
 
 " ' Then please tell her I only visit people 
 who are out of their usual.' 
 
 " ' Eh, man ! ' cried the dumfounded 
 Andrew, ' she'll l)e that fast enough, gin 
 ye dinna gang ! ' ' 
 
 " ' Well,' said the doctor, with a laugh, 
 ' we'll wait developments ; ' and he nodded 
 poor old Andrew away. Now, what does 
 my papa, who knows his Mrs. Laidlaw, think 
 will happen to that rash young man ? " 
 
 The doctor shook his head. " Rash indeed, 
 to quarrel gratuitously with his bread and 
 butter. Talk of my being a bar to hi& 
 success — as if the parish minister could 
 make or unmake a man." He paused, 
 perhaps expecting Nancy to correct this too 
 modest estimate of his powers, and at her 
 silence his tone took on tartness. " He has 
 no one but himself to thank if he fails — as 
 fail he inevitably will,"
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 63. 
 
 " What would you have him do % ' Nancy 
 asked mischievously. 
 
 " Any but a fool would have obeyed her 
 summons." 
 
 "And administered a bread pill?" Nancy 
 smiled. " I'm afraid he must have heard a 
 little about ]\Irs. Laidlaw before he went to 
 interview Andrew at the back door. So you 
 think she will snub him % Shall I tell you 
 what I think ? I think she will immediately 
 place him on that pedestal which your 
 neglect, wicked papa, was supposed to raise 
 for him. She'll praise him and advertise 
 him, and be humbly grateful and very 
 s;racious when he does condescend to call," 
 
 " Tut — tut, child ! you don't know Mrs. 
 Laidlaw." 
 
 "No ; but I know women." 
 
 " That, my child, might be called a feminine 
 non sequitury 
 
 "Is itr' said Nancy, meekly. "If you 
 arc troiuo- to talk in stran^-e tonnes, I think 
 I'll cro to Ijed."
 
 CHArTER V. 
 
 UTHERLANI) was greatly interested 
 in the old minister's case ; it was 
 the first of any importance to wliicli he 
 was called after lie was able to forego 
 daily attendance upon young Coventry at 
 the Castle, and he gave his whole mind to 
 it. lie said the old man reminded him of 
 a sculptural head of Fra Augelico we had 
 seen in one of the churches in Rome — a lean 
 ascetic head, hollow at the temples, a face 
 high cheek-boned, patient, with a worn 
 sweetness of look. I dimly recall it illumi- 
 nating some dark corner of a tawdry, over- 
 hedecked interior, the exact site forgotten. 
 From what Sutherland dropped from time 
 to time, the resemblance did not cease with
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. . 65 
 
 the outer man ; the Scotch Calvinist had 
 his share of the Italian monk's devout and 
 childlike nature. 
 
 "He doesn't seem to have dra\yn a lars^e 
 congregation, and perhaps no wonder. Few 
 people can breathe such rarefied air as he 
 lives in for loni^ : the kirk across the dividinor 
 fields probably suits easy-going consciences 
 better. But he has his followinsr. There's 
 always somebody waylaying me to ask for 
 him." 
 
 "AVho looks after him ? " 
 
 " Oh, a variety of women," he said, witii 
 a faint contempt. " I see a new face at bis 
 bedside most days. The clergy woman belongs 
 to no sect." 
 
 " Then he isn't married ? " 
 
 " No ; a widower, I think. I heard some- 
 thing of a son, but only to excuse his absence, 
 lie's in London, it seems — not such an in- 
 surmountable distance when one's father's 
 going blind — but pact sentimentalit}'. \ 
 dare say I'd have stayed away in his place." 
 
 As if he would !. 
 
 VOL. I. ^>
 
 66 . TBE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 This was at the first. In a little place 
 like Shawbridge one soon hears all the gossip 
 that is going. I had urged Sutherland to call 
 on Mrs. Laidlaw, having been warned by some 
 of our new acquaintances of the importance of 
 securing her good graces ; but he refused. 
 
 "There's nothing the matter with her, 
 except a superabundance of adipose tissue ! 
 I'll frighten her with that, if she insists 
 upon calling me in. She ought to w^alk, 
 rather than be dragged about in that Bath 
 chair. Time enough ? No, I haven't, not 
 for that kind of visiting. If it's so necessary 
 to observe the proprieties, you'd better do it 
 for both of us." 
 
 " It isn't me she wants." 
 
 "Well, when she really wants me, she'll 
 have me. Those old women, with no com- 
 plaints at all, or only imaginary ones, are 
 the plague of a doctor's life ; if he prescribes 
 for them, he loses his self-respect ; and if he's 
 honest and doesn't, they'll do their best to 
 damage his practice. The only safe way is 
 to steer clear of them."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 67 
 
 He went wliistling to the surgery, having 
 metaphorically, as it ^Yere, washed his hands 
 of Mrs. Laidlaw. Of course he couldn't get 
 rid of her so easily, and it seemed a pity he 
 should stand in his own liglit. Eeport called 
 her immensely rich, though it added, she 
 considered the honour of attending her reward 
 enough, and paid no doctor's bills. Still, 
 her good word was a fortune, and there was 
 no likelihood that Dr. Nairn would recover 
 from the paralysis that had struck him dowm 
 But if his assistant and successor liad a more 
 pliable back? Sutherland thought none of 
 these thoughts ; you could not bend him 
 to circumstances; they had to incline to 
 liim. But I could have wished he had less 
 human obstinacy; prejudices are poor fare 
 to live on. 
 
 It was, after all, a woman who came to 
 the rescue. Sutherland was out, seeinsf Mr. 
 •Cunningham ; he was watching him till the 
 time was ripe for a consultation, and I was 
 sitting alone with my book, when a cab, 
 over-burdened with luggage, drew up at our
 
 68 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 door. Burton, with a foreboding brow, })re- 
 sented a card. 
 
 " The doctor is out. Burton," I said. 
 
 " Yes, sir ; but when I told the lady, sh& 
 said you would do." 
 
 I glanced unw^illingly at the card, and read 
 on it, "Mrs. Tom Carnegie." At first the 
 name carried no meaning ; then I remembered 
 that a year or so before a fragment of mouldy 
 w^edding cake and a newspaper, announcing 
 Colonel Carneoie's marriasfe, had reached us» 
 Archie had amused himself at tlie black 
 sheep's effort to wash his fleece. 
 
 " Is she waiting % " I asked, hoping Burton 
 would assure me that the lady had vanished ; 
 but he answered, in a voice of gloom — 
 
 "She's waiting, sir; and the maid. The 
 cabman and Thomas are carrying the luggage 
 into the hall." 
 
 She rustled in graciously — a woman, young 
 still, who was pretty in an indefinite sort of 
 way, and with taking manners. 
 
 "We are cousins, though we have never 
 met," she said ; "that must be my excuse for 
 this unannounced descent."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 69 
 
 Even when I corrected the mistake, slie 
 delicately insinuated that at least we must 
 be friends. In five minutes she had explained, 
 in the lightest possible manner, that she and 
 Colonel Carnegie had been visiting in the 
 neio-hbourhood, and that her husband had 
 unexpectedly been called away on business. 
 
 " I do so detest business," she said, with 
 a smile on her lip ; but I read care in her 
 eyes. Poor Colonel Tom was no doubt 
 suffering once more a temporary eclipse. 
 " Tom thought perhaps Dr. Sutherland and 
 you would extend your hospitality to me 
 for a day or two, till he could rejoin me." 
 He liad written ; we had not got the note % 
 Ah, country posts were so tiresome — you 
 couldn't depend on them ! But he had 
 certainly written. She had brought her 
 maid — a quiet girl, who would give no trouble. 
 She hoped she was not making a dreadfully 
 inconvenient request ? 
 
 There was nothing for it but to reassure 
 her. Sutherland came in presently — Colonel 
 Cavnr'o-io's .note in his hniid, and welcomed
 
 70 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 her genially. As a host Iiis niauner was- 
 admirable. 
 
 "I was hurried in o;oino[ out, and foro-ot 
 to prepare you for this pleasure, Fowler," 
 he said to me. " I'm the most unpractical 
 of managers, as I'm afraid you'll find, Mrs. 
 Carnegie, but I believe I did remember to 
 order luncheon." 
 
 " If I mio-lit remove my Ijonnet, and wash 
 away the stains of travel ? " she suggested ; 
 and I believe it then occurred to him, for 
 the first time, to wonder how she and a 
 maid were to be accommodated in our strictly 
 bachelor household. I was maliciously in- 
 clined to leave him to his embarrassment, 
 but that I knew Burton would be equal to 
 the occasion. He had indeed, in an incredibly 
 short time, stripped my room and dressing- 
 room of all signs of masculine possession, 
 and the maid was already unpacking frills 
 and furbelows and strange feminine vanities 
 where books and pipes had reigned in peace. 
 The pipes I found in the disused nursery at 
 the top of the house, keeping company with
 
 7 HE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 71 
 
 a liiuTiedly gathered wardrobe ; the books, 
 mostly in foreign tongues, aroused, I believe, 
 Mrs. Carnegie's lively curiosity, and gave her 
 the damaging and erroneous impression that 
 " cousin Archie's companion " was clever. 
 
 Burton apologized for my unhandsome 
 quarters, but they had compensating ad- 
 vantages, as he pointed out. 
 
 " You'll find it quieter like, if it is a garret. 
 AVherc there's women in a house there's sure 
 to be clashes ; but you'll be safe up here. 
 I'll bring up your bath and the easy-chair 
 after lunch. You'll find your papers all 
 right, sir." 
 
 It was silent enough now, where once the 
 patter of feet and the voices of children 
 had made music. The gay, fabled people 
 on the walls played to no audience ; they 
 seemed to me, indeed, to wear an air of 
 forlorn chagrin at my intrusion ; the spring 
 wind shook the iron bars at the casement as 
 if to ask had his old playmates returned? 
 I had last glanced at this room wlien the 
 widow of the late occupier showed Sutlierlnnd
 
 72 • THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 and me over the house. She had hurried 
 forward to open a shutter, so that the doctor 
 might be able to tell his lady what excellent 
 accommodation there was for her little family. 
 How Sutherland had laughed at her incre- 
 dulous face when he said — 
 
 "You see all the family there is before 
 ^T-ou, madam ! " 
 
 She told him, with a shaken head, it would 
 be against his practice that he was unmarried. 
 
 Perhaps she was right, but how pleasant 
 a comradeship ours had been, no woman 
 coming between. And here, all at once, we 
 were being converted into a "family" by 
 no design of ours, and who could tell to 
 what this invasion of petticoats would lead. 
 
 Mrs. Tom settled down quickly, and 
 adapted herself, with fine feminine tact, to 
 our ways, seeming to follow where she really 
 led. She took our deficiencies very amiably. 
 Of course there was no drawing-room. Didn't 
 she, who had brothers and a husband, know 
 how men hated a woman's room ? all little 
 tables and slim chairs you couldn't sit down
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 73 
 
 on lest they should break under you, and no 
 room to turn round. The dining-room quite 
 met witli her approval — so solid and hand- 
 some — nothing superfluous. That was how 
 it should ])e. 
 
 But though she fitted herself gracefully 
 into Archie's big leather easy-chair she 
 seemed too fine and foreio-n a thins^ for 
 its homeliness, in her black lace evenino; 
 dress, with the glimmer of white throat and 
 arms, and it was impressed upon our con- 
 sciousness, for the first time, that to sit in 
 the room where one had dined, with tlie 
 odours of that meal, and the reminiscences 
 of many pipes impregnating the air, was not, 
 perhaps, so altogether delightful as it had 
 appeared. I met Sutherland restlessly ex- 
 ploring upstairs next evening. 
 
 " I say, isn't there a cushion an}- where 
 about ? " he asked ; " or a footstool ? And, 
 look here, what's the matter witli the table? 
 — it looks awfully bare." 
 
 " Let's ask her," I said. 
 
 She laughed.
 
 74 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Perhaps a few flowers ? " she suggested. 
 " I am educating Tom to appreciate flowers 
 ■ — the ouly uses they represented to him 
 before were buttonholes. He has got the 
 length of tolerating them on the table, and 
 that is a very, very big step for a man ! Of 
 course, waifs and strays as we are, we can't 
 have things very nice and natty, but flowers 
 are a wonderful consolation to the feminine 
 mind." 
 
 ''You shall have as many as you like 
 to-morrow," said Sutherland. 
 
 " And we'll make a nice little oasis up at 
 this end," she said, turning a shoulder to 
 look at the table. "It's that big expanse 
 of oak between us that paralyzes one's powers 
 of speech. You feel as if you ought only to 
 send superior remarks across such a gulf. 
 And — I'm afraid of Mr. Fowler." 
 
 " His superiority hasn't extinguished me," 
 said Archie. " Perhaps, when you get nearer 
 him, you'll find he's only made like the rest 
 of us." 
 
 Somehow she brightened the house wonder-
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 75 
 
 fully. She iutcrcsted herself readily in all 
 sorts of little things ; she made friends with 
 the charwoman who had come to supplement 
 Burton's labours and act as chaperon to the 
 demure maid — and even Burton himself 
 softened towards a lady w^ho gave so little 
 trouble. Every morning she would come down 
 Avith an eager look in her eyes, and when she 
 found no letter on her plate it would fade, 
 making her look suddenly ten years older. 
 AVhat had she seen in poor Tom to marry 
 him, and, having condescended to him, how 
 dared he cause her a moment's anxiety ? 
 
 It was the thousjht of Colonel Tom's 
 })robable failings as a husband that warmed 
 Sutherland towards her, I think ; if he 
 habitually thought of women as weak, their 
 frailty never failed to arouse his chivalry. 
 lie treated her with a banterino^ friendliness 
 tbat pleased and amused her, and reminded 
 lier, she said, of her jjrothers at home. 
 
 " Do you know," she confided in mc one 
 day, " I tliiidc it's a very good thing T came,. 
 aftr-r.'ill."
 
 76 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 "I've never bad any doubt of it," I bastencd 
 to say. 
 
 " Ob yes, you liad ! " sbe laugbed. " You 
 sbould bave seen wbat a borrified flice you 
 wore tbat day I walked in on you ; and wben 
 you told me Tom bad not written, I wondered 
 if you took me for an impostor. He does so 
 bate writing letters ; but I stood over bim 
 till tbat note was written, and I posted it 
 myself. Tben I took my courage in botli 
 bands, and came " 
 
 " And saw, and conquered." 
 
 Sbe sbook ber bead, 
 
 " Even if I'm a nuisance — and of course 
 I am — upsetting a bacbelor bousebold, I 
 tbink I can do a little sometbino; to make 
 up. You see, men are belpless creatures, 
 after all, before a social difficulty ; and a 
 doctors bome, especially, is no bome at 
 all witbout a woman. Tbere wouldn't bave 
 been tbat year of waiting you told me of, 
 if you bad bad a woman to preside bere, 
 Mr. Fowler." 
 
 " If you're formulating a scbeme to get
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Archie married," I cried ; and at my dismayed 
 countenance she became m-ave ao-ain. 
 
 "Indeed I'm not so foolish as to meddle 
 in that way," she said. "Marriage is a 
 great venture, and nobody — nobody should 
 come between, or to try to draw two people 
 together." She was seated in a basket- 
 chair at the open window of the empty 
 drawing-room, where she was sheltered from 
 the east wind, and shared the briHit sun 
 with Burton's geraniums, and her vehemence 
 made me wonder if she were speaking out 
 of her own experience. " I was only think- 
 ing," she went on, after a pause, " that my 
 being here would give peoj)le an excuse to 
 call." 
 
 " Is that what they've been waiting for ? " 
 " Tlie ladies, certainly. Tliey couldn't very 
 well call on two young unmarried men — could 
 they ? — though I dare say they have been 
 devoured with curiosity. There would be 
 th(.' husbands and brothers to reckon with. 
 But, now that I'm here, and vouched for as 
 f|nite respectable, they needn't l)e afr;iid of
 
 78 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 ]Mrs. OruiKl}^ She's always a tcml3le person 
 in a little town, you know." 
 
 " I think slie must go by the name of 
 Laidlaw here." I sketched that bogey's cha- 
 racteristics, and described Archie's obdurate 
 refusal to propitiate her. 
 
 " Oh, that will be all right ! " she said 
 brightly. " As Mrs. Laidlaw is an old lady, 
 it will be my duty to call first. I dare say 
 she knows the Lorimers, with whom Tom 
 and I were staying — if she doesn't, she'll be 
 pleased that I should imagine she does ! 
 And I will tell her all about you both, and 
 she'll be so anxious to see you that she 
 won't dream of making that impossible by 
 (juarrelling with Cousin Archie." 
 
 " Are you going to make us so attractive ? " 
 
 " I'm going to make you delightful ! But, 
 first of all, we must get permission to brighten 
 up the house a bit." 
 
 " What's amiss ? What does it look like ? " 
 
 " Dreadfully like a man's house ! Why, 
 you've no curtains in the upper rooms ! " 
 
 " They're not furnished."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 79 
 
 "That's a little fact you should gracefully 
 drape. And not even a Hower or a dickey 
 bird! A pretty house inspires women with 
 confidence ; and, after all, they are the chief 
 employers of doctors, aren't they ? " 
 
 " They could have called Sutherland in 
 without coming here. He says a doctor 
 ousfht to draw a strict line between the 
 professional and social sides." 
 
 "Ah, but that is a mistake," she said, 
 with a pretty air of authority. " In small 
 places people must know all about you 
 before they trust you. I've lived in a 
 country town, and I know what it is. You 
 mustn't have any reticences." 
 
 " What — not any ? " 
 
 " Oh, you may think what you like, of 
 course, but the outer circumstances of your 
 life — your food, servants, rent, clothes — are 
 public property ; you must be amiably soci- 
 able — if you've any little idiosyncrasies of 
 your own you must sacrifice them for the 
 common good." 
 
 "I'm afraid you'll find it hard work to
 
 8o THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 persuade Archie to take tliat view. He has 
 * nae broo ' of the common good in that 
 sense." 
 
 "Oh, it won't be necessary for him to 
 trouble. His wife will do all the needful 
 sacrificing, and, since she is not here yet, I 
 am going to play my humble little part 
 instead." 
 
 She was rio-ht in one thincr. After her first 
 Sunday in the parish church (she made me go 
 with her) the ladies of Shawbridge began to 
 call. Perhaps there was for them some 
 mysterious signal in the fresh draperies that 
 appeared, as if by magic, at every window, 
 and in the look of sprightliness the house 
 assumed. Sutherland, in his lavish way, 
 would have furnished the drawing-room to 
 please her, but she earnestly protested. What 
 was she but a mere bird of passage, waiting 
 for her laggard lord ? A drawing-room was 
 the mistress's special j)rovince, and it was the 
 wife's privilege to adorn it. " What would 
 your wife say if she found I had forestalled 
 her, Archie ? "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 8i 
 
 At tins reiterated "wife" he laugliccl, yet 
 not so spontaneously as usual. 
 
 So the Shawbridge ladies were received in 
 the dining-room, and by some art or guile she 
 managed to propitiate them all. She con- 
 sulted them aljout her shopping, and was led 
 by their advice ; she was sympathetic on the 
 iniquities of servants, and interested in childish 
 complaints ; the womenkind of the great 
 tweed lords, w^ho dashed up to our door in 
 their fine carriages, pronounced her charming : 
 wasn't she the wife of a military man who 
 was cousin to an earl ? Sutherland shone in 
 her reflected glory. They had always known 
 he was a gentleman ; to hear them, you would 
 think they had all along been alive to his 
 merits, and only waiting a chance to prove 
 his skill. 
 
 Particulars of these interviews were related 
 to me, as she sat in her basket-chair warmiug 
 her pretty feet in the sun, and she diligently 
 coached me in my social duties. 
 
 " So much w^ill devolve on you," she said, 
 ^' until " 
 
 VOL. I. 6
 
 82 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Until Archie gets another partner " — 
 perhaps some hidden bitterness came out in 
 the words, for she looked at me gently. 
 
 " You yonrself must marry some day." 
 
 If I had contradicted her she would not 
 have understood ; so I held my peace. 
 
 The day she went to call on Mrs. Laidlaw 
 she would not let me accompany her beyond 
 the door of the old mansion in Shaw Street, 
 though I would have braved the bogey, if it 
 would have helped her. 
 
 " We'll get on best alone, and I'm not one 
 atom afraid of her ! " she waved me a little 
 farewell as she was swallowed up in the dark 
 doorway. 
 
 I hung about, making a pretence of study- 
 ing the Sadler's window, and inspecting the 
 specimens of split peas and oatmeal disjDlayed 
 in the corn chandler's, half expecting to find 
 her making a hurried retreat ; but it was a 
 good hour by my watch before I saw her' 
 crossing with light step the angle of South 
 Place, and her face was serene. 
 
 "For pity's sake, a cup of tea!" she cried;,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 83 
 
 as I ran to meet lier. " The dear old lady 
 was so much taken up with asking questions 
 that she forgot to offer me any. Xo, Lydia, 
 never mind my bonnet — and bring tea here. 
 Oh no, the ogress didn't devour me " — she 
 laughed, as she sipped the cup I poured out 
 for her. " She was very gracious indeed. I 
 had to give her an outline of the family 
 history — what a good thing Tom drilled me 
 in the Carnegie pedigree ! I'm afraid I may 
 have bestowed on Cousin Archie an uncle or 
 so who doesn't belong to him ; but it explains 
 him Ijetter to her consciousness than the 
 distinguished college career ive are proud of. 
 She gave me to understand that he owes his 
 present popularity to her. Some message, too, 
 I was to deliver, about a letter " 
 
 '' H'm — do you think that's needful ? " 
 
 " Oh, you blush ; you are betrayed ! So it's 
 you who wrote it ! " 
 
 " Only to do the civil — Archie ought to 
 have called." 
 
 "He'll soon have occasion. I believe she 
 means to have a nice little convenient illness
 
 84 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 as an excuse to call him in. As for you, I 
 promised you would go to see her one day 
 this week." 
 
 And when I protested that I would do 
 nothing of the sort, she looked at me re- 
 proachfully. 
 
 " I thought you would do anything for 
 your friend ! " she said. " Ah, that's the way 
 of men ! They are all promises and willing- 
 ness ; but ask them to leave their books and 
 easy-chairs and pipes, to perform the com- 
 monest act of politeness, and where are all 
 their protestations ? It is we poor women 
 who have to make all the sacrifices." 
 
 " As if you didn't like it ! " I cried. " The 
 tea and the gossip " 
 
 "Not gossip — useful information. Shaw- 
 bridge has been turned inside out for my 
 benefit. She spoke of Mr. Cunningham." 
 
 " She couldn't say anything nasty of 
 him." 
 
 " No." She was silent, toying with the 
 bread-and-butter for quite two minutes. Then 
 she gave me a queer sidelong glance.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 85 
 
 " Do you remember that handsome girl in 
 tlie Manse pew at the Established Church % " 
 
 " Miss Gillespie ? Yes ; I've seen her once 
 or twice/' 
 
 " She is nursing Mr. Cunningham ; she is 
 there every afternoon. Isn't it sweet of her ? " 
 she cried. "I think it's perfectly charming. 
 One hears so much of jealousies and rivalries 
 between the churches ; but what could be 
 prettier than her devotion to an opponent % " 
 
 But I couldn't share her enthusiasm. 
 
 " That handsome girl " — " She is there every 
 afternoon." The words made a dull tunc in 
 my head, and it had no melody in it.,
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 HY had Arcliie never mentioned her? 
 Did he contemptuously cLass her among 
 those clergywomen, trotting humbly at the 
 skirts of parsons, he had spoken of? But I 
 had seen her, and knew she was a woman one 
 must needs sinc^le out even in a crowd. Her 
 face was the only sermon for me on that Sun- 
 day when Mrs. Carnegie and I went to her 
 father's church. A fine face, blithe and strong, 
 and yet tender ; eyes a little sad, perhaps, but 
 the mouth quietly humorous. She was a 
 grandly made young creature, and when the 
 precentor raised the psalm tune she stood half 
 a head taller than any woman near her. The 
 sermon was of the flowery order that tends to 
 vagrant thoughts : an anecdote or two, a
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. S7 
 
 reiteration of the text ; some selections of 
 sacred verse mouthed with impressiveness. 
 Tlie doctor, her father, struclv one as a bene- 
 volent, well-meaning humbug ; but she listened 
 to his oratory with an interest and a respect 
 that had an air of beino; 2:enuiue. A o-ood 
 daughter, no product of the dying century; 
 yet Sutherland saw her every day, and said 
 nothino-. 
 
 " He probably finds her a good nurse," I 
 said to Mrs. Carneo-ie. 
 
 It was the day following her visit to Mrs. 
 Laidlaw on which this remark was made, and 
 it struck me afterwards that she did not ask 
 me to whom I was referrimr. Instead slie 
 smiled and said — 
 
 " Probably he does. Some day he will wake 
 up and find she is a woman," 
 
 " You are determined there must be a 
 
 woman." 
 
 " It is Kismet," sho answered " We come 
 into every man's life, somehow, some time or 
 other, and inlluence it for good or evil. It's 
 uur revenge for the inferior place you still
 
 88 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 insist on our accepting in the order of creation 
 — Men, women, and 
 
 " Clergymen. Not the lowest place, after 
 all, you see. By the way, talking of clergy, 
 what do you think of Dr. Gillespie ? " 
 
 " He's a dear I Handsome to behold, and 
 gracious to talk to. He rescued me the other 
 day from a horde of savages, which had taken 
 possession of Shaw Street, and threatened to 
 annihilate me. I am to go and have tea at his 
 Manse." 
 
 " AVhat, while Miss Gillespie is playing the 
 Samaritan ? " 
 
 " Oh no ; she is to be at home to receive 
 me. It was settled that day I met them at 
 Mrs. Lang's." 
 
 " You never told me you had met her," A 
 jealous pang shot through me. 
 
 " Didn't I ? " she answered lightly. " But 
 then, I meet so many people, you see, and some- 
 times I am afraid my talk about them bores 
 you. It's so difticult to make them interest- 
 ing, for they all do and say the same things, 
 and wear the same clothes. But I dare say
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 89 
 
 ]\Iiss Gillespie will be different when one gets 
 lier alone. I will tell you all about my visit 
 when I come home. And I will find out if I 
 can " — she spoke demurely ; love of teasing 
 is inbred in women — " whether she is so 
 very, very superior that you wouldn't be so 
 disrespectful as to think of her as a mere 
 woman. That would account for Cousin Archie 
 keeping silent about her, wouldn't it % " 
 
 So she, too, had noticed his silence ! 
 
 Of course j^ou will say, why were you such 
 an idiot as not to ask him openly ; but Suther- 
 land is not a man to be questioned. He has- 
 liis reticences, which vou must needs choose to- 
 respect. And less than ever could I question 
 him when Mrs. Carneigie had left us. She 
 took her departure quite suddenly, before that 
 cup of tea had been offered at the Manse. 
 
 It was one of Tom Carneo-ie's inconvenient 
 ways to present himself without announce- 
 ment, assuming a welcome that was not always 
 forthcoming. Surprises are the most foolish 
 of grown-up tricks. His wife was instructing 
 me in the care of certain phints, which now
 
 90 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Ijloomed an invitation in our wiudows, wlien a 
 loud ring at the bell was followed by a still 
 louder voice making itself very much at home 
 in the hall. At the sound she started away 
 from my side, blushing and quivering, and in 
 another minute her two little grubby hands, 
 that had so fearlessly stirred the soil as she 
 illustrated her lecture, were clasped round the 
 warrior's neck, she all heedless of the gaping 
 button-boy, who stood taking in the scene. 
 What do women, such as she, see in men like 
 ■our colonel that they should give so freely the 
 treasure of their love % I lingered behind her, 
 not to witness their meeting, and they came 
 in ]Dresently, he looking a trifle sheepish and 
 ashamed of himself, and blustering the more 
 to hide it. 
 
 " Well, how are you, Fowler ? Look less 
 
 weedy than wdien I saw you last. By " 
 
 something or somebody — his profanity had 
 acquired a milder turn since marriage, " you've 
 got a capital crib here. Where's young 
 ■Sawbones ? " 
 
 " Dr. Sutherland is out."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 91 
 
 " The colonel fears we cannot wait to say 
 good-bye to liim," she struck in, standing Ly 
 him and holding one of his big hands. " He 
 says we must catch the train going South in 
 an hour. Aren't husbands inconsiderate crea- 
 tures, Mr. Fowler ? Here is mine calling for 
 me as if I were a package, and he expected to 
 find me all carefully tied up and labelled ! 
 Why, Lydia will sulk for a week if I make her 
 do the work of four hours in one." 
 
 " Let her,"' said the colonel, with a few more 
 expletives. " You've either got to be ready, 
 little woman, or I must go without you." 
 
 She faltered out a word of reoTet for leavino^ 
 us. 
 
 "You've been so good, both of you," she 
 said ; " my husband and I can never thank 
 you enough for sheltering me." 
 
 " When I was down on my luck," he said, 
 with a gloomy laugh. " Eelations are some 
 use in the world." 
 
 " And I am very sorry to leave my new 
 relatives," she said prettily ; l)ut her face in 
 its new brightness belied her.
 
 92 THE AIISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 What cared she for all our endeavours to 
 please her — the queen we had made of her 
 — now that her scrapegrace of a lord had 
 come to claim her? While she was hastily 
 stuffing into her boxes those pretty costumes 
 worn to enchant us, the colonel graciously 
 accepted my offer of refreshment. It was but 
 eleven o'clock, but the breakfast dishes were 
 brought back and the whisky fetched from 
 the sideboard ; and, while he regaled himself, 
 he was pleased to give me his reasons for 
 leaving in such hot haste. They were not 
 very dear, but perhaps they were imperative. 
 He had not improved since the days when, 
 as lads, Sutherland and I had laughed at his 
 big stories and his airs of adventure ; per- 
 haps he had gone too far down the hill for 
 even marriage to pull him up. He cared for 
 his young wife as much as it lay in him to 
 care for any one save himself, but he used her 
 too. If she was poor, she was well born ; and 
 her connections, as he made no scruple of 
 owning, served some of his ends. 
 
 Sutherland looked black when he heard of 
 the sudden exit.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 93 
 
 "Confound the fellow! Does lie take my 
 house for an inn," he cried, "that he can 
 come and order his food and swallow it and 
 go, without so much as a ' How d'ye do ? ' " 
 
 But next moment he lausfhed. 
 
 " So he was afraid I would question him, 
 was he ? " he said ; and then I learned that 
 the colonel had written a day or two before 
 to ask for a temporary loan. 
 
 " And you gave it to him ? " 
 
 " He has made it precious difficult to re- 
 fuse," he said grimly ; and I knew he was 
 thinking of the poor lady who might have 
 to sufier if her husband's recjuests were not 
 punctually met. 
 
 We missed her more than it seemed pos- 
 sible for two such professed woman-haters to 
 miss a little person who was not so particularly 
 clever or wise, but who was always gay and 
 good tempered. The piano Sutherland had 
 hired, that she might sing to us in the draw- 
 ing-room — its emptiness the best condition for 
 music-making, she told us — was packed off 
 to the shop ; we sunk back into bachelor
 
 94 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 wavs — no more clressino; for dinner — no more 
 flower decorations — no more abstention from 
 pipes. For a day or two an echo of her 
 ballads, gay or pathetic, seemed to linger 
 about the house. Archie would hesitate 
 1 )efore his big chair, as if he saw a little figure 
 seated there in all its gay bravery. Did he, 
 indeed, begin to feel the house lonely without 
 a woman in it ? I found a fors^otten orlovc 
 in the drawer of my dressing-table, and 
 was sentimental enough to preserve it as a 
 memento. 
 
 But, after all, her visit was but an episode,, 
 and, over, it was soon forgotten. One good 
 turn, however, she had done us in explaining 
 us to Shawbridge. We were vouched for 
 now ; even my humble pedigree being public 
 property ; and the ladies, finding us less of 
 adventurers than we had seemed, vied with 
 each other in securino- Sutherland's services. 
 Some of them, perhaps, had convenient little 
 ailments on purpose. He had no longer 
 reason to complain of neglect, and was rapidly 
 taking the place of Dr. Nairn, now hopelessly
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 95 
 
 invalided ; but a veil seemed to Lave falleu 
 between liis life and mine. Of liis daily work 
 I licard but tlie vas^ucst details. The doctor 
 is a priest too, bis bosom a confessional 
 whence the secrets wrung from humanity in 
 its hour of anguish never escape. Far dif- 
 ferent was it from the days when we had read 
 and studied together, and talked and argued 
 into the small hours of the nioht. Sutherland 
 was never to be counted on ; he was called 
 lierc and there, in and out at uncertain times. 
 We scarcely ever took a meal together, for he 
 imperiously forbade me to wait for him. His 
 food was hashed up, kept warm, or hastily 
 cooked to suit his convenience. In his leisure 
 hours he was often absorl)ed and absent- 
 minded or shut up in his surgery, his patients, 
 no doubt, filling all his thoughts. 
 
 Yet while I sat alone, with some loss of 
 relish even for the old and well-tried friends 
 on my bookshelf — tliere are times when 
 liuman companionship is Avorth all the wisdom 
 of the ancients — I w^as haunted by a recurring- 
 fear that would not be shaken off. Was it
 
 96 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 the measles in the Fletchers' nursery, or the 
 scarlet-fever epidemic in jMr. Brown's seminary 
 for little boys, or Mr. Burton's sciatica that 
 alone filled his mind ? Was it even the swift- 
 ■comino- darkness that made the Free Church 
 minister's pathetic lot something more than 
 a mere case to him ? AYas it, perhaps, the 
 nurse rather than the patient upon whom he 
 dwelt as he secluded himself among his bottles 
 and pills and powders ? 
 
 They say that jealousy is a woman's iu- 
 firmity, but men can suffer this evil passion 
 too, when au2;ht threatens a lifelonof friend- 
 ship. I know that the demon had even then 
 begun to torture me, until a mere vagrant 
 fancy, born of idle words, became a rooted 
 conviction. Sutherland had seen the woman 
 he could love, and I should lose him. 
 
 One afternoon, when he was out upon his 
 rounds, an uro-ent summons came for him. 
 I was going out, and almost ran against the 
 waiting messenger at the front door. Burton, 
 who had answered the bell, consulted the slate, 
 but o-athered no lio-ht from it. The doctor
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 9 7- 
 
 had started on his rounds at ten — he might 
 be here or he might be there ; it was Burton's^ 
 cue to make his master overwhelmed with 
 work, but he woukl be tokl he was wantedii 
 whenever he came in. 
 
 " Look here," I said, taking the matter intO' 
 my own hands, and speaking to the anxious 
 man who stood panting and perspiring on the 
 door-stej^, " try Brown's, You know it % The 
 school for little boys in Pipe Lane. My road 
 takes me past the Free Church Manse ; and 
 I'll look in and tell the doctor, if he's there: 
 He's pretty safe to be at one or other place^ 
 and this will save time." 
 
 The man thanked me, and hurried off, while- 
 I took the opposite direction, pleased with my 
 own cleverness. Yet, the heat of the moment? 
 past, when I asked myself what I expected 
 to gain, I could not tell. Would the house- 
 cry aloud the secret I longed to wrest from 
 it? 
 
 The Manse, a plain harled building of no- 
 pretensions, stood in an ample garden, well 
 tended and cared for. Across the fields lay 
 
 VOL. I. 7
 
 S 
 
 98 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER, 
 
 tlie otlier Manse ; by that brown path Mis? 
 Gillespie came to play her j^art of ministering 
 angel. The house door stood wide open, perhapsi 
 for air, for the late days of spring had borrowed 
 the warmth of summer. As I was about to 
 lift my hand to ring, a woman in out-door 
 dress — a member of the sick man's cono-reo-a- 
 
 O O 
 
 tion, no doubt — came towards me. For whom 
 she mistook me I know not ; but she received 
 me as one expected. 
 
 "The doctor " I began ; and she nodded, 
 
 and said in a whisper that he would be here 
 presently. With a lifted finger, cautioning 
 silence, she indicated a door that stood open 
 to the right of the narrow lobby. Thinking 
 that she recognized me, and perhaps guessed 
 my errand, I accepted her invitation to enter, 
 while she went out noiselessly down the 
 gravel path. 
 
 It was plainly the minister's study in which 
 I found myself — a room barely furnished, save 
 for the crowding books upon the deal shelves — 
 books much handled ; a student's library, with 
 an air of orderly disorder. But I had scarcely
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 99 
 
 noted this, or the old-fashioned desk with its 
 mass of papers, when I became aware that the 
 door of an inner room stood half open ; from 
 its position it was probably the sitting-room 
 of the Manse, but it had been converted to 
 the sick man's use. I knew it as I stood 
 -embarrassedly there, for I heard him speak. 
 
 " I have been a long time ill ?" he asked ; 
 :and a woman's voice answered gently — 
 
 " A lono* time." 
 
 " So long that I have forgotten the time of 
 year." 
 
 "It is nearly the end of May; but the 
 blossom is still white upon the trees. The 
 spring delayed, but it is lovely now." 
 
 "Yet such a dark day." 
 
 For a moment there was silence ; the 
 woman's voice, when it rose again, had a 
 break in it. 
 
 " It is a sunny day — fair and clear." 
 
 She drew up the blind, revealing a glass 
 door that led to the garden, and as the light 
 iflooded the room I saw all its details plainly. 
 Why I stayed to look and listen I cannot tell ;
 
 loo THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 I have no excuse to offer, unless it be one to say 
 that I could not drag myself away. There, on 
 an old-fashioned wooden bed, lay the minister, 
 his white hair spread upon the pillow like 
 frosted silver, his face gaunt and worn, with no 
 beauty in it save that of a w^hite soul shining 
 through the mask, his eyes travelling round in 
 search of the light denied. Miss Gillespie 
 remained at the window, her back turned to 
 the room ; she stood rigid and motionless, 
 seeing nothing of the outward beauty she had 
 pictured to him. The hardest pain, perhaps, is- 
 to suffer hopelessly for another. 
 
 At a sigh from the invalid she turned, and 
 knelt by the bed. Her eyes had unshed tears 
 in them, and her mouth (piivered ; her voice 
 faltered as she said — 
 
 " You feel the warmth, don't you ? " And 
 indeed a beam fell full upon his white head, and 
 illumined his hao-o-ard face. There was a wist- 
 ful trouble like the trouble of a child on it. 
 
 " I feel the warmth ; but there is a veil 
 before my eyes. Will you draw back the 
 curtain ? "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. loi 
 
 She did not move. A divine pity was in 
 Iier eyes. She could let it rest there now, for 
 he coukl not see it to shrink from it. 
 
 He turned restlessly on his pillow. 
 
 " I thought it miglit be ca dream," he said, 
 the first bitter wave of truth breakino- on 
 
 O 
 
 him. She took his hand, worn and yellow 
 like an old ivory, and bowed her forehead 
 upon it. 
 
 " If the veil should not be lifted here, could 
 you bear it, dear % " 
 
 There was a silence, and in it I heard her 
 sob. How many things he must have thought 
 of in that keen sword-thrust of anguish l)y 
 which his fate was made clear to him — thouoht 
 of to renounce : the books upon the homely 
 shelves, the pen and ink scarce less dear to a 
 scholar ; the flowers that helped his eveniug 
 meditations, as he walked between their shin- 
 ing rows ; the faces that had looked up to him 
 for years and years on Sundays in the high 
 pulpit while he delivered the divine message ; 
 that sought his in the little study with sorrow 
 ihat came sure of comfort, or joy that knew it
 
 I02 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 would be shared. Who would blame rebellion, 
 against so cruel a sentence ? Yet when he 
 spoke at last it was with the resignation pos- 
 sible to one alone who has mastered the secret 
 of peace. 
 
 " It has pleased God to take back that which 
 was His gift, blessed be His name. Hush, my 
 bairn ! " for she was weeping now the tears he 
 would not shed. *' Think of all the years I 
 have had the blessing of sight, and shall I 
 murmur because my Master asks me to travel 
 the last miles of the long journey in the dark ? 
 An hour or two in the mirk night, and 
 then the mornino- in the land where the sun 
 
 O 
 
 never sets ; and I, too, shall see Him face to 
 face. It's a bonnie world, and I fain would 
 have looked once more upon the spring trees, 
 and the gowans in the grass, and the faces I 
 have loved, and oh — " the groan w^ould not 
 be suppressed — " Frank, my son, my son." 
 
 " He will come back ! " she cried, her tears 
 dried, faith and hope illuminating her face ; 
 " he will come home when he hears, and we 
 will take care of you together. We will be
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 103 
 
 eyes to you, he and I. Oli, it "will not seem 
 so sad. Frank will read to yon, and write for 
 you. Think what a grand scholar he is — so 
 clever and quick, and you know what a pen 
 he has. Was there ever any one who could 
 write brighter letters or report things more 
 clearly in just a few words ? It will grieve 
 him to hear, poor Frank ; and yet how glad he 
 will be to fly home again ! As for me, I will 
 try to be wise, and notice all the little thinG;s 
 you have taught me to see — the ways of the 
 birds, and the coming of the flowers — so that 
 you may not miss them. I wish I had paid 
 more attention at school and had not refused 
 to learn Latin, then perhaps I might have 
 helped you a little with your book ; but, with 
 Frank at hand, what will that matter ? He 
 loves books, while I can only take care of the 
 outsides of them with a duster. Do you 
 remember how we used to laugh, and say he 
 must be your secretary when he grew up ? 
 And now the time has come." 
 
 Her voice was still murmurino: on — words of 
 consolation and hope and cheer — when I found
 
 T04 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 myself outside the house, tiptoeing still — though 
 my footfall could not reach the two in that 
 inner room — with a hanQ-ino- head, and a 
 .shamed sense of dishonour. Yet since none 
 aaeed ever know I had been witness to that 
 moving scene, or Ijc hurt by my alien 
 presence, I would not have missed it. Ten 
 years of social intercourse — of meetings in the 
 market, and handshakes, and exchange of polite 
 'Civilities at wa' teas — and I should not have 
 known Miss Gillespie as I knew her now, who 
 had never so much as spoken to her. 
 
 And with the thought came the sharp after- 
 .•sting — 
 
 " If Sutherland loves her, she is worthy of 
 him." 
 
 At the gate, going head down in my blind 
 fashion, I nearly ran against him. 
 
 His '' Hallo, Fowler I You here ? " startled 
 me into attention. 
 
 "Anything wrong V he asked anxiously. 
 
 I pulled myself together, and remembered 
 the errand I had come on. 
 
 He fro^Tied meditatively.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 105 
 
 " I'll go as soon as I eaD," lie said ; " but I 
 must look in here first. It's a o-ood tliino; we 
 •chanced to meet : it will save me a sood lono; 
 tramp." 
 
 " I have been waiting," I said, forcing my- 
 self to tell him so much; "the person who 
 opened the door seemed to expect me. Of 
 course it was a. mistake ; but I didn't like to 
 .make a disturbance by explaining." 
 
 " She took you, most likely, for a fellow 
 they were expecting from Edinburgh, about 
 his book. lie M'as writing a commentary, poor 
 ■old man. He'll never finish it now." 
 
 (So that was the task " Frank " was to 
 .accomplish.) 
 
 " Is there no chance for him ? " 
 
 " None — atrophy of the nerves. I've fore- 
 seen it for some time, and Aitcheson last night, 
 when he saw him, confirmed my judgment. I 
 left it to her to tell him " 
 
 He seemed to forget me, as he stared before 
 him. She was nameless in his thouohts alread v ; 
 of all the women who flitted in and out of 
 their pastor's sick-room he saw her alone.
 
 io6 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Cowardly perhaps — " he roused himself — 
 " but women have the art of softening most 
 blows and makino- them bearable. Well, I 
 mustn't stand here gossiping. Don't wait 
 dinner for me ; I'm certain to be late." 
 
 We parted, and I took my uneasy secret 
 home with me. It was mine, my own posses- 
 sion, and since it revealed her as all womanly, 
 tender, and good, why should I be ashamed 
 even though I had stooped to steal it ? 
 
 She was worthy of Sutherland, l)ut the 
 knowledge, surely to rejoice at, gave mc no 
 pleasure. For the very qualities that lifted 
 her to his plane made her the one whom I, too, 
 could have worshipped had there been place in 
 such a life as mine for love of woman. But 
 there was none.
 
 I ps 
 
 ^^ 
 
 CHAPTER VIT. 
 
 T elianced that I liad been able to render 
 a trifliDg service to the poor woman 
 who was paid to minister to Mrs. Laidhiw's 
 whims, and be the butt of her ill-humours and 
 spites, so that when next I encountered her in 
 Shaw Street, trotting meekly beside the bath- 
 chair, her timid recognition of me justified me 
 in lifting my hat. 
 
 "Who's that?" demanded the lady in the 
 chair, with an imperious sign to the chairman 
 to halt. " Mr.— What d'ye call him ? " 
 
 " Mr. Fowler, ma'am," said Miss McAlistcr, 
 a round little dot of a woman, with a 
 frightened face and a mouth always open 
 for surprises. She spoke in a piping voice,, 
 like the overorown child she looked. " I told
 
 io8 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 you, ma'am, if you remember, we met in Mr. 
 Mackie's sliop, when I was getting the pepper- 
 mint drops, and I had forgotten my purse, 
 and this gentleman " 
 
 " You would forget your head, McAlister, 
 and expect somebody to bring it home in a 
 poke to ye, if it weren't attached to your 
 body," said the old lady, with contempt. 
 *' So you're the companion," she looked at 
 me with her beady black eyes ; " or is it the 
 •patient ? " 
 
 " As you prefer, madam," I said, resolved 
 to show myself finely indifferent to her satire. 
 
 " They tell me lunatics are the most profit- 
 able investment, or is it inebriates ? There's 
 a heap o' them hereabouts. We call them 
 drouthy folk." 
 
 I professed myself unable to inform her, 
 
 "Nairn could tell," she said with a chuckle 
 -that shook her double chin. " Ay, ay, Nairn 
 kept a private Bedlam when first he came 
 here. Shawbridge was too healthy then for 
 vi doctor to thrive on his neiohbours' com- 
 plaints, so he filled his house with ' resident
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 109 
 
 patients ' — tluit's the geuteel way they put 
 it ; and if ever a poor soul of them was cured, 
 it was no thanks to his keejDer. But it's a 
 meeserable generation I've lived to see, an' I 
 doubt na, your young friend will find plenty 
 to make his experiments on." 
 
 " I understood that you were anxious to 
 consult him yourself," I said, making a sally 
 into the enemy's camp. 
 
 "Hoots, do ye take me for a lameter be- 
 cause ye see me hurled in ca wheel chair ? " 
 she asked, not without good nature. " It's- 
 my carriage, 3"oung sir, and a cheaper than 
 keeping horses to eat their heads off. Andrew 
 Souttar costs me less than a coachman, and 
 walking exercise is good for McAlister ; she's- 
 feared,, she'll grow too fat." The poor little 
 woman blushed a distressed red to see her 
 little weakness thus dragged fortli to light. 
 " So, yon little bit body you sent to see me,, 
 your niece, was't, or your cousin ? thought 
 she was securing a fine patient for the young- 
 doctor lad! McAlister will tell ye I'm 
 never ill "
 
 no THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Except once," murmured the conscientious 
 attendant, "when you had a threatening of 
 gout." 
 
 " Ay, and ye thought it was all by wi' me ; 
 but I've taken my own way living, and Til 
 take my own w\ay dying too," she triumphed. 
 " And a good thing for you, McAlister ; for 
 what would a feckless, thouless, fushionless 
 woman like you, do wanting me ? And now, 
 for all his drugs and his l)ottles, Tom Nairn's 
 down himself, and will never walk a step 
 again. And six good years younger than me. 
 A fine commentary on his skill. What think 
 ye, young man ? " 
 
 I might have answered with some platitude, 
 but she gave me no time. 
 
 " AVhat have ye done with the wee wifie, 
 Mrs. Carnegie ? " she asked. " A bit genty 
 thing — and no' upsetting, all things considered. 
 I told her to come back again." 
 
 " Her husband carried her off" suddenly." 
 
 " And you let her go ■? " 
 
 "We could not have hindered her. She's 
 an excellent wife."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. iii 
 
 " I dare say — I tlare say, from your point 
 of view," slie said dryly. " I would have 
 mauao'ed liim better ; " and, trulv, I believe 
 she would. Think of Colonel Tom, with Mrs. 
 Laidlaw for a partner ! 
 
 " Well, and what have you to say for your- 
 self, Mr. Companion ? Don't ye know that 
 I'm the principal person in Shawbridge, and 
 that a' body calls on me ? " 
 
 " I couldn't imao'ine that a visit from me 
 
 O 
 
 would afford you any particular pleasure, 
 madam." 
 
 " Ye mean that it wouldn't give you any 
 particular pleasure to come," she said shrewdly. 
 
 I laughed ; for there was a twinkle in her 
 eye that seemed to promise the possibility of 
 ?i truce after all. 
 
 " Come to-morrow — three o'clock," she said ; 
 " and McAlister will pay her bill to you — 
 fourpence-halfpenuy. Mackie would charge 
 you sixpence, the greedy Ijody ; but he knows 
 Ijetter than to expect it from me." 
 
 " This was the beginning of my acqunint- 
 unce with the tyrant who ruled us all. She
 
 112 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Avas pleased to take a passing fancy to me, 
 and was very frank when I went, as com- 
 manded, next day. 
 
 " I'll no' offer you any tea," she said. 
 " I'm too old for newfangled ways, and for- 
 bye, tea's bad for the digestion and the nerves. 
 It was wine in my day ; but young men don't 
 drink wine now either — their heads are no" 
 made to stand it," 
 
 "I dare say we should if we had all a finely - 
 stocked cellar." 
 
 " So you've heard about my cellar ? Oh^ 
 you'll hear fine stories about me ! I'm the 
 richest and the nearest woman in the town. 
 You see I know my own character ! But 
 they come, for all that, though some of them 
 hate me, and some are feared of my tongue. 
 Now, I wonder which you'll be % " 
 
 "Not afraid of you, certainly," said I, fall- 
 ing in with her humour. " Why should I be ? 
 I'm a very inoffensive person ; I have had no 
 tragedies in my life. We were very well 
 content, my friend and I, to live retired and 
 unnoticed."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 113 
 
 " Retired and unnoticed, indeed ! " said she, 
 with a shake of her capstrings. " I know 
 fine wliat young men are ; and if you arc to 
 be so unco' humble and meek, how is your 
 friend, the doctor, to live % Tell me that ! 
 He's no' above takiuo; a fee when he can ^et 
 it, I'll warrant ; but unless he's a fool, he'll 
 no' wait for it to drop into his mouth like a 
 ripe plum off the wall. There's Nairn's 
 practice, d'ye say ? And how much of Nairn's 
 practice would he have been like to get but 
 for me ? It's no' the earl at the Castle that's 
 here to-day and away to-morrow, nor yet 
 your Free Church minister, nor your minister's 
 daughter, that can make or unmake a man in 
 vShawbridge — it's me, Jennet Laidlaw." 
 
 She looked at me as if she expected me to 
 challenge this statement ; but I had no ojiinion 
 to offer, and perhaps she took my silence for 
 acquiescence. It was certain she was a force 
 ■one had to reckon witli if one would live in 
 peace. 
 
 She questioned me in the openest manner 
 about our menage. A man and a lad to 
 
 VOL. I. 'S
 
 114 THE AIISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 wait on us, and a charwoman. Set iis up T 
 AVhat did our butcher's bill amount to ? We 
 ought to deal with Jamieson ; his meat was 
 a penny the pound cheaper. What did I do 
 Avith myself, since I professed to know nothing 
 of housekeeping ? Read books ! She ex- 
 pressed as frank a contempt as I sometimes 
 felt myself for my idle way of life. That 
 anybody who had even a little money should 
 not want to make it more seemed to her 
 inexplicable. She favoured me with an out- 
 line of her own history, and impressed upon 
 me that there was no pride about her. She 
 was the daus-hter of a Glaso-ow merchant and 
 the widow of a manufacturer, who, but for 
 her energy and foresight, would have been a 
 poor struggling laird all his days. But though 
 she was the C|ueen of Shawbridge, all her 
 subjects were her equals when they met in 
 her parlour. 
 
 We were alone on the occasion of my first 
 visit with the exception of ]\Iiss ]\IcAlister, 
 who sat behind a hisfh screen, and who must 
 have heard a good many sarcastic remarks
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 115 
 
 directed at herself. The screen perhaps hid 
 some homely needlework as well as poor Mss 
 McAlister's blushes, for when the little woman 
 emerged, as she often did, to fetch or carry for 
 her mistress, her shabby Ijodice was stabbed 
 with pins. More than one visitor was turned 
 away that day from the doorstep, an honour I 
 ought, perhaps, to have appreciated more than 
 I did, had I not been witness to the shafts that 
 sped after their departing steps. Their turn 
 to-day ; mine to-morrow. Would they have 
 gone so confidently had they heard their dear 
 friend's candid opinion of them ? Portly Dr. 
 Gillespie, for instance ; but then it is consoling 
 to reflect that he would never have recoo-nized 
 his own portrait. The self we see and the self 
 others see in us, have they one feature in 
 common ? 
 
 " Do you know his daughter ? " she asked 
 me suddenly ; and when I stammered out that 
 I did not, she looked at me searchingly. 
 
 " Keep out of her road, then," she said, "or 
 you'll be fancying yourself in love with her, 
 Nancy Gillespie's a proud peat, and thinks no
 
 -J 1 6 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 (man good enough for her ; she'll end by finding 
 herself hinoino' forsaken on the bouoh. Men 
 ;are fools, but until they're created different, 
 women have got to thole them, or play the old 
 maid." 
 
 Mrs. Laidlaw was so kind to me and so full 
 'of questions and advice that it amazed me to 
 think she had rested satisfied for nearly a year 
 without making Sutherland's acquaintance or 
 mine, but on the occasion of my next visit I 
 was to have my lesson in a woman's fickleness. 
 81ie gave me but one fat finger to shake ; the 
 room was nearly full — the company mostly 
 men, though some few ladies were present. 
 There was a rather sio-nificant silence when I 
 ■entered — perhaps it was my own little history 
 I had interrupted ? Mr. Little, the banker, 
 started forward and shook me so effusively by 
 the hand that I couldn't help thinking he had 
 been betraying the very modest state of my 
 balance. A paltry two hundred pounds a 
 year ! How does the creature live ! To be 
 sure his coat is rather glazy at the seams ; 
 but look at the books he buys !
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. iif 
 
 1 found myself supporting an angle of the- 
 wall furthest away from the throne and the- 
 courtiers round it, with Charlie Nairn for my 
 companion. 
 
 " I say," he whispered, " are you in disgrace- 
 too ? She asked me to tea on Sunday, and I 
 suppose I ate too much. I meant to have a 
 tuck in before I came ; but she didn't give me 
 a chance. She nabbed me comino- out of 
 church, and made me walk home with her, and 
 listen to McAlister readino- some rotten old 
 
 O 
 
 book all afternoon. Did you ever hear old' 
 McAlister read aloud ? It's an awful joke. 
 She's pulled up every second word and made 
 to repeat it as if she was a kid. I got off by 
 saying I had a sore throat ; but she paid me 
 out. ' If you've got a bad throat, Charles,' 
 she says, ' you'd better not eat so much ' — 
 there wasn't bread and butter enough for one, 
 let alone three — ' you'll be turning feverish, 
 and your uncle can't attend to ye now. 
 McAlister will give you a dose of the mixture 
 before you go home.' My, ain't she an old 
 screw ! She would like to feed us on the
 
 ii8 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 medicine she gets out of my uncle's surgery 
 for nothing. I made McAlister pour the 
 beastly stuff down the sink. You can always 
 get round lier ; but the old lady found it out, 
 and I'm in her black books yet." 
 
 " What makes you come here — a young lad 
 like you ? " I asked. 
 
 Charlie looked at me with surprised 
 disdain. 
 
 " What do ijou come for ? " he demanded. 
 " You go to church too — I saw you ! " He 
 seemed to be lost in wonder that, having 
 absolute licence to do as I liked, I should choose 
 the disagreeables of life. " I'm in Laidlaw's 
 mill ; she knows to a halfpenny the miserable 
 screw they give me, and would cut it off if I 
 stopped away from church, or didn't come here 
 reg'lar when she sends for me. Oh, it's all 
 very well for you I I wouldn't darken her door 
 if I was that lot." He looked with frownino; 
 contempt, in which I was subtly included, at 
 the group round the chair. " It's her money 
 they're after ; but she won't leave one of 
 them a halfpenny. I b'lieve she'll order it
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 119 
 
 all to be buried in lier coffin just to spite 
 them ! " 
 
 " Let's make our escape," I said, " and come 
 home with me. I like my cup of tea, though 
 J\Irs. Laidlaw assures me it is bad for the 
 digestion ; and Burton always allows me cake 
 when I brino- a visitor." 
 
 Charlie looked tempted, but his gloom 
 immediately returned upon him. 
 
 " It would be no good. She'd see us." 
 
 " Well, and if she did ? She can't keep us 
 prisoners ; and if, as you say, we are in dis- 
 grace — though Heaven only knows what my 
 offence is — the sooner we let her see that we 
 don't care the better." 
 
 ''- All right," he winked, " let's cut ! " 
 
 So, by a skilful strategic movement we 
 found ourselves safely out of doors. 
 
 This device, or the excellence of Burton's cake 
 — Burton was once a boy, with an appetite to 
 <ippease — probably tempered Charlie's opinion 
 of me, for he favoured us with his society 
 pretty often ; but I found it more difficult to 
 re-enthrone my own self-respect, for though 1
 
 I20 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 liad very little esteem for Mrs. LaicUaw, I, too, 
 had my purpose to serve in toadying her. But 
 it Avas not her money I coveted. 
 
 One day I had my reward — rather dearly 
 bought, perhaps, by a good many variations, 
 of climate from heat to chill in Mrs. Laidlaw's 
 reception of me. It was the turn of the 
 Arctic regions, and in that desolation Dr. 
 Gillespie, of all people, was my fellow-traveller. 
 Surely it was not often the bland, invincible 
 Doctor had to suffer such banishment ? He 
 button-holed me as if glad to find even so 
 poor a companion in exile. 
 
 " You and I meet here often, Mr. Fowler," 
 he said, " and yet we do not improve our 
 acquaintance " — he had never bestowed more 
 than two or three words on me before. " As 
 our hostess has so many to engross her to- 
 night, we shall commit no serious breach if 
 we take our leave. If you have no better 
 engagement, will you walk with me to the- 
 Manse, and let my daughter offer you a cup- 
 of tea ? I am not a book-worm, like you ;. 
 but there's an ancient volume or two on my
 
 THE MISCHIEF-iUAKER. i2i> 
 
 shelves tliat are perhaps worthy of your 
 notice." 
 
 The Doctor, however, more vahaiit or more 
 diplomatic than I, Avould by no means consent 
 to slip away unperceived. He made his 
 farewells with unabated courtliness, and wheii 
 Mrs. Laidlaw, after snubbing him all after- 
 noon, asked innocently — 
 
 " What's taking you away so soon, Doctor % " 
 he answered. 
 
 " Our young friend here has kindly con- 
 sented to accompany me home." 
 
 " Oh, you're expecting a friend, are you?" 
 she says, staring at the middle Ijutton of my 
 waistcoat, as if she saw the wall-paper behind 
 it. " And you're going Ikjuic to look after 
 Nancy? 'Deed, Doctor, it's the young men, your 
 visitors, 1 would look after if I was you. Miss 
 Nancy is very well able to take care of herself." 
 
 " She's a — little difficult," said the minister, 
 mildly, hooking his arm within mine when 
 we ii'ot outside — " a little uncertain, but an 
 excellent woman iu the maiu. Suppressed 
 gout, 1 believe."
 
 122 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Unsuppressed bad temper ! " said I, gaily. 
 What cared I for lier ill-humours and spites 
 since I had gained my end ? I didn't need 
 to go begging hat in hand for subscriptions, 
 or to wrest repairs from an unwilling heritor. 
 My one fear now was lest Miss Gillespie 
 should not be at home ; but when we had 
 loitered a few moments over the doctor's 
 book-shelves, which held no remarkable 
 treasure, he j)i-'oposed an adjournment to the 
 garden, and there we found her. She sat 
 under an oak tree that cast a strip of shade 
 over the little lawn, though it was scarcely 
 yet in full leaf, and when she rose to meet 
 us I was struck anew with her height and 
 fine carriage. Her eyes looked frankly into 
 mine, as she said — 
 
 " I am very glad to see you." 
 
 " Mr. Fowler is Dr. Sutherland's friend," 
 said the minister, quite superfluously ; there 
 are not so many strangers in Shawbridge that 
 she could mistake me for any one else. " We 
 met at ]\Irs. Laidlaw's ; and he came with me 
 on the strength of my promise that you 
 would give him some tea."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 123 
 
 " But I didn't require to be bribed," I 
 protested. 
 
 "Mrs. Laidlaw disapproves of tea," she 
 said, witli a little smile ; " but she hasn't 
 managed to convert my father to her views 
 yet." 
 
 " She considers her conversation refreshment 
 enough. It has some tonic qualities." 
 
 " Wholesome and nasty ? " she said lightly. 
 " I'm afraid I do not love medicine of that 
 kind ; I am not good enough to take it with- 
 out making a wry face." 
 
 " Indeed, it would be better if you went 
 sometimes to see our friend, my love," said 
 the minister, seating himself in a garden-chair 
 and watching the approach of the tea-tray 
 as it was borne by the housemaid ; " the young 
 ■ought to defer to the old." 
 
 She looked at him thoughtfully for a 
 moment. AVus she thinkinii; the old ouo-ht 
 'to earn respect before they exact it % There 
 was another, far-travelled in the vale of years, 
 to whom she gave the whole devotion of lier 
 .heart, as I, who had no right to know, could
 
 124 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER, 
 
 liave testified. But slie had a smile for Ler 
 fatlier. 
 
 " Do you tliiulv it would be good for me 
 to be snubbed ? " she asked merrily. " Snubbed 
 people are often nice, certainly. Mrs. Laidlaw 
 goes upon that principle Avith all young women. 
 We ouoht to have belono-ed to her o-eneration, 
 when girls said prunes and prism every 
 morning to keep their mouths a pretty shape 
 for the rest of the day ; and did and spoke 
 and thought just what they were told. Can. 
 you imagine a meek and mum Mrs. Laidlaw, 
 Mr. Fowler? The girl was scarcely mother 
 to the woman in such case ! " 
 
 " She has grown a good deal since then,' 
 I said : and we both lauQ-hed as we would have • 
 laughed at anything, the day Avas so bright- 
 and genial, the tea so good. The minister' 
 ate muffins with a zeal that left him half 
 heedless of our talk, which rambled over many 
 subjects. Her face, which had worn a shade- 
 of sadness when we came upon her under the 
 tree, was now quite bright. But always at 
 the l)ottom of my heart lay the uneasy
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 125 
 
 thought — if she speaks of Sutherknd, what 
 revelation shall I read there ? I dreaded yet 
 longed for the introduction (^f his name : at 
 last I could bear it no longer, and lilurted 
 out — 
 
 " You've seen a good deal of my friend 
 and comrade, Dr. Sutherland ? He has told 
 me of your devotion to his patient, ]\Ir. 
 Cunninoiiam." 
 
 " Yes," she said, with a perfectly natural 
 composure. " I have often been sitting with 
 Mr. Cunninoham when he has called. He 
 has taken a o-reat deal of trouble." 
 
 " The case interests him very much." 
 
 " It could not fail to do that," she said, 
 with a simple conviction. " I have often 
 thought that a doctor's constant contact with 
 pain, and his habit of looking at the disease 
 rather than the patient, must make it difficult 
 for him to keep his sympathy alive and fresh. 
 One looks to him to be strong, ratlier tliaii 
 pitiful. But such a calamity as blindness 
 must touch every heart." 
 
 " It must indeed."
 
 126 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Ah yes," said the minister ; " poor Cun- 
 ningham ! — very sad. A httle more cream, 
 my dear." 
 
 "It is such a lonely world the blind live 
 in," she went on, as if she had forgotten us ; 
 " sometimes one gets a glimpse of it when 
 one weakens in the dark ; it is not fear, as 
 when one w^as a child, so much as an over- 
 whelming helplessness. But Dr. Sutherland's 
 23resence has been a stay and comfort to his 
 patient, I know. He has given more than, 
 mere medical skill." 
 
 " Sutherland has the best heart in the 
 world," I burst out. The minister had 
 strayed away to the gooseberry bushes, and 
 we were alone. " Under a cold outside, he 
 is all fire ; he will never merge the man in 
 the doctor. He loves his profession ; but it 
 has only made him the more humane. I 
 who have known him since we were 
 boys together, I can tell. I've seen him 
 with his mother — a silly, exacting woman, 
 whom many sons might have despised — but 
 he never failed in his duty to her. He has
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 127 
 
 not met many women — perhaps never bad 
 one really good and noble woman for a friend 
 — and men avIio live alone are apt to get 
 rough and careless, but the heart within is 
 pure gold." 
 
 Why I should have praised him thus I 
 cannot tell, but that the impulse was upon 
 me to set him right with her. AYas it dread 
 of my own disloyalty ? I call it by no higher 
 name. 
 
 She looked at me with some faint surprise 
 in her eyes, as if she wondered at my vehe- 
 mence ; but her face lighted as she said with 
 2;racious warmth — 
 
 " He has no need of a woman's kindness 
 who has such a friend ! " 
 
 Her words disconcerted me. I could but 
 stammer that I owed him everything. 
 
 " Perhaps he will have another story to 
 tell ! " she said, w^itli a smile. 
 
 My praise of him may have pleased her 
 after all. 
 
 " He is very clever, isn't he ? That is 
 such a good thing for Shawbridge. People's
 
 128 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. , 
 
 energies here have only one outlet, and the 
 rich have no time to look after the poor. 
 Perhaps some one fresh — from the outside 
 — would know better how best to help." 
 
 " Do you know Father Murphy ? He comes 
 to see us sometimes. He has ideas." 
 
 She said she had never spoken to him, 
 thouo'll she had heard of his self-denial and 
 devotion to his little flock. She glanced at 
 her father sauntering back to us, his hands 
 behind his l^aek, as if he and a gooseberry 
 bush had never so much as seen each other, 
 and I gathered that the subject had better 
 be dropped. It was not then known to either 
 of us what a bad impression we had given 
 of ourselves l)y admitting the priest, and 
 shutting our door upon the Parish Pope. 
 Indeed, but for his good nature, and the 
 weakness he had for knowing everybody, 
 the minister might well have declined my 
 -acquaintance. But he was too easy-going 
 to bear resentment. He liked gossip of a 
 harmless order, and he sat down beside his 
 daughter and me, and talked of Tom, Dick,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 129 
 
 aud Harry, with the queerest little details 
 and small items of news o-athered duriuo- the 
 day. Miss Gillespie had produced some 
 knitting, and assented a little absently, I 
 thought ; she had known those people all 
 her life, while to me they were but the merest 
 abstractions — shadow pictures. 
 
 Before taking my leave, I made bold to 
 ask her if she thought there was any service 
 I could render Mr. Cunnino-ham. 
 
 " It seems presumptuous, considering the 
 number of his friends and the poorness of 
 my acquirements ; but I am an idle man, 
 with much time, if little else to give. He 
 is writing a book, I believe." 
 
 "A commentary," interjected the minister, 
 "on the Epistle to tlie Hebrews. It will 
 never be finished now." 
 
 Slie looked up quickly ; but she said 
 nothinfT. 
 
 " I've never written a line in my life ; l)ut 
 books have been my cliief friends." 
 
 " You are very kind," she said ; '' I know 
 
 he would wish me to thank you. He is unfit 
 VOL. I. 9
 
 I30 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 for work still ; but later, perhaps — wlien he 
 is stronger. He hopes to finish his book when 
 his son comes home." 
 
 " What ! " cried the minister, with energy 
 not nntinctured with disgust. " Young Frank 
 coming home ? " 
 
 " Certainly," she said, with a touch of 
 haughtiness as it seemed, though I did not 
 look at her. I had heard of this home- 
 coming before, and the recollection shamed 
 me. " Where should he be but here, at his 
 own home, now that his father is old and 
 blind ? " 
 
 " The wish certainly does him credit," said 
 the minister, dryly. "Have you heard when 
 he is expected ? " 
 
 " No ; " she drooped, and the fire died out 
 of her voice ; " but he will write." 
 
 As the minister accompanied me to the- 
 gate, he hissed one word into my ear, 
 "Jackanapes!" he said; and I knew that 
 he was presenting me with his opinion of 
 Mr. Frank Cunningham.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ^LONG the houses whose doors were fluns; 
 wide open to Archie since he had 
 effected that speedy cure of young Coventry 
 was that of a very fine new mansion, built by 
 a famous Edinburgh firm for I\Ir. Benjamin 
 Green — one of the largest millowners in Shaw- 
 bridge. Meddlesome persons hinted at an 
 exceedingly humble beginning to all this pros- 
 perity, and Mrs. Laidlaw had been known to 
 use this rumour effectivel}' as a weapon, but 
 nobody else cared, or perhaps could afford to 
 care. 
 
 " We're all self-made," said Mr. Green liim- 
 self, " except Templeton ; and what have ids 
 fine family done for him ? Sorned on him, 
 sir, and despised him when they had squeezed
 
 i-,2 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 'o 
 
 liim dry. It's better to be whittled with your 
 own knife than not made at all." 
 
 The workmanship was a little rough ; it 
 takes a generation or two to put on the polish, 
 but Green Secundus would improve upon his 
 papa, and Green Tertius might be quite a 
 finished gentleman. That sort of thing goes 
 on daily, and nowhere so fast as in manufac- 
 turing centres. 
 
 Sutherland got an invitation to dinner at 
 Grove End the day after he had been seen 
 shakino- hands with the Earl under the statue 
 of Sir Walter Scott. It was market day, and 
 a good many people witnessed this exchange of 
 civilities, and thought the more of the young 
 surgeon for his promotion. Why not ? Earls 
 are not as common clay. There can never be 
 more than a certain number of them. 
 
 "It's an easy way to pay his bill," said 
 Sutherland, as he twisted the note into a spill 
 and lit his pipe with it. " His lordshijD doesn't 
 even need to give me an invitation to his own 
 board when some more important person has 
 disappointed him ; he has only to be seen
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. ly. 
 
 greeting me in the market-place and I can get 
 as many big dinners to eat as I want. You're 
 included in this, Fowler." 
 
 " Are you going to accept ? " 
 
 '• I think so — yes," he answered, with rather 
 an unnecessary amount of explanation — almost 
 of apology. " I'm a bit curious to see one of 
 these gorgeous interiors. Green is a patron of 
 art ; anybody can buy pictures if he sticks to 
 big names and is willing to give long prices ; 
 they say he's had the good sense to leave the 
 stocking of his cellar to skilled hands. I'm 
 told he has some splendid Lafitte. Besides, 
 there are six possible patients in the six Miss 
 Greens." 
 
 " Any more reasons ? " 
 
 " No ; " he laughed a little consciously. 
 " I wish I could promise you a splendid library, 
 Fowler, as an special inducement, but the taste 
 for books never seems to be acquired till the 
 second generation. The other day when I was 
 called to Spooners, the only visible literature 
 was a red-plush alljum." 
 
 " Well, it matters less, as I'm not going,"
 
 134 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 said the comrade, who had a hundred reasons 
 for staying at home. He had never possessed . 
 a dress suit ; had not assisted at a party since 
 he went in a short jacket and round collar, and 
 brought home pocketed spoil. " Crackers 
 have ceased to l3e a joy, and even the 
 mottoes have lost their virtue as poetry. Go 
 alone, old man ; the society upon my shelves 
 is more to my taste than that of the six Miss 
 Greens, who would only alarm me. What have 
 I to say to girls ? They make me feel a fool." 
 
 " Not an unwholesome experience. Besides, 
 there are some women you get on with." 
 
 " Mrs. Laidlaw, for instance ! " I had again 
 in these last weeks been restored to that capri- 
 cious lady's favour. 
 
 " And a younger than Mrs. Laidlaw," he said 
 significantly. 
 
 Our thoughts flew simultaneously to the 
 Manse garden. Once and again I had gone 
 there, sometimes to find the minister alone, 
 but, as the tea-hour approached, Miss Gillespie 
 would be seen coming from that other Manse 
 by the brown field-path where the go wans and
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 135 
 
 buttercups beut to let lier pass. She was not 
 always unaccompanied ; what more natural 
 than that a busy doctor should seize a five 
 minutes' rest and a cup of tea before resuming 
 his rounds ? Could he have read in my face 
 as he found me under the oak where the cups 
 were spread, that it cost me a pang to resign 
 my place to him ? I had ill-schooled it if he 
 did. 
 
 Needless to say, he overruled all my 
 .scruples. 
 
 Grove End was a very fine house indeed, set 
 <m the slope of the hill above the railway, and 
 well away from the belching smoke of Shaw- 
 bridge's tall chimneys. The steep face of the 
 hill had been boldly terraced, and from the 
 little wayside station, we humble toilers on 
 foot ascended Ijy quite a long zig-zag before 
 the glories of the mansion burst upon us. A 
 hired fly from tlic Dragon — which had come 
 by the proper avenue — was drawn up at 
 the door, and from it there stepped a lady and 
 gentleman whom we Ijotli instantly re(M)gnized 
 iis the minister and his daughter.
 
 136 THE MISCHIEF-AIAKER. 
 
 "Did you kuow she was to be here?" I 
 asked quietly. He confessed, with a lialf- 
 abashed laugh, that he did. 
 
 " She's not like other women, Fowler ; her 
 friendship is w^orth cultivating." 
 
 Her friendship) — was that to be my share ?. 
 And his % 
 
 We were received by Mrs. Whittlemore — a 
 sister of Mr. Green, who, from time to time^ 
 deserted her own hearth to look after her 
 motherless nieces. She was a large woman^ 
 a little blindingly glaring in her dress and 
 manner — like a gas jet without the shade on. 
 
 She received us graciously, her bracelets jing- 
 ling as she shook hands, and immediately carried 
 Sutherland off to introduce him to the other 
 guests, while I was left to share the hearth-rug 
 with her brother, who was good enough to give 
 me an outline of his history, letting fly facts 
 at me as if they were bullets. 
 
 "My fam'ly's had a better chance than evei- 
 I had," he said, for he had the honesty not to 
 be ashamed of his orig-in. " / had to learn 
 myself everything I wanted to know, but it's.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 137 
 
 all been paid for and put in to tliem. There's 
 a French Madam in the house now, to speak, 
 parley-vous with them, but my sister won't 
 have her at table — says her foreign popish 
 ways put her out." 
 
 " Ah, and who instructs the young ladies 
 in English ? " asked Dr. Gillespie, who had 
 joined us, wishing to be politely conversational. 
 
 Our host turned upon him with a growl 
 that made the good doctor jump. 
 
 " Their English, sir, they learn in the 
 parlour " — he pronounced it porlour. " Have- 
 ye any fault to find with it ? " 
 
 " Certainly not — certainly not, my dear sir," 
 said the Doctor, hastily. "I was merely think- 
 ing that possibly — I heard of a tutor the other 
 day, an excellent creature, whom it would be 
 a kindness to employ. He was destined foi' 
 the Church." 
 
 "A sticket minister!" — with scorn. "S 
 dare say he would count it a fine down-sitting 
 to step in here ; but maybe he'd be teaching 
 my bairns more than I bargained for." 
 
 "The conjugation of the verb amo, for
 
 138 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 instance," said the minister, taking the matter 
 in very good part ; " well, you must expect 
 they will find instructors in that art whether 
 you will or no, Green, such charming young 
 ladies as they are." 
 
 " I've a son too, and a sharp 'un, worth all 
 these trash o' lassies," the manufacturer turned 
 to me ; it is my belief he was not quite certain 
 what the minister was driving at, and had 
 no wish to confess the same. " He's at 
 Dr. Dysart's Academy. You've heard of 
 Dysart % " 
 
 My reply was cut short by the sound of the 
 dinner- Q-ono-. The drawino--room had looked 
 imposing even in the soft light of a June 
 evening, but the dining-room surpassed it in 
 splendour. Even a vulgar mind can scarce 
 spoil a room in these days, when good taste 
 can be secured at little outlay ; vanished are 
 the hideous crystal, the overflowing epergnes 
 of old, the barbaric chandeliers, formless side- 
 boards, the back-breaking chairs ; harmony, 
 dignity, beauty are to be had at a price, and 
 the manufacturer had paid royally for them.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 139 
 
 Perhaps he was happier ^Yhen he sat down at 
 a deal table to a slice of the joint with his 
 homely wife to wait on him, and there is 
 surely something not unpathetic in the 
 sacrifices a man will make, and the strange 
 thino's he will endure for the sake of those 
 who are to succeed him, Mr. Green enjoyed 
 nothing of his grandeur, except the thought 
 that he had earned it to bestow upon his 
 •children. He was never known to use one 
 of his many carriages, and at his own table 
 passed all the made dishes, dining frugally 
 upon the fish and joint ; he had no apprecia- 
 tion of the wines which he circulated freely 
 among his guests. 
 
 The elder Miss Green, newly emancipated, 
 fell to mv share, and I was curious to see 
 what circumstances had made of her, but she 
 was not to be drawn out. Never, surely, was 
 so silent, so shy a girl. Did she like the 
 country % She thought she <lid. (Jf course 
 she often went to Edinburgh, or even to 
 London : perhaps she preferred the town ? 
 .She didn't know. Iler loud-voiced aunt at
 
 I40 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 the head of the table, her silent father at the 
 foot — for he only spoke by fits and starts — 
 seemed to paralyze the girl. 
 
 " Are you always as quiet as this ? " I asked' 
 at last, in smiling despair, and she answered, 
 with a blush that she was afraid she was. 
 
 " If you wouldn't mind talking, I could'' 
 listen,"' she said. " Aunt Maria is looking 
 at us. 
 
 Why Aunt Maria should particularly look 
 at us was a mystery, but Miss Green's nervous- 
 distress made it impossible to refuse the odd 
 request ; was she, too, a sufferer from un- 
 digested wealth \ She was rather a pretty 
 girl, with dark hair and eyes ; but she seemed, 
 to keep a continual watch upon herself lest 
 she should offend some unwritten code — and 
 her uneasiness laid its constraint uj)on others. 
 
 Far different was it at the other side of 
 the table, where Sutherland sat at Miss. 
 Gillespie's side. I had done no more than 
 shake hands with her in the drawino'-room. . 
 and the intimate loud talk of the remainino- 
 guests — manufacturers and their wives —
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 141 
 
 prevented any syllable that fell from lier 
 ^•eachino- me. 
 
 But only to look at her animated face was 
 a pleasure. She wore a gown of black with 
 a soft lustre, satin perhaps, that clung to her 
 like a sheath out of which her fair throat and 
 head rose flower-like. It was open but a little 
 way at the neck, but her white arms were 
 covered to the wrist with black lace. The 
 effect was virginal, charming, like an old 
 picture, one would say, except that so many 
 old pictures are hideous. Her hair was 
 brushed from her forehead, rippling in a high 
 sort of wave, and twisted in a loose knot 
 behind : that, too, was a fashion of the past, 
 for Miss Green, whose gauzy dress was surely 
 a recent importation from Paris, wore an 
 elaborate fringe, and a loop behind which 
 might almost have served as a handle to lift 
 her by. Miss Gillespie was not talking much, 
 though now and then her humorous mouth 
 broke into smiles, but with such a listener 
 who ^\'ould care ? There is a great difference 
 in silence ; as practised by Miss Green it
 
 142 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 depressed me, whereas its apparent effect on 
 Sutherland was to animate him. Never had 
 I seen him more gay, more energetic. 
 
 My companion grew slightly more easeful 
 as the long meal drew to an end, and she 
 found me less formidable than she had 
 imagined. Yes, she played a little : she was 
 very fond of music ; she liked it better than 
 anything, she thought, nnless — unless reading 
 — but when questioned as to her favourite 
 author she shrank back confused. 
 
 " Your aunt isn't looking," I said, trying tO' 
 reassure her ; " and even if it should be Zola,. 
 I won't tell ! I understand you read 
 French ? " 
 
 " Oh, but only dry things, like Corneille 
 and Racine," she said, " and some of Moliere's 
 plays. Do you " — she twisted a gold bracelet 
 nervously round her thin wrist — " do you 
 know many literary people ? " 
 
 " I know a few who write books." (I am 
 afraid the distinction was lost upon her.) 
 
 *' Do you write yourself? " she returned. 
 
 AVhy this harping upon the profession of
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 143 
 
 letters ? Could it be that Sliawbrido-e 
 nurtured a budding novelist or poet? Poet 
 it must be ; one of the long-baired order wbo 
 write for the future. Miss Green was not 
 more than nineteen. 
 
 " No, I am a mere reader of otlier people's 
 productions. One of the humble outside 
 public " 
 
 Mrs. Whittlemore cut the conclusion of this 
 sentence short by giving the signal to the 
 principal lady, and my companion fluttered 
 away nervously from my side. Poor little 
 girl ! how much happier she must have been 
 before papa and mamma became so grand ! 
 She was caught too late, and now she is for 
 ever trying to forget all she learned l)eforc she 
 was fifteen, and to remember all the thinors 
 she has acquired since, and between these 
 contending forces she is crushed. 
 
 What we talked of when the ladies left us, 
 matters very little ; it is always shop of ouc 
 kind or other, wherever you go — politics, 
 finance, trade, the learned professions — and it 
 is never quite so wise or so profound as women
 
 ^44 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 imagine when ^Yo decree their banishment ; 
 it used to be uncleanly enough upon occasion, 
 once on a day, but, thank heaven, we are all 
 dull and decorous now. 
 
 The drawing-room, where we presently 
 migrated, was now softly lit with candles, 
 -each shaded by a crimson hood. The French 
 governess was putting a good deal of soul into 
 a nocturne of Chopin, thereby stimulating talk, 
 for Shawbridge recognizes this as the sole end 
 of music, and encourages its young ladies to 
 carry their " pieces " about with them in neat 
 bead-work rings when invited to tea or dinner, 
 
 I slipped into a window- seat, where little 
 Miss Victoria Eugenie Green, in a white frock 
 and blue ribbons, condescended to share her 
 picture-l)ook with me. She told me that she 
 and her little sisters had w\atched at the 
 pantry door for the ices, and " My, weren't 
 they cold ! " said the little maid. " Beatty 
 ■didn't dare to eat them, for they give her 
 toothache, and make her cry — which do you 
 Jike best, the pink or the white ? " 
 
 Presently there was a movement in a group
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 145 
 
 near us, aud Miss Gillespie came to our corner. 
 
 Miss Green was with lier. 
 
 " I won't sit, thank you," she said. " Sophia 
 
 and I have had a great talk over the Sunday 
 
 school library, which wants to be fitted out 
 
 with new brown-paper great-coats, and now 
 
 I must speak to Mrs. Baird, I came to ask 
 
 you if you still have leisure and inclination to 
 
 help Mr. Cunningham ? " 
 
 " Nothing would give me greater pleasure." 
 " Even an hour every morning ? " 
 " Two or three hours — as lono^ as he likes." 
 She hesitated, then lifted her candid eyes 
 
 to mine. 
 
 " You remember I told you about his son, 
 
 that he was coming home ? " 
 
 Sophia Green withdrew her arm from Miss 
 
 Gillespie's, and sat down by the little sister on 
 
 the window-seat. 
 
 " I remember." It was six weeks ago. I 
 
 could not tell her how often I had wondered 
 
 why the young man still delayed. 
 
 " He has been detained," she said, the faint 
 
 colour coming and going again as quickly ; 
 
 VOL. I. ll>
 
 146 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 "his work has hindered him from leaving 
 town. He is a journalist, you know." 
 
 " Indeed, I did not know. It's an exacting 
 profession." 
 
 " Yes, I believe so ; he hopes to come soon. 
 And in the mean time it would be good for 
 Mr. Cunningham to work a little ; he has so 
 much time for sad thousjhts." 
 
 " I'll go to-morrow. Perhaps if I were to 
 call at the Manse first, you would be good 
 enough to go with me and introduce me ? I 
 don't suppose he has ever heard of me ? " 
 
 " Oh yes, he has ! " she smiled. " You 
 forget that Dr. Sutherland is there almost 
 daily, and he, too, knows how to value friend- 
 ship. Ah, Sophia, they are looking for you to 
 sing." 
 
 " I don't want to," cried the girl ; " I 
 can't ! " She hid her face in the little sister's 
 long flaxen hair. 
 
 "You silly!" cried the child; "Made- 
 moiselle will make you ! " 
 
 And sure enouo;h a crook of Mademoiselle's 
 fiuorer, and a nod of her sleek black head
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 147 
 
 were sufficient to draw Sopliia forth from her 
 retirement to her allotted place by the piano, 
 where jMadenioiselle was already playing the 
 ■accompaniment. 
 
 " She sings so charmingly," said Miss 
 •Gillespie, with generous appreciation. " How 
 I envy people who can speak through music ! " 
 " You don't sino' ? " 
 
 " No, nor even play beyond the poorest 
 strumming. The fairies were in a niggardly 
 mood when they met at my cradle ; they gave 
 me the love of music, and kept the executive 
 power for somebody else." 
 
 " Still, you had the best of that bargain." 
 " I am greedy enough to want both ! " 
 There was no envy in the pleasure with 
 which she listened. Miss Sophia's singing 
 justified her praise ; if her voice had no great 
 compass, it was singularly sweet and true, and 
 it had an odd, searching quality of pathos that 
 redeemed the foolish sentimentality of the 
 words she sang — " Farewell, love, for aye, 
 love." The whole tragedy of parting was 
 embodied in the si^hed-out notes. Where
 
 148 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 had the girl learned the trick ? Was it merely 
 some inherited quality, trained till it became 
 an art, or had she depths of feeling in her that 
 found here their only outlet ? It says some- 
 thing for her power that those nearest the 
 piano listened in silence, broken only by a loud 
 whisper from Mrs. Whittlemore. 
 
 Eeally, she imparted to her neighbour, con- 
 sidering what had been spent on Sophia's 
 music, there was uncommonly little to show 
 for it ; " anybody could sing a simple ballad 
 like that without any teaching at all, and 
 Sophia needs as much pressing as if she was a 
 public character, whom it pays to say no." 
 
 Clearly there was war between the loud- 
 voiced aunt and the silent niece ; Miss Sophia 
 kept the breadth of the room between herself 
 and her relative, and would scarce talk till 
 two of her younger sisters were set to thump 
 out a duet. She kept hovering round Miss 
 Gillespie with that adoration young women 
 often feel for one of their own sex before they 
 have wakened to the stronger passion. I saw 
 them both talking to a stout old lady in
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. '149 
 
 bugles, while I was doing my best to respond 
 to ]\Irs. Wliittlemore's comments. Sutherland, 
 who had been persuaded to join the card- 
 players, saw them too, or one of them at least, 
 though he played just at well and as coolly as 
 ever. He is to be envied his power of doing 
 two things at a time. 
 
 The card-party, however, was to be ruth- 
 lessly broken up not many minutes later. 
 While the girls, their backs to the players, 
 stood gossiping with Mrs. Baird, a cheery old 
 lady who was every one's friend, one of the 
 candle shades in the sconce above them causht 
 fire, and at a gust from tlie suddenly-opened 
 door the burning fragments fell between them. 
 In an instant Miss Sophia's gauzy skirt was 
 alight, but almost before she could scream Miss 
 Gillespie was kneeling on the floor crushing- 
 out the burning sparks with her hands. 
 Sutherland was the first to flins: aside his 
 cards, and rush forward ; the room was all in 
 confusion, Sophia sobbing hysterically, and 
 everybody talking at once. Mrs. Whittlemore 
 ^.mnounced that she felt sure she should faint ;
 
 ISO THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 but nobody took any notice of lier, and she- 
 probably thought better of it. Sutherland 
 sent me for his bag, which he had left in the 
 hall, intendino- to 2'o on to a case after leavino' 
 Grove End. I collided in the doorway with 
 ]\Er. Green, carrvino' a bedroom ewer in each 
 hand, and leaving a watery track behind him- 
 in his haste. AYe all lost our heads, I suppose,, 
 but the panic subsided somewhat when it was 
 ascertained that Miss Sophia was quite unhurt, 
 and that she and her sisters were only cry- 
 ino- from frioht. Sutherland advised JMrs. 
 
 o o 
 
 Whittlemore a little curtly to send them to 
 bed. 
 
 " Will you allow me to look at your hands. 
 Miss Gillespie, please ? " he said, in a tone of 
 authority. She had been standing silent in 
 the middle of the commotion, her back to the 
 wall, her hands behind her. She was very 
 pale ; but she flushed when he spoke, and tried 
 to smile as she turned to her father, and said 
 reassuringly — 
 
 " It really isn't anything, dear." 
 
 * * « * «
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 151 
 
 Sutlierland went home with her and her 
 father, who was quite unstrung. When Green 
 learned the true state of the case, I think he 
 wouki almost have given IMiss Gillespie half 
 his fortune. It seemed to distress him that he 
 could do nothino- but order out the easiest 
 carriage, and fill it with cushions and rugs ; 
 but he had the good sense, at Sutherland's 
 hint, to expedite her departure, and hurry her 
 away from the babble and chatter, and praise. 
 Pah ! it sickens me yet to think of those poor, 
 scarred hands, as it will touch me for ever to 
 remember the dignity and patience of her face. 
 
 Though it was still early, the party was 
 completely broken up. Being the only humble 
 individual who went on foot, I took leave at 
 once ; others, dependent on their carriages, 
 waited in resigned impatience their arrival. 
 
 I was making my way towards the opening in 
 the shrubbery, by which the track led down hill, 
 when a window at the end of the house was 
 softly unlatched, and T heard my name called. 
 Turning back, surprised, I saw a figure at tlie 
 French window, which opened on to a terrace,
 
 152 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 and, the night being serene and clear, easily 
 recognized Miss Sophia. She was wearing a 
 dark morning dress, and her eyes were red- 
 lidded with much crying. 
 
 " Mr. Fowler, you seem kind ; you — you 
 didn't laugh at me to-night for being so stupid, 
 and I thought I might ask you a favour ; will 
 you post this letter for me ? " 
 
 It seemed rather a small request after such 
 a preamble, but why should Miss Sophia, who 
 could surely command her father's entire staff, 
 choose me as her messenger % 
 
 I suppose she saw my hesitation. 
 
 " It's — it's nothing wrong," she stammered. 
 "Indeed, it's the riglit thing to do, though it 
 is difficult. I wrote it since — after poor Nancy 
 saved me, you know." 
 
 Now, I don't love mysteries, and, fatherly as 
 she imagines me, and as I am to Miss Sophia's 
 youth, I would prefer to keep clear of con- 
 fidences. But if this were, as I supposed, an 
 effusive outburst of thanks from one girl friend 
 to another, it would be the height of absurdity 
 to make a fuss.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 153 
 
 " Of course I'll post it," I said clieerfully ; 
 ^' you may depend ou its disappearance in the 
 first pillar-box I come to. And now wouldn't 
 it be safer for you to go in ? You ought not 
 to risk catching cold after the shock you have 
 already had to-night." 
 
 " Yes, I will shut the window. Thank you 
 very much." 
 
 There was a post-office on the outskirts of 
 .Shawbridge, and remembering my promise, I 
 stopped to fulfil it. As I took the letter from 
 my over-coat pocket to shoot it into the slit 
 the gleam of a lamp fell clearly upon a name 
 written in Miss Sophia's round school-girl 
 •hand, " Frank Cunningham, Esq."
 
 CHAPTEK IX. 
 
 DID not, of course, expect to see Miss 
 Gillespie when I called next morning 
 at the Manse ; her father, whom I found 
 wearing a plaid dressing-gown, and seated at 
 a late breakfast in his little study, told me 
 she had passed a restless night, and suffered 
 much pain. 
 
 " It has upset me sadly," he said. His air 
 of suffering was so well sustained as to be 
 quite convincing (but he replaced the cover 
 on the bacon-dish, perhaps to conceal the fact 
 that it was empty). " But I am forgetting. 
 You will let me order some fresh coffee for 
 you "? My housekeeper is one of the few 
 women who can make drinkable coffee." 
 
 " Thanks, but I breakfasted two hours ago."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 155 
 
 " All, you must not imagine I n,m always 
 such a sluggard," he said, with a pensive smile ; 
 "but, naturally, my dear child's condition 
 kept me anxious, and my rest was much 
 broken. I am habitually an early riser. The 
 morning hours, as you, a student, scarce re- 
 quire reminding of, are the golden hours." 
 
 jMy studies were no more profound than his 
 own, and equally little required special rules 
 of life ; but it is difficult to tell a gentleman 
 to his face that he is a humbug. That portion 
 of the table which was not occupied with the 
 breakfast-tray held a few books ; they were 
 the same I had seen on my first visit to this 
 little room, and then, as now, there was the 
 dust of disuse upon their tops. The muffin- 
 dish reposed upon a pile of yellowing manu- 
 script, creased and much fingered at the 
 corners. 
 
 " You are looking at my tools, I see," said 
 the minister, intercepting my wandering- 
 glances. He spoke quite pleasantly, with that 
 big, bland manner that sat so well on him. 
 *' You see me in my huniljle little worksliop."
 
 ^56 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 He lifted the muffin-dish, and placed his hand 
 upon the papers. "A reserve stock," he 
 explained. " When 1 was a younger man 
 I had a zeal for sermon-writing, perhaps to 
 the neglect of equally important duties con- 
 nected with the ministry. Do you believe in 
 the efficacy of preaching ? " 
 
 " That must depend on the preacher and 
 Jiis subject, must it not % " I answered lamely. 
 " There are sermons and sermons." 
 
 " And there are hearers and hearers ! " he 
 .retorted. " To live in a country parish alters 
 many of one's earlier views," he said plain- 
 -tively. " Personal influence — a social gift, 
 goes further than pul^Dit eloquence. One soon 
 learns that it is folly to preach above the 
 heads of one's audience. One has to come 
 down to their level." 
 
 Judging from the specimens I had heard, 
 one would suppose he had not very far to 
 descend ; but, in a civilized society, rude 
 .remarks are forbidden. 
 
 " Yes — yes, it's a mistake to aim too high," 
 he continued. " One's flock likes best that
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 15 r 
 
 you sliall say what they themselves might 
 have thought. It makes them feel clever." 
 
 He smiled at his own shrewdness ; but 
 surely even the most accommodating con- 
 gregation must have grown weary of assent 
 in the years during which that pile of sermons- 
 had done duty ? 
 
 " Now, our dear friend," he indicated, with 
 a backward wave of his hand the Manse across 
 the fields, " has made that mistake — a man 
 of great weight and learning, but with no 
 kind of popularity. Of course, from my posi- 
 tion, it is impossible that I should be one of 
 his hearers ; but I gather from what my 
 daughter tells me, as well as from the evi- 
 dence of my own eyes, that his adherents are 
 fewer than they might be." 
 
 It was not in reason, perhaps, that he should' 
 Avish Dissent to flourish under his very nose ; 
 but need he have worn that look of resigned 
 pity when he spoke of his neighbour's failure ? 
 
 " Perhaps," I said, " Mr. Cunningham liolds 
 that 'the reach should exceed th(; gi'^^sp J ' 
 Some unworldly people do."
 
 158 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " But heaven is not with us yet," he said 
 softly. 
 
 To my mind it was far indeed from the 
 warm little room redolent still with the 
 odours of an excellent meal. There was a 
 ham and fish, as well as the bacon ; the mar- 
 malade had ousted a concordance ; buttered 
 toast usurped the place of the inkstand. It 
 w\as typical of the man who mouthed at old 
 sermons year after year, but was punctual at 
 dinner-parties, and imposing at christenings 
 <and weddings. 
 
 There was very little need for him to tell 
 me that Mr. Cunningham shared none of his 
 cheap social triumphs. The principles for 
 which men marched out from Tanfield Hall, 
 homeless and churchless, had taken no deep 
 hold in Shawbridge. 'Tis an easy-going place, 
 not ambitious of being too good, preferring 
 religion of the silver-slippered order ; and 
 Mr. Cunningham's followers were consequently 
 limited. His was a nature of deep spirituality 
 and great simplicity, l)ut he was a student 
 rather than a man of affairs. Odd stories
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 159 
 
 were told about liim — liow lie hail o-oiie to 
 Edinburgli to get a uew coat, and had spent 
 the day and his money book-stalling in the 
 byways of the town ; how, on a rare occasion, 
 persuaded to dine with a neighbour, he had, 
 instead of smartening his person, put on his 
 nio;ht-2;ear and o-one to bed — lauo-hable Ijut 
 lovable lapses to those who knew the man. 
 
 Failing Miss Gillespie, I had meant to ask 
 her father to walk over with me to the Free 
 Church Manse, but thought better of that 
 decision. I was in no mood for more of his 
 society, finding it less easy than usual to take 
 him humorously. Few grown-up people are 
 amiable in the early morning hours ; the day 
 and one's spirits mellow together. I was rising 
 to take leave when an ejaculation from him 
 checked the intention. 
 
 " Dear, dear ! " lie said, " it is — yes, it is 
 Mrs. Laidlaw ! " He glanced with dismay at 
 his dishabille. " My dear young friend, if 
 you could intercept her, while I make my 
 toilet % Pray meet her at the front door, 
 conduct her to the drawing-room or the dining-
 
 i6o THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 room. Make my excuses ; tell her I hope to 
 be with her in a moment." 
 
 He took me by the shoulders and propelled' 
 nie gently from the room, turning the key in 
 the door and pocketing it. His plaid skirts 
 had barely whisked round the corner of the 
 stair — he went with wonderful agility for so 
 bio; a man — before the bath-chair was drawn 
 up at the threshold, and Mrs. Laidlaw and I 
 were confrontins; each other. 
 
 I delivered the minister's message. 
 
 " And what are you doing here ? " she 
 demanded. 
 
 " Possibly I came on the same errand as 
 yourself." 
 
 " And how do you know my errand ? '" 
 she asked sharply. 
 
 " I don't know it." 
 
 She looked as if she could not quite make 
 up her mind whether I was a fool or merely 
 pretending to be one. 
 
 " Well," she said, " I didn't come to sit at 
 the doorstep and be glowered at by the likes 
 of you."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. i6i 
 
 "Let me help you out." 
 
 "Ay, you may help me out aud lielp me 
 iu too. 3IcAlister," slie turned to the little 
 woman, who had been trotting to keep pace 
 with the chair, and who now came up, panting 
 and breathless, " you can bide out here, 
 where you won't be in the road ; but don't let 
 me catch you sitting in the machine again ! " 
 
 As there was nowhere else for her to sit, 
 unless, like the heroine of the nursery rhyme, 
 upon her thumb, I lifted one of the oak hall 
 chairs on to the gravel path, ]Mrs. Laidlaw 
 viewing this trivial act of courtesy with 
 mighty good-humoured scorn. 
 
 " Xow, you come in here with me," she 
 said, leading the way into the drawing-room 
 like a warder who expects the prisoner to 
 follow, and taking possession of the sofa. It 
 was the first time I had seen her Avalk, and 
 her vio-our was amazino-. '* Shut the door. 
 
 o o 
 
 The minister ? Toots, do ye tliink I don't 
 know him and his ways by this time ? I 
 know fine what a sluQ;-a-bed lie is, the break- 
 fast dishes are no' cleared in the study yet: 
 VOL. r. ]l
 
 i62 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 I saw them tlirouofli tlie window as I came 
 
 by. Let liim take liis time ; lie'll come in as 
 
 pawky as ye like, aaid j^iretend lie's been with 
 
 Nancy. Now, you just tell me what happened 
 
 last night. I'm a plain woman, mind, and 
 
 I like a plain tale." 
 
 Thus conjured I stood before the inquisitor 
 
 and o-ave her a veracious account of the 
 
 accident. 
 
 She listened in silence, then nodded her 
 
 head, dryly. 
 
 " Ay, Nancy's a clever lass." 
 
 " Miss Gillespie's a very brave woman." 
 
 " She didn't burn her hands for nothing," 
 
 she said sarcastically. 
 
 '■'No, she did it to save Miss Green." 
 
 " Pooh ! and how much do you understand 
 
 of a woman's motives % " 
 
 " Are they so different from a man's ? " 
 She seemed to think her questions ought tO' 
 
 carry as much weight as a statement, for she 
 
 condescended to no reply. 
 
 "So she got the doctor to gallivant] her 
 
 home last night ? "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 163 
 
 " I never said so," I cried weakly. 
 
 She bruslied aside the evasion with a fat 
 hand. 
 
 " He went of his own accord, if it pleases 
 ye any better," she said grimly; " and he came 
 again of his own accord to dress her hands 
 this morning, and ijoii come of your own 
 accord at eleven o'clock to ask for her ! " 
 
 " Perfectly correct. And Mrs. Laidlaw 
 comes of her own good will at 11.30 on the 
 same kind mission." 
 
 She looked a trifle disconcerted ; perhaps 
 she was not accustomed to have her deeds 
 judged so charitably ; but she rallied im- 
 mediately. 
 
 *' Never you mind what I came for," she 
 said. " I never looked to meet you here, that's 
 certain ; but, since you are here, there's a point 
 or two on which you can satisfy me." 
 
 " I have told you everything that passed. 
 The incident was very simple." 
 
 "And the consequences are like to be very 
 simple too," she mimicked me. 
 
 " I trust so. The burns are superficial.
 
 £•64 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Dr. Sutlieiiaud liopes Miss Gillespie's hands 
 will soon heal." 
 
 " And then ? " she queried. 
 
 "And then — we shall all rejoice." 
 
 She extinguished my light-mindedness with 
 ■a snort of contempt. 
 
 " A woman can only marry one man at a 
 time — mostly she finds one enough. Which 
 ^f ye is it to be — you or the doctor % " 
 
 " Is it decreed that one must marry ? " I 
 asked. " This is rather alarming. May not 
 -a harmless bachelor, a stranger and an orphan, 
 exist in Shawbridge ? Has anybody fallen in 
 love with me ? It is very kind of you to 
 warn me, for, you see, I'm not a ladies' man : 
 I've no social graces or parlour tricks. I'm 
 sure I shouldn't prove at all domestic. I'm 
 not even a ratepayer." 
 
 She read my face keenly ; I flatter myself 
 she saw nothing there I wished to con- 
 ceal. 
 
 "Then it's the doctor," she said. "I 
 thouoiit as much." 
 
 " Dr. Sutherland has reposed no confidence
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 165 
 
 in mc," I replied ; " and the few young ladies 
 I have met in Shawbridge have been equally 
 reticent. I am not quite so young as I look, 
 Mrs. Laidlaw, and I have found it a good rule 
 in life to burden myself with as few aftairs of 
 my own as possible, and with none at all of 
 other people's." 
 
 *' Pooh ! you may try to throw dust in mj 
 eyes, but they can see as far as most people's," 
 she retorted. " And let me tell you, Mr- 
 Companion, when a woman makes up her 
 mind to marry to her own advantage, it's not 
 your convenience or mine, or your wishes or 
 mine, that will stop her." 
 
 "I am quite sure," I answered, ''that if 
 you made up your mind to ask my hand 
 in marriaofe, I should be obljoed to consent ; 
 so, please don't. It wouldn't be to youv 
 advantao-e." 
 
 She lauohed, and I was restored to her 
 good graces. 
 
 ** Maybe it would be to yours, though," 
 she retorted. "Ye might d(j worse, my fiiicv 
 3-uuug man, though I sa)' it."
 
 1 66 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Well, possibly. There is alwcays a con- 
 ceivably lower deep than any one has pic- 
 tured, even when in the clutch of a nightmare. 
 I think she was explaining to me how rich 
 she was, and how little of her wealth she 
 managed to spend, when the door opened, 
 and the minister entered. He was beautifully 
 shaved, and most correctly dressed, and his 
 very handshake was a benediction. Delightful 
 minister ! How glad I w^as to present him 
 with my gridiron and make my escape. 
 
 Miss McAlister remained in possession of 
 the gravel path and of the hall chair — a small 
 monument of patience, with expectant mouth 
 and folded hands ; Andra', the chairman, 
 greatly daring, was smoking at a little 
 distance, a ragged glengary cocked over one 
 eye ; the other bent on the door. She jumped 
 up when she saw me. 
 
 "Is it true that Miss Gillespie is ill ? " she 
 whispered. She listened agitatedly while I 
 explained. 
 
 " Then, it wouldn't be good for her to see 
 any one," she said, " She shouldn't be dis-
 
 THE MISCHJEF-MAKER. 167 
 
 tiirbed. Couldn't you prevent any one from 
 going upstairs ? " 
 
 Rut I had no relisli for more of that kind 
 of business ; and, even as I shook my head, 
 her face fell. 
 
 "It is too late," she said, shrinking back. 
 
 It was too late. The minister was even 
 then piloting Mrs. Laidlaw upstairs. It had 
 taken exactly two minutes to mould him to 
 her will. 
 
 The present chronicler could not, of course, 
 follow them there ; but many things in this 
 little story were made known to him at a 
 later time. 
 
 " My dear," said the minister, when he had 
 received permission to enter his daughter's 
 room, " I have brought you a visitor to cheer 
 you in your solitude ; and, since I know it is 
 not good fur }'0u to see too many people at 
 once, I will place this chair near you for our 
 good friend, and leave you to have your chat." 
 
 Nancy was seated by tJie open window, 
 which afforded a })leasant prospect of the 
 garden and orchard and the fields Ijcyond.
 
 i68 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 She turned ii pair of grave, surprised eyes 
 upon the visitor, who came in large, confident 
 and smilino'. There is a bindino- hiw which 
 forbids you to be discourteous even to an 
 enemy if he seeks your hospitality. Nancy 
 wondered if Mrs. Laidlaw would prefer the 
 window shut ? 
 
 Mrs. Laidlaw professed that she liked the 
 air. 
 
 *'And what's this you've been doing to 
 yourself % " she asked. 
 
 " I suppose papa has told you ? " 
 
 "Ay, and more than papa. It's no' often 
 a. body gets the chance to play the heroine 
 in Shawbridge, You're in everybody's mouth, 
 my dear, and I just thought I would get 
 Andrew to hurl me up here once errand to 
 hear ye're own version of the story." 
 
 " There is no story to tell," said the girl, 
 a little proudly ; " the fire was out in a 
 moment ; there never was any danger." 
 
 " Eh, but we'll not spoil a pretty tale by 
 being overly modest," said the old lady, 
 noddino; her head with mysterious intent ;
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 169. 
 
 " folks are saying ye risked, your own life 
 to save tliat silly quean's, Sophia Green ~ 
 ye may as well take the credit when it comes 
 your wa}-. An' 'deed ye've been clever enough 
 to bandage your hands, I see ; so long as ye 
 keep the clouts on, nobody '11 be any the- 
 wiser." 
 
 Nancy stared in amazement. Then she^ 
 laughed — a genuine peal of amusement. 
 
 "I suppose you think I'm shamming," 
 she said: "trying to secure a. little cheap- 
 notoriety." 
 
 " Well, and I wouldn't be the one to blame 
 ye — even if you hadn't a better reason." 
 
 '• AVhat reason ? " Xancy asked haughtily. 
 
 " My dear," said JMrs. Laidlaw, with a fine 
 assumption of sympathy, " I'm an old woman ,_ 
 and r\e seen the world '' — when people use 
 that phrase they usually mean the bad side 
 of tlic world — "and I know that a lass, when 
 .she has no tocher to look to, must do the 
 best she can for herself. Your father's no 
 very wise, Xancy ; l)ut you're clever enough 
 to Ijc your own iaUier and muther both, and
 
 lyo THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 no' miss a sfood down-settino- wlien it comes 
 ill your road." 
 
 " AVliat do yon mean ? " asked Nancy, 
 wliite-lipped, and with angry, steady eyes. 
 
 " Hoot, toot, there's no need to put on airs 
 with me, my woman, or to flyt at me ; I tell 
 ye, I think it's small blame to ye to catch a 
 braw lad when ye have the chance. It's 
 little enough the minister will leave ' you, 
 and you're no' the woman to work when 
 ye can get others to work for ye, Nancy 
 Gillespie. Is't true that the young doctor 
 has given up attending on old Richard 
 Cunningham ? " 
 
 " And if it is ? " said Nancy, defiantly. 
 
 "And if it is," she repeated, "why shouldn't 
 ye foregather with him here ? Ye can play 
 the patient if ye cannot any longer play the 
 nurse, and maybe it Avill serve your turn 
 better. There's many a chance lost in this 
 world for want of a little boldness ; but you've 
 an auld head on your young shoulders, and 
 need no teaching of mine. Shawbridge folk 
 believe in your burns, my dear, and they'll
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 171 
 
 get no enlightenment from me. Just keep 
 tlie bandages on, and you'll take tliem in, 
 fine ; they're mostly fools." 
 
 Under an attack so bold, so brutal, Nancy 
 found her righteous wrath wither into con- 
 tempt. To be angry with such an adversary 
 ■would be a debasing condescension, derogatory 
 to dignity. 
 
 "I suppose," she said, after a silence, ''it 
 would be useless to tell you that you are 
 mistaken." 
 
 " 'Deed, an' I think it would," rejoined Mrs. 
 Laidlaw, \\\\X\ an awful good humour ; " unless 
 ye've fixed your mind on the other one." 
 
 " The other one," the girl murmured, as if 
 the words were forced from her. She steadily 
 averted her gaze from the window, where one 
 could trace the brown track that led to the 
 Free Church Manse ; for a moment it seemed 
 as if her secret were to be brutally dragged 
 from her, and trampled under this scorner's 
 feet. 
 
 " Ay, the other one," Mrs. Laidlaw repeated; 
 "" but I give ye credit for a bonnier taste,
 
 172 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Nancy, tlian to take up with yon aiild maid of 
 a companion I left down tlie stair. The 
 doctor's the better man and the better match." 
 
 Nancy breathed again. 
 
 " Does it give you hajDpiness to think such 
 things ? " she said, looking strangely at the 
 horrible, wicked old woman who looked back 
 at her with unwinking boldness. "Were you. 
 ever a girl that you could l^elieve another girl 
 would stoop to so base a calculation ? But, 
 whatever you may choose to think of me — h 
 care very little for 3'our good opinion — I 
 forbid you in future to connect my name witlii 
 that of either of the gentlemen you have 
 mentioned. They are my friends, and they 
 shall not suffer if I can prevent it — I forbidi 
 you — do you hear I Yes, I am young, and 
 you are old; but you like to hurt and injuro 
 people, and so I have a right to say you shall, 
 not" 
 
 " Upon my word ! You're no' blate, Nancy 
 Gillespie." 
 
 "No," the girl assented firmly, "I am no'' 
 blate, where my friends are concerned."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 173 
 
 Mrs. Laidlaw laiiglied. She liad accom- 
 plished the mischief she desired to work, and 
 what cared she for a oirl's ano'cr ? 
 
 " If ye had a little more sense, ye would 
 see that I was your best friend," she said ; 
 '' but ye need fear neither meddling nor 
 inelling from me. Play your own game, my 
 dear, in your own way, and I'll be the first 
 to clap my hands if ye succeed. Success pays, 
 as I've a right to know. 'Deed, if ye think 
 better of it and will condescend to accept an 
 old woman's help, ye shall have it and 
 welcome. Come to my work - party on 
 Thm'sday, and I'll see that ye have an escort 
 liome again. With opportunity, a clever 
 woman can do what she wills." 
 
 Mrs. Laidlaw had organized a society for 
 clothing the poor with flannel jwtticoats ; like 
 some other charitable people, she was content 
 to do her good deeds by proxy ; she linked 
 the affluent and the indigent, herself con- 
 tributinrr nothino; save the use of her room 
 and|t]ie benefit of her c(miments, Nancy liad 
 persistently refused to countenance garments
 
 174 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 made under such auspices ; slie had no new 
 answer now. 
 
 "Well?" said Mrs. Laidlaw, interroga- 
 tively. 
 
 Nancy looked down at her white bandages. 
 
 "Eh, but I clean forgot your injured 
 hands ! " the old woman laughed. " They 
 won't be better ? " 
 
 "They won't be better/' said Nancy,, 
 steadily. 
 
 " And if they were, ye wouldn't come ? " 
 
 " I wouldn't come." 
 
 " Then I must e'en leave ye to your own 
 devices. I'll be going my ways, now, or 
 Andra' i\IcPherson will be charging me an 
 extra sixpence for keeping him waiting, the 
 unconscionable creature ! Good-bye, my 
 dear ; take care of your hands,'' she chuckled 
 maliciously. " And I wish ye good luck with 
 the doctor. I'll be hearing of ye from him 
 since you're too ill to come out yet." 
 
 All the way home she was in a mood of 
 exuberant good nature, laughing once or twice 
 so unaccountably as to make Miss McAlister
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 175 
 
 jump, and laugliing agaiu at the cfifect of her 
 unholy mirth. 
 
 " I've put a spoke in Nancy Gillespie's 
 wheel," she whispered to herself, " She 
 thought she could defy me and treat me like 
 dirt — set her up ! She was a fool to go conter 
 to me if she wanted to marry the doctor ! " 
 
 " I am sorry," Dr. Gillespie was saying, as 
 he stood in his daughter's room — he looked 
 out of the window rather than in her face — 
 " that you cannot get on with her. / find no 
 difficulty ; she requires a little humouring — a 
 little tact. A valuable quality in a minister's 
 daughter. But I'm afraid you have no tact, 
 Nancy." 
 
 " I'm afraid not." 
 
 "You mio^ht consider me," he went on 
 peevishly — " my position here. She is the 
 richest heritor, and you know how difficult it 
 is to o;et her to consent to even tlic most 
 necessary outlay. Besides, if she were thwarted, 
 she might be a — rather — dangerous person." 
 
 '' Only if one liad a bad cause," said Nancy, 
 looking up at her father wistfull}'.
 
 176 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " If you had chosen," he went on, with the 
 persistence of the weak, ignoring her remark, 
 " you might liave been on good terms with 
 her ; a young woman should not find it so 
 •very difficult to defer a little to an old one, 
 even if she is not very — even if there are 
 some little things one would prefer altered in 
 Jier." 
 
 Nanc}", looking out of the window, smiled 
 faintly. 
 
 " And now I am afraid you have incurred 
 her enmity." 
 
 " Yes," she assented, " I suppose we are 
 -enemies ; but the situation might have been 
 worse." 
 
 " How so % " 
 
 " We mio-ht have been friends."
 
 CHAPTEK X. 
 
 mm 
 
 leave Mrs. Laidlaw's society for that of" 
 tlie blind minister was like passing 
 from tlie bnffetings of the Bay of Biscay tt> 
 the tideless shores of the Mediterranean'. 
 Tideless shores ; for he had left the bustle of 
 life behind him. Whatever of anxiety, of 
 sharp struggle he may have known had but 
 heightened the triumph of conquered peace. 
 
 As I went by the high road I met an anxious- 
 faced young cleric hurrying along with a shiny 
 black bao" in one hand, and knew that he hac^ 
 come from the Manse. One such presented 
 himself Sunday by Sunday, courting the- 
 suffraf^es of the cono^reo^ation, and in the- 
 Manse pew, a shepherd's plaid over his knees,, 
 sat as listener the man who for forty years had 
 
 VOL. I. 1'-'
 
 178 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 ministered to liis flock, and would teach them 
 no more. And, of all men in the kirk, the 
 least critical he, who knew the most. 
 
 " Is he sound in the essentials ? " " Is he 
 safe on Moses ? " ThrouQ-h this ordeal had 
 each candidate for the vacancy to pass ; but 
 whatever he suffered at the hands of the 
 people from their pastor he had nothing to 
 fear. 
 
 But it was merely a question of an assis- 
 tant. The elders refused to accept Mr. 
 Cunningham's resignation ; when he was 
 stronger he would preach again. Nor would 
 they permit him to vacate the Manse. Per- 
 haps the hope buoyed him up too, for he was 
 always calmly cheerful. It was easy to know 
 him, and easier still to love him. He received 
 me with a great deal of kindness, and made 
 far more of my trifling services than they were 
 worth. He was infinitely patient with my 
 blunders and slowness in findiuq; the references 
 he needed. We began by going over and 
 making a fair copy of that portion of his 
 work which was so far completed, and often
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 179 
 
 •^'lieii I paused to puzzle out a phrase — for he 
 wrote ill the minutest of schohirly hands — he 
 would eagerly supply the passage from memory. 
 My task was mainly (derical, for with, the 
 •original text I could help him Ijut little. On 
 fine mornino'S we worked in the o-arden. An 
 old woman, thirty years in his service, would 
 lead him out to the bench under a thorn, which 
 had been crimson a month earlier with double 
 blossom, and would settle him there with a 
 kindly l)ut peremptory touch or two. "Woe 
 betide him if he let sli]) the plaid across his 
 knees, or neglected the tumbler of milk placed 
 ■on the little table at his elbow. His lean form, 
 and pale, delicate, spectacled face — he wore his 
 glasses out of old habit — became a part of that 
 summer world for me. He knew every flower 
 that blossomed within a wide radius of his seat, 
 and before we beg-an our task he would ask 
 whether this or that were yet in bloom. Often 
 when he could not distinguish a specimen by 
 the smell he would recognize it by tlie touch. 
 He smiled at my blundering descriptions. 
 Never was such an imioramus as 1.
 
 i8o THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " I am the No Eyes of the moral tale," said 
 I. "I suppose it comes of drifting about 
 from city to city, with never a little corner of 
 one's own to cultivate." 
 
 "You must get Nancy to teach you. She 
 knows every flower by its everyday name ; 
 I could never ojet her to be the least interested 
 in ficardeners' Latin." 
 
 " I think I understand that from a woman's 
 point of view. You drop a friend's title wheii 
 you get familiar. It's too ceremonious ; it sets 
 up a barrier." 
 
 " Y^es ; and she is all womanly. She is r« 
 dear daughter to me. She and my son were 
 playmates." 
 
 It was the first time he had spoken of his 
 son by adoption ; but our acquaintanceship 
 was scarce a week old, and why should he con- 
 fide in me ? Nevertheless, I had often enough 
 thought of the mysterious Frank Cunningham 
 since I posted that letter Sophia Green en- 
 trusted to me. Why should she write to him, 
 and why should Miss Gillespie look anxious 
 when she spoke of him ? One morning I
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. i8r 
 
 orrivcd early, before the minister had been 
 lielped downstairs. I was arranging some 
 papers on the writing-table of the study when 
 the old servant came to me. 
 
 " He's no' sae weel the day," she said ; " but 
 he'll be down the now." 
 
 " Perhaps in that case I had better leave ?" 
 
 " Na, na, bide whaur ye are. It's a ploy till 
 him, the w^ritino;, an' tak's his mind aff liimsel'. 
 He's fair wrapped up in thae weary books, an' 
 blithe as he is to hear the birds at their 
 morning lilt, the scart o' the pen's a dearer 
 sound." 
 
 " I'll see that he isn't over-tired ; I can be 
 tired myself, you know." 
 
 " Ay, dae that. It's weel ye've a puckle 
 sense ; but it's'no' you that should be at this 
 M-ark." A shadow fell across her face, and 
 seemed to harden it. 
 
 " Ym only here till somebody better turns 
 
 up. 
 
 " I [(i that should fill the bairn's place'U no 
 <:ast up till it pleases liim," she said, with 
 bitterness. " Train up a chikl, an' awa' he
 
 1 82 THE MlSCHIEF-iMAKER. 
 
 gangs. Ay, I ken fine it's no' in tlie Bible,, 
 but it's the reading many a broken liert pits 
 intil the auld proverb," 
 
 What was- there to say ? She went before 
 I couki frame a commonplace to meet the 
 case. It was that same day he spoke of his- 
 son. He was soon tired, and we did not work 
 long. 
 
 " I have made a beginning," he said. " If 
 it is not given to me to finisli, some one else 
 may ; if not, it will be because it is best. I 
 had hoped that my son — but the old should 
 not impose their tasks on the young ; besides, 
 he has his own life-work." 
 
 " He is a journalist, I think ? " 
 
 " Yes ; a fine career — next to the ministry 
 the finest, I think. Rightly directed, the press 
 may be as potent an influence for good as the 
 pulpit — it reaches further," he said a little 
 
 sadly. 
 
 It was clear that, in his innocence, he knew 
 nothing of the methods of modern journalism, 
 and it w^as not for me to enlighten him. He 
 thought of the highway — the royal road of
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 183 
 
 literature, sunned and canopied by Leaven ; 
 I of the slums and by-waj's, the crooked 
 alleys, the back doors. But better his belief 
 than my knowledge. 
 
 " He lives in London ? " 
 
 " Yes ; his work takes him here and there, 
 but London is his centre. London draws all 
 the young and eager to it ; perhaps in earlier 
 days I might have felt its fascination too. 
 1 spent a "week there once, in a street off the 
 Strand." 
 
 " A lively enough spot, or near, at least, to 
 the bustle." 
 
 ^' Yes : but you have heard of the loneliness 
 of a crowed ? I knew no one, and was glad 
 to come back to my quiet haunts." 
 
 " The quiet places are good to come back to. 
 Your son must find it a rest to come home." 
 
 He leaned forward and suppressed a sigh. 
 
 "It is only the old who appreciate rest," 
 he said, with studied cheerfulness — "a chair 
 in the sun, and a book, and we are happy ; 
 but when the blood is young, one wants a 
 more stirrini:^ life. You are kind to an old
 
 r.84 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 man in sparing time and taking trouble — you 
 say that you like it, and that makes your 
 iiielp kinder still ; but while you bend to me 
 I cannot hope to be in any way your com- 
 panion. I should be a damper on your 
 ])leasures ; you read other books and think 
 •other thoughts, and how would the world 
 grow if it were not so % A young lad should 
 not be tied to the home apron-string ; we are 
 unwise when we fail to remember our own 
 young desires for freedom. No, no, when I 
 let Frank go, it was without repentance. I 
 pray that I may not be selfish enough to call 
 him away from his own work to help my 
 little schemes — the world can get on very 
 well without them. And Shawbridge would 
 «eem dull, very dull indeed, after London." 
 
 It was difficult to listen to this special 
 pleading without prejudging and condemning 
 the imknown son, who could desert such a 
 father in his extremity. 
 
 " Come," he said, rising, as if he took my 
 <issent for granted. " I will show you his 
 picture."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 1S5 
 
 He walked erect with very little aid from 
 me, seeming to know every step of the way 
 into the house, and into that room where I 
 •had seen him lie upon his sick-bed. It was 
 -restored now to its special use as a sitting- 
 room, dininn- and drawing-room in one, of 
 ■this humble little establishment. Everything 
 in it bespoke bachelor occu23ation ; it did not 
 .attempt to be tasteful, scarcely even comfort- 
 4ible ; 'twas plain to see no Avoman had ever 
 presided here. 
 
 He paused before the mantelpiece and 
 pointed upwards to a portrait that hung 
 •there as if it were visible to himself. The 
 picture — a sketch in chalks — was that of a 
 young man, some two or three and twenty 
 at most, olive-complexioned, dark-haired, dark- 
 .*3yed, with a curious sensitive, emotional look. 
 
 " Tell me what you think of it," lie said, 
 his tone implied that 1 could not l)ut praise it. 
 
 " It is a clever face." 
 
 "Yes, he has good abilities; he will make 
 .his mark. An artist friend, with whom he 
 .lived for a time, drew it, and my boy sent it
 
 i86 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 home to me. I am no judge of such things ;. 
 but it seems to me well executed." 
 
 " It strikes me as a faithful likeness." 
 Indeed, there was a subtle something about 
 the rough, unfinished sketch that l^reathed 
 character. 
 
 '^ Some one is coming," he said, turning his 
 sightless eyes towards the window. 
 
 His ear had been quicker than mine, but 
 presently I, too, heard the fall of steps, and 
 in a moment more saw Sutherland coming- 
 down the garden path with Miss Gillespie at 
 his side. She looked grave and rather pale,, 
 and her hands were still bandaged ; but she 
 carried lierself with the old ease. I watched 
 the minister's face and saw it irradiate. 
 
 " Nancy ! " he said. 
 
 She ran in by the glass door, which stood 
 wide open, and resting her two arms on his 
 shoulders, kissed him. 
 
 " Your bad penny back again ! " she said 
 gaily. 
 
 "And none the worse?" His tone was 
 caressing ; one understood that this man had
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 1S7 
 
 made a mistake in uot qualifying as husband 
 and father. 
 
 " Not a pin the worse ! " she answered 
 blithely. " I have brought your doctor to 
 give me an equally good account of you." 
 
 Me she had not yet seen, but now dis- 
 covered. She came forward with outstretched 
 hand, while the old man turned courteously 
 to Sutherland. 
 
 " I am glad to see you here," she said. 
 "I hoped you would be. I used to watch 
 from my window to see if you would pass 
 down by the field-path ; but I never saw 
 you. 
 
 "No. I come by the high road, like the 
 candidates with their shiny black bags — only 
 I find my sermon — and a good one — waiting 
 for me here." 
 
 She lauQ;hed. 
 
 " Has the favoured one appeared yet, do 
 you know ? I am behind the times, you 
 
 see." 
 
 " So far as I can understand, the last one 
 was considered unsound on Genesis ; the one
 
 1 88 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 before, I Ijelieve, gave himself airs ; lie wore 
 tlie wrong kind of collar, or perhaps it was 
 the shape of his boots that displeased." 
 
 "Yes," she nodded, "there's always some- 
 thing. They've been used to think their 
 minister perfection, you see ; that makes it 
 hard for anybody to succeed him. How is 
 the work gettino; on % " 
 
 " I'm afraid I must confess to lieing a very 
 indifferent secretary." 
 
 " He will never discover it. He will think 
 ■only of your kindness." 
 
 "That's the worst «jf it. His gratitude 
 knocks the bottom out of one's conceit." 
 
 " Do you think it's good to be conceited ? " 
 
 " It's an indispensable condition of happiness, 
 at least." 
 
 " I don't know," she smiled. " I think that 
 sounds rather immoral. Do you think you 
 -always speak the truth ? " 
 
 " Who does % The sooner one learns to pre- 
 varicate comfortably the better one gets on in 
 the world. Even in Sliawbridge the art of 
 -disguising your mind comes in hand}^"
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 1S9 
 
 She looked at me in a (|uick questioning 
 way, a little proudly too. 
 
 " If one lias nothino' to conceal ? " slie said. 
 
 "Even in that possible case some people- 
 require snubbing." 
 
 It was a clumsy way, no doubt, but at the 
 moment I could think of no better to show her 
 that she had nothing to fear from me. For I 
 had seen Mrs. Laidlaw go upstairs to Nancy iia 
 her seclusion, and had I not unhappy expe- 
 rience of that inquisitor's methods ? 
 
 She averted her glance for a minute, and her 
 head was still turned away when she said 
 lightlv— 
 
 " One would think you had some crime on 
 your conscience," 
 
 "So I have — heaps. But you're only a 
 sinner when you're found out. I don't mean, 
 to be found out." 
 
 She seemed to gather that I was talking 
 merely from the lips to set her at ease, for she 
 made no reply, and in tlic pause between us 
 the minister was clearly heard, saying — 
 
 " I brought your friend here to show him '' —
 
 I90 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 like all bliud people, lie spoke as if lie still saw 
 — " tlie portrait of my sod." 
 
 Sutlieiiand looked up quickly to tlie mobile 
 face above the mantelpiece. He bad schooled 
 liis owu face to express notliiug. Suddenly lie 
 turned to Nancy — 
 
 ''Is it a good likeness ? " lie asked. 
 
 She too looked at the picture — a long steady 
 look. Her colour came and went; for a moment 
 I think she forgot us. We watched her, we 
 two ; only the minister waited, with a smile. 
 
 " It — it is not good enough," she said at last. 
 
 The minister's smile broadened. 
 
 " Nancy and I think nothing and nobody 
 good enough for the boy," he said. " We are 
 a pair of foolish people." 
 
 *' Nothing and nobody," she repeated, with 
 a new light on her face. She went up to the 
 old man and put a hand through his arm. 
 The action seemed to say, " We are enough for 
 eacli other ; we v/ant nobody else." 
 
 Sutherland's face kept its set look. He took 
 his leave abruptly, pleading hurry, and, my 
 own day's task at an end, I went with him.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 191 
 
 AYe scarcely exclianged a word on our way 
 Lome — perhaps lie was interpreting the little 
 scene in the way she meant him to read it — ■ 
 for who could doubt the intention of her 
 words ? If these failed to convince, her face 
 carried its message plain to see. Only one 
 emotion lio-hts a face as hers was lit. To me 
 it was all plain enough ; as the one who had 
 never had any chance, perhaps it was easier for 
 me to understand. Nancy was a good woman. 
 There are women — good enough in their way 
 — meaning no harm, who count it no Ijreacli 
 •of honour to let a man offer them his all, even 
 while they mean to reject the gift ; takers of 
 scalps these, who find a certain pride in their 
 trophies, labelling them like the curiosities in 
 a museum, " See the result of my raids ! " 
 Nancy was not of this order ; she had guessed 
 at Sutherland's secret — perhaps he had let some 
 word fall in the many times they had met, or 
 a look had betrayed him : women have an 
 unerring intuition in such matters. Or it may 
 have been that the cowardly (jld woman who 
 had not dared to attack Sutherland, had
 
 192 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 ruthlessly drawn the veil from the girl's eyes. 
 She saw whither he was drifting, and put out 
 a hand to save him a confession. Only a very 
 single-minded woman, sincere and pure, caib 
 do this, forgetting self and the petty vanity of 
 being possibly misunderstood. She wounded 
 her own pride to save his — she bared her heart 
 that he mioht read its fluttering: secret and 
 spare his own a pang. 
 
 He said nothing — being, indeed, very busy 
 all the afternoon — till we were smoking together 
 at night. Then he asked me abruptly — 
 
 " Do you ever hear from Davidson now ? " 
 
 " When he has some new triumph to relate. 
 He spares me his failures." 
 
 " Write to him and ask him what he knows 
 of this young Cunningliam." 
 
 * ' Do you want to know more of him ? It 
 seems to me his face tells one enouQ-h." 
 
 *' There may come a time when we shall 
 have to know more," he said bluntly. " I sup- 
 pose Davidson isn't an absolute fool ? He can 
 be trusted to tell you what you want to know." 
 
 " In all matters literary he thinks himself
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 193 
 
 infiillible. Perhaps lie is — as nearly as they 
 make them. He has completely mastered the 
 art of beino' interviewed ao-ainst his will. His 
 own face grins at him from his own title-page ; 
 he knows to a fraction the value of the social 
 paragraph — as a journalist lie makes author- 
 ship a complete success." 
 
 " Then he's sure to know another of his 
 kind." 
 
 " Why necessarily of his kind ? We had a 
 strong testimonial in young Cunningham's 
 favour." 
 
 " Good people often believe in bad ones — to 
 their ultimate sorrow. It's borne in upon 
 me that I shall have dealings with that young 
 jackanapes yet." 
 
 The same term of contempt that Dr. Gilles- 
 pie had employed. 
 
 " You think it's quite fair ? " 
 
 " My motive is good. [ shan't move in this; 
 matter unless there's clear reason." 
 
 I wrote that night to Davidson — a. diplomatic 
 letter, trustino; to his cleverness to read between 
 the lines. 
 
 VOL. I. 13
 
 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 HEN I went, as in duty bound, to call 
 at Grove End — Sutherland is excused 
 such social functions — Miss Sophia Green 
 was not visible. As I was ushered by the 
 butler into an ante-room, the sound of a 
 piano in the adjoining drawing-room sud- 
 denly ceased, and light, flying steps seemed 
 to hint at retreat. Mrs. Whittlemore, who 
 was still paying her brother one of those 
 domiciliary visits of inspection she undertook 
 at intervals, kept me a long time waiting, 
 perhaps to convince me of my social insig- 
 nificance — possibly to make a toilet. In 
 daylight she was almost as dazzling as by 
 night ; the effect seemed to be achieved by 
 a lavish expenditure of cut beads ; her
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 195 
 
 eyes and lier liancls were restless — two signs 
 that black silk and jet were not lier birth- 
 right. She received me with very modified 
 QTaciousness. 
 
 " The vonnsf ladies," she said, when I asked 
 for them — the phrase was her own — " were 
 busy." She didn't approve of young girls, or, 
 for the matter of that, of young men either, 
 being idle. 
 
 I insinuated that idleness was only per 
 TQissible in venerable persons like myself. 
 
 " I am sure you never liave an unoccupied 
 moment." The compliment was a large one; 
 but she assimilated it gracefully. 
 
 " I try to act as a good example," she said, 
 modestly ; " and indeed, without boasting, 
 I'm a great deal more active than any of 
 my nieces. My l)rother's orphan children 
 are a weight on my mind, Mr. Fowler ; you'd 
 never believe the worry they are to me ; not 
 that their mother could have done much for 
 them ; slie was one of the thouless kind that 
 would take three In^eaths to 1)I<)W out a 
 -candle ; Init it's a thankless task to look
 
 196 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 after other folks' 1)airns. If they go wrong, 
 you're to blame, and if they do well, vou 
 get uo credit. There's Sophia — yon were 
 introduced to Sophia, I tliiuk ? " 
 
 She made it rather clumsily — this attempt 
 at a fine lady's indifferent memory. 
 
 " I had that pleasure." 
 
 " To be sure," she said. " I remember 
 now. You took her in to dinner. Well, 
 what opinion did you form of her ? ' ' 
 
 " What does one ever think of a youno^ mA 
 except that she is charming ? " 
 
 She smiled a little disdainfully. 
 
 " I don't find her charming ; perhaps it 
 isn't to be exjDected ; she's like her mother — 
 a soft l)it of a thing, with a will you can't 
 bend. But she'll have to please her father, 
 or it will be the worse for her. How's the 
 doctor ? " 
 
 This al^rupt transition left me with nothing 
 to say but that he was well. 
 
 She accepted this satisfactory intelligence 
 without pleasure. I had somehow the im- 
 pression that more had been expected of me.
 
 THE -.MISCHIEF-MAKER, 197 
 
 "He lias, unfortunately, no time to make 
 afternoon calls." 
 
 " Then we must persuade him to come 
 often to dinner," she said, with renewed 
 good-humour. '" A busy man ought to take 
 his enjoyment when he can. It stands to 
 sense he can't always be at work. He's doing 
 very well in his practice % " 
 
 It was ;t question rather than an a^:ser- 
 tion. 
 
 " He's very much interested in liis 
 profession." 
 
 " So 1 hear. He's been very kind to that 
 old minister — let me see, Cunningham, isn't 
 it ? — about whom Nancy Gillespie makes such 
 a fuss. A good girl, that, but a little vaia 
 — eh ? She is a o-ood deal admired." 
 
 " 1 can well believe it." 
 
 " She makes men admire her." 
 
 ''Not a difficult task." 
 
 "You think so?" She laughed dryly. 
 ^' It's a pity she can only reward one for 
 all the devotion she gets, isn't it '. And that 
 the one you would least expect Ix-r to take,
 
 iqS the MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 you may depend on it ; but women are fools 
 when they many " 
 
 " The wrono' man." 
 
 "Exactly — the wrong man," she assented. 
 *' It's the duty of older people to see that 
 they choose the right one, in spite of 
 inoTatitude." 
 
 What was it she w^anted to make plain to 
 my obtuse masculine perception ? That I had 
 better aim less loftily than at the rich man's 
 daughter when on a wooing bent ! Thanks, 
 madam, but matrimony has few charms for 
 me, and little ]\Iiss Sophia is safe from my 
 machinations. Why can't women be honest ? 
 AVhy must they needs complicate the affair^. 
 of life with their finesse ? 
 
 Presently, however, it became evident by 
 the persistence with which she returned tO' 
 Sutherland, that me she had not in her 
 thoughts at all. She appeared to have 
 been makino- successful investiojatioDS into 
 his pedigree ; Ijut I disappointed her by 
 being unable to give her any information 
 about Lord Harrow.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 '99 
 
 " I believe lie's some sort of relative — a 
 Scotch cousin, perhaps ; but, to my knowledge, 
 they have not met for twenty years." 
 
 " It isn't the Scotch way to ignore one's 
 own kith and kin — lords or no lords," she 
 said severely. 
 
 " I will point out to Sutherland that he 
 has neglected his duty. Scotch cousins — 
 especially when they are lords — are to be 
 assiduously cultivated." 
 
 She laughed. 
 
 " I could set him right on a good many 
 points if I had the chance," she said, 
 with entire frankness. " A man is blind 
 to his own advantao-e without a woman 
 to open his eyes for him. Oh yes, I know 
 what you're thinking ; but what's the use of 
 being well connected, if it isn't to serve you 
 in some way or other ? If you've money, 
 it's different. Money," she remarked to this 
 penniless person, " opens all doors ; but if 
 you've none, why shouldn't your belongings 
 give you what support they can ? " 
 
 A liuiiil)lc iiivitatluii shall l>e de.'-i|ialclicd 
 
 t3
 
 200 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 to Lord Harrow tliis very night, if persuasion 
 on my part will avail/' 
 
 " It pleases you to be sarcastic," slie said, 
 looking at me with condescending indulgence ; 
 '"but there's sound common sense on my side. 
 He must marry — a doctor hasn't a chance 
 unless he's married." 
 
 " So several people have been kind enough 
 to inform him." 
 
 "Oh," she said sharply, "I dare say he'll 
 find plenty to tell him that, and to be ready 
 with their advice too ; luit it isn't every girl 
 .•I doctor without private means can afford to 
 take as a wife. He wants one wdth some 
 money to set him up comfortably, and if he 
 can give her a certain position in exchange, 
 things will be all the easier arranged." 
 
 " Sentiment is to have no place, then ? " 
 This large lady did not look as if she had 
 married for love. 
 
 " Sentiment ? Fiddlesticks I If it's love- 
 making you mean, it's my experience that it 
 thrives best on a substantial income. It may 
 please you to think us mercenary — us women ;
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 201 
 
 ])ut when we ixive our moDev we like some- 
 lliiog in exchange for it — why not \ It hasn't 
 been easy earned." 
 
 That was not difficult to credit. AfHuencc 
 .sat on her like an ill-fitting frock. 
 
 " Call it what you like," she made me the 
 .liberal concession, " it's in our blood to barter ; 
 but if we like to see our money's worth, we're 
 honest too, and stick to our bargain. My 
 l^rother Benjamin began at the Ijottom of the 
 ladder, and my husband wasn't a step above 
 liim ; thev'vc made every sixpence they 
 •J ((assess, and, let me tell you, you know 
 nothing of tlie value of money till you've 
 •e;irned it by the sweat of your brow. We're 
 not more sordid than finer folks, l)ut maybe 
 we know our own value better." 
 
 " I humblv ao-ree with vou that wealth 
 lather than knowledge is power nowadays," 
 said I ; " but surely it can buy a bigger prize 
 fthan a poor country surgeon ? " 
 
 '• A doctor with a connection among the 
 
 .uristocracy can be anything lie chooses," she 
 
 riaid, visions of knighthood and i-oyal patronage
 
 202 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 floating- before her eyes. " A consulting; 
 practice in the West End is as much as any 
 girl need look for. I'm a mother myself,. 
 Mr. Fowler, and though I've no daughter, 
 my sons have done well for themselves, I'm 
 thankful to say. They didn't need to look 
 for fortunes, Ijut a grandfather or so doesn't 
 come amiss — we've none to boast of ourselves/' 
 she said, with a jolly laugh ; '' so w^e're pleased 
 to adopt other people's ancestors. Yes, my 
 lads have satisfied their father and me, and 
 havino- nothino- more to do for them, I can. 
 
 CO ^ 
 
 aff'ord to be interested in the fortunes of other 
 young men. You're the doctor's bosom friend, 
 they tell me, and if you want him to prosper,, 
 you advise him to look out for some nice girl 
 Avith a snuo- little fortune of her own. There's- 
 more than one in Shawbridge I could name ; 
 but it isn't for the likes of me to be choosing 
 for him." 
 
 She was honest enough now, ofifensively 
 plain, in all conscience. Was this the true 
 woman, or that other of the dinner-party 
 who affected to be so offended at blunt brother
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 205 
 
 Benjamin's allusions to a ImmUe up-bringing? 
 Probably each was true in its measure, for 
 what woman is to be judged by one mood? 
 Her drift was no lono-er obscure ; little Miss 
 Sophia was to be rescued from some entangle- 
 ment which displeased the authorities, and 
 married according to arrangement. She was 
 rather pretty, and she had a more than pretty 
 fortune — why shouldn't a poor professional 
 man with nothino- but a distant relative or 
 two in Debrett to recommend him, be grateful 
 for such a prize ? If only we could mould 
 our neighbours to our will, Sophia's fate- 
 might have been settled that same afternoon,, 
 and not unhappily perhaps ; but who can 
 control the passion we call love ? 
 
 1 thought of another woman who would 
 fain have meddled with Suthei'land's fate — 
 were all the matrons of Shawbridgc match- 
 makers ? — and casually asked ni}' hostess if 
 she knew IVIrs. Laidlaw ? 
 
 She had volunteered to show nic the hot- 
 houses, and we were standinc!; in ;i stcnniv 
 atmosphere, wherein gorgeous bhxuns tx-
 
 :o4 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 paneled iu wanton loveliness, and exhaled 
 an intoxicating perfume ; she turned upon 
 me sharply, and told me that she neither knew 
 the lady in question nor desired to know her. 
 
 " An upsetting woman," she said, " with 
 lier fing'er in every pie. T keep out of her 
 way when I'm visiting here ; we've our own 
 society in Glasgow, and I don't ask any better. 
 It's good enough for me. I would advise you 
 to have little to do with her either ; " she 
 dispensed some of that cheap counsel she kept 
 ready in labelled packets to bestow on her 
 acquaintances. " She's a mischief-maker, if 
 ever there was one, and she'll get you into 
 trouble sooner or later. That's the way she 
 serves her friends ; gets them to confide in 
 her, and then turns round and betrays them — 
 I call that low, if you ask me. Now, I'm 
 different ; when I take an interest in any one, 
 I want to helj^ them if I can. I tell the girls 
 often I wouldn't be leaving my own comfort- 
 able home and coming here if it wasn't for my 
 wish to do the best for them." 
 
 The tiled path between the banks of blossom
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 205 
 
 was uaiTow, and tlie lady was stout ; while slie 
 cliose to haraugiie me I was her prisoner. I 
 was aloue sustained b\" the thoui>'ht that so 
 humble an individual could not possibly prove 
 " interesting " in her eyes. 
 
 She spared me not a single house, not even 
 the tropical one where palm and orange trees 
 flourished ; she foroot her own sufferino-s in 
 her conscientious desire that I should miss no 
 single point of their glory. When at last I 
 emerged, faint with luscious odours into the 
 clean, reviving summer air, it was as a pioneer^ 
 laden with spoils from the Promised Land. 
 
 In the avenue I met Miss Sophia, a little 
 sister lianoiuo- on her arm. They were hat- 
 less, and had the guilty air of escajicd 
 prisoners. 
 
 She greeted mc nervously, and directed her 
 gaze at the basket of grapes and bouquet of 
 exotics. 
 
 " Did Aunt JNEaria give you these ? " the 
 little sister asked, witli round eyes. "TTow 
 fond slic must be of you I she hardly ever 
 lets anybMil\- liavc a Hower."
 
 2o6 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " It's not m(' she's fond of, little one. I 
 am one of tlie spies. I am taking back these 
 trophies to prove what a delightful place the 
 Land of Canaan is." 
 
 Miss Sophia pouted. 
 
 " It isn't very nice to live in," she said. 
 " Beatty and I would rather live in Shaw- 
 bridse — wouldn't we ? — in a street where there 
 are shops — and — and people to see." 
 
 •' Better not. There's an old grandmamma 
 there who sometimes plays the wolf to pretty 
 Bed Bidiuo-hoods." 
 
 " That's a fairy story," Beatrice corrected 
 me solemnly. " It's out of a book." 
 
 " And I've been hearing another fairy story 
 which isn't in print yet — about a prince and 
 princess. She was rich, and he was poor." 
 
 "Tell it me," urged the child, coming up 
 and taking my hand. 
 
 " It isn't for me to tell, my dear. I shall 
 never play the prince in any fairy story." 
 
 Miss Sophia tapped the ground with a little 
 foot. Her colour came and w^ent. 
 
 "No," she said, speaking timidly. "But
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER, 207 
 
 there's a kniglit ia most stones, who hcljDs the 
 distressed people." 
 
 " The knights are all dead ; they lie in the 
 churches with stone arms crossed on their 
 stone breasts. We've fallen on a prosaic age ; 
 I am no knight, Miss Sophia, but only a 
 humdrum old book-Avorm, with a treacherous 
 memory and a troublesome conscience." 
 
 She looked at me with such alarm and 
 distress in her dark eyes, that I could not but 
 reassure her. 
 
 " When a friend trusts me, I don't lictray 
 his confidence, but the postman is a safer 
 messenger. It's his business, you see." 
 
 "I shall never troul)le you any more," she 
 said proudly; then her face fell back into 
 sadness. " It — it was no use." 
 
 Poor little girl ! Whatever lier trouble, 
 it would help her no wliit to loan on me. 
 Hadn't I been made to understand very 
 plainly that I was only an ambassador, who 
 is, after all, merely a superior kind of porter % 
 " Influence the prince, and you will be wol- 
 comc, but don't presume to aifect that you
 
 2o8 THE mischief-maker. 
 
 are a superior person yourself. Yo\h have nO' 
 coronets or sucli merchandise with which to 
 barter at our mart, our prizes are not for sucli 
 as you." 
 
 Beatrice was ckmourino' for a tale when the 
 elder sister plucked at her sleeve. 
 
 "I think," she said, in a frightened voice, 
 " that Aunt Maria is callincj us." 
 
 The little one started off, fleet as a hare. 
 Miss Sophia took leave more sedately. 
 
 " Thank you," she said, " and j)lease believe 
 I didn't do anything wrong. But Aunt Maria 
 
 IS 
 
 "Well, I knew what Aunt Maria was, s© 
 it did not matter that she left her sentence 
 unfinished. 
 
 "And be sure you eat the grapes," she said; 
 with a demure little smile, " for — I'm afraid 
 you won't get any more ! "i 
 
 The fruit of Eschol consoled one of Suther- 
 land's poorer patients, and the flowers • died 
 their appointed death in some corner of the 
 house. 
 
 "Faugh! Stephauotis ! " said Sutherland,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 209 
 
 picking the bouquet up and throwing it down 
 again. " Characteristic of the woman, isn't 
 it, that she should choose that flower? The 
 sort of person to scent herself with patchouli." 
 
 " Ungrateful ! She sent them to you." 
 
 "Much obliged, I'm sure. I'll send the 
 grapes, if you don't mind, to poor Betty 
 Cooper. The flowers go into no sick-room. 
 They'd make a hale man ill." 
 
 "]\Irs. Whittlemore hopes you'll be induced 
 to dine often at Grove End." 
 
 "I've gone there once, and you've done the 
 civil thing by calling. You told her, of 
 course, that I had no time for such dissi- 
 pations ? " 
 
 '•'No, I didn't. I couldn't." 
 
 " Why not ? " 
 
 " Because, if you wish to go to the ]\lanse, 
 3^ou can find time." 
 
 It had to come ; the silencie between us 
 was hurtinor us both. It was makino; a ojulf 
 that daily widened. ITc looked at me for 
 a moment almost resentfully, a glow in his 
 deep eyes; perhaps lie tliouglit he had kept 
 VOL. I. ■ If
 
 2IO THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 the secret tliat was so plain to read, and he 
 was a man to resent any attempt to force his 
 confidence. But if he held me overbold, he 
 forgave me. God knows I thought only of 
 him, crushing back my own pain. He put 
 his hand up to his brow as if to wipe away 
 his suspicions. 
 
 "Yes, I've gone ; the more fool I." 
 
 "Don't say that." 
 
 " What have I gained by it ? Nothing l)ut 
 an addition to pain. I'm awfully hard hit. 
 You see her often ; but you've never noticed 
 her, I think. "^ 
 
 " She's very handsome." 
 
 " She's perfect. I'm not sentimental, as 
 you know ,' but I'll never think of any one 
 else." 
 
 " Why not win her, then ? " The words hurt 
 like a knife. 
 
 " She's not to be had for the asking ; you 
 make her too cheap." 
 
 "Faint heart," said I, falling from sheer 
 embarrassment into hopeless commonplace. 
 
 " It isn't a case of cowardice. A man is a
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 211 
 
 fool or worse if lie can't ask tlie woman lie 
 cares for to man'}' liiiii ; if he liasn't pluck 
 enoiiQ-li for that lie deserves to lose her. It's 
 that her heart is constant, and she has given 
 it to some one else." 
 
 "You can't be sure of that until she tells 
 you," I retorted, but without conviction, 
 remembering the picture scene. 
 
 " She has told me. Do you suppose I 
 would leave a stone unturned to win her if I 
 could ? I never thouo-ht to care for a woman. 
 I don't know now how I came to care for her ; 
 but I think it must have been almost the first 
 time wc met by that old fellow's bedside. She 
 was so heavenly good to him, and all without 
 a thought of herself or me, or of anything l)ut 
 to soothe liim. The women we meet at bed- 
 sides are not often lil^e tliat. You wonder 
 that we're cynical, we doctors, and sneer at 
 the sex ; but when they wear the nurse's dress 
 and put on tenderness and devotion to further 
 tlicir flirtations — Faugh ! his hospital experi- 
 ence makes a man ashamed to have had a 
 motlier or sisters. I suppose it was l^ecauso
 
 2 12 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 she's different from the women we've come 
 across — more honest, more simple, more sin- 
 cere. We haven't known many good women, 
 Fowler." 
 
 " Not many." 
 
 " And so — but if you had cared for her you 
 would understand." 
 
 " Perhaps." I hid the bitterness within. 
 AVhy need he ever know % 
 
 " Well, as I tell you, I haven't a chance. I 
 knew it before I asked her. You remember 
 that day we were looking at that portrait of 
 Cunnin2;ham's son ? She never looked at me 
 like that. Her face betrayed her. It's precious 
 little use to rail because he's won and I've 
 lost." 
 
 " You would have won if you had had his 
 chances. He's known her since childhood." 
 
 " And since she thinks him 2food enouo-h, 
 what more is there to say ? We'll burn that 
 letter of Davidson's, Fowler, and hold our 
 tono'ues about it, unless there comes a time 
 when it will help her to act upon it. It was 
 mean, perhaps, as you said, to pry into his
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 215 
 
 aflfairs behind his back ; but when a man's 
 3^our rival " 
 
 " You'll not stop going to sec her ? You'll 
 remain friends." 
 
 " Friends ! Can there be friendship between 
 a man and woman when one of them has 
 aspired to love ■ That wouldn't help her — 
 would only get her talked about. I told her 
 I wouldn't 00 ao-ain until — she sent for me. 
 She's the kind of woman you can trust t(* 
 claim your help if she wants it. She has no 
 smallness or false dcdicacy. Oh God, why 
 couldn't I win her ? " 
 
 He loved her with all honour ; but he could 
 not mock his love by calling it friendshij) — 
 pale, bloodless ghost, that makes strangled pas- 
 sion its boast. So he fought his battle between 
 desire and wisdom, and dug an open grave for 
 burial rites. Siie was young ; her life's lot 
 was east with a man who was immeasurably 
 her inferior in mind and Jieart and character. 
 There were malicious tongues in Shawbriduje 
 that could sting. He did his best for Ir-i- 
 when h'' resolved to Iceep away. Perhaps hr
 
 214 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 was thiukiug of liis own dignity too, with a 
 proud man's desire to save it. Human 
 motives are never unmixed. He had held 
 himself so unlikely to surrender. Women he 
 thought of as a class ; woman he had never 
 thought of at all. The wife he sometimes talked 
 of was an aljstraction, a phantom, a thing he 
 must some day — so they told him — add to 
 his household like the furniture of his con- 
 sulting-room — important to his profession. He 
 could not himself have told when the great 
 barrier had been surmounted, and his heart 
 had begun to throb at passion's bidding. Yet 
 he was no celibate by instinct ; I, who knew 
 him best, knew that he was weak where he 
 thought himself invincible — a man made for 
 common fireside joys, chivalrous towards weak- 
 ness, with hidden reserves of sentimentality. 
 
 And now he had o-iven his all to one who 
 could give him nothing back again. 
 
 Well, is it not often so 1 It seems at times 
 as if an acquired desire should do everything 
 for one ; raise one on wings. Why should not 
 a frustrated desire lia.ve lifting powers as well ?
 
 THE MISCHIEF-iMAKER. 215 
 
 He used his strenoth as a strouo- man should 
 
 o o 
 
 to struggle for self-mastery. He schooled him- 
 self to a guarded unsociability ; patients spoke 
 of him as cold, reserved, proud, perhaps, of his 
 family couuection — a very little good blood 
 goes a long way in a self-made town. Men 
 liked him because he did his work, and went 
 his ways ; sensible women valued his skill, and 
 thought him honest ; only the silly fools who 
 make a profession of invalidism, hoping to 
 attract and interest, found him curt and 
 brusque. 
 
 In the autumn Shawbridge was visited by 
 an epidemic of influenza. Sutherland hailed 
 it as a war-horse the blare of trumpet. 
 
 After all, there was his work. Life is not 
 all barren while one can be doing.
 
 CHAPTER XTL 
 
 iS y.g ^ 
 
 HE winter passed witlioiit eveiit ; Suther- 
 land was very busy, for tlie epidemic 
 took a severe form, and I saw little of him. 
 He had patients in almost every house, except 
 here and there where men were rich enough to 
 send wife and children to some favoured spot 
 unvisited by the plague. The earliest to go 
 was Mrs. Laidlaw, for this bold lady who ruled 
 us all was routed herself by the first whisper 
 of disease or dangei- ; she took herself, 
 McAlister, and tlic Bath-chair to a seaside 
 resort Avhich made a boast of its low death- 
 rate ; her ragged attendant was left behind. 
 
 " It will be cheaper to hire than to pay your 
 railway fare, Andra, my man," she announced ; 
 for, in spite of her panic, she had an eye to-
 
 THE MJSCIIIEF-MAKER. 217 
 
 lier little economics. ' " And you'll Hncl plenty 
 liere to hurl about, when folks begin to mend 
 and are on their legs again. ' 
 
 For all that, she expected her old henchman 
 to be at her beck and call when she returned, 
 and douljtless he would obey without demur. 
 Everybody obeyed her ; but it would be safe to 
 aver that no livino- soul missed or regretted her 
 when she made her baroain with the cabman 
 who carried her to the station, and disappeared 
 for a time from Shawbrido-c. 
 
 Of gaiety there was little, and the few invi- 
 tations that came our way were steadily refused. 
 Sutherland was hir too much occupied to dine 
 abroad, finding it difficult enough to snatch a 
 meal at home, and 1 had little inclination for 
 any society other than his. When T met Mrs. 
 Whittlemore one day in Shaw Street she 
 acknowledged my bow with great coldness ; 
 clearly I was in her black books, and was held 
 responsible for Sutherland's unaccountable 
 delay in accepting the good things oflered to 
 liim — tlie chief of these good things was sitting 
 at her aunts side in the imposing carriage ;
 
 2i8 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 she looked pale and listless, but slie flushed a 
 rosy red wlien she saw me. Poor little girl, 
 she had found no knight yet to espouse her 
 -cause, and the process of being made, under the 
 tuition of a sensible relative, to forget whatever 
 romantic fancy she may have harboured in her 
 girlish heart was clearly not a happy one. 
 
 The chief breaks in a life of comfortable 
 monotony were my visits to the old minister ; 
 these were still paid regularly, though I had 
 ceased to go as his secretary. Slowly, and not 
 without much pain, bravely hid, he had 
 realized that the completion of his book was 
 im^DOSsible without more skilled help than he 
 could obtain in Shawbridge. Whether, had 
 he been able to give it to the world, it would 
 have added much to the sum of general know- 
 ledge, I know not ; to him it had been a labour 
 •of love, a consolation in distress, a refuge from 
 sad thoughts, but, by a coincidence not un- 
 frequent in the kingdom of letters, it so 
 happened that a book on very similar lines was 
 published about tliis time by a Nonconformist 
 -divine, whose name carried weight. We would
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 219 
 
 liave kept the knowledge from him, but by 
 some chance he heard of it. He was eao-er to 
 
 O 
 
 question me when I called ; Nancy Gillespie 
 was with him. We looked at each other with 
 vexation. What fool had blundered ? 
 
 But his nature was too sweet and sound for 
 jealousy. It never seemed to occur to him that 
 we had expected him to show annoyance. 
 
 " Hardinge is a great authority," he said ; 
 "" in his hands it is a piece of work well done, 
 without a doubt, though there may be minor 
 points on which we should differ. I should 
 have felt — unworthily, perliaps — a little hurt 
 to know myself superseded by one less able 
 than Hardinge ; but all men must bow before 
 his knowledge, and so, })erhaps " — he spoke 
 with a fine dignity and a pathos that was 
 moving too, turning his face from one to the 
 •other of us as if he could read ours — " it is as 
 Avell my little effort sliould di(^ stillborn. We 
 tliink our })lace cannot be filled, but there 
 is alwa}'s some one who can take u]i the 
 unfinished task and IjiiiiiJ' it to a better (-on- 
 
 O 
 
 •elusion."
 
 2 20 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 "What was there to say ? Nothing. Nancy 
 put out a hand and hud it on his, folded on the 
 top of his stick. These two required no- 
 words. 
 
 He was eager in his surmises about the book 
 — how this passage had been interpreted, 
 Avhat view the theolooian had talvcn of such ancL 
 such a point ; and, seeing him too large-natured 
 to be hurt, I commissioned Davidson to send 
 me a copy and all the press notices he could 
 get hold of In the mean time, with Miss^ 
 Gillespie's connivance, it had been found 
 possible to get the completed sheets of his owni 
 book set up in type, and the first proofs came- 
 by the same post as the parcel from town. 
 
 By happy chance when on my way to the- 
 Manse with these, I saw Nancy crossing the 
 field-path ; the pasturage was bare and brown 
 now, and the 2;)ath was spongy with recent rain- 
 She looked a thino- of freshness and life as she 
 came along, tdert in avoiding the puddles ; the 
 first mysterious, indescribable touch of spring, 
 was in the aii', thouo:h not a blade or leaf 
 showed sign of having heard the call to awake ;.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 221 
 
 only her youtli and her lioalth responded 
 to it. 
 
 "A regular Slougb of Despond, isn't it?" 
 she said briglitly, giving me her hand ; " hut 
 it's so much shorter one is tempted to sacrifice 
 one's boots." 
 
 " I'm glad you (-ame this way, for I miglit 
 have missed you if you had come by the road. 
 I've got these proofs." 
 
 " Oh, I'm glad ! 1 thouglit something 
 })leasant was going to happen. It's in the air." 
 " You must give them to him." 
 "No, you ; it was your surprise." 
 " I couldn't have mana^'ed tlie thinf?- without 
 you. Besides, he'll like it better coming from 
 you. 
 
 " We'll do it together," she said, as gaily as a 
 '•hild. Then she caught sight of my other parcel. 
 '* It's Dr. Hardinge's book," I explained ; 
 " I wrote to a friend for it, and he's sent mc 
 one or two reviews of it as well. I'm unre- 
 cenerate enouixh to be n^lad tliat one of them 
 is tolerably disparaging." 
 
 "I don't think lie will r.'cl like that," slie
 
 22 2 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 said a little doubtfully. '* I believe it will 
 give liim pleasure to praise it." 
 
 " Yes ; but since lie hasn't any common, 
 natural little weaknesses himself, we may be 
 allowed to indulge in them for him. I'm 
 ready to swear, before I open it, Hardinge's 
 book isn't a patch npon his." 
 
 " Of course I like to think his is best," she 
 said ; but her voice had lost its gaiety. 
 
 As we walked up to the door together she 
 said, with a visible effort — 
 
 " You got your copy very quickly. Perhaps 
 it was an early one % I wrote for one too, 
 but — it hasn't come." 
 
 " I dare say mine is a press copy," I said 
 quickly. " Davidson reviews all kinds of 
 books ; theological ones too, for all I know. 
 He's a lazy beggar, and wouldn't have taken 
 the trouble to send it so soon if he hadn't had 
 it at hand. We'll say nothing about it to-day, 
 and your copy will be sure to have turned up 
 by to-morrow." 
 
 " But, when you have taken all that 
 trouble "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 '' I want to look into it myself. Besides, 
 one surprise is enough for liim at a time." 
 
 Slie acquiesced, perhaps unAvilling that 
 I should guess too much, while my one desire 
 was that nothing in voice or manner should' 
 betray me. For I knew to whom she had 
 written, and why he had not replied. 
 
 AVith the packet had come one of Davidson's 
 scrawls, containing scraps and tags of news of 
 WTitins: folk, who make a little world of their 
 own and think it of a deal of importance. Tin 
 a postscript he said — 
 
 " That yoiiDg fool, Cunningliain, is going as straight 
 as lie can to the devil. Why don't his people look 
 after him ? Not that it would bo much good ; he's too 
 far on the down-grade to be pulled up, short of shutting 
 him lip in a lunatic asylum, and the law doesn't touch 
 his kind of madness, worse luck. If there's an able- 
 bodied, cool-headed, hard-hearted member of the family 
 you might give him a hint ; but don't you send his 
 mother, or his sister, or his sweetheart on his track. 
 He's not a pretty sight, and he's jiast a woman's 
 influence." 
 
 Aiid to see her look at me, with those clear 
 candid eyes, full of a wistful trouble — no, she, 
 at least, should not be sacrificed. Let him go
 
 2 24 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 if he would into tlie liell of tlie hopeless ; such 
 as he, daring to claim a woman's love, and 
 with no manliness to keep it, are not worth 
 the price of a tear. 
 
 She forgot her uneasiness, perhaps, while 
 she Avas with the old minister ; they were like 
 a pair of children together, she delighting in 
 his delight, as he felt with his slim finger-tips, 
 already growing expert, the smooth surface of 
 the printed slips, the colour bright in his 
 hollow cheeks, his blind eyes strained wide. 
 Something akin to the joy of fatherhood must 
 a man feel in seeing thus the birth of his 
 mind's toil and labour, and in knowing that 
 he has given a gift to the w^orld. It was easy 
 to slip away and leave them absorbed in each 
 other ; easier still to deceive her guilelessness. 
 That same afternoon Davidson had a per- 
 emptory telegram to send a second copy of 
 the learned divine's work from town, addressed 
 to Miss Gillespie at her father's Manse ; the 
 poor little trick w^as w^orth plajdng if it gave 
 her an hour's peace. 
 
 And having embarked on a course of deceit,
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 225 
 
 I gathered boldness with practice. Of 
 Davidson's letter no word was said ; indeed, 
 that fine composition, with its little epigrams- 
 and those well-turned sentences which had 
 doubtless done duty in some more public 
 capacity — for Davidson does not waste his 
 material — went to the back of the fire and 
 was reduced to harmless tinder before Suther- 
 land came in. He looked fagged ; a winter 
 of unremitting work had told even upon his 
 strong nerves, and now that the stress was- 
 over he began to show his fatigue. 
 
 " I've been thinking," I remarked, " that 1 
 want a change of scene ; I would say a holiday,, 
 but for your polite derision. You- wouldn't 
 admit that I work." 
 
 He smiled sombrely, looking into the fire. 
 
 "I don't know that. Idleness would be to» 
 me the hardest work of all." 
 
 " Then I am suffering from that form of 
 pressure. I'm ill." 
 
 He glanced up sharply — his physician's- 
 
 glance, keen and penetrating. 
 
 " You do look seedy." 
 VOL. I. 1 r>
 
 226 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Of course I do. Did you ever know me 
 look anything else ? I've l^een too long in 
 Shawbridge. You must take me away, 
 Archie." 
 
 He lay back in his chair and looked at me 
 humorously. 
 
 " You're not so bad as all that, you know," 
 he said ; " but I don't mind if you do engage 
 me as travelling physician for a week or two. 
 I suppose you thought it was time I pulled 
 up, and this innocent ruse is the result % Well, 
 one can't work for ever. Let's o-o and see if 
 we can't manage to play yet. Where have 
 you set your mind on going % " 
 
 "Anywhere, so long as it's a big place. 
 London for choice. Shawbridge is a suffo- 
 catingly little hole ; you can't lose yourself for 
 half a minute." 
 
 " London then. It's as good as one can get 
 at the end of February ; we can try Paris if 
 it fails us. You must give me ten days ; the 
 work is slackening, and by that time I shall 
 be able to leave things in Rutter's hands. 
 Black will look after the serious cases."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 227 
 
 Changed times since the force of example 
 had compelled even gentle-natured Black to 
 turn his back on the upstart aspirant. Suther- 
 land had succeeded to Dr. Nairn's comfortable 
 practice, and was now making a better income 
 than he cared to spend. Eutter was a fourth- 
 year student of jDromise, whom he had engaged 
 during the winter as unqualified assistant to 
 help in the surgery. He spent his days dis- 
 pensing — a silent, awkward young fellow, 
 intent on his work and on savinof enough to 
 qualify. Sutherland had arranged that he 
 should sleep out. To my companionship he 
 was accustomed. Sometimes we scarce ex- 
 •changed six words a day, and neither of us 
 ready to misunderstand the other's silence ; 
 but he was in no mood for the irksomeness 
 of a third at our board. He had fought and 
 frowned his trouble into quiescence, but the 
 iron restraint he imposed on himself made 
 him easily irritable over little matters. The 
 lines on his strong face had deepened. I, 
 Avho, witli my sickly air, had always lieen 
 taken for his senior by many years, looked
 
 228 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 nearer his level now ; and it was no wonder 
 to me that many should think him hard and 
 cold, or that Kutter, the raw Scotch peasant 
 lad, should go in awe of such a master. 
 
 Of that ended episode in his life we never 
 spoke. I knew that from time to time he 
 met Nancy Gillespie — in a little town such 
 encounters are inevitable. I knew, too, that 
 her innate nobleness made their meetings as 
 
 "to' 
 
 few and as little wounding to him as might 
 be ; but each such reminder of what he had 
 lost could not but give him pain. He was 
 not one to care easily or forget soon. At 
 Christmas Dr. Gillespie had had a slight 
 attack of the prevailing malady, and he had 
 attended him, as in duty bound ; but he said 
 nothing of his visits, nor did he question me 
 about my meetings with her at the othei;- 
 Manse. It might have gone easier with him 
 could he have spoken. It would have been 
 a thousand-fold easier to me, suffering for 
 and with him ; but it was not his way, and 
 a man must bear his burden as it fits him 
 best.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 229 
 
 Walking clown Shaw Street, in the comfort- 
 ■able security that there was no malicious old 
 censor seated in the bow-window of Bridge 
 House to criticise one's walk or question one's 
 movements, I saw Miss Sophia Green tripping 
 out of a shop. She was afoot and dragon- 
 less on this occasion, and her peaceful expres- 
 sion was accounted for when she explained 
 that Aunt Maria had been summoned home 
 by the illness of one of her daughters-in- 
 law. 
 
 " I am afraid you are a very heartless 
 person, Miss Sophia. You are actually 
 smiling." 
 
 " She isn't sufferiug, you know " — she gave 
 a little nod — "just a slow, comfortable, lazy 
 kind of illness — an excuse for beef-tea and 
 chicken-broth and grapes, and pretty tea- 
 gowns and a comfortable sofa. And Aunt 
 Maria does dearly love a patient." 
 
 "Ah, you haven't given her enough work 
 to do." 
 
 She looked up witli a quick, liali'-frightened 
 glance.
 
 230 the: MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " I'm not ill. Why should she want to 
 meddle 1 " 
 
 " Some people are born that way. I used 
 to think that Miss Matty only lived between 
 the boards of the nursery story-book ; but 
 since I grew up and came to Shawbridge, I 
 find she's a type." 
 
 " You would have found it out lono; a^o if 
 you had been a girl. You don't know what 
 a privilege it is to be a man." 
 
 " I'll begin to realize it, if you'll let me walk 
 a little way with you. The Philistines will 
 be upon us immediately." 
 
 " Thank you. The mill hands always scare 
 me, even when I'm driving ; but I'll be quite 
 safe. I'm going to pay a visit. You won't 
 guess where, so I may as well tell you. I'm 
 going to a Dorcas party." • 
 
 " Is that a new kind of tea-meetino; ? " 
 
 " Oh, you know ! You make clothing for 
 the poor. I've been buying some stuff. I 
 dare say I'll know some of the people ; and it 
 will be very good fun." 
 
 " Excellent, I'm sure. Are men admitted ? "^
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 231 
 
 " As if men could sew ! " 
 
 " They can criticise. It's u very useful 
 accomplishment, I assure you, Miss Sophia." 
 
 "Ah, but that's Mrs. Laidlaw's function. 
 It's to her house I'm going. She got back 
 two days ago." She looked up as if to depre- 
 cate criticism. "I met her at Mrs. Baird's 
 yesterday, and she asked me herself. She 
 was very kind. I think her much nicer than 
 I was told she was." 
 
 "Ah, that's what Red Ridinghood thought 
 of dear old grandmamma till she changed into 
 the wolf Take care she doesn't gobble you 
 up; Miss Sophia. It would be better to be 
 discreet, like Dr. Sutherland and me, and run 
 away." 
 
 " Are you going away ? " She looked sui'- 
 prised. 
 
 " We are two sadly overworked people, 
 and, unlike the Peebles gentleman, we are not 
 satisfied with Shawbridge for pleasure. We're 
 going to take ours in London." 
 
 She coloured, and her dark eyes were 
 eager.
 
 .332 
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " I love London, I wish I were going 
 there." 
 
 "And I wish I were leaving yon anywhere 
 but at grandmamma's door." 
 
 " Oh, I'll be quite safe ! " she said, recover- 
 ing her little air of shy dignity. " It's only 
 Aunt Maria who thinks I can't be trusted."
 
 ■uiu> wm^mr^r^ m.jw^' j**was«---3«s?9an> 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 HE panting engine had crawled toilsomely 
 up the bleak slopes of the Cheviots, 
 and with recovered breath was liasteniDQ-down 
 the decline to the shelter of the South. 
 
 From the uneasy sleep into which we had 
 ■fallen as we were borne throuo;!! the mirk 
 night, we were wakened to sudden horror by 
 a rending jar, followed by a quick leaping, 
 >.ibratiug motion of the train, as if it were a 
 J^hing of life, instinct with fear, and frantic to 
 escape some guessed-at doom. 
 
 Tossed and buffeted, as for one long minute 
 
 •our carriage oscillated from side to side before 
 
 recovering its ec|uilil)rium, neither of us could 
 
 gasp out a word. Sutherland was the first to 
 
 .gather breath and composure.
 
 2 34 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Are you imliurt, Hany ? " he asked, with 
 a keen edge of fear in his voice. 
 
 " Only a bruise or two. And you ? " 
 
 " All rio'ht. That was a near shave. We- 
 were off the line. Fm afraid there's been 
 worse behind." 
 
 We were in complete darkness, the light 
 above us having been extinguished by the 
 shock ; but the train had now come to a 
 standstill, and, thrusting heads from broken 
 windows, we could see far down the permanent 
 way the blurred outline of a wreck with lights 
 moving about it here and there. The wind 
 comino- in our direction brouo-ht the hiss of 
 escaping steam, and, shudderingiy crossing it, 
 the cry of the imprisoned, fighting for life.. 
 The engine, l)y some miracle, had kept the 
 line, and had dragged the foremost carriages 
 back to safety, but down yonder, where the 
 couplings had broken under the strain, what 
 horror of death and destruction should we not 
 find ? 
 
 Sutherland groped for the travelling-candle, 
 by w^hose light he had read through the early
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 235. 
 
 hours of the night, and made a quiclc search 
 for his bao- amono- our huddhxl and confused 
 possessions. I noticed that my hand, struck 
 by a fragment of falHng glass, was bleeding. 
 A firm turn of my handkerchief staunched the 
 flow for the moment : I was not o'oino- to be 
 left behind. When we reached the first 
 agitated group of sufferers Sutherland made 
 it known he was a medical man, and in the 
 indescribable scene that followed he found occu- 
 pation enough. My own recollection of it is 
 one of mazed horror, such as I used to feel 
 as a child in studying the illustrations of 
 Dante's Inferno. AVhere the train had parted 
 in two, a couple of carriages had dashed them- 
 selves against the parapet of a bridge, and, 
 forcing themselves through the obstruction^ 
 lay in matchwood now at the bottom of the 
 embankment ; others, telescoped into each 
 other, piled the line with ruins. Only those 
 at the far end of the long express had, 
 like ours at the front, escaped with little 
 damage. 
 
 Bonfires hastily lit from broken spars aud
 
 .236 THE MISCHIEF-AIAKER. 
 
 splinters, flared up towards the black heaven, 
 and lit the weird, horrible picture ; in that 
 dancing glare men worked with the fierceness 
 of wild beasts, and the strength of giants. 
 AVho would not be inspired by those anguished 
 •cries, once heard never to be forgotten ? 
 Already a black line of inanimate figures lay 
 upon the grassy slope of the bank, w^rapped in 
 a silence that should for ever remain undis- 
 turbed ; gone were these, from the appeal to 
 man to the tribunal of God. A quick motion 
 of hand and head, as Sutherland, surrounded 
 'l)y many helpers, made his swift examination, 
 ,pronounced their sentence. Time and enough 
 to mourn the dead ; the jDrecious moments 
 were all too few to save the wounded and the 
 .perishing. 
 
 In the work of extricating the victims, 
 pinned down in many cases with fallen wreck- 
 age, I could give little help ; at best it fell to 
 me to console the distracted survivors who had 
 escaped with little injury. I was administer- 
 ing a dose from my flask to a woman who had 
 fainted from sheer terror, when an urgent hand
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 2ST 
 
 plucked at my sleeve, and a voice, penetrated 
 with fear and trouble, said slirilly — 
 
 " Come, oh, come with me. You are not 
 wanted here ; she has only fainted ; it is cruel 
 to waken her. Ford — there is no one to help 
 her ; she lies there so white, and I cannot 
 rouse her. They are all so busy, nobody will 
 listen. Oh, will nobody help me 1 " 
 
 I looked up from the grass on which I kneltj.. 
 and by the leaping light saw a slim figure 
 bending down to me. Her disordered hair 
 had escaped from under the hood of the 
 travelling- cloak she had pulled over it ; her 
 eyes were full of the fear with which she had 
 awaked out of her sleep ; her gloveless hands 
 clutched each other nervously. Her voice and. 
 accent bespoke refinement. 
 
 " Of course I will go with you," I said, 
 screwing the top on to my Hask. 
 
 The woman I liad been trying to help was 
 recovering, and could safely be left in charge 
 of her husband. 
 
 " Lift her back," I said to him, '■' so that she 
 won't see this when she recovers consciousness..
 
 238 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Help will be here immediately from Ban- 
 bridge, and you'll be able to get her under 
 shelter.*' • 
 
 The girl let me wait for no reply. She had 
 me by the sleeve, as if she feared I would 
 escape her, and was stumbling hurriedly over 
 the wreck-strewn rails. 
 
 She stopped at the door of a iirst-class 
 carriaoje, immediatelv behind the scene of the 
 accident ; it appeared uninjured, and it had 
 not left the line. She sprang in at the open 
 door, still clutching at my sleeve till I followed 
 her. 
 
 " Look," she said, bending down over the 
 figure of a middle-aged woman, who lay out- 
 stretched on the seat facing the engine in the 
 attitude of sleep, " here she is ; she has never 
 moved or spoken, and I cannot rouse her. 
 Ford, Ford, don't you hear me ? She has 
 been wounded, you see." She pushed back a 
 fold of the shawl with trembling fingers, and 
 by the dim light I saw a bluish bruise on the 
 temple, from which a small thread of blood 
 had trickled.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 239 
 
 Even to eyes so little used as mine to death, 
 it was clear tliat lielp was unavailing. Dis- 
 ordered packages, flung from the rack above, 
 strewed the floor of the carriag^e ; amou2: them 
 was a heavy metal desj^atch or jewel box, 
 square and sharp-cornered, which had doubt- 
 less in its descent dealt the fatal blow. 
 
 " Why don't you do something ! " cried the 
 girl, turning on me imperiously. " Are you 
 going to make excuses and forsake us too ? 
 A man came and looked at her and said he 
 would send help, but he never did. Oh, what 
 shall I do ? " 
 
 To soothe her I knelt and moistened the 
 blue-white lips with a little brandy. I tried 
 to force a few drops down the throat, but they 
 trickled back. 
 
 " Who is she ? " I asked, to gain time. 
 
 " She is Ford — our maid. I have been 
 paying a visit, and mamma sent her to travel 
 home with me. Oh, wliat will mamma say ? " 
 
 " Your mother was attached to her ? " I 
 asked, getting up from my useless task. 
 
 " She's an invaluable servant," she said, with
 
 240 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 reserve. Then fear crept into her eyes. They 
 Avere child-like eyes, clear, and the colour of 
 amber. The hair that escaped under the hood 
 had a copper tinge. " Why do you speak in 
 the past tense ? " she asked, her voice falling 
 to a frightened whisper. 
 
 " I'm afraid I must," I said helplessly. 
 
 She sat down dizzily on the opposite seat, 
 and covered her face with her hands. I was. 
 afraid she was going to cry — and what can a 
 man do before a woman's tears ? — but she 
 did not. 
 
 " Are you sure ? " she said presently, but so 
 low I could scarcely catch the words. 
 
 " I am not a medical man, so of course I 
 cannot be absolutely sure ; but I fear there is 
 little chance of any mistake. Has she never 
 moved or spoken ? " 
 
 " Never." 
 
 " Tell me all you can." 
 
 " I made Ford come in with me here. We 
 had the carriage to ourselves. I was sleeping, 
 and I remember nothing till I woke with a 
 terrible crash, and knew that something
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 241 
 
 dreadful had Iiapiiened. I called to Ford, 
 but she didn't answer. I was too frio;htened 
 to move at first, then I went to try and get 
 help." The sentences came out brokenly, she 
 was making a great effort at control. 
 
 " I am going to ask you to take this, please," 
 I said, pouring a little brandy and water into 
 the cup of my flask ; " yes, drink it, it will do 
 you good." She obeyed, and a little shade 
 of colour came back to her face. " Now, if 
 you will stay here, I will go in search of a 
 friend of mine — a doctor — and see if he can 
 be spared to come back with me." 
 
 '' You have a friend — a doctor here — and 
 you never said so ! " There was wonder and 
 reproach iti her look. 
 
 "Because he is more needed where he is." 
 
 She got up hurriedly. 
 
 " Don't leave me," she said, " if — if you are 
 right, I should be afraid," she shuddered. 
 " Let me go with you." 
 
 So we groped our way over the obstructions 
 together. A gang of men from Banbridge, 
 the nearest village, and a cou2:)le of doctors 
 
 VOL. I. IG
 
 242 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. ■ 
 
 had now arrived, and Sutherland could be 
 released. He listened, lifting his cap to the 
 young lady, but scarcely glancing at her, and 
 turned to go back with us at once. He went 
 alone into the railway carriao-e, but the briefest 
 examination sufficed. In a moment he had 
 stepped on the platform again. 
 
 "I am sorry," he said gently, "but I can 
 do nothing. Her lip c[uiYered, and again she 
 said piteously — 
 
 '' What will mamma say ! " 
 
 Sutherland looked at her more closely. 
 Perhaps the words struck him oddly as they 
 had me ; perhaps he was moved by the childish 
 appeal of the quivering lips and wide eyes. 
 
 But from the moment he came she was less 
 excited, more courageous. He has a Avay of 
 creating confidence. It seemed natural that, 
 learning as he did that she was companionless, 
 he should think for her. Under his care, the 
 body of the dead woman was carried to the 
 bank to be transferred, when the injured had 
 been cared for, to the w^aiting-room at Banbridge 
 Station where the inquest would be held.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 243 
 
 There were not many Avomen among the 
 passengers, and Sutherland's hope that we 
 should find some motherly person to look 
 after the young stranger was not fulfilled. 
 Those to whom he appealed had friends or 
 relatives amono- the victims who claimed their 
 anxious thoughts, or were preoccupied with 
 their own discomfort. He had bade ns wait 
 for him in the now empty compartment ; my 
 strange companion sat quietly and said 
 nothing — her eyes fixed on the opposite 
 seat. 
 
 He told us when he returned, that the few 
 carriages which had as yet been mustered, 
 were being filled with the injured and their 
 friends. 
 
 "Banbridge is, I find, our nearest refuge," 
 he addressed the girl ; "it is three miles 
 distant, a little less if we go by the line, but 
 it is rough walking. If you feel able for it, 
 my friend and I will see you safely there. 
 There is a very decent inn, I'm told, in the 
 village, where you could stay till you can 
 communicate with your family."
 
 244 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 She rose at once, eager to leave the 
 aiielancholy scene. 
 
 " I am quite strong — I can walk a long- 
 way. Please let us go now." 
 
 She professed herself willing to venture 
 by the line, which blocked, was indeed safe 
 -enough ; but it was, as Sutherland had said, 
 rough travelling. The night was still inky 
 dark ; a slight fine drizzle was falling. We 
 had left all luggage behind us, with the 
 •exception of a small dressing-bag she had 
 pointed out, which Sutherland carried with 
 his own, and a bundle of wraps I made my 
 charge. She had recovered her hat, and with 
 one or two of those quick, deft touches, that 
 are a mystery to the mere male creature, 
 she had smoothed her unruly locks, and 
 tidied her disarray. Something in her light, 
 quick walk hinted at a latent fund of 
 courage, and she bore herself erectly, and 
 with grace. 
 
 The lantern we had borrowed threw but 
 a small circle of light upon our path ; but if 
 by chance she stumbled, she ignored the hand
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 24.5 
 
 one or other of us held out to help. A proud 
 young lady, now that she was recovering, 
 control of her nerves. 
 
 A strange walk that, in the teeth of the- 
 inclement weather and enveloping dark, and 
 stranger still the days which followed. We- 
 walked almost in silence, guessing little the 
 future we were travelling to meet ; Sutherland 
 was absorbed, dwelling still on the pitiful 
 wounds he had tried to succour. For me, 
 the weird, hideous scene was burned on mT 
 brain — a picture painted in fire against the- 
 solid blackness of night's canvas — only the 
 girl, chance companion of the hour, she 
 who had come closest within death's circlini> 
 shadow, was, to outward seeming, the least 
 moved. 
 
 She was very young, as was to be seea 
 next morning, when Sutherland knocked at 
 tli(! door of the landlady's parlour in the 
 White Hart, and asked permission to speak 
 to her. The inn was taxed to find room for 
 so many unexpected guests ; but Sutherland 
 had secured an efticient protector for our
 
 246 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 charge in the smiling, good-humoured owner 
 of the house. We had betaken ourselves to a 
 humbler hostelry higher up the village street. 
 
 An hour or two of sound, young sleep had 
 l^rought back a little of her natural colour ; 
 she was slim and erect, the result of much 
 Swedish drill and careful calisthenics, and 
 she carried herself with an odd little air of 
 pride and dignity, which, every now and 
 then, broke down before her girlish fears. It 
 gave way when Sutherland told her she would 
 have to remain for the inquest. 
 
 " Must I ? " she said helplessly. 
 
 "' I'm afraid so. But of course your friends 
 will come to you. The first thing to do is 
 to telegraph to them that you are safe and 
 well, before they have time to read of the 
 accident in the papers, and be alarmed on 
 your account." 
 
 " There's only mamma. She won't see the 
 papers for hours yet." 
 
 "But she will probably expect you. If all 
 had gone well, you would have been in town 
 before this.'
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 247 
 
 " Yes, of course ; I forgot — and Ford — pooi- 
 Ford ! " 
 
 " If you would allow me to telegraph for 
 
 It 
 vou 
 
 " Oh yes, please ! It — it will break it." 
 
 " But — the address " — he smiled. 
 
 Her laugh broke out, for the moment 
 chasing trouble away. 
 
 Her face with its new brightness was 
 charming — an oval face, the colour quick to 
 €ome and go ; a fine little nose, with a wilful 
 ti^^ ; hair that it would be crude to call red ; 
 eyes of that clear amber, which some one 
 describes as wine-coloured, bordered with dark 
 lashes ; eyes that would make any face 
 remarkable. 
 
 She showed the })rettiest white teeth when 
 she laughed. 
 
 ' ' How stupid of me ! I have never told 
 you my name ! I am Patricia Uniacke. 
 iMiimma is Lady Uniacke; we live in London 
 — 150, Pont Street. You are Dr. Sutherland, 
 aren't you ? The landlady told me. And 
 youi' friend is Mr. Fowler? It h'cls as if
 
 248 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 we had been quite properly introduced, 
 doesn't it ? " She S23oke with the ease of a 
 little lady of the world. Then her expression 
 chano-ed aoain. 
 
 " This — this inquiry ; when is it to be ? " 
 
 " This afternoon. You will be able to 
 return to London with vour friends to- 
 morrow." 
 
 "Are you going away?" she asked, with 
 apprehension. 
 
 " No, we are remaining," 
 
 " Mamma won't come," she said, with a 
 shaken head, " and there's no one else she 
 can send — unless "—she frowned, breaking off, 
 
 Sutherland looked perjDlexed. 
 
 "I'm afraid it's rather dull for you here," 
 he said ; " those who were able to travel 
 went on by special train to catch the express 
 at Carlisle this morning ; there arc only the 
 injured and their friends left." 
 
 "And the dead," she said, covering her eyes, 
 
 " Your maid did not suffer," he said kindly. 
 * It w^as all over in a single instant." 
 
 "Yes," she said, makincj a struo-ale for 
 
 o&'
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 249 
 
 composure. " I suppose that's something, if 
 one must be killed ; but death is horrible — 
 horrible ! " 
 
 Sutherland rejoined me in the road where 
 he had left me. There was not much to 
 look at. The bleak highway dipped down 
 the hill to the long Tillage street, and then 
 climbed up again and lost itself in the moors.. 
 A great sense of space and of unutterable 
 dulness was the impression Banbridge left, 
 thouo'h summer weather miejlit reveal un- 
 guessed charms. The little station attracted 
 the most limited traffic ; express trains 
 whizzed by it in a scornful flash ; two 
 general shops, a smithy, the doctor's villa 
 at one end, the church, with its surrounding 
 graveyard, at the other, sufticed all the needs, 
 of the population, living and dead. The 
 little public where we were housed, aud the 
 more pretentious inn, which had opened its- 
 doors to the sufferers, were the sole centres 
 of a languid life. 
 
 Sutherland wore a look of half amusement 
 half vexation.
 
 250 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " She's sucli a child ! She wants to go for a 
 •walk ! " 
 
 " There isn't much to walk to apparently," 
 
 " Well, there's no one else to take her." 
 
 AVe looked back at the inn ; its pulses stirred 
 to a sudden fever. The village doctor and an 
 assistant, summoned fi-oni some neighbouring 
 parish, were in charge of the patients. 
 
 " They're on their own ground ; I'm not 
 wanted," he said, in answer to my (juestion. 
 " I've telegraphed to Miss Uniacke's friends ; 
 till they come to look after her we must do the 
 best we can — though why we should be singled 
 
 out as knight- errants to a damsel in distress 
 
 Why, it was you who went to the rescue ; by 
 all that's fair you ought to play the chaperon, 
 Fowler. You look the part, in that old coat." 
 
 "Then you must come along to protect me," 
 I said, as if I didn't know the kindness of his 
 heart towards all helplessness. 
 
 So we took Miss Uniacke for a tramp over 
 the moorland road, where the wind met us in 
 the teeth, sent shivers down my sj^ine, and 
 brought a royal colour into her cheeks. She
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 251 
 
 proved, like so many modern girls, a capital 
 walker, and she brightened up under the 
 exercise and gave us many little particulars of 
 her history. She had been visiting some 
 friends in Glasgow — her first acquaintance 
 with Scotland — and had seemingly had a very 
 good time in that hospitable bustling capital. 
 
 " I think I'm the loneliest girl in all 
 London," she said. " Mamma was an only 
 ■child, and papa had only one brother, and he 
 is unmarried, so 1 haven't a single cousin." 
 
 " Some people would think that not wholly 
 an unmitigated drawback,' said Sutherland, 
 lightly ; "in Scotland the counting of kin has 
 ■degenerated into a vice." 
 
 " Ah, but it's nice to feel that you'\'c pi.'ople 
 that belong to you ; there were such lots of 
 relatives coming and going at the house I was 
 staying at ; it made me feel as if I were only 
 sitting on the edge of the world, and had never 
 been right in the middle of it." 
 
 She meant to tell us nothing, of course, 
 .that dignity would liavc for))idden ; but she 
 was half a child, as Sutherland had siiid, iind
 
 25? THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 somehow the picture which we gathered of her 
 home life was unfavourable. The very tone of 
 her carelessly-uttered " mamma " had its tale to 
 tell ; a grown-up daughter bestows the sweeter 
 word "mother" when the relationship justifies 
 it. . 
 
 When we got back to the inn, reply 
 telegrams w^ere waiting us. Miss Uniacke 
 read hers in silence ; but I saw the risino- colour 
 of shame and anger throb in her throat and dye. 
 her cheek. 
 
 " I knew mamma wouldn't come," she said, 
 trying to speak naturally, as she handed the 
 paper to Sutherland. " She isn't very strong,., 
 and she hates to be friditened." 
 
 The words he read were these — 
 
 " Dreadfully upset. Cannot possibly come. Find 
 some respectable people to travel with." 
 
 Sutherland crushed the paper in his strong 
 hand. 
 
 " It's all right," he said quietly, " if you'll- 
 accept our escort. Unless there's anybody else 
 you would like to send for ? " 
 
 " There is nobody else. Uncle Robert is too^
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 253 
 
 old ; he couldn't come. But — if you don't 
 mind letting me go in tlie same carriage as 
 you — I have never travelled alone." 
 
 So, by the decree of destiny, she became our 
 charge ; an embarrassing one, but for Suther- 
 land's coolness. To him she looked, and not 
 without justification — in the trying ordeal of 
 that afternoon. She never knew how carefully 
 he shielded her, saving her all that was 
 possible, but her dependence on him was 
 perfectly naive and frank. Me she treated 
 with a certain peremptoriness, as if she expected 
 my obedience ; to him she w\as all submission. 
 Some relatives of the dead maid, turned up at 
 the inquest ; respectable people, who were re- 
 sentfully mournful ; already whispering to each 
 other the word " compensation." Miss Uniacke 
 went and spoke to them, with a white and 
 quivering face. 
 
 *' You see," she whispered, coming back 
 coweringly to my side, " poor Ford never cared 
 for me, and that makes it worse. She was 
 mamma's maid." 
 
 So the verdict was broufjht in, and the li\ii]«jj
 
 254 IHE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 and the dead went each to his own place. No- 
 one has blundered ; shift the blame to the 
 heavily-weighted shoulders of Fate ! The line, 
 soaked by a deluging rainfall, had subsided 
 under the burden of the express, tearing at full 
 speed down a decline, and a dozen poor souls 
 had paid the forfeit. 
 
 Our journey, begun that same evening, for 
 we were in time for the late train, was without 
 event. Sutherland and I exchanged our third 
 for first-class tickets, rescued Miss Uniacke's 
 luggage, and took the best care we could of 
 our chance acquaintance. 
 
 She revived with the elasticity of her years 
 when the scene of trouble was left well behind, 
 and was a charming companion, but as our 
 train puffed into St. Pancras her face clouded. 
 It was a transparent face, and the storm 
 signals were easily read upon it. 
 
 *^«
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 
 WAS about to put out my head to hail 
 a porter as the train slowed and came 
 to a standstill, when a large, good-tempered 
 red face, attached to a large, overgrown body, 
 was thrust in at the window. 
 
 " Well, Pat, my dear, here you are, safe- 
 and sound, thank God," said a husky voice. 
 " Congratulate you." 
 
 The young person in the corner seat drew 
 herself up stiffly. 
 
 " I have told you before, Lord Mortlake, 
 that I object to be called Pat," she said 
 freezingly. 
 
 " Yes, to he sure ; awfully sorry, but so 
 glad to see you safe, you know," lie 
 stammered.
 
 256 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 By this time, in spite of an exceedingly 
 tight yellow glove, he had wrestled success- 
 fully with the door handle. The glove had 
 got a little soiled in the process, and he 
 looked at it doul^tfully, as if he thought Miss 
 Uniacke might object to shake the hand within 
 it. 
 
 Her behaviour coloured the supposition, for 
 she tucked her own hands into her jacket 
 pockets, with a boyish air put on for him ; the 
 frown, in which her level brows met, was also 
 worn for the unfortunate gentleman. 
 
 " Why did you come ? " she demanded. 
 
 " To see you home," he said, as if glad to 
 find the answer so simple. "-Your mother 
 thought you would be alone." 
 
 "But I am not alone, you see. These 
 gentlemen have been very kind to me ; but 
 for them I don't know what w^ould have become 
 of me." 
 
 Lord Mortlake lifted his hat, and murmured 
 something about Miss Uniacke's family being 
 under o-reat obligations to us : but he looked 
 at us askance. Evidently he thought the
 
 THE AIISCHIEF-MAKER. 257 
 
 young lady miglit have found more suitabK^ 
 protectors, and neitlier of us resented the 
 honest gentleman's scruples, though Suther- 
 land's tone was rather curt, as he said — • 
 
 " The young lady was left unprotected at 
 a very trying crisis. My friend and I can 
 only count it a privilege if we were able to be 
 of any service." 
 
 We rose to gather our traps, and bow our 
 farewells ; but Miss Uniacke struck in, in her 
 clear, decided tones — 
 
 '^ Yes, Lord Mortlake, that's just what 1 
 think of you, too. If you had come to Ban- 
 brido-e it miolit have been of some use : but 
 I suppose the proj)rieties are saved if I'm 
 escorted safely througli the London streets ! I 
 see mamma has sent the parlourmaid. AVould 
 you please show her the way to the luggage 
 van ? Scrope is such a goose, she will never 
 manage by herself. My boxes have a ))ig red 
 ' U ' upon tliem, so you can't mistake them." 
 
 Confused and embarrassed, he turned away 
 to obey her, and while he was peering ]ielp- 
 lessly into the compartment from which the 
 
 VOL. I. 17
 
 258 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 big, sliming milk-cans we liad picked np on 
 the way were being sliot forth, and getting 
 embroiled with porters, and mixed up with 
 flurried travellers, our little lady made her 
 farewells. 
 
 She turned on us a face of lauojhino- 
 mischief. 
 
 " He's going to be my step-papa some day, 
 so he may as well be useful. I'm teaching 
 him in time, poor dear, because I dare say he 
 thinks he's going to have authority over me, 
 and it would be a pity to deceive him." 
 
 *' But he'll be a relation," said Sutherland, 
 with a smile. 
 
 " Oh, but I didn't mean second-hand rela- 
 tions, especially when one isn't given one's 
 choice. There is Scrope peering about for me. 
 I'm afraid poor Lord Mortlake hasn't recog- 
 nized my belongings, though there can't surely 
 be any other red U's travelling about." 
 
 We saw her, and all her small impedimenta, 
 safely into the hands of maid and porter. She 
 said good-bye very prettily, offering us each 
 her small, slim fingers, and with a touch of
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 259 
 
 sadness, recalling the scene we had witnessed 
 toQ-ether. 
 
 Sutherland laughed softly when she was out 
 of sio-ht. 
 
 "His lordship was scarcely prepared to en- 
 dorse her selection of " respectable " travelling- 
 companions ! " 
 
 " She hadn't any choice, poor child." 
 
 " We hadn't, anyway. Well, that small 
 iidventure is over. Let's be getting on, or 
 there won't be a cabby left in the ranks," 
 
 But we were not quite at the end of the 
 little story yet. While a porter was hoisting 
 our portmanteaux on to a hansom, his lordship 
 again bore down upon us with an air of em- 
 barrassed but determined affability. It was as 
 plain as the stars in the sky that he was having 
 «, second lesson in doing as he was told, but he 
 acquitted himself very creditably, saying every- 
 thing that was polite and appropriate, and on 
 his assurance that Lady Uniacke would herself 
 wish to thank us for our care of her daughter, 
 we exchanged cards, 
 
 " You would scarcely Ijclieve," said Suther-
 
 26o THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 land, as we were liglitly bowled along the- 
 streets, " that that chap, who looks, and is, 
 such a duffer in civil life, played his part 
 very creditably as a soldier. I remember 
 Tom Carnegie speaking of him ; and, with all 
 his faults, Tom knows a good officer when he 
 sees him." 
 
 " That's perhaps the secret of his prompt 
 obedience." 
 
 " It's often the way. A man wiio is brave- 
 enough when he's about his own business, i& 
 dominated by the first petticoat that chooses 
 to exert authority. If he becomes Miss 
 Uniacke's step-father, I venture to j)ropliesy 
 he'll find he's got two tyrants to reckon with." 
 
 " A little campaigning Avouldn't do his 
 figure any harm. He's unprofessionally 
 stout." 
 
 " He'll have to work it out in reduction 
 of domestic rebellion, then. Our young friend 
 will keep his hands full. He retired from the 
 service years ago. He has considerable means, 
 I believe." 
 
 " He looks a bit of a fool."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 261 
 
 He lauglied. 
 
 " It's that little witch. T dare say she made 
 us look a pair of noodles too. She isn't old 
 ■enough to appreciate Mortlake for his money, 
 as her mother does, and she's young enough 
 to fancy him old, and to snub him accordingly." 
 
 "How can you tell that her mothi^r 
 appreciates Lord Mortlake's money 'I " 
 
 '•' Because she has very little of her own." 
 
 " I don't see how you gathered that." 
 
 " Easily enough. While you were inscribing 
 our address on your card, I had a glimpse of 
 the brouo-ham which hid our travellino'-com- 
 panion. Xobody who wasn't pretty hard up 
 would permit such a sorry screw between the 
 .shafts — and the man's livery was a misfit, his 
 predecessor was both bigger and stouter. I 
 »say, I suppose you do know where we're going '( 
 We seem to be pretty long in getting there." 
 
 Our destination was a quiet street near 
 Kensington Gardens. Sutherland, wlio pro- 
 fessed to Ije lioliday-makiug U) ])lease me, 
 /:ared little where he was lioused, and to me 
 London's big playground h;id an <')Hhn'ing
 
 262 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 charm. Nowliere, witliiii so small an acreage 
 can you liave your choice between an almost 
 rural solitude, peopled by sooty sheep, and 
 the rush and Ijreezy hurry of an ever-moving 
 crowd. Fashion has lifted her disdainful 
 skirts, flying the old Court suburb in its age 
 and despoiled beauty, but ghosts of a gayer 
 past still haunt its changed scenes. In the 
 darkening they steal out, and one in a thousand,, 
 perhaps, of an unheeding generation sees and 
 f»Teets them. 
 
 When I told him where we were going,. 
 Sutherland said he was glad that we were out 
 of Fashio-n's beat. 
 
 " Not that Society has any notice to spare 
 for you and me, but it irritates me to see 
 people making such an utter mess of their 
 lives as these fashion-mongers do. They are 
 as hard-worked as convicts in the treadmill^ 
 and as uselessly." 
 
 " Oh, well, we're in the outer darkness, in 
 Brown Street, our arrival won't be trumpeted. 
 Besides, it's only March : too soon for the 
 season's fever."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 263 
 
 " An incurable fever, so long as men and 
 women fancy that the world centres itself 
 in Mayfair, and that you can't know anything 
 of ' life ' unless you've a bowing acquaintance 
 with a few hundred swells. The world is 
 pretty much the same everywhere, and 
 twenty-five people in a provincial town will 
 give you as wide a range as ever you want 
 of human nature." 
 
 " One Mrs. Laidlaw will do that ! " 
 
 " Don't be snappy, Fowler. Aren't you in 
 London where your soul longed to be ? AVe'll 
 sink Shawbridoe and all its inhabitants while 
 we are here. It's holiday-time, and there 
 isn't the smallest good in changing your local 
 habitation if you're going to carry the same 
 old train of thousjhts and ideas about with 
 you in your luggage. You should learn to 
 unbend gracefully, man. As for me, I mean 
 to do nothing but sleep and cat and stare 
 about me. 1 hope you remembered to order 
 breakfast ? I'm as hungry as a wolf." 
 
 Ilis cheerfulness seemed pretty spontaneous; 
 with his strong will he was putting his foot
 
 264 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 down on tlic past, tliougli it was scarcely 
 possible to suppose he could blot it out of 
 his life by a mere effort of determination. 
 But more than any other doctor I have ever 
 know^n, he was able to apply his ow^n prescrip- 
 tions personally, and with him " Don't fret " 
 was no mere fraoment of his stock-in-trade 
 tendered to a patient. He had warred with 
 that evil demon, worry, and knew that conquest 
 was possible. He was no marplot with a 
 melancholy face, to spoil one's pleasure. 
 
 But Shawbridge refused to let us wipe out 
 from mind and memory it and its concerns 
 so easily. On our breakfast -table lay one or 
 two notes and telegrams of kind concern and 
 conoratulation. From j\Irs. Laidlaw herself 
 came, by the trembling liand of Miss McAlister, 
 a peremptory command for information : our 
 safety she seemed to regard in the light of a 
 godsend, chiefly because it left us capable of 
 thrilling her with a new sensation, and 
 providing her with a topic to spice her 
 receptions. It is delightful to feel one's self of 
 some use in the world. What I prized more
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 265 
 
 ?.vere tlie sloping uncertain lines in which the 
 blind minister rejoiced in our escape. A few 
 words in a feminine hand to the same effect, 
 were added as a postscript. They were un- 
 signed, but when I handed the note in silence 
 to Sutherland, his eyes rested on that little 
 messao-e lono'est of all. 
 
 At last he looked up. His mouth was 
 ironical. 
 
 "' He says he hopes you'll l)e able to see 
 something of his son. That's a nice pleasure 
 in store for you ! " 
 
 " Well, if it's a pleasure to him " 
 
 ' ' AYhat ! To Mr. Frank Cunningham % You 
 must be more modest, my dear Fowder ; you 
 are a mere lounger in the by-paths of 
 literature, you do not mould public opinion 
 in the slashing review or the social paragTaph. 
 You have never, so far as I know, even been 
 interviewed. If I mistake not, Mr. Frank 
 •Cunningliam will regard you in much the 
 .same light as I should a vendor of quack 
 medicines from the cart's tail — an unauthorized 
 meddler in thinfjs too \\\sA\ for vou — unless,
 
 266 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 indeed, you present yourself before him as an 
 unknown admirer." 
 
 " Eot ! " 
 
 " Your tone is too frivolous, Harry. We're 
 discussing the susceptibilities of a literary 
 man." 
 
 "You may be. I was thinking we might 
 have the good luck to please two guileless 
 and blameless people, whose worst crime it is 
 to have given too generously." 
 
 " So you're going to act the mediator ? " 
 he asked, sudden passion darkening his face. 
 " You're going to rehabilitate him in your 
 letters, so that she " 
 
 "No," I struck in. "God knows, if he 
 needs rehabilitation he must work out his own 
 salvation. No man can do another's repent- 
 ing for him. But it's not like you to judge 
 a man unheard. He may have had good 
 enough reasons for his silence." 
 
 He sat for a while looking darkly down at 
 his plate, sayiug no word. Then his face 
 cleared. 
 
 " You'll have to look him up, of course.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 267 
 
 I knew it from tlie first, but — I won't offer 
 to ^o witli von — I hate tlie fellow too cor- 
 dially. I think I'll go out for a pipe, and 
 look round. You mio-ht as well o-ive me that 
 list of books old Cunninfyham wants. I'm 
 going down to the Strand to order some for 
 myself, and perhaps I can pick up these too. 
 Breakfast at this unholy hour has knocked 
 out lunch for to-dav. You mio-ht meet me 
 somewhere for dinner." 
 
 We agreed on a trysting-place, and he left 
 me. 
 
 I had not told him tliat my chief ol)ject 
 in comino; to town was to seek out Frank 
 Cuuning^ham, thouo-h, no doubt, he finessed 
 it. Two people v.dio live in such close inti- 
 macy as had been ours since childhood, get 
 to be accurate readers of each other's minds, 
 AVhat was to be gained by making young 
 Cunninghtim's acquaintance remained unde- 
 fined in my thoughts — probably ver}' little. 
 I was not fool enouo-h to imagine tliat I 
 should exercise any influence over him ; that 
 subtle foi-m of conceit is usuallv wholesomclv
 
 268 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 chased out of one's system as one advances 
 in life ; but it mio-ht Le that the sioht of some 
 
 o o 
 
 •one coming direct from the man who took 
 his father's place, and the woman who loved 
 him, would shame him into relieving their 
 anxiety. 
 
 AYe were comfortably lodged Avith a land- 
 lady who understood the needs of bachelor 
 man, and there was nothino- to do but to toss 
 out the contents of portmanteaux into ward- 
 robe and drawers, stow away travelling-gear, 
 and get into clean linen after the necessary 
 tub had washed away the stains of travel. 
 
 Sutherland was ready first, and he left the 
 house with a bano- of the door that told me 
 he had gone. But I knew that he would 
 come back restored to his usual equanimity, 
 and that he had taken himself off so that I 
 might prosecute my search without embarrass- 
 ment. 
 
 By great good luck I found Davidson, that 
 shinino- rushlio-ht of modern literature, at 
 home. He was, in fact, in bed, and I owed 
 it perhaps to that circumstance that he was
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 269. 
 
 willing to admit me at iincanonical hours 
 whcu 1 sent up my name. His face had a 
 yellow pallor, increased by the wet handker- 
 chief bound about his brow ; and his dark^ 
 smouldering eyes looked more sunken than 
 usual. He was unshaved, and the wadded 
 dressing-gown he wore had evidently been 
 chosen when his complexion was not at the- 
 mercy of a bilious attack. Even his de- 
 tractors — and what man has not a few ? — 
 were unanimous in agreeing that the only- 
 occasion upon which Davidson did not pose 
 was when he was ill. I feel sure they Avere 
 right, for he would certainly have chosen a 
 more picturesque complaint had choice been 
 his. 
 
 He said he was very glad to see me, and 
 he paid me the compliment of tucking a 
 yellow novel well out of sight under the 
 pillow. His rooms had undergone a great 
 transformation since I last saw them. They 
 were Japanesy then — as if a bit of Tokio had 
 descended on sooty TiOndon. They repre- 
 sented some other period now — early British —
 
 2 70 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 at ca hazard. A little bare and severe, per- 
 haps ; but there was comfort in being able 
 to move without knockino- over a table on 
 tottering bamboo legs, a precious vase, or a 
 spindly cabinet, or of findiug yourself in 
 danger of suspension by the hair of your head 
 in ducking under the ribs of an outspread 
 umbrella. 
 
 I asked him if he had l)een contributino- to 
 a jumble sale. He glanced at me for a 
 minute ; then he said, condescendingly — 
 
 " Oh, you're referring to my decorations ? 
 Yes, I remember ; we took our cue from the 
 East, when you were here last. We've out- 
 grown all that, you know ; but I suppose we 
 move faster than 'you do. I dare say you're 
 still at the cult of the fan and the art-pot 
 down your way ; but in London there's nothing 
 so intolerable as the fashion of last year." 
 
 It struck an impartial observer that when 
 the fickle goddess of change decreed some 
 newer law to her votaries, there would be 
 conveniently little to discard in this swept 
 iind garnished flat ; but I only observed that
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 271 
 
 Sutlierland and I were provincials now, and 
 had come up to get the rust rubbed off". 
 
 " I thought I'd look you up at once, and 
 get the newest news from you." 
 
 If you want to make yourself agreeable, 
 set a man to talk about himself. There is 
 nothing weak human nature loves more, and 
 the indulgence costs nothing but a little 
 patience on the listener's part. And David- 
 son's talk always interests me. The man 
 who, more than crowned and sceptred king, 
 than poet, warrior, lawgiver, should move 
 and sway his fellows, would be he who should 
 write an absolutely veracious account of his 
 inmost thoughts, feelings, passions, desires. 
 The thing never has been done, and never 
 will be done, unless, as some think, the great 
 Eeckoning Day will make each man his own 
 biographer ; because when we take the pen 
 or open our lips, we arc half conscious hypo- 
 crites, and utter that which we ought to feel 
 rather than that which we do feel. But 
 sometimes we get glimpses of such a self- 
 revelation ; we stand, as it were, upon the
 
 272 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 edo-e of such a confession, and it is borne in 
 upon us what to be in the centre and heart 
 of it mio'ht mean, 
 
 Davidson cared not a straw about me or my 
 affairs, and frankly made little pretence that 
 way ; but I was a passive bucket into which 
 he poured the ocean of his egotism. He found 
 me convenient, a handy receptacle for the 
 overflowing of his mind, and he liked me a 
 little on that account. Heavens, how he 
 talked ! one red spot burning on either yellow 
 cheek, his eyes a dull fire, his big shaggy head 
 shot forward between his shoulders. A head 
 well -enough furnished with brains, for your 
 egoist need not be a fool. Davidson has the 
 sort of cleverness that goes to make success, 
 and is almost as indispensable to the papers 
 he represents as he thinks himself to be. 
 
 His landlady had come in once to replenish 
 the dying fire while his voice flowed^ on, and 
 the evening had darkened down and she had 
 come again to ask if he would have tea before I 
 could edge in the question I had come to ask. 
 
 " Cunningham ? " he said, the interest dying
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 27; 
 
 ■out of his eyes, and a look of iudifterence 
 settling there. " I've lost sight of him ; had 
 to give him up, you know. He's gone too far 
 under." 
 
 " How does he live, then % " 
 
 He shrugged those big shoulders ekimsily. 
 
 " He works hy fits and starts when he can 
 pull himself together." 
 
 " Drink ? " 
 
 " Worse. He's a morpho-maniac. It's a 
 pity," he said, with conventional compassion, 
 " for that sort of thino- brino's literature into 
 
 o o 
 
 disrepute. It's only a De Quincy who can 
 risk that little game and — make it pay. And 
 Cunningham had a pretty little talent; no 
 staying power, you know, but a neat touch. 
 By the way, have you seen that article of mine 
 in the Torch ? It's deuced good, though I say 
 it. Touches up Severn on the raw spot" — 
 he harked back to the old theme. 
 
 " I'll read it," I said, in the first available 
 pause. I was ready to pledge myself to any- 
 tliino- if he would but answer me. " Can you 
 ffQt CunninQ-ham's address for me ? " 
 
 o o 
 
 VOL. J. IB
 
 274 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 He looked annoyed, fretted, as a horse miglit 
 feel when the tether pulls him up short. 
 
 " I dare say I could, if it was worth while." 
 " It is worth while. Do, there's a good 
 fellow*. Here's our address. We're just round 
 the corner. You might drop me a line — or 
 look us up." 
 
 "Do you mean to say you're interested in 
 him % " he asked, as if personally aggrieved by 
 the suggestion. " You who can claim my 
 friendship," his look said, " stoop to hunt out 
 a broken-down devil like him % " 
 
 " I am interested in him, for the sake of his 
 people." 
 
 " Oh, well, well," he said impatiently, " I'll 
 see what I can do. But better let him alone, 
 you won't do any good, you know. Must you 
 be going ? Well, pop in soon again, and tell 
 me what you tliink of my reply to Severn. 
 I'll send you the number ; it had to be re- 
 printed — first issue all gone on the day of 
 publication. I scored that time," he chuckled. 
 " Good-bye. Awfully glad to have seen you, 
 old man. Our chat has done me good."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 275 
 
 He called it a chat. Perhaps lie tlioiiglit it 
 was. 
 
 In that little world within a world he had 
 unfolded to me — its inhabitants think it the 
 universe — there are lights of many magnitudes 
 — constellations, planets, fixed stars. Alas 
 that there should be meteors too, at best a 
 brief, bright flash, ending in nothingness !
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 SUTHERLAND held a small note in liis 
 ^^ hand, and looked at it this way and 
 that with ironical amusement. It was written 
 on exceedingly thick paper, of an odd shade 
 of blue, with a minute monogram in one 
 corner, and "Clara" inscribed in straggling 
 gold letters across the other, and it gave Dr. 
 Sutherland permission to call on Lady Uniacke, 
 to receive her gracious thanks. It named the 
 day and the hour when her ladyship would 
 find it convenient to bestow these. The day 
 had already broken — the hour was five o'clock. 
 It was what ladies call a "pretty note." 
 Sutherland found it too gracious. 
 
 " AVhat does it mean ?" he asked, fingering 
 it as if it would explode.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 277 
 
 "Apparently just what it says. She wants 
 to express her gratitude to you." 
 
 " She doesn't j^ropose to thank you." 
 " Mercifully, no ! Isn't one of us enough % " 
 " She has taken four days to examine the 
 situation," he said grimly. '' I dare say she 
 has been making inquiries. Wanted to know 
 whether she shouldn't receive me in the house- 
 keeper's room, and offer me a glass of wine and 
 half a crown. Apparently my character has 
 stood the test. I dare say Mortlake has been 
 set to fish out my history and family connec- 
 tion. 1 told you Tom Carnegie knew him." 
 
 " Well, and wliy not ? " I asked. In some 
 ways I find myself a more worldl}- person 
 than Sutherland, who has a savage hatred of 
 society's little manoeuvres. She has a young, 
 
 impulsive daughter to look after " 
 
 " Much she looked after her at Banbridge ! " 
 " Who seems to have a leaning towards 
 the unconventional," I went on, unheeding 
 the interruption. "From a mother's point 
 of view, you'll own, lier choice of travelliog- 
 companions was a little bit risky."
 
 2 78 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 But lie lost patience at that, and abused 
 me roundly. He said that the atmosphere 
 of London was already tainting my judgment ; 
 he denounced, as low and vulgar, the view 
 that a woman, because she is young and 
 pretty, may not turn safely for help in 
 extremity to a man who is not a greybeard. 
 He said it was to degrade womanhood, to 
 destroy the dying spark of that chivalry that 
 made every man, in purer days, a knight, 
 when distress or helplessness claimed him. 
 
 Sutherland in a rage is a very stimulating 
 companion, but he is a Quixote, born in 
 the wrong century ; for, so long as there are 
 ambitious mammas with pretty daughters to 
 launch on the world, prudence and expedience 
 must rule the day. For my part, I thought 
 no worse of Lady Uniacke because she had 
 been making a little investigation before she 
 invited her daughter's champion to her house, 
 or chose to countenance an acquaintance 
 begun in so unauthorized a manner. Hadn't 
 Mrs. Whittlemore, whom nobody could accuse 
 of being fashionable, done the same ?
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 279 
 
 But I owed something to our little passage 
 ■of arms, since, save for it, that delicately- 
 scented note would certainly have gone into 
 the fire, ignored and unanswered. Rub a 
 Scotchman the wrong way and all his native 
 pugnacity bristles forth ; he would know 
 ]\Iiss Uniacke if he chose, he would befriend 
 her if he chose, let him break every law of 
 Mayfair in the doing of it. 
 
 People say he looks his age, but in some 
 ■ways he will never grow up. No wonder I 
 should feel old and world-worn beside 
 him. 
 
 Yet, had I guessed how far his theories 
 •would carry him, perhaps I should have re- 
 joiced to see that little letter perish in the 
 flames. At the moment, however, it suited 
 me to be rid of him. Davidson had Ijidden 
 me to an intellectual feast in his rooms ; a 
 gathering of men and women who were 
 " doing ' odd ' things ; " and J made bold 
 to adventure myself in tliis fearsome company 
 in the hope of hearing something of Frank 
 €unninc:ham. Yox it had not been worth
 
 28o THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Davidson's while to seek out tlie 2^oor black 
 sheep. 
 
 Nowhere, perhaps, could I have found 
 myself less at home than in that hive of 
 industrious bees, each intent on buzzino- his 
 own affairs into the world's ear. Davidson 
 received me with an absent, two-fingered 
 shake ; he informed me in a thick whisper 
 that it was an immense Ijore that he had 
 let himself in for this, since he had just been 
 inspired with a brilliant idea, and positively 
 must work it out. His bic; head looked as 
 if it would explode unless it were relieved 
 of this dangerous matter ; I saw him pre- 
 sently making rapid notes upon his shirt cufl", 
 and nobody seemed to think it at all odd 
 when he retired to the staircase with a thick 
 manuscript book and pencil. The spareness 
 of the furnishing necessitated the use of the 
 bedroom for the o-uests. 
 
 From my humble corner seat, on what I 
 took to be a laundry basket, but presently 
 discovered to be Davidson's coal-bin, I was 
 able to make observations on this unexj^lored
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 281 
 
 coinitiy into wliicli I bad drifted — for the 
 Bohemia of which 1 had once had glimpses, 
 as a passing tourist, is clean vanished away. 
 It is no longer considered a mark of superiority 
 for an inhabitant of that country to wear 
 soiled linen, or long hair ; and velvet coats 
 and Byronic collars have gone the w\ay of 
 limp draperies and draggled skirts of aesthetic 
 hue. Once on a day one took pleasure in 
 one's motley; now it is a duty to look as 
 much like other people as possible, and only 
 to feel vastly superior. Frock coats and 
 irreproachable trousers ; trim tailor-made 
 waists ; the seductive blouse ; the })icture 
 liat — to tliis level has Bohemia fallen in 
 abrogating her sumptuary laws. 
 
 It was a very lively, brisk, self-satisfied 
 company that had climl)ed to Davidson's high 
 eerie ; it diflered only from a fashionable 
 assembly in that each person present had a 
 mission or vocation, which he was anxious 
 to proclaim. 
 
 There drifted presently to my corner a very 
 young lady, to whom I made offer of my seat
 
 282 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 on the coal-box. She looked down at her 
 fresh summer draperies, and declined with a 
 shaken head. We fell into talk, for in this 
 superior company introductions are considered 
 superfluous. 
 
 *' Mr: Davidson is so quaint, isn't he ? " she 
 said brightly. " You never know, from time 
 to time, where vou'll find him." 
 
 " At this moment, I believe he's sitting on 
 the stairs." 
 
 " Yes," she assented, as if she found 
 nothing odd in her host's behaviour, and 
 nothing ironical in my comment; "you see 
 he had an idea, and it's too precious to 
 waste." 
 
 " Rather ill-bred of ideas, isn't it, to choose 
 such ill-timed moments for their visits ? " 
 
 She looked a little puzzled ; then she 
 smiled. 
 
 " Oh," she said, *' you think it rude ? We 
 don't mind ; we're all workers, and we know 
 the value of an inspiration ; it's too scarce 
 a visitor to treat with neglect." 
 
 " I should like very much to be honoured by
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 28 
 
 ^-xi 
 
 an inspiration. Do you think there are any 
 more o-oino- about ? " 
 
 "Oh, we all gather something, I suppose. 
 If you went into the next room you'd see 
 Philip ]\Iarch taking notes at this very minute. 
 He's making copy out of us." 
 
 " Out of us ? " I stammered. 
 
 " Out of everybody here. He's on the staff 
 of Light and Leading. He'll call it 'A 
 Scribbler's Symposium,' or something of that 
 sort. He'll make quite a charming article of it. 
 "Would you like to sj)eak to him ? He's sitting 
 on the bed ; you can't fail to recognize him." 
 
 '' No, thank you, I wouldn't interrupt him 
 for the world," I said promptly. " I've read 
 somewhere of a literary man who used to stick 
 a red wafer on his forehead when he was in 
 the throes of composition to warn off intruders. 
 I'm sure Mr. March has sealed his brow, and if 
 I interrupted him he might revenge himself by 
 putting me into his article." 
 
 She said quite seriously that it was a very 
 good idea. Ladies are not supposed to have 
 much sense of humour.
 
 284 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " It's sucli a bore to be disturbed," she said ; 
 " You never can pick up the thread of your 
 thouo-ht ao-ain." 
 
 She was very frankly communicative. I 
 found that she supplied a weekly column of 
 advice to ladies upon a bewildering variety of 
 topics. She called it ' Tea-cujD Talk.' She 
 laughed when I ventured to say that her 
 knowledge must indeed be encyclopedic. 
 
 "One has to pretend sometimes. I suj)pose 
 the old oracles were rather humbuos, weren't 
 they ? And of course I can get help. My 
 brother is at Barts, and I hand the medical 
 questions over to him ; it's good practice for 
 him. There's very little else one can't tackle, 
 with the exercise of a little common sense, and 
 a few books of reference. The girls and women 
 who write to me are mostly idle people, you 
 see, who like the little excitement of a printed 
 correspondence. Nine times out of ten they 
 could answer their own questions if they 
 took the trouble. When a man writes it's 
 different." 
 
 " He must be desperate indeed before he-
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 285 
 
 screws his courage to that point. May one 
 venture to ask, without indiscretion, what he 
 writes about ? " 
 
 " Oh, it's generally about his wife's allowance, 
 or the way she manages the house." 
 
 " By way of complaint ? " 
 
 " Oh yes ; he always thinks she's ex- 
 travagant. I don't think I ever came across 
 a man yet who thought his wife spent too 
 little." 
 
 " And you take his part, of course ? " 
 
 " Oh dear no ! " she said crushingly. " It's 
 almost always the man's fault when the 
 domestic machinery doesn't run smoothly. 
 You see you can't drive the notion out of 
 men's heads tliat woman is a chattel. But 
 perhaps you're married ? " 
 
 She seemed to have a better opinion of me 
 when she found T had oiven no woman cause to 
 denounce me in the columns of "Tea-cup Talk " 
 as a tyrant, and she oljligingly pointed out all 
 the " interesting " people in the room — they 
 seemed to be interesting in proportion to the 
 eccentricity of their occupations. There was
 
 286 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 the lady — a vivacious brunette — who ran a 
 laundry, and her still more daring sister, who 
 had adventured all thins^s in the cause of 
 Journalism. She had taken service as a 
 scullerymaid to write up the wrongs of the 
 basement ; had pryed into the shop-girl's 
 grievances ; had shared the gutter with the 
 sellers of penny toys, and was now, it wa& 
 whispered to me with bated breath, consider- 
 ing the propriety of breaking a window or 
 stealing a loaf of bread that she might taste 
 the bitter degradation, the undeserved martyr- 
 dom, of imprisonment. 
 
 The men, poor, inferior creatures, were 
 naturally less enterprising, were prosy or 
 poetastery, according to their bent and oppor- 
 tunity, or anonymously instructive in the 
 pages of the newspaper. Most of them 
 probably had an acquaintance with the semi- 
 seamy side of life, and perhaps when they 
 were not taking part in a " scribbler's sym- 
 posium " were rather uncomfortable folk to 
 live with. But then, what would you ? An 
 author's emotions are precious copy ; he
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 287 
 
 capitalizes liis feelings, and lias none left over 
 for fireside use. Doubtless it would be rather 
 trying — if one were a woman — to belong to a 
 literary man. If the public scores, it is the 
 wife who pays. 
 
 When I had my chance I asked my ques- 
 tion, and then it was a pleasure to find that 
 this young lady, who had so poor an opinion 
 of our sex, had yet a woman's divine gentleness 
 •for its frailty. 
 
 Her blue eyes expanded. 
 
 " Are you a friend of ]Mr. Cunningham's ? " 
 she asked. 
 
 " No ; but I desire to be." 
 
 "I'm so glad," she said simply. "He's in 
 the same lodgings as Tom — that's my brother. 
 Our name is Flower. There's nobody to 
 look after him — it's dreadful. Tom does what 
 he can, but " — she blushed — " it's very little ; 
 we are poor." 
 
 " You know him, then ? " 
 
 " Scarcely at all. I've seen him here some- 
 times, and I always read his things^when I can 
 get hold of them. He's very, very clever ; he
 
 2 88 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 might do anything. Tom says it's his own 
 fault that he has drifted away from everybody 
 lately ; but perhaps he's wrong. The poor 
 fellow can't help being ill, can he ? " 
 
 Her face was full of pity ; she was a brave 
 little womau, making an honest struggle for 
 independence. Her small affectations were not 
 worth weisihino- in the balance ao-ainst her 
 compassion for a man of whom she knew 
 little except as a fellow- worker who had fallen 
 by the way. 
 
 A man with a merry countenance — a writer, 
 ftlie whispered to me, of a melancholy and 
 pathetic turn — came up at this moment to speak 
 to her, but not before she had given me her 
 brother's address, with permission to call on 
 him, and through him to approach young 
 Cunningham. 
 
 A cheerful chatter and clink of cups followed 
 me down the long flight of stairs ; happy people 
 to be so unassailably convinced of their own 
 importance ! 
 
 Davidson was still in the grip of the birth- 
 pangs ; scattered sheets lay like autumn leaves
 
 THE MJS CHIEF-MAKER. 289 
 
 -around liiiii ; he allowed nic, so entire was his 
 absorption, to walk over him witlioiit so much 
 >as a scowl flunir at me. 
 
 And this was the world I had once envied I 
 Perhaps I should have found myself as little 
 at home had I been bidden with Sutherland to 
 Pont Street. Yet he was received with charm- 
 ing unceremoniousness by a very pretty and 
 prettily-dressed woman who had the knack of 
 lookino- vouno-er than her own dauo-hter. 
 Oynic as he calls himself, Sutherland is just 
 the man to yield to such an influence when he 
 comes within its sphere. He misfht lauirh 
 afterwards and say that Lady Uniacke was a 
 butterfly, a Society woman, a creature with no 
 intellectual needs, but her afiectation of being 
 'anafi^ected, her pretty poses, her white hands 
 that made play with the tea-cups, her perfectly 
 adorned body, her gaily frivolous mind, with 
 scarce a rag of costume to its back ; these had 
 their fascination for liim as for other men. 
 ■She was like a cleverly-executed picture, a well- 
 acted scene — a thing to encliaut for the 
 
 moment without any serious result on one's 
 VOL. r. 19
 
 290 THE. MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 life. Depend on it, Siitlierland would have- 
 taken it ill bad he been summoned to a o-lass 
 
 O 
 
 of wine and ;i Kttle patronage in tbe house- 
 keeper s room. 
 
 It is easily eonceivable tbat lie liked being 
 thanked by such lips and eyes. He began to 
 think Mortlake rather a lucky man on the- 
 whole — if one must marry. The daughter, 
 when she came in, seemed to him oddly brusque 
 beside this elegant mother ; his impression 
 that the girl was a little hardly used began 
 to fade. She was a tall creature, towering- 
 over her little mamma^ and her brows looked 
 rebellious. Her dress was unbecomino; and 
 almost shabby. She shook hands with Dr. 
 Sutherland stiffly. 
 
 " How is Mr. Fowler ? " she asked presently.. 
 
 " He's very well," said Sutherland, " and 
 enjoying himself in his own peculiar way." 
 
 " Ah, a friend of yours who is visitiug you, 
 I understand ? " said Lady Uniacke, graciously. 
 " Patricia, my child, how very remiss we have 
 been ! "We ought to hare asked Mr. Fowler 
 to come and see us, and give us an opportunity
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 291 
 
 of tluiiikiiig him for lielpiDg to look after you 
 at tliat terrible time." 
 
 '•' I don't think he would liavo cared to 
 come," said the girl, very coldly. " He can 
 command far more interesting company tliau 
 ours." 
 
 " He is literary, is he not ? " Lady Uniacke 
 turned to Sutherland Cjuite amiably. "Authors 
 are delightful people ; so odd, but then, of 
 course, they can afford to be so. But they 
 make ordinary people feel just a little nervous 
 — a little more stupid than usual ! " 
 
 "Mr. Fowler doesn't write. He is only .m 
 absorber of other people's works." 
 
 This was perhaps rather a damaging admis- 
 sion. The fashionable lady had got on 
 beautifull}- with the young Scotch doctor. 
 She knew all about the Carnegie connection 
 — it contains many much more respectable 
 members than poor Colonel Tom — and slic 
 knew Lord Harrow^ quite intimately ; but this 
 poor Fowler had no fine relatives to trot out, 
 and he hadn't even the passing distinction «>f 
 being a Scotch author. Novels in dialect
 
 292 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 were coming into vogue at the time, and even 
 fashionable folk had to pretend some zest for 
 them. 
 
 "■ A student ? " ]^ady Uniacke lifted a pair 
 of whimsical brows. '*' That is even more 
 alarming to a poor ignoramus like you or me, 
 isn't it, Patricia ? " 
 
 She pictured the absentee, no doubt, as the 
 wearer of rusty clothes, with a great deal of 
 hair, and a very small washing-bill, and Miss 
 Patricia was perhaps scolded in private for 
 bringing this person so ])rominently into the 
 conversation. 
 
 AVith girlish perverseness she stuck to the 
 .subject, however, and asked so many questions 
 about that coterie of literary aspirants with 
 whom the absent Fowler was privileged to 
 mingle, and of whose doings and sayings 
 Sutherland discoursed so lightly and laugh- 
 ingly, that a little pucker of annoyance 
 appeared upon the mother's fair brow. This, 
 you see, was by no means one of the topics 
 upon which she shone. 
 
 ^' You must forgive the poor child," she said
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 293 
 
 with determined serenity to the visitor. " She 
 has shot up into such a great big thing, able 
 to look down upon her own mamma, that 1 
 quite forget she has just left the schoolroom, 
 and that novels are quite a new delight to 
 her," 
 
 " I think it is the passing of time you forget, 
 mamma," said the young lady, very com- 
 posedly. '" I was eighteen my last birthday, 
 and Miss Smith, my governess, left me two 
 vears a.o-o. As for novels, I've read them ever 
 since I could read anything. ]\Iiss Smith got 
 them from the circulating library, and \ve cried 
 over them tooether. I've read Mr. Davidson's 
 'The Green Loaf and tlie Sere," and that's why 
 I like to hear about him. He's quite disillu- 
 sioned with life, isn't he? I'm sure he must 
 have an interesting history, because his women 
 are so horrid.' 
 
 " Dear child, how your naughty tongue runs 
 awa}' witJi you ! " 
 
 Lady L^niacke's tone was sub-acid, and there 
 was a spark in her blue eyes that threatened 
 a conflasrratioij. Clciirlv motln r and daufi^htci-
 
 294 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Avere antipathetic, and if the ckler knew how 
 to keep the peace in public, the younger had 
 less skill, less tact, more honesty, just as you 
 like to put it. There is something very terrible 
 to grown-up feelings in the rash combativeness 
 of youth, its readiness to rush into the fray ; 
 if there are troublesome mammas in the world 
 as we are so fre(|uently told there are nowadays, 
 there are certainly troublesome daughters 
 too. 
 
 Fortunately, for Sutherland's comfort, some 
 new guests were announced, and in extending 
 them a graceful welcome, Lady Uniacke's brow 
 cleared. 
 
 Sutherland took his leave at once, but not 
 without a cordial invitation to return. He 
 was to lunch at Pont Street. He found 
 himself saddled with several little commissions 
 for his hostess, and charged with messages 
 to relatives who would scarcely have known 
 him if he had presented himself before them, 
 and would more than likely shut their doors 
 in his face. 
 
 In passing througli ;i little ante-room, the
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 295 
 
 third of a small suite, be found Miss Uniacke 
 uaitino- for liim. 
 
 '* I want to speak to you," she said abruptly. 
 ""Oh no, 1 shan't be missed in there/' »She 
 ^ave a backward look at the inmost room, 
 whence came the chatter of soft well-bred 
 voices. "I never go near mamma's visitors. 
 1 don't even pour out tea. I haven't got 
 pretty hands or pretty manners, you see, and 
 I'm supposed to be in the schoolroom." 
 
 He had tliought her almost plain — even a 
 little sulky, but when she looked up roguishly 
 her charm came back. 
 
 " I hope you have quite recovered from the 
 <;tfects of the journey ? " he said, not knowing 
 Avhat else to say, 
 
 "Oh yes, quite. It's about Ford — poor 
 Ford — I w^anted to talk to you. Mamma 
 hasn't forgiven me for killing her. Scrope 
 can't dress hair." 
 
 " You I " he said, stai'tled. " You had 
 nothing to do with it." 
 
 '•' Women aren't logical," slie said, smiling 
 more faintly; " your friend .Mi*. Davidson will
 
 296 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 tell you that. It's one of the least things he 
 has against iis. And poor Ford's loss is very 
 inconvenient. It would have been better- 
 really better — if I had been the one who was 
 killed. Ford was really an invaluable maid. 
 But — as she wasn't mu maid, I can't help 
 thinking of her just as a woman who had 
 hopes and plans, and wanted to live as much 
 as the rest of us — and who had to die 
 in that cruel, horrible way ! You saw her 
 people that" — she gave a little shudder — 
 " that day. They didn't seem to like it when 
 I tried to talk to them. Perhaps they, too^ 
 thought I was to blame. I suppose I was, 
 because, of course, I could have come home 
 from Glasgow quite well alone," 
 
 " Put the notion of your responsibility 
 (juite out of your head," said Sutherland, 
 bluntlv. " What is it you w\ant me to do ? " 
 
 " Only to get some money conveyed to the 
 mother. She's old, and Ford had to help her. 
 Ford was with us for ten years." 
 
 " I can do that quite easily if Lady Uniacke- 
 approves."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 297 
 
 " I am independent of my mother," she 
 said, with a haughty uplifting of lier little 
 head. " I have two hundred pounds a year 
 of my own. I asked you because Ford's 
 people seemed to take to you, as they certainly 
 didn't to me, and perhaps they would ho 
 more willinsf to listen to you." 
 
 Sutherland thouoht she need have no dread 
 of a refusal ; but he only said gravely — 
 
 " 1 am at your service. I will do Avhatever 
 vou wish." 
 
 lie went home })uzzled, a little amused^ 
 perhaps a little annoyed ; it seemed as if, 
 against his will, he were to be drawn into this 
 new arena of petty squabbles and small spites. 
 
 And vet between the mother — a finished 
 social article — and the daughter, with her 
 rash yet generous impulses and crude defiances, 
 the contrast was piquant — if one cared for 
 that sort of thino-. He remembered liow the, 
 li-irl's eves had brimmed with tears as shii 
 spoke of the unfortunate maid, and his 
 sympathies wavered back to Iicr. Yet \vh;it 
 a nuisance to take sides , -it all ! It washolidav-
 
 298 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 time, lie Wcanted no such task. He would 
 fulfil liis promises aud have done with Pont 
 -Street. 
 
 A pity that it should fall to me to plunge 
 him back into trouble that was gravely real. 
 
 I was waitino- for him on Mrs. Brown's 
 doorstep, having but five minutes previously 
 reached it. 
 
 " I want you to go with me to see 
 (Junningham — don't delay. It's a case of an 
 overdose of morphia, I fear. We can't rouse 
 inm. 
 
 His face changed at once — it wore its 
 collected, keen, professional expression. He 
 hurried into the house to fetch such things 
 -as he required, and joined mo again in a 
 moment. 
 
 " Come on," he said, thrusting his arm 
 through mine. " Is it far ? Just round the 
 corner ? AVell, time's precious. We'd better 
 have a hansom."
 
 n 
 
 CHAPTEK XVI. 
 
 E"LL do now," Sutherland said at last. 
 There were three of ns in that 
 ^\•retched garret besides the patient ; the 
 niedieal student, whom I had only succeeded 
 ill finding at home after calling at his lodgings 
 twice, Sutherland, and myself. 
 
 The landlady, at first inclined to be aljusive, 
 luid Ijecn appeased by the settlement of her 
 bill, and would have done what she could if 
 •Sutherland had not locked her out of the 
 room. The window, propped open by a 
 clothes-ljrush, let in the raw air with an 
 easterly nip in it ; but Sutherland and the 
 vouno: medical student looked hot and flushed 
 ^\•it]l their exertions. It was a miserable room 
 ■enough, as Ijare and comfortles.s as a hired
 
 o 
 
 oo THE iMISCHIEI^-MAKER. 
 
 lodffiiic; can be when tlie inmate is nut 
 punctual in discharging bis bills and meets, 
 and perhaps deserves but scant attention. The 
 furniture was of that grained and painted 
 order, depressing at the best, and hideous in 
 decrepitude ; a strip of old stair carpet was 
 the only floor covering ; a crazy little looking- 
 glass tottering on three feet had been deposed 
 from its table to make room for some scattered- 
 papers and writing materials; the Avater-jug 
 leaked with a melancholy drip ; the forlorn- 
 ness of the room was increased l)y the wet 
 towels Avith which the patient had been 
 vigorously slapped back to life, flung hither 
 and thither, and by the dust of untold time 
 that lay everywhere. 
 
 And upon the frowsy, disorderly bed rested 
 the man who had fallen to this. His head... 
 was sunk drowsily on the pillow, his eyelids 
 were puS'ed and swollen, his face pallid ; it. 
 was ditticult to recoo-nize in this human wreck, 
 the bright debonair presentiment that shone- 
 out of the picture in the Manse sitting-room ; 
 as difficult as it was to think of liim slipping.-
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 301 
 
 41 way wilfully from the love and ])riJe and 
 joy that had crowned him there. 
 
 Yet the case was simple enough, common 
 *'nough, quite uncomplicated, from a, doctor's 
 point of view. Here was a youth with better 
 brains than most — that was still a fine fore- 
 head from which the wet hair was thrust — 
 with a serviceable talent that ensured him 
 against want, yet who, from lack of moral 
 stamina, had made a hopeless mess of his 
 life before he had lived the half of it. Like 
 S(j many brain- workers, he chose to do his 
 task by fits and starts, putting on tremendous 
 spurts, neglecting food and rest while the fit 
 Listed, and seeking to stem the succeeding 
 exhaustion with equally reckless bursts of 
 dissipation. Nature took its revenge in moods 
 of deep depression, in acute neuralgic pains 
 <iiid nerve disorders, which, refusing to yield 
 to stimulants, could only l)e soothed by 
 morphia used in increasingly larg(! doses. A 
 very simple story: no more beaten path than 
 this down the slopes of Avernus. 
 
 A smell of liot coffee camr up into Llie
 
 302 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 room from the basement. The medical student 
 ran to the door and took the steaming tin pot 
 from the little slavey. Her face was smudged,, 
 her hair dishevelled as a haystack, but as she. 
 peeped round the door, her plain countenance 
 wore a look of pity and concern that made it 
 all womanly. The young student told me 
 later that but for the kindness of this poor 
 toil-worn human machine, the wretched occu- 
 pant of the garret must have died long- 
 ago. 
 
 Sutherland raised Cunningham's head and 
 put the cup to his lips. With a petulant 
 movement he jerked it aside, and the cofiee 
 splashed upon his bare throat and chest. He 
 gave a groan. 
 
 '•' Come, man, pull yourself together. Drink 
 this. It will do you good." 
 
 The quiet tone of authority reached the 
 drowsy brain. The heavy lids were lifted. 
 
 " Who are you % " he asked languidly. 
 
 " Never mind that now. I'm here to liel}> 
 you to get well. That's the first thing." 
 
 Sutherland has a knack of making himself
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 30J. 
 
 obeyed. lu another quarter of au lioiir tlie 
 patient was safely asleep"). 
 
 " He Yery nearly slipped out of our liands," 
 lie said, looking down on the unconscious face ; 
 " but he'll jiull through this time." "We were 
 alone by now, the student having had to rusli 
 off to a lecture. 
 
 " Is it a bad case % " 
 
 " As bad as well can be. Look here." 
 
 He pulled up the loose shirt-sleeve, and 
 displayed a thin arm pitted all over with little 
 lumps. 
 
 " What is it ? " 
 
 " Hypodermic syringe. They soon learn 
 to use it themselves. By-the-bye, there must 
 be one hidden somewhere about, and thouoh 
 he's safe to sleep for some hours, we may as 
 well find it."' 
 
 "He's had a fright. He'll never attempt 
 to dose himself aQ;ain." 
 
 " Won't he ? That's all you know. When 
 the craving's on a man, the threat of hell 
 itself wouldn't deter the victim of the morphia 
 habit. Man, you don't know — may you never
 
 304 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 know — the awful bondaf>'e to which a wretched 
 beiDo- sells himself when he takes to this. 
 
 O 
 
 He would barter his soul for an hour's bliss. 
 The poor devil may have had his struggle at 
 the first ; who knows, but it was a lost battle 
 from the beoinnino-. He's the last man — with 
 
 O O 
 
 a nervous system no l)etter than a woman's — 
 who should have been cast loose in London. 
 The old minister did him a bad turn when he 
 let him go. He ought to have stayed in the 
 country and hoed turnips." 
 
 We searched the room, and found nothing. 
 Sutherland dived deftly under the pillows 
 without disturbing the sleeper. , 
 
 "He's got it hidden somewhere — under the 
 mattress, perhaps. AYell, we'll hope he'll sleep 
 all nio-ht, and I'll be round first thinq; in the 
 mornino-," 
 
 " I'll see he doesn't get it, I'm going to 
 stop here and look after him." 
 He turned upon me sharply, 
 "Why?" 
 
 " You said yourself he ought to be w^atched." 
 "Yes, but you "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 305 
 
 "Well, wliv not I? I've notliing to do, 
 I'm not here for necessary rest, like you." 
 
 " I thought it was you who were the 
 inyalid;"' he said, with a grim smile. "You 
 invited mo, if I remember, to attend you 
 medically." 
 
 '*' Take it that I've recovered, then ! If \ 
 don't look after him, young Flower will — and 
 he can't afford his night's rest. He's a good- 
 hearted young chap, that." 
 
 " Upon my word, you force me to think 
 you're a good-hearted chap yourself" 
 
 " Nonsense ! what have I done ? I came 
 here with no other thought than to call oii 
 him — take him news from home ; and when 
 I found him in tins plight I went straight 
 hack to fetch you. You've done all the rest.'' 
 
 lie looked at me as if he had not listened. 
 
 " I suppos(^ this was what you came \{y 
 London for," he said searchingly ; "to look 
 after him — out of friendsliip for his friends ? " 
 
 " Out of friendship for his friends," I 
 repeated. He need never know more. 
 
 He looked down darkly at the l)ed ; at lIk- 
 
 VOL. I. 20
 
 3o6 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 insensate face on the pillow, its beauty marred, 
 its very intellect brutalized by self-indul- 
 gence. 
 
 " You're a good man, Harry," lie said ; " 1jut, 
 tlien, if you had loved the woman who has 
 given her heart to tliat, you might have felt as 
 I do. I'll do my duty by him as a doctor, but 
 I can't serve him as a brother." 
 
 There was no need that he should. Sus- 
 ceptible and yielding where women are 
 concerned, he is severe towards the errors of 
 men, perhaps because the ordinary temptations 
 have passed him by. But if he were perfect, 
 w^ould he be half so good a comrade ? Besides, 
 a weakling myself, sheltered all my life under 
 his strong friendship, I found it less hard than 
 he to sympathize with another's failure. Had 
 I ever had any hope of winning Nancy 
 Gillespie, it might have been different ; but 
 jealousy had no root-hold. She had never 
 known, and would never know, that I loved 
 her. 
 
 He gave me some few simple directions and 
 then left me, and in tliat darkened room, where
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 307 
 
 there was iiotliinir for a watclier to do but to 
 listen to the heavy breathing of the sleeper, 
 visions of two fiir-away homes came to me, 
 where love was waiting patient and expectant ; 
 well it is for dim-siohted man that a veil 
 intervenes between him and the calamities 
 which he can bear so long as they arc hidden. 
 For the first time it was possible to be glad 
 tliat the old minister was blind. 
 
 About nine o'clock the youno; student came 
 creaking up on tiptoe to invite me to share 
 his supper. The patient, sunk in deep sleep, 
 •could be safely left. On our way down we 
 met the young servant lass. 
 
 " Look here, Polly, my dear," said ni}^ 
 ■companion, taking the girl by the thin 
 shoulders and shakino- her to and fro, ''this 
 gentleman is going down to my room for an 
 hour oi- so. Just you look iu on Mr. 
 ■Cunninsjliam from time to time, and tell us if 
 he stirs or seems uneasy. I kuow you'll do 
 this for the love of mc." 
 
 The girl promised, with a l)lush and a grin 
 for the gay young g<mtlcmaii, who was good
 
 3o8 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 for a sliilling wlien lie liad odc to spare, and 
 always ready with a cheery word for this poor- 
 white slave. 
 
 Mr. Flower occupied Avhat is kuown to 
 landladies as the " first-floor back," a room 
 which is cheaper on account of its limited view 
 over a dingy net-work of backyards, the jungle 
 of the night-prowling cat. 
 
 " It's awful good sport potting them," he 
 informed the visitor ; in imitation of a wittier 
 wag he read the Kiot Act, and, conscience 
 thus appeased, made cheerful war upon the- 
 marauders with an air gun. 
 
 On one end of the table a coarse cloth was 
 spread, and a frugal meal of bread and cheese 
 set out upon it, Hanked by a big jug of beer. 
 Youno- Flower busied himself for a minute in 
 the depths of a cupboard, M'hile the guest 
 pretended absorption in a grisly little heap of 
 bones, which kept the beer-jug company. 
 
 " Human foot," said the student, producing 
 from one paper bag some rosy slices of ham,, 
 and from another half a dozen pale-faced tarts, 
 and spinning round in search of a plate ; " and
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 309 
 
 beastly difficult to master too." He swept up 
 the collection and tlirust it in liis jacket pocket. 
 '" I keep tliem there handy, and go over them 
 when I've an odd minute. Those brutes of 
 examiners trip you up if they can, you see — 
 and they're pretty safe to do it unless you've 
 crammed a lot.' 
 
 He went on to apologize for the fare ; though, 
 guessing how generously he had ])rovided for 
 me, I was half ashamed to eat it. He was a 
 bright young fellow, with tlic same honest 
 open look I had noticed in the sister, and he 
 was very frank and communicative. 
 
 " ^Mary's a ^'ery good sort," he announced, 
 '''' though she <liums with a queer lot. She 
 wants to live with me — Ave're all the family 
 that's left ; l>ut she can't come here, you 
 know. Not tlic. ])lacc for a girl. Mrs. 
 AVembly only goes in for men lodgers ; saves 
 her l)other, 1 suppose. Cunningham is the 
 only one of us who works ;if homi; for the 
 .greater part of the day, ami 1 dare s;i\- that's 
 why the old woman is rough on him. He was 
 HO did <jf a swell when lirst I caiip' here. Tic
 
 uo 2 HE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 o 
 
 hail the diiiiDg-room floor, aud gave supper- 
 parties almost every iiiglit/' 
 
 " Tlien the lower a man falls, the hio-her Ik^ 
 mounts ? " 
 
 " Oh;'' he laughed, " we're all used to up;* 
 and downs. I was skied myself for a whole 
 quarter. Mother Wembly is decent enough ; 
 she doesn't turn a fellow out till she must." 
 
 " Is there a vacant room now he could use !• 
 There's no fireplace in that garret, I notice. 
 It must have been freezing in winter, so near 
 the roof." 
 
 " Perishing ; I don't know how the poor 
 chap got along. I used to coax him down 
 here sometimes ; but for weeks past he 
 wouldn't budge. But perhaps he didn't 
 suffer as much as one fancies ; I suppose he 
 was living in a sort of dream — half fuddled, 
 don't you know, and didn't take much 
 notice." 
 
 " How long has this been going on ? " 
 
 " Let's see. He had to move up when he 
 lost his post on the AForning News. It must 
 have been the end of Last session."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 311 
 
 •• I mean this morpliia-takiug." 
 
 " Oh, a. oood bit. You see, it's uothiug- 
 when a man begins, but lie's bound to go on 
 increasing the dose. It's an awfully good 
 thing for him you've turned up. There's 
 nobody here to look after him." 
 
 " I don't know that he'll agree with you ; 
 he may resent my interference." 
 
 " Not he. He's pretty well past caring ; I 
 suppose " — lie tilted his glass, and looked hard 
 at the remains of beer in it — " there's a point 
 at which a, fellow loses his sense of shame, 
 when he could let himself down to take that 
 poor slavey's mite of a wage." 
 
 There was silence between us. There are 
 feelings one can't put into words. It seemed 
 a long time to both of us before I found myself 
 saying— 
 
 ''1 doll L know him, as L tuld \ou this after- 
 noon. He never so much as set eyes on me 
 till to-day — never even heard of me ; but 
 there's an old m;iii at home — his father — who 
 chariied me to look after liim. 1 was com- 
 missioned bv liiiu to s(itth- ;iiiy little mattci-
 
 312 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 that might be owing. There's the Liudlady— 
 there was no difficulty iu getting her to j)resent 
 her bill, of course." 
 
 •' Mother Wembly hasn't what you might 
 call much diffidence in her composition," he 
 said, with an awkward laugh, 
 
 " But it wasn't to be expected she should 
 know of his other creditors, and I suppose one 
 mustn't be hopeful about getting any exact 
 statement from himself? Most men are un- 
 veracious on the subject of their liabilities ; 
 Init I count on you to tell me all you can." 
 
 He was young and ingenuous, and I knew 
 by the way he wriggled on Jiis chair that my 
 little ruse had succeeded ; his slender purse, 
 too, had been laid under contribution. 
 
 He was reluctant to make any claim, but 
 gave in when it was pointed out to him that I 
 was the mere agent for another. I trust the 
 recordino- ano-el will blot tliat small fabrica- 
 tion from my record when he makes up my 
 .•iccount. 
 
 Without this young fellow's cordial help it 
 would have been difficult for me to play my
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 313 
 
 self-allotted part ; but he liad an audacious 
 ^smiling way that made him the spoilt child of 
 the house. The landlady was indeed not sony 
 to be relieved of nursiuo- an undesirable tenant : 
 but who else, save the first-floor back, could 
 have coaxed her to sacrifice her best mattress 
 -on my behalf, or wruug from her an extra pair 
 of blankets? With this impromptu shake- 
 down 1 was like to do very well ; but Flower 
 insisted on briuoino- me his travelliuo-ruo; as 
 well, pointing out how liberal a draught the 
 ill-fittinii- door admitted. Ide would have 
 shared my watch too, hud I been willing, or 
 lialvcd it had he had his own way, and he left 
 me urainu' me to call him should 1 experioufc 
 , any difficulty with the patient. 
 
 " I'm afraid I'm an awfully sound sleeper," 
 he said, with apology, " so it wouldn't be any 
 good to ask you to thum[» oji the floor ; but if 
 you'l] just tear down and empty the water-jug 
 -over m<,' 1 111 pretty certain to waken." 
 
 Such severe measures seemed unnecessar}', 
 
 fur indeed th(i early part of the night passed 
 
 ■ 'piietly oiiougli. (^^inuiiigham, sunk in lieavv
 
 314 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 uncousciousness, was so silent that more than 
 once I rose to bend over him and listen if he- 
 still breathed. For me there was no such 
 thing as sleep ; the day's discovery had moved 
 me too profoundly. There were moments in 
 that black night when the house and the 
 quiet street without, eerily still after the- 
 bustle of the dav, lifted thouo-ht into iireater 
 vividness — moments of assailing tempta- 
 tion when I liercely longed that Nancy 
 Gillespie should stand by the sleeper's bed, 
 and see with her own eyes the abyss to which 
 the man of her choice had Mien. Surely love 
 must have perished in the shock ? 
 
 But who dare set limits to u. woman's 
 tenderness, and was it for me to grudge him 
 his last chance of redemption '': Lost as he 
 seemed to be, her hand might yet pluck him 
 back from the deeps, set him on his feet, make 
 a responsible human being of him ; if it were 
 willed that she should give her youth, her life, 
 for this, she would hold it well spent. But to- 
 me, in those endless, crawling hours, it seemed 
 monstrous, ]iorril)le, a, shameful waste that
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. x\ 
 
 o':>- 
 
 slie should bestow on liim so much as one 
 pure thought — spend on him ;i single sigh or 
 tear. 
 
 A calmer judgment came with the breaking- 
 dawn, as if there were evil spirits abroad who 
 Hed the eye of day. 
 
 A sleepless night may make a raisanthro})e 
 of any man, but I had no more time for 
 broodino-. 
 
 There was no means of excluding the light 
 from the miseralde room, for there was neither 
 blind nor curtaiu. As it fell on the sleeper's 
 face, he stirred uneasily and presently awoke. 
 Never shall I forcret the hours that followecl. 
 With the full return of consciousness, 
 Cunnino'ham was seized with a terriljle rest- 
 lessness, the effects of the morphia, had worn 
 off and the awful craving for more had 
 returned in full for(-e. He suffered, as I 
 believe, the torments of the rack as he lay 
 there shattered, palpitating, writhing ; the. 
 change upon him was more marked in the 
 morning- lio-ht ; the sensitive mouth was 
 coarsened, the delicacv of the features blunted,
 
 ,3^6 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 he had the look of au old wizened man as he 
 lay shaking and palsied, a, mere bundle of 
 shattered nerves. 
 
 There was no one yet astir in the house. 
 I dared not leave him even to seek the help 
 of the medical student ; alone I struo-o-led 
 witli him as Avith an unnatural strenoth he 
 fought for his liberty, or, sinking back ex- 
 hausted, would curse and rave, or weep like 
 .41 child as he entreated me to have mercy on 
 him. He was long past caring that a stranger 
 should intrude upon him ; perhaps I was but 
 part of the baleful waking nightmare in which 
 those hours were passed, when, for one reason 
 or another, he was denied the drug. He 
 ■asked no questions ; wonder and curiosity 
 were both dead, numbed as was every other 
 .natural feeling. Whatever had been bright 
 .and eno-ao'ino- iu him — and surely there had 
 been much once — ^what of zest and delight 
 he had experienced in the exercise of imagina- 
 -tion and fancy, all was lost, swept away, as 
 ,it seemed, beyond recovery. Glimpses of the 
 black purgatory in whicli he was plunged.
 
 THE mischief-maker. 317- 
 
 lioiTor of the burden lie was condemued to 
 l)ear, chased every feeling but compassion from 
 one's mind. Who would not pity sins so 
 bitterly punished ? 
 
 No longer could I wish for Nancy Gillespie's 
 presence ; any one who called her friend could 
 but pray that she might remaiu in happy 
 ignorance of his fall. 
 
 AVith what leaden feet the morning crawled. 
 I was weary almost past usefulness when at 
 last I heard Sutherland's buoyant step on the- 
 stair. 
 
 He came into the room talkino. 
 
 " What sliii:>-a-beds you are here ! " he cried. 
 " I've been prowling round for an hour or 
 more, and at last effected an entrance with 
 the connivance of tin' milkman. Well, how 
 is he now ? " 
 
 His own question was answered as he- 
 a2:>proached the bed by another wild attempt 
 on Cunningham's part to escape. 
 
 "Steady," he said, j)uting out a strong 
 liand, and thrustino- Cunnino^ham back amonjr 
 the pillows. " You don't want to get up
 
 3i8 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 yet, man. There's nobody awake but tlie 
 sparrows." 
 
 Cunninsjliam fliino- incoherent words at him 
 with lips that Avere almost too parched for 
 speech. The old raving, the old craving : 
 j)hrases that were burned on my brain. 
 
 "All right," said Sutherland, quietly; " one 
 minute and you shall have some. I knew you 
 would want it, so I brought it with me." 
 
 I looked on horror-stricken while he took 
 from its case a little hypodermic syringe already 
 charged, and sought for a space among the 
 punctured wounds to make the injection. 
 Had I dared I would have stayed his hand. 
 Perhaps he guessed this, for as he drew the 
 needle out he looked up with a little nod and 
 a smile. 
 
 " You look a l)it of a wreck, Harry," he 
 said. " Night watches don't agree with you, 
 that's clear ; but you won't have any more 
 trouble for a while. This will settle him." 
 
 Even as he spoke, the anguish died out of 
 Cunningham's fiice, and a dull, lethargic peace 
 stole over it.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 319 
 
 We watelied iu silence a moment or two, 
 then Sutherland put his arm in mine and 
 drew me from the room. 
 
 " Come home and wash and eat and sleep," 
 he said, " that precious scamp won't know 
 you've left him." 
 
 "But, Sutherland," I said, resisting, "to 
 give him more of that ])oison, after last 
 nio-ht " 
 
 He smded, amused. 
 
 " I know what I'm about. You can't stop 
 the morphia all at once, the only way is to 
 lessen the dose gradually. If I refused to 
 give it him, he'd get it somehow^ or go mad 
 for want of it ; your victim of the morphia 
 habit has the cunniuo- of the devil. Did vou 
 find out where he keeps his supply ? " 
 
 " No, I didn't make anv further search." 
 
 " You liad your hands full, old man ! I 
 tliought he would have slept longer. AYell, 
 he's all right in the mean time — Ijack in his 
 paradise, poor wretch ; but we must cut oft' 
 the source, or we can't help him at all. Some- 
 body has brought it in, fjr he hasn't been
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 out for weeks. Laiidlach' bribable, do you 
 suppose ? " 
 
 " I shouldn't tbiiik so. She seems to dis- 
 like him." 
 
 " Any servant, then, who would do his 
 biddino' ? " 
 
 "There's only that slip of a girl you saw 
 yesterday," I said, turning hot and avoiding 
 his eye, as I remembered young Flower's 
 admission of the night before. 
 
 " It ought to be a punishable offence to sell 
 deadly drugs to any but a medical man direct," 
 he said, " and not to him without his signature. 
 Of course some fool has given him a prescrip- 
 tion. I dare say he's had it made up by every 
 chemist in the neighbourhood." 
 
 To describe the days that followed would be- 
 but a repetition of what has already been told. 
 Sutherland insisted on my giving up the night 
 watch, and when I flatly refused, he promptly 
 engaged a nurse for that duty. 
 
 " I could do it myself," he said ; " but, for 
 one thing, I owe it to my own patients to make 
 the most of this holidav, and for another.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 321 
 
 there's a better chance of his obeying me if I 
 stick to the doctoring. ' Sir Oracle ' daren't 
 make himself too cheap." 
 
 The lodsfino- was but ten minutes' walk from 
 our own quarters, and I still spent all my days 
 there. Mrs. Wembly had been induced to give 
 up a less comfortless room on the second floor, 
 and we got the patient into it without much 
 difficulty. He was utterly run down, and 
 having for months had no appetite, was nearly 
 starved. It almost seemed as if his constitu- 
 tion had received too severe a shock for 
 recovery. To sit by him and record his 
 varying moods was scarce a joy ; he was by 
 turns gloomy, fractious, self-pitying, self- 
 abasiug — a sorry spectacle. He was incapable 
 of effort or of interest either in his work or 
 in his friends. ]\Ie he regarded incuriously, 
 taking my presence for granted, as he took all 
 the details of his life. 
 
 Once, wlicn of set purpose I mentioned 
 Sliawbridge, he looked up with a gleam of 
 intelligence. But he was too sunk in apathy 
 to ask any questions ; Sutherland was now 
 
 VOL. I. 21
 
 32 2 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 daily lessening tlie dose of morphia, and 
 missing its stimulation, lie was going tlirough 
 all the tortures of depression that make the 
 uphill road one long martyrdom. Truly, for 
 those who escape it is a saving as by fire. 
 
 Twice, in spite of all our vigilance, he suc- 
 ceeded in dosing himself, and the whole wear}^, 
 horrible battle had to be beejun over ao-ain. 
 Once he made a futile attempt at suicide. 
 Sutherland was pitilessly stern with him. 
 
 "You're too much of a coward to kill your- 
 self outright," he said ; " you haven't even 
 pluck enough to put yourself out of a world 
 which is the worse for such as you, but you're 
 mean enouMi and small enough to oive as 
 much trouble to others as you can. If there's 
 any spark of decent feeling left in you, let it 
 have some chance. Is it nothing to you that 
 you're breaking two of the best and kindest 
 hearts that ever beat ? Haven't you a thought 
 for the old man at home, who has been more 
 than a father to you, or — or of the girl you 
 presumed to love ? Do you think it's any 
 pleasure for my friend Fowler here to spend
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 323 
 
 his holiday waiting on your whims, and 
 listening to your whimperings and wailings ? 
 If it weren't to save some who care for you 
 far more than yon deserve, from a pang or 
 two, let me tell you neither he nor I would 
 spend a thought upon your Avorthless body. 
 You are pleased to think of us as tyrants when 
 we restrain vou for your e'ood, and to friditen 
 us you play at taking your life, thinking to 
 scare us by the sight of blood ; but you're 
 careful that it's only a harmless little vein you 
 open. If you truly want to die, I will tell you 
 a quicker road to take than that. Go on as 
 you've been doing; baffle us by taking that 
 poison you've been clever enough to conceal, 
 and no doctor in Loudon will be able to save 
 you." 
 
 The poor wretch lay white and stricken 
 under this terrible reproof, and for one after- 
 noon the watcher had an easy task, and 
 almost dared to hope that the beo-innino- of 
 better tilings was at hand. But not so easily 
 are the chains of old habit broken and the 
 prisoner set free. To liis shame, be it
 
 324 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 spoken, there were days and seasons wlien 
 his self-apj)ointed guardian was fain to fling 
 the burden from him, and let the victim go his 
 own way to destruction ; it was only the vision 
 of a woman's sorrowful eyes, the thought of 
 a woman's pleading prayers for trespasses 
 beyond her dreaming, but not beyond Heaven's 
 pardon that kept him at his post. 
 
 Sutherland's visits — he calm, practical, 
 cheerful, except when roused to rare anger — 
 were a source of strength, and the young 
 medical student was a capital comrade. Once 
 or twice I saw his sister ; good feeling 
 towards this bright young pair was an easy 
 thing, and we promised ourselves some rare 
 days together when the patient could be safely 
 left. 
 
 Perhaps the hardest part of all was the 
 sending of news to the Manse. They had 
 to be told there that Frank was ill, and yet 
 not too much made of the matter to arouse 
 their alarm. Looking back, I can scarce say 
 now whether the answers that came to me 
 were greatest pain or pleasure. Rarely, they
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 325 
 
 were iu the blind minister's uncertain scrawl ; 
 oftenest dictated, but never without some word 
 from Nancy Gillespie herself. To read these 
 hopeful, grateful sentences in the light of my 
 knowledge gave me many a stab, but I hold 
 myself absolved, the end for once justifying the 
 means, and if any take that to be Jesuitical 
 doctrine, let him but imagine himself in the 
 same dilemma. 
 
 Sutherland asked no questions about this 
 correspondence, which was conducted with 
 perfect openness, the letters directed to our 
 lodgings. 
 
 Once when I invited him to look at a letter 
 in writino- which he could not but recoQ-nize, 
 he pushed it gently aside. Perhaps he was 
 wise, for what could it be l)ut pain to him to 
 read her words of lively hope and gratitude ? 
 It was something else that he craved from her. 
 
 I heard little of how he passed his time, 
 seeing nothing of him except at Cunningham's 
 bedside. T knew that he had souQ-ht out Mrs. 
 Tom Carnegie and saw her sometimes. From 
 something he let fall, I gathered, too, that lie
 
 326 
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 was a good deal at Pont Street, where doubtless 
 Lady Uniacke found a use for him. But he 
 was well able to look after and amuse himself, 
 and I concerned myself little with his doings. 
 I was living in a world apart, all thought and 
 energy bent to one end.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 T was a red-letter day when we got him 
 on to the sofa, hired from the second- 
 hand shop round the corner — a capacious 
 ancient Chesterfield, its shabby leather hidden 
 with a gay cretonne. The bolster and the 
 pillow from the bed supported him ; and a 
 flowered chintz dressing-gown, the property 
 of the dining-room, and borrowed from him 
 by the friendly young medico, gave a touch 
 of colour to our patient's ghastliness. 
 
 He took little interest himself in our pro- 
 ceedings, and grumbled when we carried him 
 over to the couch, nor could he for a long 
 time be made to smile at young Flower's little 
 quijDS and jokes. To sec the transformation 
 in this young gentleman's face when Sutlier-
 
 o 
 
 28 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 land punctiliously discussed the case with him 
 — not a muscle of Sutherland's face ever 
 moved, be sure — was an edifying spectacle ; 
 such airs of empressment, a bedside manner 
 that the oldest specialist might envy. But 
 he threw off his gravity in the patient's room^ 
 and laughed and sang and told little tales, 
 horrible or comic, of his hospital experiences, 
 till even poor Cunningham's melancholy was 
 a little shaken. 
 
 " You wouldn't believe what a jolly fellow 
 he was once," he said to me, when Cunning- 
 ham had fallen asleep. " You've never heard 
 him sing ? " 
 
 " He looks very little like singing now." 
 " He can warble, though. I don't suppose 
 his voice is trained ; but he's one of the chaps- 
 that can do things by instinct, without any 
 teaching. And a good sort too ; would do 
 you a good-natured turn if he could. Why, 
 when I was down on my luck he — he spoke 
 to Mrs. Wembly for me. He was in her 
 good graces then, you see ; the dining-room 
 always is, so long as he can pay up."
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 329 
 
 Tlie young fellow spoke generously, and 
 there was no mention of those " temporary 
 loans," w^ith which he had repaid this small 
 favour ; those little borrowings had all been 
 repaid, and Mrs. Wembly was in so charitable 
 a frame, that of her own accord she sent up 
 a cutlet and a milk pudding for the invalid's 
 dinner. She, too, had a word of praise for 
 the "pleasant gentleman" Mr. Cunningham 
 had been before he took to evil courses, and 
 mounted to the garret and forgot to pay his 
 bills. 
 
 He was Don Doloroso now, and anything 
 but a cheerful comrade ; but either he had 
 fallen among an extraordinarily charitable set 
 of people, or there must have been something 
 winnino- and takino- about him after all, which 
 only his fatal indulgence had obscured. 
 Prosperity suits most tempers, and his first 
 years in London had been full of promise, and 
 of fulfdment too. He had steady work, and 
 with diligence and punctuality might have 
 risen rapidly. Whether that door was now 
 closed to him remained to be seen, but there
 
 330 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 iire few professions where one's place cannot 
 be quickly and easily filled. One must be 
 a genius indeed to be missed. 
 
 Miss Flower called that morning, as she 
 sometimes did, to see her brother, or leave 
 a message for him, deputing me to deliver 
 it when he was out. 
 
 The dining-room floor — to quote Mrs. 
 Wembly — I never chanced to meet the occu- 
 pant — was good-natured enough to let his 
 room be used for visitors in his absence, and 
 there I found Miss Flower. She had a basket 
 of primroses in her hand. 
 
 " Tom out ? " she said. " I was afraid I'd 
 miss him. Would you mind telling him I've 
 got press tickets for the Savoy to-night ? He's 
 to come round and fetch me. I know I 
 oughtn't to tempt him ; but he does work 
 pretty hard — or, at any rate, / do." 
 
 " I'm sure of that." 
 
 " You mean Tom doesn't ? " 
 
 " Not more than is good for his health. 
 He's got that to study, you know." 
 
 She laughed a little.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 331 
 
 " Well, he'll have to study other people's 
 all his life, after this, aud that will be hard 
 work. Did you ever see Tom feel a pulse or 
 take a temperature, Mr. Fowler ? He used 
 to practise on me when I let him. If I hadn't 
 been compelled to laugh, I'd have fancied 
 myself dying of some mysterious complaint. 
 Oh, what humbugs we all are ! " 
 
 " What imposition are you practising on 
 your public now ? " 
 
 " Oh, nothing very dreadful this week. I've 
 got to cram up the law of master and servant. 
 Can you tell me of a trustworthy hand-book ? 
 and prophesy on the sleeve for summer ; that's 
 easy, you know ; puffs will be Ingger than 
 ever ; and there's the usual woman who wants 
 to be told where to go for a holiday — there 
 are, a good many idiots in the world." 
 
 " And what bit of the habitable globe do 
 you reserve for them ? " 
 
 " Oh, it doesn't matter in the least ; because 
 they never by any chance adopt one's recom- 
 mendation. All their energy is exhausted in 
 putting the (juestion. If one felt one was
 
 332 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 going to be taken in earnest it would be a 
 serious matter." 
 
 " For the fools ! " 
 
 '' Oil, no doubt," she laughed ; " but I was 
 thinking it would be a pretty bad business 
 for me." 
 
 " Don't say that, because I came down 
 specially to consult you." 
 
 She opened her eyes with mock seriousness. 
 
 "You weren't thinking of dyeing your hair, 
 were you, or taking a wife ! " 
 
 " The two things seem to have some co- 
 relation in your mind — is the one generally 
 a preliminary to the other ? When I fall in 
 love, I'll come and describe all my symptoms ; 
 perhaps I'll even screw my courage to the 
 point of writing to the editress of ' Teacup 
 Talk,' and asking to be put up to the latest 
 fashions in proposals. They change like the 
 sleeves, don't they ? " 
 
 "An editor can't know everything," she 
 said demurely ; "but I dare say I could read 
 the subject up — in the British Museum. But 
 I think you said there was something else % "
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 " Which ouly needs a woman's quick intui- 
 tion to answer. That poor chap upstairs " 
 
 " Tom said he was better," she broke in. 
 
 " Yes ; we've got him out of bed. That's 
 a step, of course ; but it hasn't roused him as 
 we hoped. He's dull and spiritless, and seems 
 to liave no energy or interest for anything. 
 It won't do to let him go on moping." 
 
 "Why not take him for a drive?" she 
 suggested eagerly. " It's not a bit cold, and 
 the air is as balmy as April. He can sit up, 
 I suppose ? " 
 
 " I suspect he can do more than he tries 
 to do ; but that's the trouble of convalescence. 
 The mind and will don't get back their tone 
 as fast as the body." 
 
 " But you think he'll recover ? " she said, a 
 little sadly. " It would seem such a waste if 
 he didn't. In our little world, the world of 
 peojjle where brains must supply the body's 
 needs, there are many whose cleverness is just 
 a sort of veneer — serviceable enough so long 
 as you don't put it to too severe a test ; but 
 lie ]iad ability tliat went right through. Mr.
 
 334 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Davidson once said lie'd be a formidable rival 
 if one weren't so certain he would cut his own 
 throat." 
 
 " That was very characteristic of Davidson." 
 
 " Ah, but you've saved him from self-destruc- 
 tion," she said hopefully. "He never had 
 anybody to make allowance for him before. 
 Others " — she spoke with evasive hesitation ; 
 but perhaps she had Davidson in her mind — 
 " only gloated over him when he went wrong, 
 because it justified their prophecies." 
 
 " Well, we must prove that your better 
 opinion of him is justified too. You would 
 advise that his regeneration begins with a 
 drive ? " 
 
 " Of course I don't know what is best for 
 him ; but surely the spring air, and the sight 
 of the budding trees, and the feeling that the 
 world is beginning all over afresh, must be 
 good for everybody. It seems as if one were 
 having the offer of new chances, and being- 
 invited to put the past behind one." 
 
 ''He might realize all that more if you 
 were there to point it out,"
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 335 
 
 Slie shook her head. 
 
 "I can't afiford the luxury of a hoUday 
 to-day," she said ; '' it's dissipation enough to 
 be going to the theatre to-night. Perhaps, 
 by-and-by, when he has been out a few times, 
 we mio-ht all go too-ether. Will you take 
 these primroses to his room ? They came 
 from the heart of a Buckinohamshire wood. 
 Perhaps as a token that spring is really here, 
 they'll beguile him out. And you'll please 
 tell Tom that if he isn't punctual, I'll give his 
 ticket to some one else ! " 
 
 But it was one thing to suggest a drive, and 
 another to persuade Cunningham to adventure 
 himself once more among the moving crowds. 
 He refused petulantly to make the attempt, 
 and turned an ungracious shoulder on the 
 basket of blossoms. His appetite and his 
 strength were in some measure returning, but 
 his spring of interest in life seemed sapped 
 at the roots. He watched us furtively, as one 
 or the other sat by him ; and under the 
 surface blur of wretchedness there peeped the 
 acute cunning: that would outwit us if it could.
 
 336 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 Ill the afternoon, when he was Ij^ing quiet, 
 I was once more summoned to see visitors in 
 the dining-room. Mrs. Wembly, knocking 
 cautiously, beckoned me to an interview on 
 the landing, never guessing, honest woman, 
 with what a leap she set my pulses bounding 
 when she told me that two ladies, one of 
 whom desired her to say that she came from 
 Shawbridge, wished to see me. For me there 
 was but one lady in Shawbridge, yet rather 
 had 1 never seen her more than face her now. 
 Then I remembered that only that morning- 
 she had written, and my courage came back 
 to me. She was straightforward, single-eyed 
 in all her ways. Had it been her purpose to 
 come to town, she would have said so. 
 
 Since I need not fear her presence, I cared 
 little whom I might meet ; but in all my 
 guesses I had never lit on little Miss Sophia 
 Green. Yet there she sat, in the worn easy- 
 chair, looking very smart and rather fright- 
 ened, and l^oth pleased and shy. She intro- 
 duced her companion, an elderly, stout, and 
 florid lady, of an amiable aspect, as Mrs.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 337 
 
 Black, a relative wliom slie was visiting, and 
 explained, with a little rush of words, that 
 she had heard from Sliawbridge how ill Mr. 
 Cunningham was, and how she had wished 
 to come at once and ask for him, but did not 
 know where he was living. She turned to 
 the lady, who nodded assent. She was large, 
 and very asthmatical, and sat bolt upright, 
 labouring for breath. 
 
 " Miss Gillespie could have told you,'' T 
 began. 
 
 " Yes," she hesitated, colouring up hotly. 
 
 " Miss Green thought it better to ask Mrs. 
 Laidlaw," said her companion, who had now 
 recovered from the exertion of walking up the 
 steps, and spoke with husky readiness. " I'm 
 told you live in Shawbridge, so I dare say 
 you've heard of her. Her husband and mine 
 were related. " 
 
 " 1 have heard of Mrs, Laidlaw," I said, 
 looking at Miss Sophia, and ex})ecting her 
 to share my amusement ; l)ut she was 
 buttoning and uidjuttoning one of her 
 fdoves with nervous lingers, her head bent. 
 
 VOL. I. 22
 
 338 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 '^ She's as good as the town-crier for 
 news," the visitor continued, with a good- 
 natured smile ; " and we knew she would be 
 able to tell us, if any one could, wdiere poor 
 Frank was hiding." 
 
 " But he isn't hiding," said Miss Sophia, 
 speaking with an effort at ease. 
 
 " No, he isn't hiding," I said, impatient 
 of this petty attempt at mystery. "You 
 could have heard of his progress at the Free 
 Church Manse — at either of the Manses for 
 that matter — any day, and perhaps a more 
 accurate account than even Mrs. Laidlaw 
 could furnish you with.' 
 
 Miss Sophia was annoyed, I could see, at 
 my persistence, but too shy to express her 
 displeasure in words. The old lady nodded 
 at me humorously. 
 
 " Shawbridgc folks are wiser than to give 
 her the go-by," she said ; " they know that 
 they would pay pretty dear for information 
 if they went to any other quarter for it ; 
 but, deary me, what does it matter where 
 we got the address, since here we are, and
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. zi^ 
 
 that poor lad no furtlier off tlian the room 
 over us ! I suppose it wouldn't be possible 
 for us to cheer him up with a little visit ? " 
 
 Miss Sophia's little boot was tapping the 
 carpet ; she bit her lip when I said that 
 visitors were quite out of the question 
 yet. 
 
 " AVell, now, that's a pity; not that I'm 
 very good at climbing stairs, but I'd manage 
 to hirj^le up if it w^ould give him any pleasure. 
 You see, Mr. Fowler, wdien Frank first came 
 to London, my husband bade him look on 
 our house as his home ; Scotch folk cling to 
 each other in the South, and there w^as the 
 Shawbridge connection as well ; and no sou 
 could be more welcome than he when he 
 came out and in ; and what made him 
 chano;e all at once I'm sure I don't know. 
 But I do know that it was a real grief to 
 l)oth Mr. Black and me. Why, you remember 
 the very last time you were with us, Sophia, 
 my dear, what fine times you had together ? " 
 
 '■'■ I don't think that can interest Mr. 
 Fowler," said the girl, distantly.
 
 34 o THE AIISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 "■ Indeed, but it does," I assured her ; " and 
 it explains many things, too." 
 
 Mrs. Black laughed wheezily. 
 
 " Ah, I dare say it does," she assented, as 
 if she shared some amusing secret with me ; 
 ''and perhaps when you tell Frank that the 
 love and welcome are waiting, unchanged, 
 for him, and that his young friend is ready 
 and eager to share his convalescence, you 
 will be able to persuade him to come back 
 to us. We live at Finchley, a very fair 
 imitation of the country, and I am sure the 
 fresh air would be good for him." 
 
 " This is the second time to-day country 
 air has been prescribed for him," I said, 
 watching the red signals mount on Miss 
 Sophia's cheek. "There was a young lady 
 here this morning — an old acquaintance of 
 his " — she looked at me furtively — " who 
 proposed that he should take carriage 
 exercise." 
 
 " Perhaps she proposed to take it with 
 him ! " Miss Sophia tossed her head. 
 
 " I hope she will," I made answer, not
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 341 
 
 uuwilliDg to punish lier. What did she 
 mean by this parade of a secret under- 
 standing with Frank Cunningham — this 
 affectation of a special interest in him and 
 his concerns ? If it was done out of erirlish 
 vanity, to impose on her kindly relative, 
 then it was ill done, and deserved no sort 
 of support from me. 
 
 iNIrs. Black lingered a little to ask some 
 questions as to the course of his illness, and 
 to urge me to use my authority to induce 
 him to go to Finchley. 
 
 I assured her that my influence counted for 
 very little ; but that possibly Dr. Sutherland, 
 as his adviser, might be more successful. No, 
 he was not living here, but he came daily ; 
 he should certainly be told of Mrs. Black's 
 kind offer. 
 
 She let mc help her out of the chair, with 
 a smiling apology for her clumsiness, and 
 escort her to her carriage, where a footman 
 was waiting to ^^ropel her up the sloping 
 gangway. Miss Sophia came Ijchind ; and 
 while the invalid's cushions and footstools
 
 342 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 were being adjusted, she said to me, low 
 and hurriedly — 
 
 " I didn't think you could be so unkind." 
 Then — before I found an appropriate re- 
 joinder — "Who is that girl-— that girl who 
 wants to go out with him % " 
 
 " Mr. Cunningham has a good many ac- 
 quaintances," I said ; " but there is only one 
 lady, so far as I know, to whom he has given 
 the right to question his actions." 
 
 The trouble in her eyes quenched their 
 anger. She looked as if the tears were not 
 far off. 
 
 "Perhaps — you don't know everything. 
 You may be mistaken." 
 
 " No ; but I think I do know where he 
 ought to go when he's stronger — and that 
 isn't to Finchley." 
 
 " Does he take his orders from you ? " she 
 said ; but her attempt at flippancy was a 
 piteous failure. 
 
 "Certainly not. I shouldn't dream of 
 interfering with his decisions." 
 
 I couldn't help smiling grimly to myself
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 343 
 
 as I tliought how futile any such attempt 
 on my part would be. Cunningham had 
 accepted my presence, uuquestioningly, while 
 too ill to care upon whom the task of nursing 
 devolved ; but I had neither sought nor re- 
 ceived the right to question him about his 
 private affairs. 
 
 There was time for no more of this unsatis- 
 factory talk, for Mrs. Black announcing her- 
 self as " settled," Miss Sophia got into the 
 carriage, contenting herself with a little nod 
 of farewell, from her seat on the other side of 
 her large companion. Mrs. Black was more 
 effusive, and entrusted me with a large basket 
 of garden and hot-house produce, which she 
 good-naturedly hoped I would share with the 
 invalid. But I was in no mood for more of 
 his company at the moment, and sent the 
 offering up to him by the hand of the land- 
 lady, while I went out to taste the air, and 
 shake off the unpleasant impression the inter- 
 view had left. 
 
 Looked at from any point of view, Cunning- 
 ham was thoroughly unsatisfactory ; if, as one
 
 344 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 could but suppose, he was engaged in a flirta- 
 tion — to call it by no harsher name — with one 
 girl, while betrothed to another, he was even 
 more of a scamp than I had supposed him to 
 be. It rendered the record ag^ainst him scarce 
 blacker to guess that he had Miss Sophia's 
 fortune in view. That he had succeeded in 
 inspiring her with confidence, the poor little 
 fool took no pains to conceal. I recalled the 
 incident of the letter, and many of her guarded 
 hints read in this new light became clear. But 
 it was not possible to think of her as con- 
 sciously and willingly Nancy's rival. She 
 was too good a girl for that. It was easier to 
 suppose she had been led to believe that 
 Nancy had ceased to have any claims upon 
 this fickle lover. 
 
 Men of his order are the scourge of the 
 world, the more because — inexplicable mystery 
 — they always win the love of the best women. 
 That they do not always keep it scarcely helps, 
 since they are seldom found out till after mar- 
 riage. Why women — whose instincts are so 
 unerring as regards their own sex — so often
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 345 
 
 make a disastrous choice when they bestow 
 their hearts is one of the things a mere man 
 will never understand. But every day you 
 see the manly man mated to the fool, while he 
 who is physically and morally a weakling carries 
 off the highest prize. 
 
 Here were ever so many feminine hearts 
 beating kindly for young Cunningham. Had 
 not Nancy Gillespie given him the treasure 
 of her faithful love % And now little Miss 
 Sophia must needs cry for him ; while the 
 servant wench in his lodgings worshipped the 
 very ground he trod on, and gave of her poor 
 wages to keep him in life, and even the sensible 
 young editress of " Tea-cup Talk " brought him 
 primroses, and took a sisterly interest in his 
 welfare. A sad waste of tenderness it would 
 seem to most men, in whose eyes Master Frank 
 would figure only as a sorry young scamp, 
 who had found principles rather cumbersome 
 luggage, and preferred to travel free. 
 
 I went round to our rooms, but Sutherland 
 was not there. It seemed to me he was very 
 little there now, though when I liad suggested
 
 346 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 
 
 that lie should run over to Paris, as we had 
 planned, he refused. He said that he could 
 amuse himself well enough in London, and 
 would not go without me ; but he did not urge 
 me to join him. 
 
 Perhaps, if he had been very eager, I might 
 have yielded. There was nothing to keep me 
 in town except the possible chance of holding 
 Cunningham up from sliding back into the 
 abyss. It was the only thing I could do for 
 the one woman whom I would have given my 
 life to please, and it was a pity to leave it half 
 done. But Cunningham was convalescent 
 now, and every day would bring some addition 
 to his strength, and one could not always play 
 the part of prop. 
 
 I had not seen Sutherland that day, and 
 wondered where he was ; one or two dainty 
 notes stuck in the frame of the mirror over 
 the mantelpiece gave the clue to some of his 
 movements. The season he despised was as 
 yet some weeks distant, but there is always a 
 certain section of society in town, and he had 
 been drawn in for various little festivities.
 
 THE MISCHIEF-MAKER. 347 
 
 One of the notes, wliicli lie liad redirected to 
 me, was from ]Mrs. Tom Carnegie, asking us both 
 to dinner on the folio wiuo- evcniuo-. For a 
 moment I was strongly tempted to accept it ; 
 to leave my patient to his own devices ; to fall 
 back into the mud if he chose. 
 
 But, if one is wise, one thinks twice before 
 acting on an impulse. I scribbled a message, 
 bidding Sutherland make my excuses to Mrs. 
 Tom, and went back to Cunningham's rooms. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, 
 
 LONDON AND BECCLGS. C, C. fir' Co.
 
 THE LIT>.RARY
 
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