"Marion," said her lover, now greatly agitated and perplexed, "what in all the earth is wrong? Will you not tell _me_, Marion?"
"O Richard, Richard, do not ask me. I cannot, I will not tell you," said the distracted girl.
"Then you desire to make me miserable too, Marion," was the reply.
"No, no, Richard; but I cannot tell you what I know will break your heart, as it has already broken mine. My peace is gone for ever, Richard, but it has gone in a good cause."
"For Heaven"s sake, Marion," said her agonised lover, "tell me, tell me at once what you mean, and do not torture me longer with this strange and unintelligible conduct. It"s not using him well, Marion, who hopes to be more to you, one day, than any other person on the face of the earth."
"Never, Richard!--never, You can never now be more to me than you are at this moment. That"s a" owre, Richard. We maun meet nae mair. I"m gaun to be the wife o" anither."
"Marion!" said Richard, his face now overspread with a deadly paleness, and his lips quivering with emotion, "in G.o.d"s name, what does this mean? Have I done anything to offend you--anything to change your opinion of me?"
"No, no, Richard, you have not," said the weeping girl; "but I maun marry John Maitland, to save my puir father and mother frae ruin--to save them frae bein thrown on the cauld charity o" the warld in quest o"
their bread."
And she now went on to detail the particulars of the situation in which they stood, and concluded by mentioning the promise she had made to her parents to accept of Maitland"s addresses.
Poor Spalding stood the very personification of misery and wretchedness during the recital of these circ.u.mstances, that laid prostrate all his dearest hopes, and wrested from him that happiness which he had fondly believed was within his grasp. For some time he made no reply to, or remark on, what had just been communicated to him; but at length, taking Marion again by the hand.
"Well, Marion," he said, with a strong effort to suppress the emotion with which he was struggling, "this is dreadful news to me; but I do not blame you; or, rather, I cannot but commend you for the step you are going to take, although it be to the destruction of my peace and happiness in this world. But is there no way of averting this evil? Is there no way of saving your father but by your----" Here he suddenly stopped short. His feelings overcame him; and he could not come out with the two words necessary to finish the sentence; he could not bring himself to add, "marrying Maitland."
"Nane, nane, Richard," said Marion, who well knew what he would have said; "there"s nae ither way left us--nane, nane, Richard."
"But," replied the latter, "your father said, Marion, you told me, that he will not ask you to make this sacrifice, until he sees that the factor is determined to proceed against him, and that there is no other means of satisfying his demands. Now, as it will be some days before he can ascertain the former, will ye promise me, Marion, that ye will take all the time that circ.u.mstances will afford you before you commit yourself further with Maitland? Will you promise me this, Marion?--and, in the meantime, I"ll stir heaven and earth to save you from the fate that"s threatening you."
This promise poor Marion readily gave; and, somewhat comforted by it, Richard left the house, to try every method he could think of, to avert the misfortune that threatened him. But, alas! what could he do? Where was he to raise 150 some odds, which was the amount of William Waterstone"s debt to his landlord? Under the excitation of the moment during his interview with Marion, and under the blind and bewildering impulses excited by it, he thought he might, by some means or other, accomplish it. But, on coming to act on the vague and indefinite notions on this subject which first presented themselves to him, he found them burst like soap-bells in his grasp, until even he himself, sanguine as he was, became convinced that the pursuit was hopeless, and that his Marion was indeed lost to him for ever.
In the meantime, the dreaded crisis approached. Step after step had been taken by the factor in the process against William Waterstone, until at length it arrived at a consummation. His effects were sequestrated, and a day of sale announced. Still the poor man entertained hopes that the last and final proceeding would not be had recourse to--that, in short, no sale would actually take place; and in this desperate belief he had still delayed committing himself with Maitland regarding his daughter, although he had dropped some hints to that person of a tendency to encourage his hopes. From this delusion, however, he was now about to be roughly awakened. The day of sale arrived, and with it came the auctioneer; and, as the morning advanced, several persons were seen hovering about at a little distance. These were intending purchasers, whose respect for poor Waterstone, and whose sympathy for his unhappy situation, induced them thus to keep aloof, with the view of saving his feelings as much as possible, until their purpose there should render it necessary for them to approach nearer to the melancholy scene.
These appearances were far too serious to leave the slightest ground for the indulgence of any further hopes from the lenity of the prosecutor; and William Waterstone felt this. He saw now that the sacrifice which he had thus delayed till the twelfth hour must be made--that his daughter must pledge herself to become the wife of John Maitland; and with a heavy heart he now put on his bonnet to go down to that person, to enter into a full and final explanation with regard to this matter, and his own distressed situation. Poor Marion"s doom was now, then, about to be irrevocably sealed. Her father was already at the door, on his way to fix her destiny, when he was suddenly arrested by a person, wrapped up in a travelling mantle, and who was about entering the house at the same moment, seizing him by the hand.
"Father!" exclaimed the apparent stranger.
William Waterstone looked unconsciously for an instant at the person who addressed him. It was his son.
"John!" said the father, at length, coldly, and returning the former"s eager salutation with marked indifference.
"Yes, John," replied his son, in a tone of surprise at his father"s reception of him; "and I thought you would have been more happy than you seem to be to have seen him, father?"
"Why should I be happy to see you, John?" said the latter, gravely.
"What have you done for me that I should rejoice in the sight of you?"
"Not much, father, I confess," rejoined his son; "but I did for you what I could; and it is my intention to do more."
William Waterstone smiled satirically. It was the only reply he vouchsafed. At this moment, John"s mother, who had heard and recognised his voice, rushed out and enfolded her son in her arms.
"My son--my son!" she exclaimed. "Thank G.o.d, I see you once more before I die! Ye"ll explain a" noo. I"m sure, my John, and mak guid your mother"s words."
To her son, part of this address was wholly unintelligible. What explanation was wanted he could not comprehend; and he therefore merely said, smiling as he spoke, that if anything in his conduct wanted explanation he would very readily give it.
"That ye will, my son," said his mother, "to the shame and confusion o"
them that entertained ill thochts o" ye."
"Well, well, mother," replied John, more puzzled than ever--"we"ll put all that to rights, whatever it is, by and by; but, in the meantime, pray tell me what is the meaning of all this?" And he pointed to the collection of farming implements and other articles, which had been placed in front of the house, preparatory to the sale, and which, with some other no less unequivocal circ.u.mstances, but too plainly intimated what was about to take place.
"The meanin o" that, sir," said his father, sternly, "is very sune tell"t. We are gaun to be roupit out the day for arrear o" rent--that"s a"--a thing very easy understood; and ye"re just come in time to see"t.
Just in time," he added, bitterly, "to see your father and mother turned out beggars on the world."
"What! rouped out! beggared!" replied his son, with a look of the utmost consternation. "Then, surely, father, some great and sudden pecuniary misfortune must have befallen you; or there has been grievous mismanagement of some kind or other, to reduce you to this unhappy state."
"Oh no," said the father, in a dry, sarcastic tone, "nae sudden misfortune has befa"en me, nor has there been any mismanagement either.
Naething has happened but what ye a" alang kent very weel about. The arrears o" rent, at least the greater part o" that debt, was standin against me before ye went abroad; and I suppose ye ken very weel that the prices o" farm produce hae been fa"in ever since; so that I dinna see, sir, that ye need be sae very much surprised at my situation as you seem, or pretend to be."
"I do not pretend, father. I a.s.sure you, to be more surprised than I really am," said his son, "and I think I have some reason. Surely what I sent you might have kept you out of debt at any rate."
"What _you_ sent me, sir," rejoined his father, sternly: "I should like to ken what that was." And he again smiled sarcastically. "My troth, my debts wadna hae been ill to pay, if that could hae dune"t."
"And I must say," replied his son, "that they must have been very considerable, and, I will add, more than they ought, if it could not."
"What do you mean, sirrah?" exclaimed William Waterstone, fiercely.
"I mean, father," replied John, now getting displeased in his turn, "that the three hundred pounds, which I have been sending you regularly every year, for the last three years, ought to have placed you in a better situation than I now find you."
"_You_ been sendin me three hundred pounds every year, for the last three years!" said his father, with a look of amazement; and then, suddenly dropping this warmth of expression--"It may be sae, John," he added, coolly and doubtingly, "and I hope, for yer ain sake, ye speak truth; but I hae never seen a farthin o"t."
"What! not of the money I have been remitting you?"
"Not a penny; but, _if_ ye sent me the money, as ye say, John," he added, "how comes it that ye never answered ane o" my letters?"
"Your letters, father!" replied the latter. "Why, you have not written me for the last three years, although I have despatched at least a score of letters to you in that time, and have never had an answer to one of them."
"Never saw ane o" your letters," said William Waterstone, dryly.
"This is a most extraordinary and unaccountable business," exclaimed John.
"Queer aneugh," said his father, coolly, and plainly evincing by his manner that he did not believe a word of what his son had said to him.
"The money I sent you, father," rejoined the young man, "was transmitted you through the house of M., P., L., & Co., Glasgow. My letters were also sent to their care, and how it has happened that neither have reached you I cannot at all conjecture; but I will see into that matter immediately. How were your letters to me sent father?" he added.
"Ou, of course, to thae folks, too," replied the latter. "It was yer ain desire in the last letter I had frae ye."
"So it was, I recollect. Well, we shall have all this explained presently; but, in the meantime, father, let me know what is the amount of the debt that is just now pressing on you, that I may discharge it, and put a stop to these proceedings."
"I"m no sure if we"ll need your a.s.sistance noo," said his father, coldly. "Your sister"s gaun to be married to John Maitland, and I believe he"ll lend me as muckle siller as "ll clear my feet o" this mischief, at ony rate."
"What! my sister going to marry old John Maitland!" said her brother, in amazement. "Impossible! He cannot have been her own free choice."
"I did not say he was," replied his father; "but Marion"s a dutifu child, and would do that and mair to save her father frae ruin. But there she is comin," he added (pointing to Marion, who was now approaching the house, from which she had been absent since her brother"s arrival, of which, therefore, she knew nothing), "and ye may speak to her yersel on the subject."