Whats Mines Mine, vol 3 | Page 8

to the way his fortune was made, and could not consent to share it."
"He would protest himself insulted, and swear, if his money was not good enough for you, neither was his daughter. What then?"
"I would appeal to Mercy."
"She is too young. It would be sad to set one of her years at variance with her family. I almost think I would rather you ran away with her. It is a terrible thing to go into a house and destroy the peace of those relations which are at the root of all that is good in the world."
"I know it! I know it! That is my trouble! I am not afraid of Mercy's courage, and I am sure she would hold out. I am certain nothing would make her marry the man she did not love. But to turn the house into a hell about her--I shrink from that!--Do you count it necessary to provide against every contingency before taking the first step?"
"Indeed I do not! The first step is enough. When that step has landed us, we start afresh. But of all things you must not lose your temper with the man. However despicable his money, you are his suitor for his daughter! And he may possibly not think you half good enough for her."
"That would be a grand way out of the difficulty!"
"How?"
"It would leave me far freer to deal with her."
"Perhaps. And in any case, the more we can honestly avoid reference to his money, the better. We are not called on to rebuke."
"Small is my inclination to allude to it--so long as not a stiver of it seeks to cross to the Macruadh!"
"That is fast as fate. But there is another thing, Alister: I fear lest you should ever forget that her birth and her connections are no more a part of the woman's self than her poverty or her wealth."
"I know it, Ian. I will not forget it."
"There must never be a word concerning them!"
"Nor a thought, Ian! In God's name I will be true to her."
They found Annie of the shop in a sad way. She had just had a letter from Lachlan, stating that he had not been well for some time, and that there was little prospect of his being able to fetch her. He prayed her therefore to go out to him; and had sent money to pay her passage and her mother's.
"When do you go?" asked the chief.
"My mother fears the voyage, and is very unwilling to turn her back on her own country. But oh, if Lachlan die, and me not with him!"
She could say no more.
"He shall not die for want of you!" said the laird. "I will talk to your mother."
He went into the room behind. Ian remained in the shop.
"Of course you must go, Annie!" he said.
"Indeed, sir, I must! But how to persuade my mother I do not know! And I cannot leave her even for Lachlan. No one would nurse him more tenderly than she; but she has a horror of the salt water, and what she most dreads is being buried in it. She imagines herself drowning to all eternity!"
"My brother will persuade her."
"I hope so, sir. I was just coming to him! I should never hold up my head again--in this world or the next--either if I did not go, or if I went without my mother! Aunt Conal told me, about a month since, that I was going a long journey, and would never come back. I asked her if I was to die on the way, but she would not answer me. Anyhow I'm not fit to be his wife, if I'm not ready to die for him! Some people think it wrong to marry anybody going to die, but at the longest, you know, sir, you must part sooner than you would! Not many are allowed to die together!--You don't think, do you, sir, that marriages go for nothing in the other world?"
She spoke with a white face and brave eyes, and Ian was glad at heart.
"I do not, Annie," he answered. "'The gifts of God are without repentance.' He did not give you and Lachlan to each other to part you again! Though you are not married yet, it is all the same so long as you are true to each other."
"Thank you, sir; you always make me feel strong!"
Alister came from the back room.
"I think your mother sees it not quite so difficult now," he said.
The next time they went, they found them preparing to go.
Now Ian had nearly finished the book he was writing about Russia, and could not begin another all at once. He must not stay at home doing nothing, and he thought that, as things were going from bad to worse in the