1 Diah was his thought who first in poison steeped the weapon formed for slaughter. Diah Error is, and worthier of damnation, who instilled the mortal venom in the social cup to fill the veins with death instead of life. Anonymous. Upon my word, Mr. Francis Osbaldestone said, Miss Vernon, with the air of one who thought herself fully entitled to assume the privilege of ironical reproach, which she was pleased to exert, your character improves upon us, sir. I could not have thought that it was in you. Yesterday might be considered as your assay-piece to prove yourself entitled to be free of the corporation of Osbaldestone Hall, but it was a masterpiece. I am quite sensible of my ill-breeding, Miss Vernon, and I can only say for myself that I had received some communications by which my spirits were unusually agitated. I am conscious I was impertinent and absurd. You do yourself great injustice, said the merciless monitor. You have contrived, by what I saw and have since heard, to exhibit in the course of one evening a happy display of all the various masterly qualifications which distinguish your several cousins. The gentle and generous temper of the benevolent rashly, the temperance of Percy, the cool courage of Thorncliffe, John's skill in dog-breaking, Dickon's aptitude to betting, all exhibited by the single individual, Mr. Francis, and that with a selection of time, place and circumstance worthy, a taste and sagacity of the sapient Wilfred. Have a little mercy, Miss Vernon, said I. For I confess I thought of the schooling as severe as the case merited, especially considering from what quarter it came, and forgive me if I suggest as an excuse for follies I am not usually guilty of, the custom of this house and country. I am far from approving of it. But we have Shakespeare's authority for saying that good wine is a good familiar creature, and that any man living may be overtaken at some time. I, Mr. Francis, but he places the panic gyric and the apology in the mouth of the greatest villain his pencil has drawn. I will not, however, abuse the advantage your quotation has given me by overwhelming you with the refutation with which the victim, Cassio, replied to the tempter Iago. I only wish you to know that there is one person, at least, sorry to see a youth of talents and expectations sink into the slough in which the inhabitants of this house are nightly wallowing. I have but wet my shoe. I assure you, Miss Vernon, and am too sensible of the filth of the puddle to step further in. If such be your resolution, she replied, it's a wise one, but I was so much vexed at what I heard that your concerns have pressed before my own.  I beg leave to ask you what it was. I was stupefied. The direct bluntness of the demand was much in the style one gentleman uses to another when requesting explanation of any part of his conduct in a good-humored yet determined manner, and was totally devoid of the circumlocutions, shadings, softenings, and paraphrases which usually accompany explanations between persons of different sexes in the higher orders of society. I remained completely embarrassed for it pressed on my recollection that Rachele's communications, supposing them to be correct, ought to have rendered Miss Vernon rather an object of my compassion than of my perished resentment. And had they furnished the best apology possible for my own conduct, still I must have had the utmost difficulty in detailing what inferred such a necessary and natural offense to Miss Vernon's feelings. She observed my hesitation and proceeded in a tone somewhat more crematory but still temperate and gentle. I hope Mr. Orr's baldy stone does not dispute my title to request this explanation. I have no relative who can protect me. It is therefore just that I be permitted to protect myself.  She suffered me to exhaust my apologies and fairly to run myself aground, listening all the while with a smile of absolute incredulity. And now, Mr. Francis, having gone through your prologue of excuses, with the same bad grace with which all prologues are delivered, please to draw the curtain and show me that which I desire to see in a word. Let me know what Rachele says of me, for he is the grand engineer and first mover of all the machinery of our baldy stone hall. But supposing there was anything to tell him, is Vernet. What does he deserve that betrays the secrets of one ally to another? Rachele, you yourself told me, remained your ally, though no longer your friend. I have neither patience nor evasion nor inclination for jesting on the present subject. Rachele cannot, ought not, dare not hold any language respecting me, Diana Vernet. But what I may demand to be repeated, that there are subjects of secrecy and confidence between us is most certain, but to such his communications to you could have no relation, and with such I, as an individual, have no concern. I had by this time recovered my presence of mind, and hastily determined to avoid making any disclosure of what Rachele had told me in a sort of confidence. There was something unworthy in retailing private conversation. It could, I thought, do no good and must necessarily give Miss Vernet great pain. I therefore replied gravely, that nothing but frivolous talk had passed between Mr. Rachele of Spaldestone and me on the state of the family at the hall, and I protested that nothing had been said which left a serious impression to her disadvantage. As a gentleman, I said, I could not be more explicit in reporting private conversation. She started up with the animation of a Camilla about to advance into battle. This shall not serve your turn, sir. I must have another answer from you. Her features kindled, her brow became flushed, her eyes glanced wildfire as she proceeded. I demand such an explanation, as a woman basely slended as a right to demand from every man who calls himself a gentleman, as a creature, motherless, friendless, alone in the world, left to her own guidance and protection, as a right to require from every being having a happier lot, in the name of that God who sent them into the world to enjoy and hurt and suffer. You shall not deny me, or, she added, looking solemnly upwards, you will rue your denial, if there is justice for wrong, either on earth or in heaven. I was utterly astonished at her vehemence, but felt, thus conjured, that it became my duty to lay aside scrupulous delicacy and gave her, briefly but distinctly, the heads of the information which Rachele had conveyed to me.  The first word which occurs to you is the plainest and must be the best. Do not think of my feelings, but speak, as you would, to an unconcerned third party. Thus urged and encouraged I, stammered through all the account which Rachele had given of her early contract to Marianne as baldestone, and of the uncertainty and difficulty of her choice. And there I would willingly have paused, but her penetration discovered that there was still something behind and even guessed to what it related. Well, it was ill-natured of Rachele to tell this tale on me. I am like the poor girl in the fairy tale who was betrothed in her cradle to the black bear of Norway, but complained chiefly of being called Bruins bride by her companions at school. But besides all this, Rachele said something of himself with relation to me. Did he not? Well, he certainly hinted that were it not for the idea of supplanting his brother, he would now, in consequence of his change of profession, be desirous that the word Rachele should fill up the blank in the dispensation of the set of the word Thorncliffe. Ah, indeed, she replied, was he so very condescending, too much honour for his humble handmaid, Diana Vernon, and she, I suppose, was to be enraptured with joy. Could such a substitute be affected? Well, to confess the truth, he intimated it as much, and even farther insinuated it. What? Let me hear it all, she exclaimed hastily. Well, that he had broken off your mutual intimacy, lest it should have given rise to an affection by which his destination to the church would not permit him to profit. Well, I am obliged to him for his consideration, replied Miss Ferner. Every feature of her fine countenance taxed to express the most supreme degree of scorn and contempt. She paused a moment and then said with her usual composure, There is but little I have heard from you which I did not expect to hear, and which I ought not to have expected, because baiting one circumstance it's all very true. But as there are some poisons so active that a few drops it said will infect a whole fountain, so there is one falsehood in Rashly's communication, powerful enough to corrupt the whole well in which truth herself is said to have dwelt, it is the leading and foul falsehood that, knowing Rashly as I have reasoned too well to know him, any circumstance on earth could make me think of sharing my lot with him. No, she continued with the sort of inward shuddering that seemed to express involuntary horror. Any lot, rather than that. The sot, the gambler, the bully, the jockey, the insensate fool were a thousand times preferable to Rashly. The confet, the jail, the grave shall be welcomed before them all. There was a sad and melancholy cadence in her voice corresponding with the strange and interesting romance of her situation. So young, so beautiful, so untaught, so much abandoned to herself and deprived of all the support which the sex derives from the countenance and protection of female friends, and even of that degree of defense which arises from the forms with which the sex are approached in civilized light. It's a scarce metaphorical to say that my heart bled for her. Yet there was an expression of dignity in her contempt of ceremony of upright feeling in her disdain of falsehood, a firm resolution in the manner in which she contemplated the dangers by which she was surrounded, which blended my pity with the warmest admiration. She seemed a princess deserted by her subjects and deprived of her power, yet still scorning those formal regulations of society which are created for persons of an inferior rank, and amid her difficulties relying boldly and confidently on the justice of heaven and the unshaken constancy of her own mind. I offered to express the mingled feelings of sympathy and admiration with which her unfortunate situation and her high spirit combined to impress me, but she imposed silence on me at once. I told you in jest, she said, that I disliked compliments. I now tell you in earnest that I do not ask sympathy, and that I despise consolation. What I have borne, I have borne. What I am to bear, I will sustain as I may. No word of commiseration can make a burden feel any feather weights lighter to the slave who must carry it. There is only one human being who could have assisted me, and that is he who has rather chosen to add to my embarrassment. Rashley Osvaldo Stone. Yes, the time once was that I might have learned to love that man, but great God! The purpose for which he insinuated himself into the confidence of one already so forlorn. The undeviating and continued assiduity with which he pursued that purpose from year to year without one single monetary pause of remorse or compassion. The purpose for which he would have converted into poison in the food he administered to my mind. Gracious Providence! What should I have been in this world and the next in body and soul had I fallen under the arts of this accomplished villain? I was so much struck with the scene of perfidious treachery with which these words disclosed that I rose from my chair hardly knowing what I did, laid my hand on the hilt of my sword, and was about to leave the apartment in search of him on whom I might discharge my just indignation. Almost breathless, and with eyes and looks in which scorn and indignation had given way to the most lively alarm, Miss Vernon threw herself between me and the door of the apartment. Stay, she said, stay! However, just to your resentment, you do not know half the secrets of this fearful prison house.  He bears a charmed life. You cannot assail him without endangering other lives and wider destruction. Had it been otherwise in some hour of justice he had hardly been safe, even from this weak hand. I told you, she said, motioning me back to my seat, that I needed no comforter. I now tell you I need no avenger. I resumed my seat mechanically, musing on what she said, and recollecting also what had escaped me in my first glow of resentment, that I had no title of whatever to constitute myself Miss Vernon's champion. She paused to let her own emotions and minds subside, and then addressed me with more composure. I have already said that there is a mystery connected with rashly, of a dangerous and fatal nature, villain as he is, and as he knows he stands convicted in my eyes. I cannot, I dare not, openly break with or defy him. You, also, Mr. Oswaldestown, must bear with him, with patience, foil his artifices by opposing to them prudence, not violence, and above all, you must avoid such scenes as that of last night, which cannot but give him perilous advantages over you. This caution I designed to give you, and it was the object with which I desired this interview, but I have extended my confidence farther than I proposed. I assured her that it was not misplaced. I do not believe that it is, she replied. You have that in your face and manners which authorizes trust. Let us continue to be friends. You need not fear, she said, laughing while she blushed a little, yet speaking with a free and unembarrassed voice. You need not fear that friendship with us should prove only a specious name, as the poet says, for another feeling. I belong in habits of thinking and acting rather to your sex, with which I have always been brought up than to my own. Besides, the fatal veil was wrapped around me in my cradle, for you may easily believe I have never thought of the detestable condition under which I may remove it. The time, she added, for expressing my final determination, has not arrived, and I would feign have the freedom of wild heath and open air with the other commoners of nature, as long as I can be permitted to enjoy them. And now that the passage in Dante has made so clear prey, go and see what has become of the Badger Baiters, my headaches so much that I cannot join the party. I left the library, but not to join the hunters. I felt that a solitary walk was necessary to compose my spirit, before I again trusted myself in Rashley's company, whose depth of calculating villainy had been so strikingly exposed to me. In Duborg's family, as he was of the reformed persuasion, I had heard many a tale of Romish priests who gratified at the expense of friendship, hospitality, and the most sacred ties of social life, those passions, the blameless indulgence of which is denied by the rules of their order. But the deliberate system of undertaking the education of a deserted orphan of noble birth, and so intimately allied to his own family, with the perfidious purpose of ultimately seducing her, detailed as it was by the intended victim with all the glow of virtuous resentment, seemed more atrocious to me than the worst of the tales I had heard at Bordeaux. And I felt it would be extremely difficult for me to meet Rashley, and yet to suppress the abhorrence with which he impressed me. Yet this was absolutely necessary, not only on account of the mysterious charge which Diana had given me, but because I had in reality no ostensible ground for quarreling with him. I therefore resolved as far as possible to meet Rashley's dissimulation with equal caution on my part during our residence in the same family, and when he should depart for London, I resolved to give Owen at least such a hint of his character as might keep him on his guard over my father's interests. Averous or ambition I thought might have as great or greater charms for a mind constituted like Rashley's than unlawful pleasure. The energy of his character and his power of assuming all seeming good qualities were likely to procure him a high degree of confidence, and it was not to be hoped that either good faith or gratitude would prevent him from abusing it. The task was somewhat difficult especially in my circumstances, since the caution which I threw out might be imputed to jealousy of my rival, or rather my successor in my father's favour. Yet I thought it absolutely necessary to frame such a letter, leaving it to Owen, who in his own line was wary, prudent and circumspect, to make the necessary use of his knowledge of Rashley's true character. Such a letter, therefore, I indicted and dispatched it to the post-house by the first opportunity. At my meeting with Rashley, he as well as I appeared to have taken up distant ground, and to be disposed to avoid all pretext for collision. He was probably conscious that Miss Vernon's communications had been unfavorable to him, though he could not know that they extended to discovering his meditated villainy towards her. Our intercourse, therefore, was reserved on both sides and turned on subjects of little interest. Indeed, his stay at Osboldestone Hall did not exceed a few days after this period, during which I only remarked two circumstances respecting him. The first was the rapid and almost intuitive matter in which his powerful and active mind seized upon and arranged the elementary principles necessary to his new profession, which he now studied hard, and occasionally made parade of his progress, as if to show me how light it was for him to lift the burden which I had flung down from very weariness and inability to carry it. The other remarkable circumstance was that notwithstanding the injuries with which Miss Vernon charged Rashley, they had several private interviews together of considerable length, although their bearing toward each other in public did not seem more cordial than usual. When the day of Rashley's departure arrived, his father bade him farewell with indifference, his brothers with the ill-concealed glee of schoolboys who see their taskmaster depart for a season, and feel a joy which they dare not express, and I, myself, with cold politeness, when he approached Miss Vernon and would have saluted her, she drew back with the look of what he disdained, but said as she extended her hand to him, Farewell, Rashley. God reward you for the good you have done, and forgive you for the evil you have meditated. Amen, my dear cousin, he replied with an air of sanctity which belonged, I thought, to the seminary of St. Homer's. Happy is he whose good intentions have borne fruit in deeds, and whose evil thoughts have perished in the blossom. These were his parting words. Accomplished hypocrites said Miss Vernon to me as the door closed behind him. How nearly can what we most despise and hate approach an outward manner to that which we most venerate? I had written to my father by Rashley, and also a few lines to O. N. besides the confidential letter which I have already mentioned, and which I thought it more proper and prudent to dispatch by another conveyance. In these epistles it would have been natural for me to have pointed out to my father and to my friend that I was at present in a situation where I could improve myself in no respect, unless in the mysteries of hunting and hawking, and where I was not unlikely to forget in the company of rude grooms and horse-boys any useful knowledge or elegant accomplishments which I had hitherto acquired. It would also have been natural that I should have expressed the disgust and tedium which I was likely to feel among beings whose whole souls were centered in field sports or more degrading pastimes, that I should have complained of the habitual intemperance of the family in which I was a guest, and the difficultly and almost resentment with which my uncles, Sir Hildebrand, received any apology for deserting the bottle. This last, indeed, was a topic on which my father, himself a man of severe temperance, was likely to be easily alarmed, and to have touched upon this spring would, to a certainty, have opened the doors of my prison house, and would either have been the means of abridging my exile, or at least would have procured me a change of residence during my rustication. I say, my dear Trasham, that considering how very unpleasant a prolonged residence at a baldest-on-haul must have been to a young man of my age and with my habits, it might have seemed very natural that I should have pointed out all these disadvantages to my father in order to obtain his consent for leaving my uncle's mansion. Nothing, however, is more certain than that I did not say a single word to this purpose in my letters to my father and Owen. If a baldest-on-haul had been Athens in all its pristine glory of learning, and inhabited by sages, heroes, and poets, I could not have expressed less inclination to leave it. If thou hast any of the salt of youth left in the Trasham, thou wilt be at no loss to account for my silence on a topic seemingly so obvious. Miss Vernon's extreme beauty of which she herself seemed so little conscious, her romantic and mysterious situation, the evils to which she was exposed, the courage with which she seemed to face them, her manners more frank than belonging to her sex, yet as it seemed to me exceeding in frankness only from the dauntless consciousness of her innocence. Above all, the obvious and flattering distinction which she made in my favor over all other persons were at once calculated to interest my best feelings, to excite my curiosity, awaken my imagination, and gratify my vanity. I dared not indeed confess to myself the depth of the interest with which Miss Vernon inspired me, or the large share which she occupied in my thoughts. We read together, walked together, rowed together, and say together. The studies which she had broken off upon her quarrel with Rashley she now resumed under the auspices of a tutor whose views were more sincere, though his capacity was far more limited. In truth I was by no means qualified to assist her in the prosecution of several profound studies which she had commenced with Rashley, and which appeared to me more fitted for a churchman than for a beautiful female. Neither can I conceive with what view he should have engaged Diana in the gloomy maze of causal history which schoolmen called philosophy, or in the equally abstruse, though more certain, sciences of mathematics and astronomy, unless it were to break down and confound in her mind the difference and distinction between the sexes, and to habituate her to trains of subtle reasoning by which he might at his own time invest that which is wrong with the color of that which is right. It was in the same spirit, though in the latter case the evil purpose was more obvious, that the lessons of Rashley had encouraged Miss Vernon in setting at naught and despising the forms and ceremonial limits which are drawn around females in modern society. It is true she was sequestered from all female company and could not learn the usual rules of decorum, either from example or precept. Yet such was her innate modesty and accurate sense of what was right and wrong, that she would not of herself have adopted the bold, uncompromising manner which struck me with so much surprise on our first acquaintance, had she not been led to conceive that a contempt of ceremony indicated at once superiority of understanding and the confidence of conscious innocence. Her wily instructor had no doubt his own views in leveling those outworks which reserve and caution erect around virtue. But for these, and for his other crimes, he has long since answered that a higher tribunal. Besides the progress which Miss Vernon, whose powerful mind readily adopted every means of information offered to it, had made in more abstract science, I found her no contemptible linguist, and well acquainted both with ancient and modern literature. Were it not that strong talents will often go farthest when they seem to have least assistance, it would be almost incredible to tell the rapidity of Miss Vernon's progress in knowledge, and it was still more extraordinary when her stock of mental acquisitions from books was compared with her total ignorance of actual life. It seemed as if she saw and knew everything except what passed in the world around her, and I believe it was this very ignorance and simplicity of thinking upon ordinary subjects, so strikingly contrasted with her fund of general knowledge and information, which rendered her conversation so irresistibly fascinating and riveted the attention to whatever she said or did, since it was absolutely impossible to anticipate whether her next word or action was to display the most acute perception or the most profound simplicity. The degree of danger which necessarily attended a youth of my age and keen feelings from remaining in close and constant intimacy with an object so amiable and so peculiarly interesting, all who remember their own sentiments at my age may easily estimate. CHAPTER XIV Young lamp, its line of quivering light, shoots from my lady's bower, but why should beauty's lamp be bright at midnight's lonely hour? An old ballad. The mode of life at Osbaldestone Hall was too uniform to admit a description. Diana Vernon and I enjoyed much of our time in our mutual studies. The rest of the family killed theirs in such sports and pastimes as suited the seasons, in which we also took a share. My uncle was a man of habits, and by habit became so much accustomed to my presence and mode of life that upon the whole he was rather fond of me than otherwise. I might probably have risen yet higher in his good graces had I employed the same arts for that purpose which we used by Ratchley, who, availing himself of his father's disinclination to business, had gradually insinuated himself into the management of his property. But although I readily gave my uncle the advantage of my pen and my arithmetic so often as he desired to correspond with a neighbor, more settled with a tenant, and was insofar a more useful inmate in his family than any of his sons, yet I was not willing to oblige Sir Hildebrand by relieving him entirely from the management of his own affairs, so that while the good night admitted that Nevoie Frank was instead a handy lad, he seldom failed to remark in the same breath that he did not think he should have missed Ratchley so much as he was like to do. As it is particularly unpleasant to reside in a family where we are at variance within a part of it, I made some efforts to overcome the ill will which my cousins entertained against me. I exchanged my laced hat for a jocky cab and made some progress in their opinion. I broke a young colt and a manna which carried me further into their good graces, a better-to-opportunity lost to Dickon, and an extra health pledged with Percy, placed me on an easy and familiar footing with all the young squires, except Thorncliffe. I have already noticed the dislike entertained against me by this young fellow who, as he had rather more sense, had also a much worse temper than any of his brethren, sullen, dogged, and quarrelsome. He regarded my residence at Al's Balderstone Hall as an intrusion, and viewed with envious and jealous eyes my intimacy with Diana Vernon, whom the effect proposed to be given to a certain family compact assigned to him as an intended spouse, that he loved her could scarcely be said, at least without much misapplication of the word, but he regarded her as something appropriated to himself and resented internally the inference which he knew not how to prevent or interrupt. I attempted a tone of conciliation towards Thorncliffe on several occasions, but he rejected my advances with a manner about as gracious as that of a growling mastiff when the animal shuns and resents as strangers attempt to caress him. I therefore abandoned him to his ill-humor and gave myself no further trouble about the matter. Such was the footing upon which I stood with the family at Al's Balderstone Hall, but I ought to mention another of its inmates with whom I occasionally held some discourse. This was Andrew Fair Service, the gardener who, since he had discovered that I was a Protestant, rarely suffered me to pass him without proffering his scotch mull with his social pinch. There were several advantages attending this courtesy in the first place. It was made at no expense for I never took snuff, and secondly it afforded an excellent apology to Andrew who was not particularly fond of hard labor for laying aside his spade for several minutes. But above all, these brief interviews gave Andrew an opportunity of inventing the news he had collected, or the satirical remarks which his crude northern humor suggested. I am saying, sir, he said to me one evening with a face obviously charged with intelligence. I have it down at the Trenley Knoll. Well, Andrew, and I suppose you heard some news at the alehouse. Now, sir, I never ganged to the alehouse. That's unless my neighbor was to give me a pint or the like of that. But to gang there on end's own court-tale is a waste of precious time and hard one-siller. But I was doing at the Trenley Knoll, as I was saying, about a wee bit business of my hand with Matty Simpson, that once a for-pitter-tois appears that'll never be missed in the alehouse. And when we're at the thrangest of our bargain, who should come in but paint McCrady the traveling merchant? Peddler, I suppose you mean? And as your honor likes to call him. But it's a creditable call and a game-fan that has been laying in yours, Barafolk. Bates a faraway cousin of mine, and we were blithe to meet with him another.  By do we, by do we, you Sotherans are aah-and-sitter-herry. And this is something concerns yourself, and you want to take patience to hear, you. Dill-a-drop-a-yield did paid off for me. But Matty Gaea's bath-a-drop can skim milk. And ain't honor a thick-head, Chonix, and that was as what and raw as a divot. Ah, for the bunny-giddle-kicks of the north. And Sabre sat down and took out our clay-vers. I wish you'd take them out just now. Great, tell me the news if you have got any worth telling, for I can't stop you all night. Then I came on, ain't the folk in London honor a clean wood about this bit-job in the north here? Clean wood? What's that? Ah, just real daft. Neither to harden it, to bind a herdy-gherdy, clean through either the dales' own jock-wobster. But what does all this mean? Or what business have I with the devil or Jack Webster? Huh! said Andrew, looking extremely knowing. It's just because just that the deridoms are bought here on Mons-Portmante. Who's portmante, or what do you mean? Huh, trust the man Morris's that he said he lost yonder. But if it's in all your honor's affair, as little as it is mine, I want to lose this gracious evening. And as if suddenly seized with a violent fit of industry, Andrew began to labor most diligently. My attention, as the crafty knave had foreseen, was now arrested and unwilling at the same time to acknowledge any particular interest in that affair by asking direct questions. I stood waiting till the spirit of voluntary communication should again prompt him to resume his story. Andrew dug on manfully and spoke at intervals but nothing to the purpose of Mr. McCready's news. And I stood and listened, cursing him in my heart and desirous at the same time to see how long his humor of contradiction would prevail over his desire of speaking upon the subject which was obviously uppermost in his mind.  Muckled good may do them. And sit like dung as the grave has gained me. It should be wheat's today, or they can at the worst ought. And its pays-dirt has visionless as shucky stains. But the Huntsman guides as he likes about the stableyard, and he's seldom the best of the litter I's warrant. Ah, but how soever we monoloss a turn of the Saturday at Hame, for the waters sail broken. And if there's a fairer day in seven Sunday sure to come and lick it up. How some ever I'm no denying that it may settle, if it be Heaven's will, till Monday morning. And what's the use of my break in my back at this rate? I think I'll eno I Hame for yon's the curfew as they cower at Jolin in Bell. Accordingly, applying both his hands to his spade, he pitched it upright on the trench which he had been digging, and looking at me with the air of superiority of one who knows himself possessed of important information, which he may communicate or refuse at his pleasure, pulled down the sleeves of his shirt, and walked slowly toward his coat, which lay carefully folded upon a neighboring garden seat. I must pay the penalty of having interrupted the tiresome rascal thought out of myself, and even gratify Mr. Fair service by taking his communication on his own terms. Then, raising my voice, I addressed him. And after all, Andrew, what are these London news you have from your kinsmen, the traveling merchant? The Peddler yon are means, retorted Andrew, but kaha what you were, there are great convenience in a countryside that's got a buttertowns like this Northumberland. That's not the case now in Scotland. There's the Kingdom of Fife. It's just like a great combined city. See, many royal boroughs yoked on end to end, like ropes of Engans and, with their high streets and their bullets, and they don't, and their crams and houses of stain and lime and four-stairs. Kirkely the cellar is longer than any town in England. Oh, I dare say it's all very splendid and very fine, but you were talking of the London news a little while ago, Andrew. I replied, Andrew, but I did not think your honour cared to hear about them. Howsoever, he continued grinning a ghastly smile. Pat McCready does say that they are a mysterious abound in their Parliament House about this oratory of Mr. Morris, or whatever they call a cheer. In the House of Parliament, Andrew, how came they to mention it there? Oh, that's just what I said debate. If it like your honour, I'll tell you the very words. It's no worth taking a lie for the matter. Pat said, I wanted to let the lords and lairots and gentles at London with the carol in his wadis.  They sat dorsely down and made laws for a hailed country and can wreck and never flushed their beards about things that were competent to the judge ordered an air of the bones. I think, said I, that if a care-wife bowed off at a neighbour as much, they would have it dweigh some of them into the Parliament House or London. It's just, said I. And Mr. Silly is our old daft lair in his Gomerals of Sons, with his huntsmen and his hounds and his hunting cattle and whore, and the riding hailed days after a bit-beast that went away socks-pounds when they catched it. You argued most admirably, Andrew, said I, willing to encourage him to get into the marrow of his intelligence. And what, said Pete? Oh, he said, what better could be expected of a weaned pock-potten English folk. But, as to the robbery, it's like that when there are the thrang of their weak and tory-wark, and can't aim any other, they like unhinged blaggards. Up gets a ling-tongued sheild, and he says, that how the north of England were rang Jacobites, and, quietly, he wasn't far wrong, maybe, and that they had levied a maced open war, and a king's messenger had been stopped and rubbed it on the highway, and that the best blood in Northumberland had been at the doing of it, and Mickle-goed ten-a-fem, and money-valuable papers, and that there was an air-address to be gotten by a mead of law for the first dresses of the peace that the rubbed man gave to. He had funned the twirloons that did the deed-bearling and drinkin' with him.  And the justice took the word of the dain for the comparance of the tither, and that they in-gay him a leg-bale, and the honest man that had lost his sciller was feigned to leave the country for fear that war had come of it. Can this really be true, said I? It's where as it's as true as that his ale-wand is a liard long, and so it is just a-batin' an inch, that it may meet the English measure. And when the shield had set his warrest, there was a terrible cry for the names and outcome here with his man Morris's name, and your uncles and squire-angle-woods and other folks beside, looking sly at me, and then another dragon-a-shield got up on the other side and said, What day accuse the best gentleman in the land on the oath of a broken coward? For it's like that Morris had been drummed out of the army operon, running away in flinders, and he said it was like the story had been made up between the minister and him, or even he had left London, and that if there was to be a search warrant, granted he thought the sciller didn't want to be found some gate near to St. James Palace. Ah, well, they trailed up Morris to their bar as they caught, to see what he could say to the job, and the folk that were getting him gave him sick and awful throgan about his running away, and about all the ill he had ever done or said for all the poor part of his life, that panties said he looked mayorer like a dead man than a living, and they couldn't get a word of the sense out of him, for downright fright at their growling and routin'.  And how did it all end, Andrew? Did your friend happen to learn? Oh, pah-pah-hi! But how's his walk is in this country? Paint but off his journey for the space of a weaker thereby because it would be acceptable to his customers to bring down the news. It's just a gate half like moonshine and water. The fellow that began it drew in his horns and said that though he believed a man had been rubbed, yet he had acknowledged he might have been mistaken in his particulars. And then the other sheila got up and said he cared not whether Morris was robbed or no, provided it was not to become a stain on only gentlemen's honour and reputation, especially in the north of England, for said he before them, I come for the north myself, and I care not how bootle-whackens it. And this is what they got explaining. The ten gears up a bit and the tither gears up a bit and a friend's again. Ah, well, after the Commons Parliament had tugged and riveted and ruggeded Morris and his rubbery till they were tired of the Lord's Parliament, they behoved to hey their spell-out. In pure old Scotland's Parliament they say to gather, cheek-punch over, and then they did no need to hey the same blithers twice over again. But till their lordships went who has muckled teeth and good-wheel, as if the matter had been a speck and a span new. For by there was something said about the end-cambrel, that's who'd have been concerned in the rubbery mirrorless, and that he would have had a warrant for the Duke of Argyle as a testimonial of his character. And this put McCallan Moore as bearded in a blaze, as good a reason there was. And he got up on an uncool bang and guarded them a look about them and what a rammet even done their throats. There was never any of the cambels, but was as white-wise, as fair as they'd trust, as all shall John the Graham. Now, if your honor's sure here, Arnaugh, drapes blood akin to a cambrel, as I am named myself, so far as I can count my kin, but I had it counted for me. I'll give you my mind on that matter. You may be assured I have no connection, whatever, with any gentleman of that name. Oh, then we may speak it quietly among ourselves. There's a base, good and bad, all the cambels. They're like other names. But this McCallan Moore has an uncool sway and say, Beth, among the great folk at London even now. For he cannot precisely be said to belong to any of the twarsides of them. Say, deal any of them, likes to quarrel with him. See, they invoted Morris's tale of false column-ness libel as they cut. And if you hadn't again them leg-veh tain the air on the pillory for lease-making. So speaking, Honest Andrew collected his dibbles, spades, and hose and threw them into a wheel-barrel, leisurely, however, and allowed me full-time to put any further questions which might occur to me before he trundled them off to the tool-house, there to repose during the ensuing day. I thought it best to speak out at once less suppose there were more weighty reasons for my silence than actually existed. I should like to see this countryman of yours, Andrew, and to hear his news from himself directly. You have probably heard that I had some trouble from the impertinent folly of this man Morris. Andrew grinned a most significant grin. And I should wish to see your cousin the merchant to ask him the particulars of what he heard in London if it could be done without much trouble. Nathan Marys, Andrew, he is Andrew, sir, and but a hint to his cousin that I wanted to pair her to our hose and he would be with me as fast as he could lay leg to the ground. Oh, yes, assure him I shall be your customer, and as the night is, as you say, settled and fair, I shall walk in the garden until he comes. The moon will soon rise over the fells. You may bring him to the little back gate and I shall have pleasure in the meantime in looking on the bushes and evergreens of a moonlight. Vara right, vara right, that's what I have often said. A kale dale or a cauliflower of glances, say, legly by moonlight. It's like a lady and her diamonds. So, saying, often went Andrew fair service with great glee. He had to walk about two miles, a labour he undertook with the greatest pleasure in order to secure to his kinsmen the sale of some articles of his trade, though it is probable he would not treat him to a court of ale. The goodwill of an Englishman would have displayed itself in a manner exactly the reverse of Andrew's, or I, as I paced along the smooth-cut velvet walks, which, emboured with high hedges of hue and of holly, intersected the ancient garden of Oswald Stone Hall. As I turned to retrace my steps, it was natural that I should lift up my eyes to the windows of the old library, which, small in size, but several in number, gave me the second story of that side of the house which now faced me. Light glanced from their casements. I was not surprised at this, for I knew Miss Vernon often sat there of an evening, though from motives of delicacy I put a strong restraint upon myself, and never sought to join her at a time when I knew all the rest of the family being engaged for the evening. Our interviews must necessarily have been strictly teta-tate. In the mornings we usually read together in the same room, but then it often sounds entered to seek some parchment to a decimal that could be converted into a fishing-book. Despite its gildings and illumination, more to tell us of some sport toward, or from mere want of knowing where else to dispose of themselves. In short, in the mornings the library was a sort of public room where man and woman might meet as on neutral ground. In the evening it was very different and read in a country where much attention has paid, or was at least then paid to be un-science. I was desirous to think from Miss Vernon concerning those points of propriety where her experience did not afford her the means of thinking for herself. I made her therefore comprehend as delicately as I could that when we had evening lessons the presence of a third party was proper. Miss Vernon first laughed, then blushed and was disposed to be displeased, and then suddenly checking herself said, I believe you are very right and when I feel inclined to be a very busy scholar I will bribe old Martha with a cup of tea to sit by me and be my screen. Martha, the old housekeeper, partook of the taste of the family at the hall. A toast and tankard would have pleased her better than all the tea in China. However, as the use of this beverage was then confined to the higher ranks Martha felt some vanity in being asked of her partake of it and by dint of a great deal of sugar many words scarcely sweet and abundance of toast and butter she was sometimes prevailed upon to give us her countenance. On other occasions the servants almost unanimously shunned the lime rara after nightfall because it was their foolish pleasure to believe that it lay on the haunted side of the house. The more timorous had seen sights and heard sounds there when all the rest of the house was quiet the inquires were far from having any wish to enter these formidable precincts after nightfall without necessity. That the library had at one time been a favorite resource of rashly that a private door out of one side of it communicated with a sequestered and remote apartment which he chose for himself, rather increased than disarmed the terrors which the household had for the dreaded library of Osbol to Stonehall. His extensive information as to what passed in the world found a knowledge of science of every kind. A few physical experiments which he occasionally showed off were in a house of so much ignorance and bigotry, esteemed good reasons for supposing him endowed with powers over the spiritual world. He understood Greek, Latin, and Hebrew, and therefore according to the apprehension and in the phrase of his brother Wilfred, need not care for geist or bargeist devil or dobe that the servants persisted that they had heard him hold conversations in the library when every varsal soul in the family were gone to bed and that he spent the night in watching for bogals and the morning in sleeping in his bed when he should have been heading the hounds like a true Osbol to Stone. All these absurd rumors I had heard in broken hints and imperfect sentences from which I was left to draw the inference and as easily may be supposed I laughed them to scorn but the extreme solitude to which this chamber of evil fame was committed every night after curfew time was an additional reason why I should not intrude on Miss Vernon when she chose to sit there in the evening to resume what I was saying I was not surprised to see a glimmer of light from the library windows but I was a little struck when I distinctly perceived the shadows of two persons pass along and intercept the light from the first of the windows throwing the casement for a moment into shade that must be old Martha, thought I whom Diana had as engaged to be her companion for the evening or I must have been mistaken and taken Diana's shadow for a second person No, by heaven it appears on the second window two figures distinctly traced and now it's lost again it is seen on the third, on the fourth the darken forms of two persons distinctly seen in each window as they pass along the room the twix to the windows and the light whom can Diana have got for a companion? the passage of the shadows between the lights and the casements was twice repeated as if to satisfy me that my observation served me truly after which the lights were extinguished and the shades, of course, were seen no more trifling as this circumstance was it occupied my mind for a considerable time I did not allow myself to suppose that my friendship for Miss Vernon had any directly selfish view yet it's incredible the displeasure I felt at the idea of her admitting anyone to private interviews at a time and in a place where for her own sake I had been at some trouble to show her that it was improper for me to meet with it silly, romping and courageable girls said I to myself on whom all good advice and delicacy are thrown away I have been cheated by the simplicity of her manner which I suppose she can assume just as she could a straw bonnet were it the fashion for the mere sake of celebrity I suppose not withstanding the excellence of her understanding the society of half a dozen of clowns to play at whisk and swabbers would give her more pleasure than if Ariosto himself were to awake from the dead this reflection came the more powerfully across my mind because having mustered up courage to show to Diana my version of the first books of Ariosto I had requested her to invite Martha to a tea party in the library in the evening to which arrangement Miss Vernon had refused her consent alleging some apology which I thought frivolous at the time I had not long speculated on this disagreeable subject when the back garden door opened and the figures of Andrew and his countrymen bending under his back crossed the moonglet alley and called my attention elsewhere I found Mr. McCready as I expected a tough, suggestive, long-headed scotchman a collector of news both from choice and profession he was able to give me a distinct account of what had passed on the House of Commons and House of Lords on the affair of Morris which it appeared had been made by both parties a touchstone to ascertain the temper of the parliament it appeared also that as I had learned from Andrew by second hand the ministry had proved too weak to support a story involving the character of men of rank and importance and resting upon the credit of a person in different fame as Morris who was moreover confused and contradictory in his mode of telling the story McCready was even able to supply me with a copy of a printed journal or a newsletter seldom extending beyond the capital in which the substance of the debate was mentioned and with a copy of the Duke of Argyle's Speech printed upon a broadside of which he had purchased several from the hawkers because he said it would be a saleable article on the north of the tweed the first was a meager statement full of blanks and asterisks in which added little or nothing to the information I had from the Scotchman and the Duke's Speech, though spirited and eloquent, contained it chiefly a panagiaric on his country, his family and his clan with a few compliments equally sincere perhaps though less glowing which he took so favorable an opportunity of paying to himself I could not learn whether my own reputation had been directly implicated so I perceived that the honour of my uncle's family had been impeached and that this person, Campbell stated by Morris to have been the most active robber of the two by whom he was a sale was said by him to have appeared in the behalf of Mr. Aus Baldestone and by the connivance of the justice procured his liberation in this particular Morris's story jumped with my own suspicions which had attached to Campbell from the moment I saw him appear at Justice Englewood vexed upon the whole as well as perplexed with this extraordinary story I dismissed the two Scotchmen after making some purchases from a grading and a small compliment of fair service and retired to my own apartment to consider what I ought to do in defense of my character thus publicly attacked End of Volume 1, Chapter 14 reading by Mike Harris Volume 1, Chapter 15 of Rob Roy This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Chapter 15 Whence and What Art You Milton After exhausting a sleepless night and meditating on the intelligence I had received I was at first inclined to think that I ought as speedily as possible to return to London and by my open appearance repel the calamity which had been spread against me but I hesitated to take this course on recollection of my father's disposition singularly absolute in his decisions as to all that concerned his family He was most able certainly from experience to direct what I ought to do and from his acquaintance with the most distinguished wigs then in power had influence enough to obtain a hearing for my cause so upon the whole I judged it most safe to state my whole story in the shape of a narrative addressed to my father and as the ordinary opportunities of intercourse between the hall and the post town recurred rarely I determined to ride to the town which was about 10 miles distance and deposit my letter in the post box with my own hands indeed I began to think it strange that though several weeks had elapsed since my departure from home I had received no letter either from my father or Owen although rashly had written to Sir Hildebrand of his safe arrival in London and of the kind reception he had met with from his uncle admitting that I might have been to blame I did not deserve in my own opinion at least to be so totally forgotten by my father and I thought my present excursion might have the effect of bringing a letter from him to hand more early than it would otherwise have reached me but before concluding my letter concerning the affair of Morris I failed not to express my earnest hope and wish that my father would honour me with a few lines where it but to express his advice and commands in an affair of some difficulty and where my knowledge of life could not be supposed adequate to my own guidance I found it impossible to prevail on myself to urge my actable return to London as a place of residence and I disguised my unwillingness to do so under a parent submission to my father's will which, as I imposed it on myself as a sufficient reason for not urging my final departure from Oswaldo Stone Hall would, I doubted not be received as such by my parent but I begged permission to come to London for a short time at least to meet and refute the infamous calamities which had been circulated concerning me in so public a manner having made up my packet in which my earnest desire to vindicate my character was strangely blended with reluctance to quit my present place of residence I rode over to the post done and deposited my letter in the office by doing so I obtained possession somewhat earlier than I should otherwise have done of the following letter from my friend Mr Owen Dear Mr Francis yours received per favour of Mr R Oswaldo Stone and note the contents shall do Mr R O such civilities as are in my power and have taken him to see the bank and custom house he seems a sober steady young gentleman and takes to business so will be of service to the firm could have wished another person had turned his mind that way but gods will be done as cash may be scarce in those parts have to trust you will excuse my enclosing a goldsmith's bill at six days sight on Mrs Hooper and Gerda of Newcastle for one hundred pounds which I doubt not will be duly honoured I remain as in duty burned dear Mr Frank your very respectful and obedient servant Joseph Owen post scriptum hope you will advise the above coming safe to hand am sorry we have so few of yours your father says he is as usual but looks poorly from this episode written in old Owen's formal style I was rather surprised to observe that he made no acknowledgement of that private letter which I had written to him with a view to possess him of Rashle's real character although from the course of post it seemed certain that he ought to have received it yet I had sent it by the usual conveyance from the hall and had no reason to suspect that it could miscarry upon the road as it comprised matters of great importance both to my father and to myself I found in the post office and again wrote to Owen recapitulating the heads of my former letter and requesting to know in course of post if it had reached him in safety I also acknowledged the receipt of the bill and promised to make use of the contents if I should have any occasion for money I thought indeed it was odd that my father should leave the care of supplying my necessities to his clerk I concluded it was a matter arranged between them at any rate Owen was a bachelor rich in his way and passionately attached to me so that I had no hesitation in being obliged to him for a small sum which I resolved to consider as a loan to be returned with my earliest ability in case it was not previously repaid by my father and I expressed myself to this purpose to Mr. Owen a shopkeeper in a little town to whom the postmaster directed me readily gave me in gold the amount of my bill on Mrs. Hooper and Gerda so that I returned to Oswaldo Stone Hall a good deal richer than I had set forth this recruit to my finances was not a matter of indifference to me as I was necessarily involved in some expenses at Oswaldo Stone Hall and I had seen with some uneasy impatience that the sum which my travelling expenses had left unexhausted at my arrival there was imperceptibly diminishing this source of anxiety was for them present removed on my arrival at the hall I found that Sir Hilda Brand and all his offspring had gone down to the little Hamnet called Trinley Nose to see as Andrew Fair service expressed it It is indeed a brutal amusement Andrew I suppose you have none such in Scotland No, no answered Andrew boldly then shaded away his negative with unless it be on Faston's inn or the lack of that but indeed it's no muck or mutter what the folk do to the midden poetry for they had seen a scar and scrabbin in the yard that is now getting a bean or pear-capped for them but I am wondering what it is that leaves the turret door open know that Mr Rushley's away it cannot be him I throw the turret door to which he alluded opened to the garden at the bottom of a winding stair leading down from Mr Rushley's apartment this as I have already mentioned was situated in a sequestered part of the house communicating with the library by a private entrance and by another intricate and dark vaulted passage with the rest of the house a long narrow turf walk led between two high holly hedges from the turret door to a little post turn in the wall of the garden by means of these communications Rushley, whose movements were very independent of those of the rest of the family could leave the hall or return to it at pleasure without his absence or presence attracting any observation but during his absence the stair and the turret door were entirely disused and this made Andrew's observation somewhat remarkable have you often observed that door open was my question not just that often neither but I have noticed it answer twice I'm thinking it more high being the priest father Voron as they call him you'll now catch any other sorrow get your nerve that stutter frightened heathens that they are for fair of boggles and brownies and long never things for a new world but father Voron thinks himself a privileged person set him up and let him do as the caution the worst stebler that ever stick at a ceremony or other tweed yonder would let a ghost twice as fast as him with his holly water and his idolatrous trinkets I didn't believe he speaks good Latin neither at least he doesn't take me up to tell him the learned names of the plants of father Voron who divided his time and his ghostly care between Osporta stone Hall and about half a dozen mansions of Catholic gentlemen in the neighborhood I have as yet said nothing for I had seen but little he was aged about 60 of a good family as I was given to understand in the north of a striking and imposing presence grave in his exterior and much respected among the Catholics of Northumberland as a worthy and upright man yet father Voron did not altogether lack those peculiarities which distinguishes order there hung about him an air of mystery which in Protestant eyes saved a priest craft the natives such they might be well termed of Osporta stone Hall looked up to him with much more fear or at least more awe than affection his condemnation of their rebels was evident from their being discontinued in some measure when the priest was a resident at the Hall even Sir Hildebrand himself put some restraint upon his conduct at such times which perhaps rendered father Voron's presence rather irksome than otherwise he had the wellbred insinuating and almost flattering address peculiar to the clergy of his persuasion especially in England where the lay Catholic hemmed in by penal laws and by the restrictions of his sect and recommendations of his pastor often exhibits a reserved and almost a timid manner in the society of Protestants while the priest privileged by his order to mingle with persons of all creeds is open alert and liberal in his intercourse with them desirous of popularity and usually skillful in the mode of obtaining it father Voron was a particular acquaintance of rashlies otherwise in all probability he would scarce have been able to maintain his putting at his ball of stone hall this gave me no desire to cultivate his intimacy nor did he seem to make any advances towards mine so our occasional intercourse was confined to the exchange of mere civility I considered it as extremely probable that Mr. Voron might occupy rashlies apartment during his occasional residence at the Hall and his profession rendered it likely that he should occasionally be a tenant of the library nothing was more probable than that it might have been his scandal which had excited my attention on a preceding evening this led me involuntarily to recollect that the intercourse between Miss Vernon and the priest was marked with something like the same mystery which characterised her communications with rashly I had never heard her mentioned Voron's name or even allured to him accepting the occasion of our first meeting when she mentioned the old priest and rashly as the only conversable beings besides herself in Oswaldo Stone Hall yet although silent with respect to Father Voron his arrival at the Hall never failed to impress Miss Vernon with an anxious and fluttering tremor which lasted until they had exchanged one or two significant glances whatever the mystery might be which overclouded the destinies of this beautiful and interesting female it was clear that Father Voron was implicated in it unless indeed I could suppose that he was the agent employed to procure his settlement in the cloister in the event of her rejecting a union with either of my cousins an office which would sufficiently account for her obvious emotion at his appearance as to the rest they did not seem to converse much together or even to seek each other's society their leg if any subsisted between them was of a tacit and understood nature operating on their actions without any necessity of speech I recollected however on reflection that I had once or twice discovered signs past betwixt them which I had at the time supposed to bear reference to some hint concerning Miss Vernon's villagers' observances knowing how artfully the Catholic clergy maintain at all times and seasons their influence over the minds of their followers but now I was disposed to assign to these communications a deeper and more mysterious import did he hold private meetings with Miss Vernon in the library was a question which occupied my thoughts and if so for what purpose and why should she have admitted an intimate of the deceitful rashly to such close confidence there's questions and difficulties pressed on my mind with an interest which was greatly increased by the impossibility of resolving them I had already begun to suspect that my friendship with Diana Vernon was not altogether so disinterested as in wisdom it ought to have been I had already felt myself becoming jealous of the contemptible loud thorncliff and taking more notice than in prudence or dignity of feeling I ought to have done of his silly attempts to provoke me and now I was scrutinizing the conduct of Miss Vernon with the most close and eager observation which I in vain endeavoured to palm on myself as the offspring of idle curiosity all these, like a Benedict brushing his hat of a morning with signs that the sweet youth was in love and while my judgment still denied that I had been guilty of performing an attachment so imprudent she resembled those ignorant guides who, when they have led the traveller and themselves into irretrievable error persist in obstinately affirming it to be impossible that they can have missed the way in the volume 1 chapter 15 recording by Felicity Campbell Wanganui, New Zealand It happened one day about noon going to my boat. I was exceedingly surprised with the print of a man's naked foot on the shore which was very plain to be seen on the sand from Robinson Crusoe with the blended feelings of interest and jealousy which were engendered by Miss Vernon's singular situation my observations of her looks and actions became actually sharpened and that to a degree which notwithstanding any efforts could not escape her penetration the sense that she was observed or more properly speaking that she was watched by my looks seemed to give Diana a mixture of embarrassment, pain and petitioness at times it seems that she sought an opportunity of resenting a conduct which she could not but feel as offensive considering the frankness with which she had mentioned the difficulties that surrounded her and other times she seemed prepared to put up on the subject but either her courage failed or some other sentiment impeded her seeking an euclases moan her displeasurement evaporated in repartee and her expostulations died on her lips we stood in a singular relation to each other spending hand by mutual choice much of our time in close society with each other yet disguising our mutual sentiments and jealous of or offended by each other's actions without confidence on one side love without hope or purpose and curiosity without any rational or justifiable motive and on the other embarrassment and doubt occasionally mingled with displeasure yet I believed that this agitation of the passions such as the nature of the human bosom as it continued by a thousand irritating and interesting though petty circumstances to render Miss Vernon and me the constant objects of each other's tended upon the whole to increase the attachment with which we were naturally disposed to regard each other but although my vanity early discovered that my presence at Osboldestone Hall had given Diana some additional reason for disliking the cloister I could by no means confide in an affection which seemed completely subordinate to the mysteries of her singular situation Miss Vernon was of a character far too formed and determined to permit her love for me to overpower either her sense of duty or of prudence and she gave me a proof of this in a conversation which we had together about this period we were sitting together in the library Miss Vernon and turning over a copy of the Orlando Furioso which belonged to me shook a piece of writing paper from between the leaves I hastened to lift it but she prevented me it's verse she said on glancing at the paper and then unfolding it the answer before proceeding may I take the liberty nay, nay if you blush and stammer I must do violence to your modesty and suppose that permission is granted oh it's not worthy your perusalist scrap of a translation my dear Miss Vernon it would be too severe a trial at you to understand the original so well should sit in judgment my honest friend replied Diana do not if you will be guided by my advice I will never hook with too much humility for ten to one it will not catch a single compliment you know I belong to the unpopular family of tell-truths and would not flatter Apollo for his liar she proceeded to read the first stanza which was nearly to the following purpose ladies and knights and arms and loves fair flame deeds of empress and courtesy I sing what time the moors from sultry led on by Agramante and their youthful king he whom revenge and hasty ire did bring for the broad wave in France to waste and war such ills from old Trojanos death did spring which to avenge he came from realms afar and menaced Christian Charles the Roman Emperor of Dauntless Rowland too my strange shall sound in import never known in prose or rhyme how he the chief of judgment deemed profound for luckless love was crazed upon a time oh there's a great deal of it so she glancing along the paper and interrupting the sweetest sounds which mortal heirs can drink in those of a youthful poet's verses namely read by the lips which are dearest to him much more than ought to engage your attention Miss Vernon I replied something mortified from her verses from her unreluctant hand and yet I continued as shut up as I am in this retired situation I felt sometimes I could not amuse myself better than by carrying on merely from my own amusement you will of course understand the version of this fascinating author which I began some months since when I was on the banks of the Garon the question would only be said Diana gravely whether you could not spend your time to better purpose in original compositions that I greatly flat it but to say truth my genius rather lies in finding words and rhymes than ideas and therefore I am happy to use those which Ariosto has prepared to my hand however Miss Vernon with the encouragement you give pardon me Frank it is encouragement not of my giving but of your taking I meant an either original composition or translation since I think you might employ your time to far purpose than an either you are mortified she continued and I am sorry to be the cause not mortified certainly not mortified but the best grace I could muster and it was but indifferently assumed I am too much obliged by the interest you take in me but resumed the relentless Diana there is both mortification and a little grain of anger in that constrained tone of voice do not be angry if I probe your feelings to the bottom perhaps what I am about to say will affect them still more I felt the childishness of my own conduct in the superior manliness of Miss Vernon's and assured her that she need not fear my wincing under criticism which I knew to be kindly meant well that was honestly meant and said she replied I knew full well that the friend of poetical irritability flew away with a little pre-looting cough which ushered in the declaration and now I must be serious have you heard from your father lately I know not a word I replied he has not honored me with a single line during the several months of my residence here that is strange you are a singular race you bold Oswaldist don't then you are not aware that he has gone to Holland to arrange some pressing affairs which required his own immediate present I know I never heard a word of it until this moment and father it must be used to you and I presume scarcely the most agreeable that he has left rashly in the almost uncontrolled management of his affairs until his return I started and could not suppress my surprise an apprehension you have reason for alarm said Miss Vernon very gravely and were I you I would endeavor to meet and obviate the dangers which arise from so undesirable an arrangement then how is it possible for me to do so everything is possible for him who possesses courage and activity she said with a look resembling one of those heroines of the age of chivalry whose encouragement was want to get champions double valor at the hour of need and to the timid and hesitating everything is impossible because it seems so and what would you advise Miss Vernon I replied wishing yet dreading to hear her answer she paused a moment then answered firmly that you instantly leave Oswaldist don't all and return to London you have perhaps already she continued in a softer tone been here too long that fault was not yours every succeeding moment you waste here will be a crime yes a crime I tell you plainly that if rashly long manages your father's affairs you may consider his ruin as consummated how is that possible ask no questions she said but believe me rashly's views extend far beyond possession or increase commercial wealth he will only make the command of Mr. All-Baldestone's revenues and property the means of putting in motion his own ambitions and extensive schemes while your father was in Britain this was impossible during his absence rashly will possess many opportunities and he will not neglect to use them but how can I in disgrace with my father and divested of all control over his affairs prevent this danger by mere presence in London that presence alone will do much your claim to interfere is a part of your birthright and it is inalienable you will have the countenance doubtless of your father's head clerk and confidential friends and partners above all rashly's schemes are a nature that she stopped abruptly as a fearful of saying too much are in short she resumed of the nature of all selfish and unconscious plans which are speedily abandoned as soon as those who frame them perceive their arts are discovered and watched therefore in the language of your favorite poet to horse to horse urged doubts to those that fear a feeling irresistible in its impulse induced me to reply Diana can you give me advice to leave Oswaldestone Hall then indeed I have already been a resident here too long Ms. Vernon colored but proceeded with great firmness indeed I do give you this advice not only to quit Oswaldestone Hall but never to return to it more you have only one friend to regret here she continued forcing a smile and she has been long accustomed to sacrifice her friendships and her comforts to the welfare of others in the world you will meet a hundred whose friendship will be as disinterested more useful less encumbered by untoward circumstances less influenced by evil tongues and evil times never I exclaimed never the world can afford me nothing to repay what I must leave behind me here I took her hand and pressed it to my lips oh this is folly she exclaimed this is madness and she struggled to withdraw her hand from my grasp but not so stubbornly as actually to succeed until I held held it for nearly a minute hear me sir she said and curb this unmanly burst of passion I am by a solemn contract the bride of heaven unless I could prefer being wedded to villainy in the person of rashly Oswaldestone or brutality in that of his brother I am therefore the bride of heaven betrothed to the convent from the cradle to me therefore these raptures are misapplied they only serve to prove a farther necessity for your departure and that without delay at these words she broke suddenly off and said but in a suppressed tone of voice we will meet here again but it must be for the last time my eyes followed the direction of hers as she spoke and I thought I saw the tapestry shake which covered the door of the secret passage from rashly's room to the library I conceived we were observed and turned an inquiring glance on Miss Vernon oh it is nothing she said faintly a rat behind the arras dead for a ducket would have been my reply had I dared to give way to the feelings which rose indignant at the idea of being subjected to an eavesdropper on such an occasion prudence and the necessity of suppressing my passion and obeying Diana's reiterated command leave me, leave me came in time to prevent my rash action I left the apartment in a wild whirl and giddiness of mind which I in vain attempted to compose when I returned to my own a chaos of thoughts intruded themselves on me at once passing hastily through my brain intercepting and overshadowing each other and resembling those fogs which in mountainous countries I want to descend in obscure volumes and disfigure or obliterate the usual marks by which the traveller steers his course through the wilds the dark and undefined idea of danger arising to my father from the machinations of such a man as rashly Oswaldestone the half declaration of love that I had offered to Miss Vernon's acceptance the acknowledged difficulties of her situation bound by a previous contract to sacrifice herself to a cloister or to an ill-assorted marriage all pressed themselves once upon my recollection while my judgment was unable deliberately to consider any of them in their just light and bearings but chiefly and above all arrest I was perplexed by the manner in which Miss Vernon had received my tender affection and by her manner which fluctuating between sympathy and firmness seemed to intimate that I possessed an interest in her bosom but not a force sufficient to counterbalance the obstacles to her avowing a mutual affection the glance of fear rather than surprise with which she had watched the motion of the tapestry over the concealed door implied an apprehension of danger which I could not but suppose well grounded for Diana Vernon was little subject to the nervous emotions of her sex and totally unapped to fear without actual and rational cause of what nature could these mysteries be with which she was surrounded as with an enchanter's spell in which it seemed continually to exert an active influence over her thoughts and actions though her agents were never visible on this subject of doubt my mind finally rested as if glad to shake itself free from investigating the propriety or prudence of my own conduct by transferring the inquiry to what concern to Miss Vernon I will be resolved I concluded where I leave us boldest own hall concerning the light in which I must in future regard this fascinating being over whose life frankness and mystery seemed to have divided their reign the former inspiring her words and sentiments the latter spreading in misty influence over all her actions joined to the obvious interests which arose from curiosity and anxious passion there mingled in my feelings a strong though unavowed and undefined infusion of jealousy this sentiment which springs up with love as naturally as the terrace with a wheat was excited by the degree of influence which Diana appeared to concede to those unseen beings by whom her actions were limited the more I reflected upon her character the more I was internally though unwillingly convinced that she was formed to set at defiance all control accepting that which arose from affection and I felt a strong bitter annoying suspicion that such was the foundation of that influence she was overawed these tormenting doubts strengthened my desire to penetrate into the secret of Miss Vernon's conduct and in the prosecution of this sage adventure I formed a resolution of which if you are not weary of these details you will find the result in the next chapter the end of volume 1 chapter 16 recording by Mike Harris volume 1 chapter 17 of Rob Roy this is a Librivant's recording all Librivant's recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit Librivox.org recording by Mike Harris Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott volume 1 chapter 17 I hear a voice you cannot hear which says I must not stay I see a hand you cannot see which beckons me a ray tickle I have already told you Tresham if you deigned to bear it in remembrance that my evening visits to the library had seldom been made except by appointment and under the sanction of old Dame Martha's presence this however was entirely a tacit conventional arrangement of my own instituting of late as the embarrassments of our relative situation had increased Miss Vernon and I had never met in the evening at all she had therefore no reason to suppose that I was likely to seek a renewal of these interviews and especially without some previous notice or appointment to twist us that Martha might as usual be placed upon duty but on the other hand this cautionary provision was a matter of understanding not express enactment the library was open to me as to the other members of the family at all hours of the day and night and I could not be accused of intrusion however suddenly and unexpectedly it made my appearance in it my belief was strong that in this apartment Miss Vernon occasionally received a phone or some other person by whose opinion she was occasionally accustomed to regulate her conduct and that at the times when she could do so with least chance of interruption the lights which gleamed in the library at unusual hours the passing shadows which I had myself remarked the footsteps which might be traced from the morning dew from the turret door to the Boston gate in the garden sounds and sights which some of the servants and Andrew Fair service in particular had observed and accounted for in their own way all tended to show that the place was visited by someone different from the ordinary inmates in the hall connected as this visit probably must be with the fates of Diana Vernon I did not hesitate to form a plan of discovering who or what he was how far as influence was likely to produce good or evil consequences to her on the act above all though I endeavored to persuade myself that this was a mere support and consideration I desired to know by what means this person had acquired and maintained his influence over Diana and whether he ruled over her by fear or by affection the proof that this jealous curiosity was uppermost in my mind arose from my imagination always describing the subvernance conduct to the influence of some one individual agent although for all I knew about the latter her advisers might be as numerous as Legion I remarked this over and over to myself but I found that my mind still settled back in my original conviction that one single individual of the masculine sex and in all probability young and handsome was at the bottom of the subvernance conduct and it was with a burning desire of discovering or at least rather of detecting such arrival that I stationed myself in the garden to watch the moment when the lights should appear in the library windows so eager however was my impatience that I commenced my watch for a phenomenon which could not appear until darkness a full hour before the daylight disappeared on a July evening it was Sabbath and all the walks were still in solitary I walked up and down for some time enjoying the refreshing coolness of a summer evening and meditating on the probable consequences of my enterprise the fresh and balmy air of the garden impregnated with fragrance produced its usual sedative effects on my overheated and feverish blood as these took place the turmoil of my mind began proportionately toward faith and I was led to question the right I had to interfere with Miss Vernon's secrets with those of my uncle's family what was it to me whom my uncle might choose to conceal in his house where I was myself a guest only by tolerance and what title had I to pry upon the affairs of Miss Vernon fraught as she had avowed them to be with mystery into which she desired no scrutiny passion and self-will were ready with their answers to these questions in detecting this secret I was in all probability about to do service to Sir Hildebrand who was probably ignorant of the intrigues carrying on in his family and a still more important service to Miss Vernon whose frank simplicity of character exposed her to so many risks in maintaining a private correspondent perhaps with a person of doubtful or dangerous character if I seemed to intrude myself on her confidence it was with the generous and disinterested yes I even ventured to call it the disinterested intention of guiding defending and protecting her against craft against malice above all against the secret counselor whom she had chosen for her confide such were the arguments which my will boldly preferred to my conscience as coin which ought to be current and which conscience like a grumbling shopkeeper was content to accept rather than come to an open breach with a customer though more than doubting that the tender was spurious while I paced the green alley as debating these things pro and con I suddenly alighted upon Andrew Fair service perched up like a statue by a range of beehives in an attitude of devout contemplation one eye however watching the motions of the little irritable citizens who were settling in their straw-patched mansion the evening and the other fixed on a book of devotion which much attrition had deprived of its corners and worn into an oval shape a circumstance which with the close print and dingy color of the volume in question gave it an air of most respectable antiquity I was then taken to Spina where they missed Jane Kwakamin's flower of a sweet savor's son on the mid-stain on his widowed sedan closing his book at my appearance and putting his horned spectacles by way of mark the place where he had been reading and the bees I observe are dividing your attention and drew with the learned author they are a contumious generation replied the gardener they have six days in the week to hive on yet it's a common observe that they will haze warm on the Sabbath day and keep folk at home for a hearing the word but there's no preaching at Green-Egg and Chapel-de-Ain it's as mercy you might have gone to the parish church as I did Andrew and heard an excellent discourse Clots are called a paddage Clots are called a paddage replied Andrew with a most supercilious sneer good enough for the dogs begging your honors pardon I I might need a head of the curate Lincoln Ha-Ha-Wed it's in his white sod of kunder and the musicians playing on whistles there like a penny-wedden in a sermon and to the boot of that I might again even song and heard a daddy duck at a mumblin in his mass muckled the better I would have been at that dockerty said I this was the name of an old priest an Irishman I think who sometimes officiated at Oswaldestown Hall I thought Father Vaughan had been at the hall he was here yesterday I replied Andrew but he left it yesterday into gang to Greystock some of the west country halls there's an uncoustard among them again now that as busy as my bees are I'd say in them that I should even appear things to the like of papists you see this is the second swarm and whilst they will swarm off in the afternoon the first swarm set off soon in the morning but I am thinking that they are settling in their skeptics for the night so I wish your honor a good night Grace and Mucklott so saying Andrew retreated but often cast a parting glance on the skeptics as he called the beehives I had indirectly gained from him an important piece of information that Father Vaughan namely was not supposed to be at the hall if therefore there appeared light in the windows of the library this evening if either could not be his or he was observing a very secret and suspicious line of conduct I waited with impatience for the time of sunset and of twilight it had hardly arrived there a gleam from the windows of the library was seen dimly distinguishable amongst the still enduring light of the evening I marked its first glimpse however as speedily as the benighted sailor disguised the first distant twinkle of the lighthouse which marks his course the feelings of doubt and propriety which had hit it too contended with my curiosity and jealousy vanished when an opportunity of gratifying the former was presented to me I re-entered the house and avoiding the more frequented apartments with the consciousness of one who wishes to keep his purpose secret I reached the door of the library hesitated for a moment as my hand was upon the latch a suppressed step within opened the door and found Miss Vernon alone Diana appeared surprised whether at my sudden entrance or from some other cause I could not guess but there was in her appearance a degree of flutter which I had never before remarked and which I knew could only be produced by unusual emotion yet she was calm in a moment and such is the force of conscience that I who studied to surprise her seemed to myself a surprise and was certainly the embarrassed person Has anything happened? said Miss Vernon Has anyone arrived at the hall? No one but I know of I answered in some confusion I only sought the Orlando It lies here, says Miss Vaughan pointing to the table and removing one or two books to get at that which I pretended to seek I was in truth meditating to make a handsome retreat from an investigation to which I felt my assurance inadequate when I perceived a man's glove lying upon the table my eyes encountered those of Miss Vernon who blushed deeply Oh, it's one of my relics, as she said with hesitation replying not to my words but to my looks It's one of the gloves of my grandfather the original of the superb Van Dyke which you admire as if she thought something more than her bare assertion was necessary to prove her statement true she opened a drawer of the large oaken table and taking out another glove through it towards me when it tempered naturally in genuine stupes to equivocate more to dissemble the anxious pain with which the unwounded task is labored often induces the hero to doubt the authenticity of the tale I cast a hasty glance on both gloves and then replied gravely the gloves resemble each other doubtless and form an embroidery but they cannot form a pair since they both belong to the right hand she bit her lip with anger and again colored it deeply Oh, you do right to expose me, she replied with bitterness some friends would have only judged from what I said that I chose to give no particular explanation of a circumstance which called for none, at least to a stranger you have judged better and have made me feel not only the meanness of duplicity but my own inadequacy to sustain the task of a dissembler I now tell you distinctly that that glove is not the fellow as you have acutely discerned to the one which I just now produced it belongs to a friend yet dearer to me than the original of Van Dyke's picture a friend by whose counsels I have been and will be guided whom I honour whom I she paused well, I was irritated at her manner and filled up the blank in my own way whom she loves, Miss Vernon would say and if I do say so she replied haughtily by whom shall my affection be called to account certainly not by me, Miss Vernon, assuredly I entreat you to hold me acquitted of such presumption but I continued with some emphasis for I was now peaked in return I hope Miss Vernon will pardon a friend from whom she seems disposed to withdraw the title for observing observed nothing, sir she interrupted with some vehemence except that I will neither be doubted nor questioned there does not exist one by whom I will be either interrogated or charged and if you swap this unusual time of presenting yourself in order to spy upon my privacy the friendship or interest with which you pretend to regard me as a poor excuse for your uncivil curiosity oh, I relieve you of my presence, said I with pride equal to her own for my temper has ever been a stranger to stooping even in cases where my feelings were most deeply interested I relieve you of my presence I awake from a pleasant but a most delusive dream but we understand each other I had reached the door of the apartment when Miss Vernon, whose movements were sometimes so rapid as to seem almost instinctive overtook me and catching hold of my arms stopped me with that air of authority which she could so whimsically assume at which from the naivete and simplicity of a manner had an effect so peculiarly interesting stop, Mr. Frank, she said you are not to leave me in that way, and I I am not so amply provided with friends that I can afford to throw away even the ungrateful and the selfish mark what I say, Mr. Francis Osbaldestone you shall know nothing of this mysterious glove and she held it up as she spoke nothing no, not a single iota more than you know already and yet I will not permit it to be a gauntlet of strife and defiance betwixt us my time here, she said, sinking into a tone somewhat softer, must necessarily be very short yours must be still shorter we are soon depart, never to meet again do not let us quarrel or make any mysterious miseries that protects for farther embittering the few hours we shall ever pass together on this side of eternity I do not know, treasured by what witchery this fascinating creature obtained such complete management over a temper which I cannot at all times manage myself I had determined on entering the library to seek a complete explanation with Miss Vernon I had found that she refused it with indignant defiance and avowed to my face the preference of a rival for which other construction could I put on her declared preference of her mysterious fighting and yet while I was on the point of leaving the apartment and breaking with her forever it cost her but a change of look and tone from that of real and haughty resentment to that of kind and playful despotism again shaded off into melancholy and serious feeling to lead me back to my seat her willing subject on her own hard terms what does this avail, said I, as I sat down what can this avail, Miss Vernon? why should I witness embarrassments which I cannot relieve and mysteries which I offend you even by attempting to penetrate inexperienced as you are in the world you must still be aware that a beautiful young woman can have but one male friend even in a male friend I will be jealous of a confidence shared with a third-party unknown and concealed but with you, Miss Vernon you are, of course, jealous in all the tenses and moods of that amiable passion but, my good friend, you have all this time spoken nothing but the paltry gossip which simpletons repeat from playbooks and romances till they give Mere Kant a real and powerful influence over their minds boys and girls break themselves into love and when their love is like to fall asleep they're break and tease themselves into jealousy but you and I, Frank, are rational beings and neither silly nor idle enough to talk ourselves into any other relation than that of a plain, honest disinterested friendship any other union is as far out of our reach as if I were man or you woman to speak truth she had it after a moment's hesitation even though I am so complacent to the decorum of my sex as to blush a little at my own plain dealing we cannot marry if we would then we ought not if we could and certainly, Trasham, she did blush most angelically as she made this cruel declaration I was about to attack both her positions entirely forgetting those very suspicions which had been confirmed in the course of the evening but she proceeded with a cold firmness which approached to severity what I say is sober and indisputable truth on which I will neither hear question nor explanation we are therefore friends, Mr. Oswaldestone, are we not? she held out her hand and taking mine at it and nothing to each other now or henceforward except as friends she let go my hand, I sunk it in my head at once fairly overcrowed that Spencer would have turned it by the mingled kindness and firmness of her manner she hastened to change the subject here is a letter, she said, directed for you, Mr. Oswaldestone very duly and distinctly, but which not withstanding the caution of the person who wrote and addressed it might perhaps never have reached your hands had it not fallen into the possession of a certain pachelet or enchanted dwarf of mine whom like all distressed damsels of romance I retain in my secret service I opened the letter and glanced over the contents the unfolded sheet of paper dropped from my hands with the involuntary explanation of gracious heaven my folly and disobedience have ruined my father Miss Vernon rose with looks of real and affectionate alarm you grow pale, you are ill, shall I bring you a glass of water? be a man, Mr. Oswaldestone, and a firm one is your father, is he no more? he lives, said I, thank God, but to what distress difficulty if that be all despair not may I read this letter she said taking it up I assented, hardly knowing what I said she read it with great attention who is this Mr. Tresham who signs the letter my father's partner your own good father will but he is little in the habit of acting personally in the business of the house he writes here, said Miss Vernon, of various letters sent to you previously I have received none of them, I replied and it appears she continued that rashly who has taken the full management of affairs during your father's absence in Holland has sometimes since left London for Scotland with effects and remittances to take up large bills granted by your father and persons in that country and that he has not since been heard of it is but true and here has been she added looking at the letter ahead clock or some such person Owen dispatched to Glasgow to find out rashly if possible and you are entreated to repair to the same place and assist him in his researches it is even so and I must depart instantly stay, stay but one moment, said Miss Vernon it seems to me that the worst which can come of this matter will be the loss of a certain sum of money and can that bring tears into your eyes? for shame, Mr. Oswald of Stone you do me injustice, Miss Vernon, I answered I grieve not for the loss of the money but for the effect which I know it will produce on the spirits and health of my father to whom mercantile credit is as honour and who, if declared insolvent, would sink into the grave oppressed by a sense of grief, remorse and despair like that of a soldier convicted of cowardice or a man of honour who had lost his rank and character in society all this I might have prevented by a trifling sacrifice of the foolish pride and indolence which recoiled from sharing the labours of his honourable and useful profession good heaven, how shall I redeem the consequences of my error? well, by instantly repairing to Glasgow as you were conjured to do by the friend who writes this letter but if rashly, said I, has really formed this base an uncontentious scheme of plundering has benefacted what prospect is there that I can find means of frustrating a plan so deeply laid? the prospect, she replied, indeed may be uncertain but on the other hand there is no possibility of your doing any service to your father by remaining here remember had you been on the post destined for you this disaster could not have happened hasten to that which is now pointed out and it may possibly be retrieved yet but stay, do not leave this room until I return she left me in confusion and amazement amid which, however, I could find a lucid interval to admire the firmness, composure and presence of mind which Miss Vernon seemed into possessing every crisis, however sudden in a few minutes she returned with a sheet of paper in her hand, folded and sealed like a letter but without address I trust you, she said, with this proof of my friendship I have the most perfect confidence in your honor if I understand the nature of your distress rightly the funds in Ratchley's possession must be recovered by a certain day the 12th of September I think is named in order that they may be applied to pay the bills and question them consequently that if adequate funds be provided before that period your father's credit is safe from the apprehended calamity certainly I so understand, Mr. Drescham I looked at your father's letter again and added there cannot be a doubt of it well said Diana, in that case my little Pachelet may be of use to you you have heard of a spell contained in a letter I'll take this packet do not open it until other and ordinary means have failed if you succeed by your own exertions I trust to your honor for destroying it without opening or suffering it to be open but if not you may break the seal within ten days of the fated day and you will find directions which may possibly be of service to you adieu, Frank we never mean more but sometimes think of your friend Divernon she extended her hand but I clasped her to my bosom she sighed as she extricated herself from the embrace which she permitted and escaped to the door which led to her own apartment and I saw her no more End of Ideal 1 Chapter 17 Recording by Mike Harris