The Ladies Lindores

home in the grand rooms overloaded with decoration⁠—who would be, if possible, superior to the killing splendour which made himself feel so small. And no woman yet had impressed Pat as sufficiently magnificent for this purpose. He wanted someone more imposing⁠—a lady of Tinto who might, as he desired in his heart, receive the Prince of Wales on occasion, or even the Queen herself. When he paid his first visit to Lindores, the Earl alone received him, and he had no chance of inspecting the daughters of the house; but he had met them as he rode home again, coming back from their drive in the little pony-carriage, of which they had just become possessed. Edith, new to all these delights, was driving her sister; and her bright little face, full of life and smiles, turned curiously upon him as he stood aside on his big black horse to let them pass. But that was not what caught his eye. Beside her was a pale and gentle countenance, unlike anything which had hitherto been presented to his notice. Pat’s heart, if he had a heart, or the big pulse that did service for it, gave a bound as he looked. It seemed to him at the first glance that this new face was more aristocratic, more distinguished, for not being pretty. The lilies and roses of the other were familiar to him. Bright eyes and fine complexions were by no means rare in the county. They were to be found everywhere, in the cottages as well as in the castles. He was not impressed by them. The smiles and animation were common things; but Lady Caroline with her gentle paleness, her slim form pliant and bending⁠—even her nose, which was a little too long, was the impersonation of refinement and rank, and fine superiority. His imagination, if he had an imagination, took fire. He thought he could see her moving about with languid grace through his fine salons, far more fine than they, lending them an air of delicacy and importance which they had never possessed before. He felt himself to be “struck” by Lady Caroline as he never had been “struck” till now. That was rank, he said to himself admiringly. To be sure, rank was what he had wanted; he had never realised it before, but now he perceived it as plain as daylight. He had been wiser than he was aware of in his fastidiousness; and now he saw suddenly presented before him the very object of which he had been in search. Lady Caroline Torrance!⁠—that was what it was.

This chance meeting, and the instant conviction that followed, had taken place some time before the interview between the sisters which we have described. How it was that the suitor communicated his wishes to the Earl, or the Earl to poor Carry, it is impossible to tell⁠—or if, indeed, up to this time, any communication had been made on the subject. Most likely there had been no communication; but the proposal, which turned the light into darkness for Carry, was in the air, overshadowing everything. Her father saw it in the dark face of Pat Torrance, and she surmised it in her father’s eyes. Before a word had been said she knew her fate, struggling dumbly against it like a creature fascinated and magnetised in the grip of a monster, but without any possibility or hope of escape. There was something more terrible in this silent certainty than there would have been in any conflict. She felt herself sucked in as to a whirlpool, overpowered⁠—all her forces taken from her in the giddy rush with which the days and hours were carrying her on, irresistible, to that climax. It was this fatal consciousness which made her cry out, “I will never give him up;” which was the cry, not of resolution, but of despair. All that she could do in her sick and failing soul was to grasp at and cling to the weeds on the bank, while the current carried her wildly on, plucking them out of her hands. Edith, who was of so different a nature, stood by appalled, astonished, not knowing how to account for her sister’s helplessness. She was positive, as her mother said, not visionary, incapable either of divining what was going to happen or of yielding to it. Why Carry could not simply make up her mind to refuse, to stand fast, to resist whatever powers might be brought to bear upon her, was a thing which Edith could not understand.

And stranger still, Lady Lindores had not even found it out. She disliked Mr. Torrance, and made no secret of her dislike. “If that is your type of a Scotch laird, I cannot say I like the species,” she said, eliciting a soft, “Oh, mamma!” from Edith, who remembered very well a statement of an entirely contrary character which her mother had once made. “If young Erskine is a type of a young Scotch laird, I am disposed to fall in love with the class,” was what Lady Lindores had then said. Edith remembered it distinctly, but gave her tongue a little malicious bite, and would not recall it to her mother’s mind; for was not young Erskine coming back? But Lady Lindores’s feeling about Torrance was more than passive. She took care to let him see that he was not a favourite in the house. She wondered audibly, even after the eyes of Edith had been opened, what that odious man wanted here; and indeed did all but refuse to ask him to a dîner intime, at which her husband desired his presence. “Torrance of Tinto,” she cried, with a cloud on her face; “why Torrance of Tinto? He has already dined here. Why should we have him again?”

“Why not?” said the Earl, with a still deeper shadow on his face. Lady Lindores saw very clearly when her attention was aroused; but she was a high-minded woman, slow to