The Fortunes of Nigel

“Whom mean you?” said Nigel, with more interest than he had hitherto shown in the Knight’s communications.

“Nay, who should I mean, but that travestied lassie whom we dined with when we honoured Heriot the goldsmith? Ye ken best how you have made interest with her, but I saw her on her knees to the king for you. She was committed to my charge, to bring her up hither in honour and safety. Had I had my own will, I would have had her to Bridewell, to flog the wild blood out of her – a cutty quean, to think of wearing the breeches, and not so much as married yet!”

“Hark ye, Sir Mungo Malagrowther,” answered Nigel, “I would have you talk of that young person with fitting respect.”

“With all the respect that befits your lordship’s paramour, and Davy Ramsay’s daughter, I shall certainly speak of her, my lord,” said Sir Mungo, assuming a dry tone of irony.

Nigel was greatly disposed to have made a serious quarrel of it, but with Sir Mungo such an affair would have been ridiculous; he smothered his resentment, therefore, and conjured him to tell what he had heard and seen respecting this young person.

“Simply, that I was in the ante-room when she had audience, and heard the king say, to my great perplexity, ‘Pulchra sane puella;’ and Maxwell, who hath but indifferent Latin ears, thought that his Majesty called on him by his own name of Sawney, and thrust into the presence, and there I saw our Sovereign James, with his own hand, raising up the lassie, who, as I said heretofore, was travestied in man’s attire. I should have had my own thoughts of it, but our gracious Master is auld, and was nae great gillravager amang the queans even in his youth; and he was comforting her in his own way and saying, – ‘Ye needna greet about it, my bonnie woman, Glenvarlochides shall have fair play; and, indeed, when the hurry was off our spirits, we could not believe that he had any design on our person. And touching his other offences, we will look wisely and closely into the matter.’ So I got charge to take the young fence-louper to the Tower here, and deliver her to the charge of Lady Mansel; and his Majesty charged me to say not a word to her about your offences, for, said he, the poor thing is breaking her heart for him.”

“And on this you have charitably founded the opinion to the prejudice of this young lady, which you have now thought proper to express?” said Lord Glenvarloch.

“In honest truth, my lord,” replied Sir Mungo, “what opinion would you have me form of a wench who gets into male habiliments, and goes on her knees to the king for a wild young nobleman? I wot not what the fashionable word may be, for the phrase changes, though the custom abides. But truly I must needs think this young leddy – if you call Watchie Ramsay’s daughter a young leddy – demeans herself more like a leddy of pleasure than a leddy of honour.”

“You do her egregious wrong, Sir Mungo,” said Nigel; “or rather you have been misled by appearances.”

“So will all the world be misled, my lord,” replied the satirist, “unless you were doing that to disabuse them which your father’s son will hardly judge it fit to do.”

“And what may that be, I pray you?”

“E’en marry the lass – make her Leddy Glenvarloch. – Ay, ay, ye may start – but it’s the course you are driving on. Rather marry than do worse, if the worst be not done already.”

“Sir Mungo,” said Nigel, “I pray you to forbear this subject, and rather return to that of the mutilation, upon which it pleased you to enlarge a short while since.”

“I have not time at present,” said Sir Mungo, hearing the clock strike four; “but so soon as you shall have received sentence, my lord, you may rely on my giving you the fullest detail of the whole solemnity; and I give you my word, as a knight and a gentleman, that I will myself attend you on the scaffold, whoever may cast sour looks on me for doing so. I bear a heart, to stand by a friend in the worst of times.”

So saying, he wished Lord Glenvarloch farewell; who felt as heartily rejoiced at his departure, though it may be a bold word, as any person who had ever undergone his society.

But, when left to his own reflections, Nigel could not help feeling solitude nearly as irksome as the company of Sir Mungo Malagrowther. The total wreck of his fortune, – which seemed now to be rendered unavoidable by the loss of the royal warrant, that had afforded him the means of redeeming his paternal estate, – was an unexpected and additional blow. When he had seen the warrant he could not precisely remember; but was inclined to think, it was in the casket when he took out money to pay the miser for his lodgings at Whitefriars. Since then, the casket had been almost constantly under his own eye, except during the short time he was separated from his baggage by the arrest in Greenwich Park. It might, indeed, have been taken out at that time, for he had no reason to think either his person or his property was in the hands of those who wished him well; but, on the other hand, the locks of the strong-box had sustained no violence that he could observe, and, being of a particular and complicated construction, he thought they could scarce be opened without an instrument made on purpose, adapted to their peculiarities, and for this there had been no time. But, speculate as he would on the matter, it was clear that this important document was gone, and probable that it had passed into no friendly hands. “Let it be so,” said Nigel to himself; “I am scarcely worse off respecting my prospects of fortune, than when I first reached this accursed city. But to be hampered with cruel accusations, and stained with foul suspicions-to be the object of pity of the most degrading kind to yonder honest citizen, and of the malignity of that envious and atrabilarious courtier, who can endure the good fortune and good qualities of another no more than the mole can brook sunshine – this is indeed a deplorable reflection; and the consequences must stick to my future life, and impede whatever my head, or my hand, if it is left me, might be able to execute in my favour.”

The feeling, that he is the object of general dislike and dereliction, seems to be one of the most unendurably painful to which a human being can be subjected. The most atrocious criminals, whose nerves have not shrunk from perpetrating the most horrid cruelty, endure more from the consciousness that no man will sympathise with their sufferings, than from apprehension of the personal agony of their impending punishment; and are known often to attempt to palliate their enormities, and sometimes altogether to deny what is established by the clearest proof, rather than to leave life under the general ban of humanity. It was no wonder that Nigel, labouring under the sense of general, though unjust suspicion, should, while pondering on so painful a theme, recollect that one, at least, had not only believed him innocent, but hazarded herself, with all her feeble power, to interpose in his behalf.

“Poor girl!” he repeated; “poor, rash, but generous maiden! your fate is that of her in Scottish story, who thrust her arm into the staple of the door, to oppose it as a bar against the assassins who threatened the murder of her sovereign. The deed of devotion was useless; save to give an immortal name to her by whom it was done, and whose blood flows, it is said, in the veins of my house.”

I cannot explain to the reader, whether the recollection of this historical deed of devotion, and the lively effect which the comparison, a little overstrained perhaps, was likely to produce in favour of Margaret Ramsay, was not qualified by the concomitant ideas of ancestry and ancient descent with which that recollection was mingled. But the contending feelings suggested a new train of ideas. – “Ancestry,” he thought, “and ancient descent, what are they to me? – My patrimony alienated – my title become a reproach – for what can be so absurd as titled beggary? – my character subjected to suspicion, – I will not remain in this country; and should I, at leaving it, procure the society of one so lovely, so brave, and so faithful, who should say that I derogated from the rank which I am virtually renouncing?”

There was something romantic and pleasing, as he pursued this picture of an attached and faithful pair, becoming all the world to each other, and stemming the tide of fate arm in arm; and to be linked thus with a creature so beautiful, and who had taken such devoted and disinterested concern in his fortunes, formed itself into such a vision as romantic youth loves best to dwell upon.

Suddenly his dream was painfully dispelled, by the recollection, that its very basis rested upon the most selfish ingratitude on his own part. Lord of his castle and his towers, his forests and fields, his fair patrimony and noble name, his mind would have rejected, as a sort of impossibility, the idea of elevating to his rank the daughter of a mechanic; but, when degraded from his nobility, and plunged into poverty and difficulties, he was ashamed to feel himself not unwilling, that this poor girl, in the blindness of her affection, should abandon all the better prospects of her own settled condition, to embrace the precarious and doubtful course which he himself was condemned to. The generosity of Nigel’s mind recoiled from the selfishness of the plan of happiness which he projected; and he made a strong effort to expel from his thoughts for the rest of the evening this fascinating female, or, at least, not to permit them to dwell upon the perilous circumstance, that she was at present the only creature living who seemed to consider him as an object of kindness.

He could not, however, succeed in banishing her from his slumbers, when, after having spent a weary day, he betook himself to a perturbed couch. The form of Margaret mingled with the wild mass of dreams which his late adventures had suggested; and even when, copying the lively narrative of Sir Mungo, fancy presented to him the blood bubbling and hissing on the heated iron, Margaret stood behind him like a spirit of light, to breathe healing on the wound. At length nature was exhausted by these fantastic creations, and Nigel slept, and slept soundly, until awakened in the morning by the sound of a well-known voice, which had often broken his slumbers about the same hour.

CHAPTER XXXI

Many, come up, sir, with your gentle blood!
Here’s a red stream beneath this coarse blue doublet,
That warms the heart as kindly as if drawn
From the far source of old Assyrian kings.
Who first made mankind subject to their sway.

    Old Play.
The sounds to which we alluded in our last, were no other than the grumbling tones of Richie Moniplies’s voice.

This worthy, like some other persons who rank high in their own opinion, was very apt, when he could have no other auditor, to hold conversation with one who was sure to be a willing listener – I mean with himself. He was now brushing and arranging Lord Glenvarloch’s clothes, with as much composure and quiet assiduity as if he had never been out of his service, and grumbling betwixt whiles to the following purpose: – “Hump – ay, time cloak and jerkin were through my hands – I question if horsehair has been passed over them since they and I last parted. The embroidery finely frayed too – and the gold buttons of the cloak – By my conscience, and as I am an honest man, there is a round dozen of them gane! This comes of Alsatian frolics – God keep us with his grace, and not give us over to our own devices! – I see no sword – but that will be in respect of present circumstances.”

Nigel for some time could not help believing that he was still in a dream, so improbable did it seem that his domestic, whom he supposed to be in Scotland, should have found him out, and obtained access to him, in his present circumstances. Looking through the curtains, however, he became well assured of the fact, when he beheld the stiff and bony length of Richie, with a visage charged with nearly double its ordinary degree of importance, employed sedulously in brushing his master’s cloak, and refreshing himself with whistling or humming, from interval to interval, some snatch of an old melancholy Scottish ballad-tune. Although sufficiently convinced of the identity of the party, Lord Glenvarloch could not help expressing his surprise in the superfluous question – “In the name of Heaven, Richie, is this you?”

“And wha else suld it be, my lord?” answered Richie; “I dreamna that your lordship’s levee in this place is like to be attended by ony that are not bounded thereto by duty.”

“I am rather surprised,” answered Nigel, “that it should be attended by any one at all – especially by you, Richie; for you know that we parted, and I thought you had reached Scotland long since.”

“I crave your lordship’s pardon, but we have not parted yet, nor are soon likely so to do; for there gang twa folk’s votes to the unmaking of a bargain, as to the making of ane. Though it was your lordship’s pleasure so to conduct yourself that we were like to have parted, yet it was not, on reflection, my will to be gone. To be plain, if your lordship does not ken when you have a good servant, I ken when I have a kind master; and to say truth, you will be easier served now than ever, for there is not much chance of your getting out of bounds.”

“I am indeed bound over to good behaviour,” said Lord Glenvarloch, with a smile; “but I hope you will not take advantage of my situation to be too severe on my follies, Richie?”

“God forbid, my lord – God forbid!” replied Richie, with an expression betwixt a conceited consciousness of superior wisdom and real feeling – “especially in consideration of your lordship’s having a due sense of them. I did indeed remonstrate, as was my humble duty, but I scorn to cast that up to your lordship now – Na, na, I am myself an erring creature – very conscious of some small weaknesses – there is no perfection in man.”

“But, Richie,” said Lord Glenvarloch, “although I am much obliged to you for your proffered service, it can be of little use to me here, and may be of prejudice to yourself.”

“Your lordship shall pardon me again,” said Richie, whom the relative situation of the parties had invested with ten times his ordinary dogmatism; “but as I will manage the matter, your lordship shall be greatly benefited by my service, and I myself no whit prejudiced.”

“I see not how that can be, my friend,” said Lord Glenvarloch, “since even as to your pecuniary affairs – ”

“Touching my pecuniars, my lord,” replied Richie, “I am indifferently weel provided; and, as it chances, my living here will be no burden to your lordship, or distress to myself. Only I crave permission to annex certain conditions to my servitude with your lordship.”

“Annex what you will,” said Lord Glenvarloch, “for you are pretty sure to take your own way, whether you make any conditions or not. Since you will not leave me, which were, I think, your wisest course, you must, and I suppose will, serve me only on such terms as you like yourself.”

“All that I ask, my lord,” said Richie, gravely, and with a tone of great moderation, “is to have the uninterrupted command of my own motions, for certain important purposes which I have now in hand, always giving your lordship the solace of my company and attendance, at such times as may be at once convenient for me, and necessary for your service.”

“Of which, I suppose, you constitute yourself sole judge,” replied Nigel, smiling.

“Unquestionably, my lord,” answered Richie, gravely; “for your lordship can only know what yourself want; whereas I, who see both sides of the picture, ken both what is the best for your affairs, and what is the most needful for my own.”

“Richie, my good friend,” said Nigel, “I fear this arrangement, which places the master much under the disposal of the servant, would scarce suit us if we were both at large; but a prisoner as I am, I may be as well at your disposal as I am at that of so many other persons; and so you may come and go as you list, for I suppose you will not take my advice, to return to your own country, and leave me to my fate.”

“The deil be in my feet if I do,” said Moniplies, – “I am not the lad to leave your lordship in foul weather, when I followed you and fed upon you through the whole summer day, And besides, there may be brave days behind, for a’ that has come and gane yet; for

“It’s hame, and it’s hame, and it’s hame we fain would be, Though the cloud is in the lift, and the wind is on the lea; For the sun through the mirk blinks blithe on mine ee, Says, – ‘I’ll shine on ye yet in our ain country!”

Having sung this stanza in the manner of a ballad-singer, whose voice has been cracked by matching his windpipe against the bugle of the north blast, Richie Moniplies aided Lord Glenvarloch to rise, attended his toilet with every possible mark of the most solemn and deferential respect, then waited upon him at breakfast, and finally withdrew, pleading that he had business of importance, which would detain him for some hours.

Although Lord Glenvarloch necessarily expected to be occasionally annoyed by the self-conceit and dogmatism of Richie Moniplies’s character, yet he could not but feel the greatest pleasure from the firm and devoted attachment which this faithful follower had displayed in the present instance, and indeed promised himself an alleviation of the ennui of his imprisonment, in having the advantage of his services. It was, therefore, with pleasure that he learned from the warder, that his servant’s attendance would be allowed at all times when the general rules of the fortress permitted the entrance of strangers.

In the meanwhile, the magnanimous Richie Moniplies had already reached Tower Wharf. Here, after looking with contempt on several scullers by whom he was plied, and whose services he rejected with a wave of his hand, he called with dignity, “First oars!” and stirred into activity several lounging Tritons of the higher order, who had not, on his first appearance, thought it worth while to accost him with proffers of service. He now took possession of a wherry, folded his arms within his ample cloak, and sitting down in the stern with an air of importance, commanded them to row to Whitehall Stairs. Having reached the Palace in safety, he demanded to see Master Linklater, the under-clerk of his Majesty’s kitchen. The reply was, that he was not to be spoken withal, being then employed in cooking a mess of cock-a-leekie for the king’s own mouth.

“Tell him,” said Moniplies, “that it is a dear countryman of his, who seeks to converse with him on matter of high import.”