CHAPTER TEN.

"WHAT MUST BE MUST--'TIS FATE."

The old Laird McLeod possessed that true Christian feeling which we so rarely see displayed in this age, and as he left the door of the old mansion where he had lived so long and so happily he held out his hand to Francis.

"God bless you, lad, anyhow. Be good, and you'll prosper."

"The wicked prosper," said Francis.

"All artificial, lad, and only for a time. Never can they be said to be truly happy."

"Good-bye--or rather, _au revoir_."

"_Au revoir_."

Then the old man clambered slowly into the carriage. Poor Annie was already there. She cast just one longing, lingering look behind, then burst into an uncontrollable fit of weeping. But the day was beautiful, the trees arrayed in the tender tints of spring, while high above, against a fleecy cloud, she could see a laverock (lark), though she could not hear it. But his body was quivering, and eke his wings, with the joy that he could not control. Woods on every side, and to the right the bonnie winding Dee, its wavelets sparkling in the sunshine.

Everything was happy; why should not she be? So she dried her tears, and while her uncle dozed she took her favourite author from her satchel, and was soon absorbed in his poems.

After they had settled down in McLeod Cottage, as the snow-white pretty villa had now been called, I do believe that they were happier than when in the grand old mansion, with all its worries and work and trouble. They were not very well off financially, that was all.

But it was a new pleasure for Annie and her maid to do shopping along Union Street the beautiful, and even round the quaint old New Market. She used to return happy and exultant, to show her uncle the bargains she had made.

One night Annie had an inspiration. She was a good musician on piano and zither. Why not give lessons?

She would. Nor was she very long in finding a pupil or two. This added considerably to the fund for household expenditure. But nevertheless the proud old Highlander McLeod thought it was somewhat _infra dignitate_. But he bore with this because it seemed to give happiness to the child, as he still continued to call her.

So things went on. And so much rest did the Laird now have that for a time, at least, his life seemed all one happy dream. They soon made friends, too, with their neighbours, and along the street wherever Annie went she was known, for she was always followed by a grand and noble dog, a Great Dane, as faithful and as true as any animal could well be.

One evening she and Jeannie, her maid, were walking along a lovely tree-shaded lane, just as the beams of the setting sun were glimmering crimson through the leafy grandeur of the great elms. For some purpose of his own the dog was in an adjoining field, when suddenly, at the bend of the road, they were accosted by a gigantic and ragged tramp, who demanded money on the pain of death. Both girls shrieked, and suddenly, like a shell from a great gun, darted the dog from the hedge, and next moment that tramp was on his back, his ragged neckerchief and still more ragged waistcoat were torn from his body, and but for Annie his throat would have been pulled open.

But while Jeannie trembled, Annie showed herself a true McLeod, though her name was Lane. She called the dog away; then she quickly possessed herself of the tramp's cudgel. Annie was not tall, but she was strong and determined.

"Get up at once," she cried, "and march back with us. If you make the least attempt to escape, that noble dog shall tear your windpipe out!"

Very sulkily the tramp obeyed.

"I'm clean copped. Confound your beast of a dog!"

Within a few yards of her own door they met a policeman, who on hearing of the assault speedily marched the prisoner off to gaol.

When she related the adventure to her uncle he was delighted beyond measure, and must needs bless her and kiss her.

They had parted with the carriage. Needs must where poverty and the devil drives! But they still had a little phaeton, and in this the old man and his niece enjoyed many a delightful drive. He would take her to concerts, too, and to the theatre also, so that, on the whole, life was by no means a galling load to anyone.

But a very frequent visitor at McLeod Cottage was Laird Fletcher. Not only so, but he took the old man and Annie frequently out by train. His carriage would be waiting at the station, and in this they drove away to his beautiful home.

The house itself was modern, but the grounds, under the sweet joy of June, looked beautiful indeed. It was at some considerable distance from the main road, and so in the gardens all was delightfully still, save for the music of happy song-birds or the purr of the turtle-dove, sounding low from the spreading cedars.

"A pleasing land of drowsyhead it was, Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye; And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, For ever flushing round a summer sky. There eke the soft delights, that witchingly Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast, And the calm pleasures always hovered nigh; But whate'er smacked of 'noyance or unrest Was far, far off expelled from this delicious nest."

Through these lovely rose-gardens and tree-shaded lawns frequently now wandered Annie, alone with Fletcher. He was so gentle, winning, and true that she had come to like him. Mind, I say nothing of love. And she innocently and frankly told him so as they sat together in a natural bower beneath a spreading deodar cedar. He was happy, but he would not risk his chance by being too precipitate.

Another day in the same arbour, after a moment or two of silence, she said: "Oh, I wish you were my uncle!" Fletcher winced a little, but summoned up courage to say:

"Ah, Annie, could we not be united by a dearer tie than that? Believe me, I love you more than life itself. Whether that life be long or short depends upon you, Annie."

But she only bent her head and cried, childlike.

"Ah, Mr Fletcher," she said at last, "I have no heart to give away. It lies at the bottom of the sea."

"But love would come."

"We will go to the house now, I think," and she rose.

Fletcher, poor fellow, silently, almost broken-heartedly, followed, and, of course, the Great Dane was there.

That night she told her uncle all. He said not a word. She told her maid in the bedroom.

"Oh, Miss Annie," said Jeanie, "I think you are very, very foolish. You refuse to marry this honest and faithful man, but your mourning will not, cannot restore the dead. Reginald Grahame is happier, a thousand, million times more happy, than anyone can ever be on this earth. Besides, dear, there is another way of looking at the matter. Your poor Uncle McLeod is miles and miles from the pines, from the heath and the heather. He may not complain, but the artificial life of a city is telling on him. What a quiet and delightful life he would have at Laird Fletcher's!"

Annie was dumb. She was thinking. Should she sacrifice her young life for the sake of her dear uncle? Ah, well, what did life signify to her now? _He_ was dead and gone.

Thus she spoke:

"You do not think my uncle is ill, Jeannie?"

"I do not say he is _ill_, but I do say that he feels his present life irksome at times, and you may not have him long, Miss Annie. Now go to sleep like a baby and dream of it."

And I think Annie cried herself asleep that night.

"It becomes not a maiden descended from the noble clan McLeod to be otherwise than brave," she told herself next morning. "Oh, for dear uncle's sake I feel I could--" But she said no more to herself just then.

Fletcher called that very day, and took them away again to his bonnie Highland home. It was a day that angels would have delighted in. And just on that same seat beneath the same green-branched cedar Fletcher renewed his wooing. But he, this time, alluded to the artificial city life that the old Laird had to lead, he who never before during his old age had been out of sight of the waving pines and the bonnie blooming heather.

Fletcher was very eloquent to-day. Love makes one so. Yet his wooing was strangely like that of Auld Robin Grey, especially when he finished plaintively, appealingly, with the words:

"Oh, Annie, for his sake will you not marry me?"

Annie o' the Banks o' Dee wept just a little, then she wiped her tears away. He took her hand, and she half-whispered: "What must be _must_--'tis fate."