The Eagle Cliff, R. M. Ballantyne [best fiction books to read .txt] 📗

shock, and it was thought advisable to keep him quiet as a matter of precaution. When she did see him at last, lying on a sofa in a dressing-gown, and with his head and face as we have described, his appearance did not call to her remembrance the faintest resemblance to the confused, wild, and altogether incomprehensible youth, who had tumbled her over in the streets of London, and almost run her down in the Eagle Pass.

Of course Barret feared that she would recognise him, and had been greatly exercised as to his precise duty in the circumstances; but when he found that she did not recognise either his face or his voice, he felt uncertain whether it would not be, perhaps, better to say nothing at all about the matter in the meantime. Indeed, the grateful old lady gave him no time to make a “clean breast of it,” as he had at first intended to do.

“Oh! Mr Barret,” she exclaimed, sitting down beside him, and laying her hand lightly on his arm, while the laird sat down on another chair and looked on benignly, “I cannot tell you how thankful I am that you have not been killed, and how very grateful I am to you for all your bravery in saving my darling Milly’s life. Now, don’t say a word about disclaiming credit, as I know you are going to do—”

“But, dear madam,” interrupted the invalid, “allow me to explain. I cannot bear to deceive you, or to sail under false colours—”

“Sail under false colours! Explain!” repeated Mrs Moss, quickly. “What nonsense do you talk? Has not my daughter explained, and she is not given to colouring things falsely.”

“Excuse me, Mrs Moss,” said Barret; “I did not mean that. I only—”

“I don’t care what you mean, Mr Barret,” said the positive little woman; “it’s of no use your denying that you have behaved in a noble, courageous manner, and I won’t listen to anything to the contrary; so you need not interrupt me. Besides, I have been told not to allow you to speak much; so, sir, if I am to remain beside you at all, I must impose silence.”

Barret sank back on his couch with a sigh, and resigned himself to his fate.

So much for the mother. Later in the same day the daughter sat beside his couch. The laird was not present on that occasion. They were alone.

“Milly,” said the invalid, taking her small hand in his, “have you mentioned it yet to your mother?”

“Yes, John,” replied Milly, blushing in spite of—nay, rather more in consequence of—her efforts not to do so. “I spoke to her some days ago. Indeed, soon after the accident, when we were sure you were going to get well. And she did not disapprove.”

“Ay, but have you spoken since she has seen me—since this morning?”

“Yes, John.”

“And she is still of the same mind—not shocked or shaken by my appearance?”

“She is still of the same mind,” returned Milly; “and not shocked in the least. My darling mother is far too wise to be shocked by trifles—I—I mean by scratches and bruises. She judges of people by their hearts.”

“I’m glad to hear that, Milly, for I have something shocking to tell her about myself, that will surprise her, if it does nothing else.”

“Indeed!” said Milly, with the slightest possible rise of her pretty eyebrows.

“Yes. You have heard from your mother about that young rascal who ran into her with his bicycle in London some time ago?”

“Yes; she wrote to me about it,” replied Milly, with an amused smile. “You mean, I suppose, the reckless youth who, after running her down, had the cowardice to run away and leave her lying flat on the pavement? Mother has more than once written about that event with indignation, and rightly, I think. But how came you to know about it, John?”

“Milly,” said Barret, holding her hand very tight, and speaking solemnly, “I am that cowardly man!”

“Now, John, you are jesting.”

“Indeed—indeed I am not.”

“Do you really mean to say that it was you who ran against my— Oh! you must be jesting!”

“Again I say I am not. I am the man—the coward.”

“Well, dear John,” said Milly, flushing considerably, “I must believe you; but the fact does not in the least reduce my affection for you, though it will lower my belief in your prudence, unless you can explain.”

“I will explain,” said Barret; and we need scarcely add that the explanation tended rather to increase than diminish Milly’s affection for, as well as her belief in, her lover! But when Barret went on further to describe the meeting in the Eagle Pass, she went off into uncontrollable laughter.

“And you are sure that mother has no idea that you are the man?” she asked.

“Not the remotest.”

“Well, now, John, you must not let her know for some time yet. You must gain her affections, sir, before you venture to reveal your true character.”

Of course Barret agreed to this. He would have agreed to anything that Milly proposed, except, perhaps, the giving up of his claim to her own hand. Deception, however, invariably surrounds the deceiver with more or less of difficulty. That same evening, while Milly was sitting alone with her mother, the conversation took a perplexing turn.

There had been a pretty long pause, after a rather favourable commentary on the character of Barret, when the thin little old lady had wound up with the observation that the subject of their criticism was a remarkably agreeable man, with a playfully humorous and a delightfully serious turn of mind—“and so modest” withal!

Apparently the last words had turned her mind into the new channel, for she resumed—

“Talking of insolence, my dear—”

“Were we talking of insolence, mother?” said Milly, with a surprised smile.

“Well, my love, I was thinking of the opposite of modesty, which is the same thing. Do you know, I had a meeting on the day of my arrival here which surprised me very much? To say truth, I did not mention it sooner, because I wished to give you a little surprise. Why do you change your seat, my love? Did you feel a draught where you were?”

“No—no. I—I only want to get the light a little more at my back—to keep it off my face. But go on, mother. What was the surprise about? I’m anxious to know.”

If Milly did not absolutely know, she had at least a pretty good idea of what was coming!

“Well, of course you remember about that young man—that—that cowardly young man who—”

“Who ran you down in London? Yes, yes, I know,” interrupted the daughter, endeavouring to suppress a laugh, and putting her handkerchief suddenly to her face. “I remember well. The monster! What about him?”

“You may well call him a monster! Can you believe it? I have met him here—in this very island, where he must be living somewhere, of course; and he actually ran me down again—all but.” She added the last two words in order to save her veracity.

“You don’t really mean it?” exclaimed Milly, giving way a little in spite of herself. “With a bicycle?”

It was the mother’s turn to laugh now.

“No, you foolish thing; even I have capacity to understand that it would be impossible to use those hideous—frightful instruments, on the bad hill-roads of this island. No; but it seems to be the nature of this dis-disagreeable—I had almost said detestable—youth, to move only under violent impulse, for he came round a corner of the Eagle Cliff at such a pace that, as I have said, he all but ran into my arms and knocked me down.”

“Dreadful!” exclaimed Milly, turning her back still more to the light and working mysteriously with her kerchief.

“Yes, dreadful indeed! And when I naturally taxed him with his cowardice and meanness, he did not seem at all penitent, but went on like a lunatic; and although what he said was civil enough, his way of saying it was very impolite and strange; and after we had parted, I heard him give way to fiendish laughter. I could not be mistaken, for the cliffs echoed it in all directions like a hundred hyenas!”

As this savoured somewhat of a joke, Milly availed herself of it, set free the safety-valve, and, so to speak, saved the boiler!

“Why do you laugh so much, child?” asked the old lady, when her daughter had transgressed reasonable limits.

“Well, you know, mother, if you will compare a man’s laugh to a hundred hyenas—”

“I didn’t compare the man’s voice,” interrupted Mrs Moss; “I said that the cliffs—”

“That’s worse and worse! Now, mother, don’t get into one of your hypercritical moods, and insist on reasons for everything; but tell me about this wicked—this dreadful young man. What was he like?”

“Like an ordinary sportsman, dear, with one of those hateful guns in his hand, and a botanical box on his back. I could not see his face very well, for he wore one of those ugly pot-caps, with a peak before and behind; though what the behind one is for I cannot imagine, as men have no eyes in the back of their heads to keep the sun out of. No doubt some men would make us believe they have! but it was pulled down on the bridge of his nose. What I did see of his face seemed to be handsome enough, and his figure was tall and well made, unquestionably, but his behaviour—nothing can excuse that! If he had only said he was sorry, one might have forgiven him.”

“Did he not say he was sorry?” asked Milly in some surprise.

“Oh, well, I suppose he did; and begged pardon after a fashion. But what truth could there be in his protestations when he went away and laughed like a hyena.”

“You said a hundred hyenas, mother.”

“No, Milly, I said the cliffs laughed; but don’t interrupt me, you naughty child! Well, I was going to tell you that my heart softened a little towards the young man, for, as you know, I am not naturally unforgiving.”

“I know it well, dear mother!”

“So, before we parted, I told him that if he had any explanations or apologies to make, I should be glad to see him at Kinlossie House. Then I made up my mind to forgive him, and introduce him to you as the man that ran me down in London! This was the little surprise I had in store for you, but the ungrateful creature has never come.”

“No, and he never will come!” said Milly, with a hearty laugh.

“How do you know that, puss?” asked Mrs Moss, in surprise.

Fortunately the dinner-bell rang at that moment, justifying Milly in jumping up. Giving her mother a rather violent hug, she rushed from the room.

“Strange girl!” muttered Mrs Moss as she turned, and occupied herself with some mysterious—we might almost say captious—operations before the looking-glass. “The mountain air seems to have increased her spirits wonderfully. Perhaps love has something to do with it! It may be both!”

She was still engaged with a subtle analysis of this question—in front of the glass, which gave her the advantage of supposing that she talked with an opponent—when sudden and uproarious laughter was heard in the adjoining room. It was Barret’s sitting-room, in which his friends were wont to visit him. She could distinguish that the laughter proceeded from himself, Milly, and Giles Jackman, though the walls were too thick to permit of either words or ordinary tones being heard.

“Milly,” said Mrs Moss, severely, when they met a few minutes later in the drawing-room, “what were you two and Mr Jackman laughing at so loudly? Surely you did not tell them what we had been speaking about?”

“Of course I did, mother. I did not know you intended to keep the matter secret. And it did so tickle them! But no one else knows it, so I will run back to John and pledge him to secrecy. You can caution Mr Jackman, who will be down directly, no doubt.”

As Barret had not at