Redgauntlet: A Tale of the Eighteenth Century by Walter Scott (classic romance novels txt) 📗

‘God only commands the issue,’ said Father Buonaventure. ‘Man uses means. You understand that, by accepting this commission, you engage yourself in honour to try the effect of my letter upon Mr. Redgauntlet, before you have recourse to informations or legal warrants?’

‘I hold myself bound, as a man of good faith and honour, to do so,’ said Fairford.

‘Well, I trust you,’ said the father. ‘I will now tell you that an express, dispatched by me last night, has, I hear, brought Redgauntlet to a spot many miles nearer this place, where he will not find it safe to attempt any violence on your friend, should he be rash enough to follow the advice of Mr. Maxwell of Summertrees rather than my commands. We now understand each other.’

He extended his hand towards Alan, who was about to pledge his faith in the usual form by grasping it with his own, when the father drew back hastily. Ere Alan had time to comment upon this repulse, a small side-door, covered with tapestry, was opened; the hangings were drawn aside, and a lady, as if by sudden apparition, glided into the apartment. It was neither of the Misses Arthuret, but a woman in the prime of life, and in the full-blown expansion of female beauty, tall, fair, and commanding in her aspect. Her locks, of paly gold, were taught to fall over a brow, which, with the stately glance of the large, open, blue eyes, might have become Juno herself; her neck and bosom were admirably formed, and of a dazzling whiteness. She was rather inclined to EMBONPOINT, but not more than became her age, of apparently thirty years. Her step was that of a queen, but it was of Queen Vashti, not Queen Esther—the bold and commanding, not the retiring beauty.

Father Buonaventure raised himself on the couch, angrily, as if displeased by this intrusion. ‘How now, madam,’ he said, with some sternness; ‘why have we the honour of your company?’

‘Because it is my pleasure,’ answered the lady, composedly.

‘Your pleasure, madam!’ he repeated in the same angry tone.

‘My pleasure, sir,’ she continued, ‘which always keeps exact pace with my duty. I had heard you were unwell—let me hope it is only business which produces this seclusion.’

‘I am well,’ he replied; ‘perfectly well, and I thank you for your care—but we are not alone, and this young man’—

‘That young man?’ she said, bending her large and serious eye on Alan Fairford, as if she had been for the first time aware of his presence,—‘may I ask who he is?’

‘Another time, madam; you shall learn his history after he is gone. His presence renders it impossible for me to explain further.’

‘After he is gone may be too late,’ said the lady; ‘and what is his presence to me, when your safety is at stake? He is the heretic lawyer whom those silly fools, the Arthurets, admitted into this house at a time when they should have let their own father knock at the door in vain, though the night had been a wild one. You will not surely dismiss him?’

‘Your own impatience can alone make that step perilous,’ said the father; ‘I have resolved to take it—do not let your indiscreet zeal, however excellent its motive, add any unnecessary risk to the transaction.’

‘Even so?’ said the lady, in a tone of reproach, yet mingled with respect and apprehension. ‘And thus you will still go forward, like a stag upon the hunter’s snares, with undoubting confidence, after all that has happened?’

‘Peace, madam,’ said Father Buonaventure, rising up; ‘be silent, or quit the apartment; my designs do not admit of female criticism.’

To this peremptory command the lady seemed about to make a sharp reply; but she checked herself, and pressing her lips strongly together, as if to secure the words from bursting from them which were already formed upon her tongue, she made a deep reverence, partly as it seemed in reproach, partly in respect, and left the room as suddenly as she had entered it.

The father looked disturbed at this incident, which he seemed sensible could not but fill Fairford’s imagination with an additional throng of bewildering suspicions; he bit his lip and muttered something to himself as he walked through the apartment; then suddenly turned to his visitor with a smile of much sweetness, and a countenance in which every rougher expression was exchanged for those of courtesy and kindness.

‘The visit we have been just honoured with, my young friend, has given you,’ he said, ‘more secrets to keep than I would have wished you burdened with. The lady is a person of condition—of rank and fortune—but nevertheless is so circumstanced that the mere fact of her being known to be in this country would occasion many evils. I should wish you to observe secrecy on this subject, even to Redgauntlet or Maxwell, however much I trust them in all that concerns my own affairs.’

‘I can have no occasion,’ replied Fairford, ‘for holding any discussion with these gentlemen, or with any others, on the circumstance which I have just witnessed—it could only have become the subject of my conversation by mere accident, and I will now take care to avoid the subject entirely.’

‘You will do well, sir, and I thank you,’ said the father, throwing much dignity into the expression of obligation which he meant to convey. ‘The time may perhaps come when you will learn what it is to have obliged one of my condition. As to the lady, she has the highest merit, and nothing can be said of her justly which would not redound to her praise. Nevertheless—in short, sir, we wander at present as in a morning mist—the sun will, I trust, soon rise and dispel it, when all that now seems mysterious will be fully revealed—or it will sink into rain,’ he added, in a solemn tone, ‘and then explanation will be of little consequence.—Adieu, sir; I wish you well.’

He made a graceful obeisance, and vanished through the same side-door by which the lady had entered; and Alan thought he heard their voices high in dispute in the adjoining apartment.

Presently afterwards, Ambrose entered, and told him that a horse and guide waited him beneath the terrace.

‘The good Father Buonaventure,’ added the butler, ‘has been graciously pleased to consider your situation, and desired me to inquire whether you have any occasion for a supply of money?’

‘Make my respects to his reverence,’ answered Fairford, ‘and assure him I am provided in that particular. I beg you also to make my acknowledgements to the Misses Arthuret, and assure them that their kind hospitality, to which I probably owe my life, shall be remembered with gratitude as long as that life lasts. You yourself, Mr. Ambrose, must accept of my kindest thanks for your skill and attention.’

Mid these acknowledgements they left the house, descended the terrace, and reached the spot where the gardener, Fairford’s old acquaintance, waited for him, mounted upon one horse and leading another.

Bidding adieu to Ambrose, our young lawyer mounted, and rode down the avenue, often looking back to the melancholy and neglected dwelling in which he had witnessed such strange scenes, and musing upon the character