The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter (good romance books to read TXT) 📕

glad surprise. Lennox embraced him. "I, too, am come to enlist under the banners of this young Leonidas."

"God armeth the patriot," was all the reply that Mar made, while the big tears rolled over his cheek, and he shook him by the hand.

"I have four hundred stout Lennox men," continued the earl, "who by to-morrow's eve shall be ready to follow our leader to the very borders."

"Not so soon," interrupted the countess; "our deliverer needs repose."

"I thank your benevolence, Lady Mar," returned Wallace; "but the issue of last night, and the sight of Lord Lennox this day, with the promise of so great a support, are such aliments that—we must go forward."

"Ay, to be sure," joined Kirkpatrick; "Dumbarton was not taken during our sleep; and if we stay loitering here, the devil that holds Stirling Castle may follow the scent of De Valence; and so I lose my prey!"

"What?" cried the countess, "and is my lord to be left again to his enemies? Sir William Wallace, I should have thought-"

"Everything, madam," rejoined he; "that is demonstrative of my devotion to your venerable lord! But with a brave garrison, I hope you will consider him safe here, until a wider range of security be won, to enable you to retire to Braemar."

As the apostrophe to Wallace, in the latter part of the countess' speech, had been addressed to himself in rather a low voice, his reply was made in a similar tone, so that Lord Mar did not hear any part of the answer, except the concluding words. But then he exclaimed, "Nay, my ever-fearful Joanna, art thou making objections to keeping garrison here?"

"I confess," replied Wallace, "that an armed citadel is not the most pleasant abode for a lady; but at present, excepting perhaps the church, it is the safest; and I would not advise your lady to remove hence, until the plain be made as free as this mountain."

The sewer now announced the board in the hall; and the countess leading the way, reluctantly gave her hand to the Earl of Lennox. Lord Mar leaned on the arm of Wallace, who was followed by Edwin and the other chieftains.

Chapter XXV.

The Citadel.

During the repast, the countess often fixed her unrestrained gaze on the manly yet youthful countenance of the heroic Wallace. His plumed helmet was now laid aside; and the heavy corselet unbuckled from his breast, disclosing the symmetry of his fine form, left its graceful movements to be displayed with advantage by the flexible folds of his simple tartan vest. Was it the formidable Wallace she looked on, bathed in the blood of Heselrigge, and breathing vengeance against the adherents of the tyrant Edward! It was, then, the enemy of her kinsmen of the house of Cummin! It was the man for whom her husband had embraced so many dangers! It was the man whom she had denounced to one of those kinsmen, and whom she had betrayed to the hazard of an ignominious death! But where now was the fierce rebel—the ruiner of her peace—the outlaw whom she had wished in his grave?

The last idea was distraction. She could have fallen at his feet, and bathing them with her tears, have implored his pity and forgiveness. Even as the wish sprung in her mind, she asked herself-"Did he know all, could he pardon such a weight of injuries?" She cast her eyes with a wild expression upon his face. The mildness of heaven was there; and the peace, too, she might have thought, had not his eye carried a chastened sadness in its look, which told that something dire and sorrowful was buried deep within. It was a look that dissolved the soul which gazed on it. The countess felt her heart throb violently. At that moment Wallace addressed a few words to her but she knew not what they were; her soul was in tumults, and a mist passed over her sight, which, for a moment, seemed to wrap all her senses in a trance.

The unconscious object of these emotions bowed to her inarticulate reply, supposing that the mingling voices of others had made him hear hers indistinctly.

Lady Mar found her situation so strange, and her agitation so inexplicable, that feeling it impossible to remain longer without giving way to a burst of tears, she rose from her seat, and forcing a smile with her courtesy to the company, left the room.

On gaining the upper apartment, she threw herself upon the nearest couch, and striking her breast, exclaimed: "What is this within me? How does my soul seem to pour itself out to this man! Oh! how does it extend itself, as if it would absorb his, even at my eyes! Only twelve hours—hardly twelve hours, have I seen this William Wallace, and yet my very being is now lost in his!"

While thus speaking, she covered her face with her handkerchief, but no tears now started to be wiped away. The fire in her veins dried the source, and with burning blushes she rose from her seat. "Fatal, fatal hour! Why didst thou come here, too infatuating Wallace, to rob me of my peace? Oh! why did I ever look on that face?-or rather, blessed saints!" cried she, clasping her hands in wild passion, "why did I ever shackle this hand?-why did I ever render such a sacrifice necessary? Wallace is now free; had I been free? But wretch, wretch, wretch; I could tear out this betrayed heart! I could trample on that of the infatuated husband that made me such a slave!" She gasped for breath, and again seating herself, reclined her beating temples against the couch.

She was now silent; but thoughts not less intense, not less fraught with self-reproach and anguish, occupied her mind. Should this god of her idolatry ever discover that it was her information which had sent Earl de Valence's men to surround him in the mountains; should he ever learn that at Bothwell she had betrayed the cause on which he had set his life, she felt that moment would be her last. For, now, to sate her eyes with gazing on him, to hear the sound of his voice, to receive his smiles, seemed to her a joy she could only surrender with her existence. What then was the prospect of so soon losing him, even to crown himself with honor, but to her a living death?

TO defer his departure was all her study—all her hope; and fearful that his restless valor might urge him to accompany Murray in his intended convoy of Helen to the Tweed, she determined to persuade her nephew to set off without the knowledge of his general. She did not allow that it was the youthful beauty, and more lovely mind of her daughter-in-law, which she feared; even to herself she cloaked her alarm under the plausible excuse of care for the chieftain's safety. Composed by this mental arrangement, her disturbed features became smooth, and with even a sedate air she received her lord and his brave friends, when they soon after entered the chamber.

But the object of her wishes did not appear. Wallace had taken Lord Lennox to view the dispositions of the fortress. Ill satisfied as she was with his prolonged absence, she did not fail to turn it to advantage; and while her lord and his friends were examining a draft of Scotland (which Wallace had sketched after she left the banqueting-room), she took Lord Andrew aside, to converse with him on the subject now nearest to her heart.

"It certainly belongs to me alone, her kinsman and friend, to protect Helen to the Tweed, if there she must go," returned Murray; "but, my good lady, I cannot comprehend why I am to lead my fair cousin such a pilgrimage. She is not afraid of heroes! you are safe in Dumbarton, and why not bring her here also?"

"Not for worlds!" exclaimed the countess, thrown off her guard. Murray looked at her with surprise. It recalled her to self-possession, and she resumed: "So lovely a creature in this castle would be a dangerous magnet. You must have known that it was the hope of obtaining her which attracted the Lord Soulis and Earl de Valence to Bothwell. The whole castle rung with the quarrel of these two lords upon her account, when you so fortunately effected her escape. Should it be known that she is here, the same fierce desire of obtaining her would give double incitement to De Valence to recover the place; and the consequences, who can answer for?"

By this argument Murray was persuaded to relinquish the idea of conveying Helen to Dumbarton; but remembering what Wallace had said respecting the safety of a religious sanctuary, he advised that she should be left at St. Fillan's till the cause of Scotland might be more firmly established. "Send a messenger to inform her of the rescue of Dumbarton, and of your and my uncle's health," continued he, "and that will be sufficient to make her happy."

That she was not to be thrown in Wallace's way satisfied Lady Mar; and indifferent whether Helen's seclusion were under the Elidon tree or the Holyrood, she approved Murray's decision. Relieved from apprehension, her face became again dressed in smiles, and, with a bounding step, she rose to welcome the re-entrance of Wallace with the Earl of Lennox.

Absorbed in one thought, every charm she possessed was directed to the same point. She played finely on the lute and sung with all the grace of her country. What gentle heart was not to be affected by music? She determined it should be once of the spells by which she meant to attract Wallace. She took up one of the lutes (which with other musical instruments decorated the apartments of the luxurious De Valence), and touching it with exquisite delicacy, breathed the most pathetic air her memory could dictate.

   "If on the heath she moved, her breast was whiter than the down of Cana;
    If on the sea-beat shore, than the foam of the rolling ocean.
    Her eyes were two stars of light. Her face was Heaven's bow in showers;
    Her dark hair flowed around it, like the streaming clouds,
    Thou wert the dweller of souls, white-handed Strinadona!"

Wallace rose from his chair, which had been placed near her. She had deigned that these tender words of the bard of Morven should suggest to her hearer the observation of her own resembling beauties. But he saw in them only the lovely dweller of his own soul; and walking toward a window, stood there with his eyes fixed on the descending sun. "So hath set all my joys. So is life to me, a world without a sun-cold, cold, and charmless!"

The countess vainly believed that some sensibility advantageous to her new passion had caused the agitation with which she saw him depart from her side; and, intoxicated with the idea, she ran through many a melodious descant, till toughing on the first strains of Thusa ha measg na reultan mor, she saw Wallace start from his contemplative position, and with a pale countenance leave the room. There was something in this abruptness which excited the alarm of the Earl of Lennox, who had also been listening to the songs; he rose instantly, and overtaking the chief at the threshold, inquired what was the matter? "Nothing," answered Wallace, forcing a smile, in which the agony of his mind was too truly imprinted; "but music displeased me." With this reply he disappeared. The excuse seemed strange but it was true; for she whose notes were to him sweeter than the thrush—whose angel strains used to greet his morning and evening hours—was silent in the grave! He should no more see her white hand upon the lute; he should no more behold that bosom, brighter than foam upon the wave, to him? A soulless sound, or a direful knell, to recall the remembrance of all he had lost.

Such were his thoughts when the words of Thusa ha measg rung from Lady Mar's voice. Those were the strains which Halbert used to breathe from his heart to call Marion to her nightly slumbers—those were the strains with which that faithful servant had announced that she slept to wake no more!

What wonder, then, that Wallace fled from the apartment, and buried himself, and his aroused grief, amid the distant solitudes of the beacon-hill!