'Nathless, you must pay for both,' I told him; and the upshot is that he
leaves with me a gold button as earnest that he will bring the remainder
of the price before the duel to-morrow. That Quaker maiden of whom you ask
hath a soul like the soul of Colna-dona, of whom Murdoch, the harper of
Coll, used to sing. She is fair as a flower after winter, and as tender as
the rose flush in which swims yonder star. When I am with her, almost she
persuades me to think ill of honest hatred, and to pine no longer that it
was not I that had the killing of Ewin Mackinnon." He gave a short laugh,
and stooping picked up an oak twig from the ground, and with deliberation
broke it into many small pieces. "Almost, but not quite," he said. "There
was in that feud nothing illusory or fantastic; nothing of the quality
that marked, mayhap, another feud of my own making.
If I have found that in this latter case I took a wraith and dubbed it my enemy; that, thinking
I followed a foe, I followed a friend instead"--He threw away the bits of
bark, and straightened himself. "A friend!" he said, drawing his breath.
"Save for this Quaker family, I have had no friend for many a year! And I
cannot talk to them of honor and warfare and the wide world." His speech
was sombre, but in his eyes there was an eagerness not without pathos.
The mood of the Gael chimed with the present mood of the Saxon. As unlike
in their natures as their histories, men would have called them; and yet,
far away, in dim recesses of the soul, at long distances from the flesh,
each recognised the other. And it was an evening, too, in which to take
care of other things than the ways and speech of every day. The heat, the
hush, and the stillness appeared well-nigh preternatural. A sadness
breathed over the earth; all things seemed new and yet old; across the
spectral river the dim plains beneath the afterglow took the seeming of
battlefields.
"A friend!" said Haward. "There are many men who call themselves my
friends. I am melancholy to-day, restless, and divided against myself. I
do not know one of my acquaintance whom I would have called to be
melancholy with me as I have called you." He leaned across the table and
touched MacLean's hand that was somewhat hurriedly fingering the
wineglass. "Come!" he said. "Loneliness may haunt the level fields as well
as the ways that are rugged and steep. How many times have we held
converse since that day I found you in charge of my store? Often enough, I
think, for each to know the other's quality. Our lives have been very
different, and yet I believe that we are akin. For myself, I should be
glad to hold as my friend so gallant though so unfortunate a gentleman."
He smiled and made a gesture of courtesy. "Of course Mr. MacLean may very
justly not hold me in a like esteem, nor desire a closer relation."