"In my country," answered MacLean, "where we would do most honor, we drink
not to life, but to death. Crioch onarach! Like a gentleman may you
die." He drank, and sighed with pleasure.
"The King!" said Haward. There was a china bowl, filled with red anemones,
upon the table. MacLean drew it toward him, and, pressing aside the mass
of bloom, passed his glass over the water in the bowl. "The King! with all
my heart," he said imperturbably.
Haward poured more wine. "I have toasted at the Kit-Kat many a piece of
brocade and lace less fair than yon bit of Quaker gray that cost you a
broken head. Shall we drink to Mistress Truelove Taberer?"
By now the Burgundy had warmed the heart and loosened the tongue of the
man who had not tasted wine since the surrender of Preston. "It is but a
mile from the store to her father's house," he said. "Sometimes on
Sundays I go up the creek upon the Fair View side, and when I am over
against the house I holloa. Ephraim comes, in his boat and rows me across,
and I stay for an hour. They are strange folk, the Quakers. In her sight
and in that of her people I am as good a man as you. 'Friend Angus
MacLean,' 'Friend Marmaduke Haward,'--world's wealth and world's rank
quite beside the question."
He drank, and commended the wine. Haward struck a silver bell, and bade
Juba bring another bottle.
"When do you come again to the house at Fair View?" asked the storekeeper.
"Very shortly. It is a lonely place, where ghosts bear me company. I hope
that now and then, when I ask it, and when the duties of your day are
ended, you will come help me exorcise them. You shall find welcome and
good wine." He spoke very courteously, and if he saw the humor of the
situation his smile betrayed him not.
MacLean took a flower from the bowl, and plucked at its petals with
nervous fingers. "Do you mean that?" he asked at last.
Haward leaned across the table, and their eyes met. "On my word I do,"
said the Virginian.
The knocker on the house door sounded loudly, and a moment later a woman's
clear voice, followed by a man's deeper tones, was heard in the hall.
"More guests," said Haward lightly. "You are a Jacobite; I drink my
chocolate at St. James' Coffee House; the gentleman approaching--despite
his friendship for Orrery and for the Bishop of Rochester--is but a
Hanover Tory; but the lady,--the lady wears only white roses, and every
10th of June makes a birthday feast."
The storekeeper rose hastily to take his leave, but was prevented both by
Haward's restraining gesture and by the entrance of the two visitors who
were now ushered in by the grinning Juba. Haward stepped forward. "You are
very welcome, Colonel. Evelyn, this is kind. Your woman told me this
morning that you were not well, else"-"A migraine," she answered, in her clear, low voice. "I am better now, and
my father desired me to take the air with him."