A Reconstructed Marriage Part 59

"I'll withdraw every bawbee out o' them. Your sisters can do as they like. And may I ask, what you are going to do? Become a miner, and carry a pick and a dinner-pail? That would be a proper ending for Robert Campbell."

"I am going to join my brother David in a banking business in San Francisco."

"Your brother David! Your brother David! So he is in California, too?

_Dod!_ I might have known it--the very place for the like o' him."

"He is one of the princes of Californian finance. He dwells in a palace.

He is worth many millions of dollars."

"_Dollars!_" and she spit the word out of her mouth with inexpressible scorn--"dollars! what kind o' money is that? I wouldn't gie you a copper half-penny for your dollar."

"A dollar is worth just one hundred half-pennies."

"I'm not believing you. Why should I? And pray how did you foregather wi' your runawa' brother?"

"He is Theodora's neighbor, and she is educating his daughters."

"And pray how did Dora happen on your brother? It is a vera singular coincidence, and I am no believer in coincidences. If the truth were known, they have all o' them been carefully planned, and weel arranged."

"She met my brother here in Glasgow."

"She did nothing o' the kind."

"She met him at the Oliphants'."

"Oh, oh! I see, I see! The dark man so often riding about wi' Mistress Oliphant was your brother?"

"He was my brother David, and he was also McNab's foster-son."

"Great heavens! What a fool Margaret Campbell has been for once! To think o' Flora McNab making a mock o' me. She told me he was her son."

"So he was, in a way. McNab suckled him, and mothered him, as well as she could. She was the only mother he had."

"You lie, Robert Campbell. I was his mother."

"You ought to be proud of it."

"Is his wife alive or dead?"

"She is dead. He will marry again soon."

"Some of the Oliphant kin, I suppose?"

"No. She is not a Scotchwoman."

"I hope to goodness she isn't English."

"She is Spanish-American, a great beauty, and almost as rich as David himself."

"_Humph!_ I am believing no such fairy-tale. Why would a rich beauty be wanting David Campbell?"

"David is a very handsome man."

"Mrs. Oliphant seemed to think so!"

"Every one thinks so."

"I hope she is not a Methodist."

"She is a Roman Catholic."

"A Roman Catholic! A Campbell can get no further downward than that.

Your forefathers fought--and, thank G.o.d, mostly killed--a Roman Catholic on sight. Ah weel, I suppose it is the money."

"Oh, no! David would not marry for money."

"He didn't anyhow. He married a poor, plain, beggarly sewing-girl."

"She was a minister's daughter, and he loved her."

"Weel, Robert Campbell, I hope you have emptied your creel o' bad news.

If you have any more tak' it back to where it came from. I'll not listen to another word from you."

"I must ask you, what you wish about this house? If you desire to remain here, I will not sell it."

"I'll not stop in it, any longer than it takes me to move out o' it. You are no kin to me now, and thank G.o.d, I am not come to a dependence on a Scotch turncoat, or even an American citizen!"

"Do you think Christina would like the use o' it?"

"Christina is doing better. Rathey is going to be man-of-law and private secretary to Sir Thomas, and they are to have the Wynton Dower House to live in, a handsome place in a big garden."

"Will you go with her, mother?"

"It is none of your business where I go. I would not ask a shelter from you, if I were going to the poor-house. I am going where I'll be rid of whimpering wives, and whining bairns, and fleeching, flattering folk, who want siller for their fine words. I'm done with the old, unhappy house. Sell it as soon as you like. It was an ill day when I stepped o'er its threshold."

"Then good-bye, mother. Say a kind word to me. We may meet no more in this world." He advanced towards her and put out his hand.

She rose and lifted her solitaire pack of cards--which was lying on the table by which she stood--and began shuffling them in her hands. "You ungrateful son of your mother Scotland and your mother Campbell!" she cried. "You traitor to every obligation due your family! You slave to a Methodist wife, go to your Papist-loving brother. California is a proper home for you. _Dod!_ I am sick of the whole lot o' you--lads and la.s.sies baith--Isabel is o'er much 'my lady' for any sensible body to thole; and Christina is aye sniffling and worrying about her bairns, or her silly, fiddling husband. I am sick, tired--heart and soul tired--o' the serpent brood o' you Campbells; and you may scatter yoursel's o'er the face o'

the whole earth, for aught I care," and with these words she flung the cards in her hand far and wide, over the large room. She was in an incredible pa.s.sion, and Robert put his hand on her arms, crying in terror and amazement:

"Mother! Mother! Mother! For G.o.d's sake I entreat----"

"Out o' my sight instanter!" she answered. "Scotland and Margaret Campbell is weel rid o' the like o' you." She shook off his restraining hands, and clasping her own behind her back, she went to a window and stood there looking far over the dull, wet street to some vision conjured up by her raging, scornful pa.s.sion.

Robert again approached her. "I am going, mother," he said. "G.o.d forgive us both! Farewell!" and he once more offered her a pleading hand. She looked at it a moment, but kept her own resolutely clasped behind her, and finally with an imperative motion uttered one fierce word:

"_Go!_"

She was still at the window when he reached the sidewalk, and he raised his hat, and looked at her as he pa.s.sed. But her gaze was intentionally far off, and if she saw this last act of entreaty, she was beyond the wish, or even the ability to notice it.