A Cry in the Wilderness Part 14

"Oh, own up, now; you mean you want to know if they 're married or single?" He was beginning to tease.

"Of course I do. This old manor has had a good many surprises for me already in these three weeks, you, for one--"

He threw back his head, laughing heartily.

"--And the 'elderly Scotchwoman', and Cale for a third; and if you would give me a hint as to the matrimonial standing of the two from over-seas, I should feel fortified against any future petticoat invasion of their wives, or children, or sweethearts."

Jamie laughed uproariously.

"Oh, Guy Mannering, hear her! I thought you said you saw Doctor Rugvie in the hospital."

"So I did; but it was only a glimpse, and a long way off, as he was pa.s.sing through another ward."

He turned to me quickly. "It's Doctor Rugvie you want to know about then? Why about him, rather than Ewart?"

"Because,--('Be cautious,' I warned myself),--I happen to have known of him."

"Well, fire away, and I 'll answer to the best of my knowledge. I believe a woman lives, moves and has her being in details," he said a little scornfully.

"Have you just found that out?" I retorted. "Well, you have n't cut all your wisdom teeth yet. And now, as you seem to think it's Doctor Rugvie I 'm most interested in, we 'll begin with your Mr. Ewart." I changed my tactics, for I feared I had shown too much eagerness for information about Doctor Rugvie.

"My Mr. Ewart!" He smiled to himself in a way that exasperated me.

"Yes, your Mr. Ewart. How old is he? For all you 've told me he might be a grandfather."

"Ewart--a grandfather!" Again he laughed, provokingly as I thought. I kept silence.

"Honestly, Marcia, I don't know Ewart's age, and"--he was suddenly serious--"for all I know, he may be a grandfather."

"For all you know! What do you mean by that?"

"I mean I never seriously gave Gordon Ewart's age a thought. When I am with him he seems, somehow, as young as I--younger in one way, for he has such splendid health. But I suppose he really is old enough to be my father--forty-five or six, possibly; I don't know."

"Is he married?"

Jamie brought his hand down upon his knee with such a whack that the old cart-horse gave a queer hop-skip-and-jump. We both laughed at his antic.

"There you have me, Marcia. I 'm floored in your first round of questions. I don't know exactly--"

"Exactly! It seems to me that, marriage being an exact science, if a man is married why he is--and no ifs and buts."

"That's so." Jamie spoke seriously and nodded wisely. "I never heard it put in just those words, 'exact science', but come to think of it, you 're right."

"Well, is he?"

"Is he what?"

"Married. Are we to expect later on a Mrs. Ewart at Lamoral?"

"Great Scott, no!" said Jamie emphatically. "Look here, Marcia, I hate to tell tales that possibly, and probably, have no foundation--"

"Who wants you to tell tales?" I said indignantly. "I won't hear you now whatever you say. You think a woman has no honor in such things."

"Oh, well, you 'll have to hear it sometime, I suppose, in the village--"

"I won't--and I won't hear you either," I said, and closed my ears with my fingers; but in vain, for he fairly shouted at me:

"I say, I don't know whether he 's married or not--"

"And I say I don't care--"

"Well, you heard that anyway," he shouted again diabolically; "here 's another: they say--"

"Keep still; the whole village can hear you--"

"We 're not within a mile of the village; take your fingers out of your ears if you don't want me to shout."

"Not till you stop shouting." He lowered his voice then, and I unstopped my ears.

"I say, Marcia, I believe it's all a rotten lot of d.a.m.ned gossip--"

"Why, Jamie Macleod! I never heard you use so strong an expression."

"I don't care; it's my way of letting off steam. Mother is n't round."

We both laughed and grew good-humored again.

"I never thought a Scotsman, who takes porridge regularly at nine o'clock every evening, could swear--"

"Oh, did n't you! Where are _your_ wisdom teeth? Live and learn, Marcia."

"Quits, Jamie." He chuckled.

"Honestly, Marcia, I could n't answer you in any other way. Ewart has never opened his lips to me about his intimate personal life; he has no need to--for, of course, there is a great difference in our ages even if he is such a companion. And then, you know, I only saw him that one week in Crieff when he was with us, and I was a little chap--it was just after father left us--and he was no end good to me. And the second time was this year in June when he stayed a week here and then took me up to Andre. He was with us a month in camp; that is where I came to know him so well. He 's an Oxford man, and that's what I was aiming at when--when my health funked. He seems to understand how hard it is to me to give it all up. I don't object to telling you it was Doctor Rugvie who was going to put me through."

"Oh, Jamie!" It was all I could say, for I had known during our few weeks of an intimacy, which circ.u.mstances warranted, that some great disappointment had been his--wholly apart from his being handicapped by his inheritance.

"About Ewart," he went on; "you know a village is a village, and a dish of gossip is meat and drink for all alike. It's only a rumor anyway, but it crops out at odd times and in the queerest places that he was married and divorced, and that he has a son living whom he is educating in Europe. I don't believe one bally word of it, and I don't want you to."

"Well, I won't to please you."

"Now, if you want to know about Doctor Rugvie, I can tell you. He lives, you might say, in the open. Ewart strikes me as the kind that takes to covert more. Doctor Rugvie is older too."

"He must be fifty if he 's a day."

"He 's fifty-four--and he is a widower, a straight out and out one."

"I know that."