“Ay, ay,” said he, laughing, “like your character, indeed! and what I most admire in it. But the point, my worthy fellow, is sometimes in a kittle bit.” He filled a glass of wine. “Though between you and me, that are such fast friends, it need not bother us long. The point, I need scarcely tell you, is my daughter. And the first thing is that I have no thought in my mind of blaming you. In the unfortunate circumstances, what could you do else? ‘Deed, and I cannot tell.”
“I thank you for that,” said I, pretty close upon my guard.
“I have besides studied your character,” he went on; “your talents are fair; you seem to have a moderate competence, which does no harm; and one thing with another, I am very happy to have to announce to you that I have decided on the latter of the two ways open.”
“I am afraid I am dull,” said I. “What ways are these?”
He bent his brows upon me formidably and uncrossed his legs. “Why, sir,” says he, “I think I need scarce describe them to a gentleman of your condition; either that I should cut your throat or that you should marry my daughter.”
“You are pleased to be quite plain at last,” said I.
“And I believe I have been plain from the beginning!” cries he robustiously. “I am a careful parent, Mr. Balfour; but I thank God, a patient and deleeborate man. There is many a father, sir, that would have hirsled you at once either to the altar or the field. My esteem for your character – ”
“Mr. Drummond,” I interrupted, “if you have any esteem for me at all, I will beg of you to moderate your voice. It is quite needless to rowt at a gentleman in the same chamber with yourself and lending you his best attention.”
“Why, very true,” says he, with an immediate change. “And you must excuse the agitations of a parent.”
“I understand you then,” I continued – “for I will take no note of your other alternative, which perhaps it was a pity you let fall – I understand you rather to offer me encouragement in case I should desire to apply for your daughter’s hand?”
“It is not possible to express my meaning better,” said he, “and I see we shall do well together.”
“That remains to be yet seen,” said I. “But so much I need make no secret of, that I bear the lady you refer to the most tender affection, and I could not fancy, even in a dream, a better fortune than to get her.”
“I was sure of it, I felt certain of you, David,” he cried, and reached out his hand to me.
I put it by. “You go too fast, Mr. Drummond,” said I. “There are conditions to be made; and there is a difficulty in the path, which I see not entirely how we shall come over. I have told you that, upon my side, there is no objection to the marriage, but I have good reason to believe there will be much on the young lady’s.”
“This is all beside the mark,” says he. “I will engage for her acceptance.”
“I think you forget, Mr. Drummond,” said I, “that, even in dealing with myself, you have been betrayed into two-three unpalatable expressions. I will have none such employed to the young lady. I am here to speak and think for the two of us; and I give you to understand that I would no more let a wife be forced upon myself, than what I would let a husband be forced on the young lady.”
He sat and glowered at me like one in doubt and a good deal of temper.
“So that is to be the way of it,” I concluded. “I will marry Miss Drummond, and that blithely, if she is entirely willing. But if there be the least unwillingness, as I have reason to fear – marry her will I never.”
“Well well,” said he, “this is a small affair. As soon as she returns I will sound her a bit, and hope to reassure you – ”
But I cut in again. “Not a finger of you, Mr. Drummond, or I cry off, and you can seek a husband to your daughter somewhere else,” said I. “It is I that am to be the only dealer and the only judge. I shall satisfy myself exactly; and none else shall anyways meddle – you the least of all.”
“Upon my word, sir!” he exclaimed, “and who are you to be the judge?”
“The bridegroom, I believe,” said I.
“This is to quibble,” he cried. “You turn your back upon the fact. The girl, my daughter, has no choice left to exercise. Her character is gone.”
“And I ask your pardon,” said I, “but while this matter lies between her and you and me, that is not so.”
“What security have I!” he cried. “Am I to let my daughter’s reputation depend upon a chance?”
“You should have thought of all this long ago,” said I, “before you were so misguided as to lose her; and not afterwards when it is quite too late. I refuse to regard myself as any way accountable for your neglect, and I will be browbeat by no man living. My mind is quite made up, and come what may, I will not depart from it a hair’s breadth. You and me are to sit here in company till her return: upon which, without either word or look from you, she and I are to go forth again to hold our talk. If she can satisfy me that she is willing to this step, I will then make it; and if she cannot, I will not.”
He leaped out of his chair like a man stung. “I can spy your manoeuvre,” he cried; “you would work upon her to refuse!”
“Maybe ay, and maybe no,” said I. “That is the way it is to be, whatever.”
“And if I refuse?” cries he.
“Then, Mr. Drummond, it will have to come to the throat-cutting,” said I.
What with the size of the man, his great length of arm in which he came near rivalling his father, and his reputed skill at weapons, I did not use this word without trepidation, to say nothing at all of the circumstance that he was Catriona’s father. But I might have spared myself alarms. From the poorness of my lodging – he does not seem to have remarked his daughter’s dresses, which were indeed all equally new to him – and from the fact that I had shown myself averse to lend, he had embraced a strong idea of my poverty. The sudden news of my estate convinced him of his error, and he had made but the one bound of it on this fresh venture, to which he was now so wedded, that I believe he would have suffered anything rather than fall to the alternative of fighting.
A little while longer he continued to dispute with me, until I hit upon a word that silenced him.
“If I find you so averse to let me see the lady by herself,” said I, “I must suppose you have very good grounds to think me in the right about her unwillingness.”
He gabbled some kind of an excuse.
“But all this is very exhausting to both of our tempers,” I added, “and I think we would do better to preserve a judicious silence.”
The which we did until the girl returned, and I must suppose would have cut a very ridiculous figure had there been any there to view us.
Chapter XXVIII – IN WHICH I AM LEFT ALONE
I OPENED the door to Catriona and stopped her on the threshold.
“Your father wishes us to take our walk,” said I.
She looked to James More, who nodded, and at that, like a trained soldier, she turned to go with me.
We took one of our old ways, where we had gone often together, and been more happy than I can tell of in the past. I came a half a step behind, so that I could watch her unobserved. The knocking of her little shoes upon the way sounded extraordinary pretty and sad; and I thought it a strange moment that I should be so near both ends of it at once, and walk in the midst between two destinies, and could not tell whether I was hearing these steps for the last time, or whether the sound of them was to go in and out with me till death should part us.
She avoided even to look at me, only walked before her, like one who had a guess of what was coming. I saw I must speak soon before my courage was run out, but where to begin I knew not. In this painful situation, when the girl was as good as forced into my arms and had already besought my forbearance, any excess of pressure must have seemed indecent; yet to avoid it wholly would have a very cold-like appearance. Between these extremes I stood helpless, and could have bit my fingers; so that, when at last I managed to speak at all, it may be said I spoke at random.