The Red Book Magazine/Volume 11/Number 6/Suspense

HE newly whitewashed front of the cottage was almost dazzling in the afternoon sunshine; the freshly-painted porch and window-frames of bright green stood out in perhaps rather vivid contrast. It was evident that every small pane of glass had been polished to its last degree of brilliancy, and that the white curtains within had not been hanging there many days; as a matter of fact, the curtains had been put up that morning. It was plain, too, that the training of the yellow roses to the left of the porch and the pink roses to the right had been regulated but recently; while the plots beneath them, sweet with mignonette and gay with pansies and calceolarias, were trim almost to primness. The gravel path had the appearance of having been raked till every pebble or fragment of shell had found its proper place, and the bit of lawn had been cropped and swept till not a daisy showed. The flagstones in the porch itself had been thoroughly pipeclayed, and then elaborately scrolled in brick color.

Clearly a visitor of some consequence was expected, for not only was the cottage prepared for one, but on the porch, dressed in her best—her Sabbath garments—stood the mistress, one brown and wrinkled hand shadowing her faded eyes. As she scanned the dusty road that wound along the shore of the loch she smiled and sighed. Her expectation was not without anxiety.

Suddenly, dropping her hand, she turned and peered into the cool, dim passage beyond the doorway.

“Duncan!” she called. “What are ye daein, ben there? Come here!”

Presently her husband came slowly and heavily along the passage, and halted beside her. He was shaggy, grizzled, and bent, more perhaps from exposure and toil than from age, for there was still much strength in his great limbs, and a spark in his deep-set eyes.

“Can I no get keekin' into the laddie's room?” he asked, with a twinkle, adding, “I thocht ye had maybe forgot something.”

“Me forget!” she cried indignantly. “I hope ye didna touch onything, Duncan.”

“Aw, I was jist rearrangin' things generally,” he said teasingly.

“Tits! I ken ye're jokin',” she returned, and once more placed her hand above her eyes.

The old man consulted an ancient and corpulent silver watch.

“Ye're ower early,” he remarked, as he stepped out of the porch, and turned to survey the front of his home. “The boat'll jist be comin' to the pier noo. He canna be here for twinty meenutes yet.”

“The boat micht be in afore it's time,” said the old woman, without moving. “Are ye shair ye tell't Geordie to be there wi' his machine?”

“If I didna',” said Duncan, smiling, “I've been tellin' ye lees since last nicht. Dinna fash yersel'.”

There was a short silence while she followed him into the sunshine.

“I'm thinkin' it's a peety ye didna let me pent the windows rid,” the old man remarked, pointing to his handiwork. “D've no think rid wud ha'e been cheerier like, Betty?”

“I'm thinkin' ye're a muckle haver,” returned Betty good-humoredly. “Rid's faur ower fancy for folk like us. What's the time noo, Duncan?”

“Jist four. I doot the boat'll be late the day,” he observed, winking. “Can ye no sit doon an' rest ye? Ye've been like a hen on a het girdle since the mornin'. Ye'll be wearit when Alick gets here.”

“Na, na, I'm no wearit,” she said, smiling.

Then she sighed.

They went back to the porch, and the old man fetched a stool for her. But she would not sit down, and resumed peering under her hand at the stretch of road.

Presently she sighed again.

“Hoots wife!” exclaimed her husband a trifle impatiently. “What's vexin' ye noo?”

“I'm thinkin' o' Alick,” she murmured.

“Weel, so am I; but that's no' a thing to be vexed aboot.”

“Ah, but I'm thinkin' he'll be—he'll be terrible changed. Twinty year's a lang, lang time. I doot he'll no' enjey hissel' here.”

And she sighed once more.

“He'll enjey hissel' fine!” said Duncan promptly. “What for wud he come a' the road frae Ameriky if he wasna' wantin' to see us an' the auld hoose, eh?”

“Maybe he thocht it was his duty to come—”

“So it is his duty.”

“Ay; but I wud rather he was comin' jist to please hissel', Duncan.”

“An' so he is, Betty! Ye're jist vexin' yersel' aboot naethin'. D'ye think he wud leave his wife an' weans an' his business, an' pey a' that siller to come an' see us, if he wasna' jist wearyin' to come? Nae fears! Alick wud be yer ain laddie yet, if it was fifty instead o' twinty year, I'm tellin' ye!”

Betty smiled tremulously, dubiously: and her husband, with the best intention in the world, said rather loudly,

“I'm shair Alick's jist daft to see the place again. He'll be makin' Geordie leather his horse. 'Deed, ay!”

“Maybe,” said the old woman slowly, “maybe he'll no' think muckle o' this place efter Ameriky. Ye ken hoo he's aye tellin' us in his letters o' the wunnerfu' places there. An' I'm whiles feart he'll think the hoose has got awfu' wee an' auld fashioned-like. Ye see, Alick's got gey big notions noo. Ye can tell that frae his letters.”

Duncan wagged his gray head in a sage fashion. “They'll be gey big notions that Alick canna tak' into the hoose he was born in,” he said confidently, perhaps a little more confidently than he really felt.

“I wudna' be blamin' him,” said Betty gently. “Twinty year's a lang time.”

“Weel, I wud be blamin' him!” Duncan replied. “But ye needna' be feart, auld wife. Alick'll be changed on the ootside, nae doot—he canna help that—but I'll bate ye onything he'll be his mither's son. He'll be tellin' ye that everything here is jist 'fair champion.' Dod, Betty, d'ye mind when he used to ca' everything that pleased him 'fair champion,' eh?”

“'Deed, ay! Oh, if I was hearin' him sayin' that again, I wud ken he wasna' muckle changed.”

Duncan chuckled. “I mind ye used to check him for sayin' the vera words, Betty. Ye tell't him there was nae meanin' in them.”

“Did I?”

“Ay, did ye! Even when he said them aboot yer tattie scones, an' cakes, an' the ither things ye used to bake for him.”

“Aw, but he was a wee laddie then.”

“Na, he wasna'. It was efter he gaed to the office in Glesca, an' when he used to come hame on the Seturdays. Oh, I mind it fine! 'Fair champion'—his vera words! An' ye checkit him for sayin' them!”

“Weel, weel; maybe ye're richt. But I doot his speech'll be like anither language, noo.

“I daursay he'll maybe hae a bit guack in his speech, but ye needna heed aboot that. I'll no' be surprised if he looses it afore he gangs back to Ameriky.”

There was a pause, during which Duncan joined his wife in watching the road.

Betty spoke first. “D'ye think he'll be vexed at us for no spendin' ony o' the siller he's been sendin' us?”

“Dinna say onything aboot it,” said Duncan. “Alick wud be offendit if he thocht that he was gaun to get it back some day. We'll jist let on we've spent a pickle o't, an' pit the rest by for oor auld age.” Here Duncan chuckled so heartily that his wife had to join him: “Oor auld age!” he repeated gleefully.

But the mother's heart was not reassured. Betty could not get rid of the foreboding, which had seized her shortly after the announcement of her son's intended visit, that he would be changed toward herself, his father, and the humble home. For he had married and had sons and daughters. He had done well in the New World: and from his letters she knew that the people he mixed with socially were not as herself and her husband. But she had long ago subdued her jealousy of Alick's wife; she had always implicitly believed him when he wrote that his growing business prevented a trip to the old country; and she had been proud to learn of his “grand” acquaintances.

Yet now there was, in the midst of all her love, the foreboding, the fear which, with her son's visit, would surely end either in heartache or exceeding joy.

The old man had put his pipe in his mouth, and was in the act of striking a match, when his wife caught his arm, crying—

“He's comin'! Alick's comin'!”

She pointed to the machine which had just turned a bend in the road, a furlong distant. Then, with her face quivering, she went down the path to the little green gate.

Duncan struck another match, and applied it to his pipe, but the flame danced over the bowl so that he could not get the tobacco ignited.

“Tah!” he muttered angrily, and followed his spouse, puffing smokelessly.

Half-way down the path he halted, turned, and stood gazing at the sky over the roof of the cottage. He heard the wagonette drive up, the wheels grate as the brake was applied. He heard voices.

Then his turn came. He faced about, took a few steps forward, and shook hands with his only son.

“Weel, Alick!” he said, as if they had parted the previous day.

In the cool of the evening father and son sat on the garden-seat, the paint of which was not long dry, in front of the parlor window. The old man, doing his best to smoke a cigar, asked brief questions, and listened to long answers, ejaculating now and then, “Weel, weel!”, “Dod, but that bates a'!”, “D'ye tell me that!”, and other expressions of approval, astonishment, or admiration. Yet all the time he was asking himself a question.

When Betty had finished washing the dishes from the evening meal, she came to the door, intending to join the twain; but on the porch something made her linger, and presently she seated herself on the stool which her man had brought out in the afternoon. Roses grew thickly up the side of the porch, and through an aperture in the leafy screen she watched her husband and son, listening the while to the latter's talk.

Her heart was unsatisfied. And yet she could not have told what it wanted. There had been nothing cold about Alick on or since his arrival. His greeting at the gate had been eager and affectionate: his appreciation of her preparations in the little room which was to be his during his fortnight's stay had quite overwhelmed her for the moment: his quick recognition of a score or so of once familiar objects of use and ornament in the kitchen and parlor had delighted her: and his innumerable recollections of the old home days had charmed her, so that she could make no remark save “Jist that, laddie!” or “Fine I mind it, Alick!” or, “So ye did, dearie!”

Perhaps her heart was wanting too much. Perhaps it was foolish to have hoped that her boy would return in the man, whose age she remembered with a shock, was near four-and-forty. She watched him as he sat there talking, the unfamiliar cigar in the left corner of his mouth, and she remembered the distant day she had caught him smoking a pipe charged with her precious tea He looked older and more careworn than she had ever imagined him; his last photograph had not been quite truthful. His clean-shaven face was too thin, she thought; his color was white beside his father's. Probably it did not occur to her that Alick was rather a poor specimen of manhood compared with Duncan.

She listened to his voice. Ay, it surely had the "quack” that her husband had spoken of, yet she loved it for the respectful tone it seemed to hold for the old man. But there was an entire absence of the old-time expressions and words, and there were present phrases which she did not understand at all. No, her heart was not satisfied.

The sun had just gone down beyond the hills when Alick rose and threw away the end of his cigar.

“Isn't mother coming out?” he asked.

“Oh, she'll be workin' aboot the hoose,” said his father. “She's aye busy at something, ye ken.”

“Well, I'll away and help her—by bringing her out here. It's too grand an evening to miss,” said the son.

“Ay, it's no a bad evenin', but ye'll dootless ha'e grander nor this in Ameriky,” returned Duncan, with a stealthy glance from his pipe to his son.

“America!” exclaimed Alick. The old man could not repress a gratified grin. “Weel, the Clyde's ill to bate in fair weather,” he remarked, as his son turned towards the porch.

Alick's mother rose at his approach. She smiled to him, almost shyly.

“Weel, dearie,” she said softly, tremulously.

He laid his hands on her shoulders, and shook her ever so gently.

“Aye workin' at something, as father says,” he said with infinite tenderness. “Just the same as before I went away. Come and see the finest evening that ever was, and—and rest ye. That's it! Sit ye doon an' rest ye!”

He drew her hand through his arm, and led her towards the seat.

Half-way he stopped and looked about him—at the hills, the loch, the sky, with its glory of sunset—looked lingeringly at these; then at the cottage.

“You've got a new chimney yonder,” he remarked abruptly.

His father chuckled. “That's no bad efter twinty year!” he cried.

Alick turned to his mother with a long breath of satisfaction. He made a comprehensive gesture with his arm.

“This,” he said, smiling affectionately upon her, “this is what my wee Duncan would call fair champion!”

There was a moment's silence.

It was broken by a shout of delight from the old man.

“There noo, Betty! Did I no' tell ye?” he cried triumphantly.