Such a wonder had an immense effect upon the popular mind, as indeed a thoroughly ascertained fact of the kind would have had anywhere. Whether or not she might turn out a prophetess, as she claimed to be, this wonderful preliminary was certain. She had risen up and walked like the paralytic in the Gospel, in defiance of all physicians and human means of cure, and was visible among them in restored health and activity a creature who had been on the verge of the grave. Throughout the whole country, great and small, without exception, were occupied by Ailie Macfarlane’s wonderful recovery. Nobody could deny, and nobody could explain it.
The thrill of strange expectation which thus ran through the parish was, as may be supposed, more strongly felt by Margaret’s friends than by any other of the rustic neighbours. The strength of their love for her tempted them almost to accuse, and certainly to reproach, the wilful sufferer who would not avail herself of her known favour with Heaven and be healed like the other. It was this certainty that set her sister free (or at least, so she thought,) to entertain visions of happiness to herself independent of Margaret. On the very next evening, when the sun had set upon the loch, but still lingered red upon the further hills, Isabel resumed the subject which had occupied her thoughts. Could she do it? Sunder her future life from her past at a leap—set herself free from all the present claims upon her—could it be possible to do it? or, on the other hand, would she, could she give up her love?
Isabel’s brain had grown giddy by dint of thinking, when suddenly she heard a little gravel thrown on the corner of the parlour window—the signal that she was waited for without. She threw her shawl round her hastily, drawing it over her head, and stole out. Margaret was not there to be disturbed. She had gone to her place of prayer some time before, and was still in that silent nook, with the sweet rowan-tree blossoms scenting the air round her. Isabel stole out with a certain guilty sense that her errand was not one to be approved by any beholder. Some way up, beyond the cottage, among the great bushes of whims and heather, lingered a single figure. Few passengers cared to wade among that thick undergrowth; here and there it was treacherous moss in which the foot sank; here and there a young birch waved its brown locks pathetically in the evening breeze; and the heather-bushes, with their gnarled stalks like miniature oaks, were not very pleasant to walk among. But the two who had appointed their meeting there did not care for the heather stalks, or the trembling moss. They were thinking but of themselves—or, rather, as they would have said, of each other.
‘Have you thought it all over?’ said the young man, eagerly. ‘Isabel, you cannot mean to cast me off. Don’t tell me so; don’t look as if you could be so cruel. I could bear anything for your sake, but that I could not bear.’
This was said in haste and excitement, after a long pause; for Isabel had nothing to say to her lover, but went on with him in silence, turning her face away from his anxious looks.
‘I never thought of casting you off,’ said Isabel; ‘how could that be? If we were to be parted for ever and ever, I could never cast you off; but I canna do it, Horace—I canna do it. You must ask me no more.’
‘Why cannot you do it?’ he said. ‘What is to prevent you? I have told you everything, Isabel. They will say I am too young to marry if I ask them at home—and they don’t know you. If my mother knew my Isabel, it would be different. And if we were but married, it would be different. Once married, everything would come right. And what matter is it if we were married in private or in public? It is always in a house here in Scotland. I only ask that one little sacrifice. Is it much to ask when I am ready to do anything—everything——’
‘But there is nothing for you to do,’ said Isabel; ‘it would all be me. You are making me deceive them now. I never said what was not true all my life before; and now I’m false to everybody—everybody but you.’
‘It would put an end to that if you would do what I say,’ cried the young man. ‘We should go away; and then when we came back, everybody would know. I am asking so little—only to have it done privately. We would come back, and all would be right. My people would make up their minds to it when they could not help it; and yours——’
‘Ah!’ cried Isabel, ‘to speak to me of running away and being married, and my Margaret—my only sister, lying dying! How can you name such a thing to me?’
‘Now, Isabel,’ said young Stapylton, ‘this is nonsense, you know. If you break my heart, what good will that do to her? It will not cure her. Besides,’ he added with suppressed scorn, ‘you know yourself—you have told me—that Margaret might be well if she liked. She is very good, isn’t she? better than that girl whom you are all talking of—and she ought to be cured. If she keeps herself ill on purpose, it is cruel and selfish of her. Why should she spoil your life and her own too?’
‘How dare you speak like that of my sister?’ said Isabel, with blazing eyes, ‘and her so near the angels? Oh, Horace, you would never think so of Margaret if you were really, really caring for me.’
‘If you can doubt me, I have no more to say,’ said the young man; and then they started apart, and the briefest lovers’ quarrel ensued—a quarrel soon made up in the inevitable, universal way, strengthening the position of the one who attacked, and weakening that of the defender. Stapylton drew Isabel’s hand through his arm when she gave it him in reconciliation and led her through the heather farther and farther from home. ‘You are never to utter such cruel words any more,’ he said, ‘nor so much as to think them. Am not I ready to give up everything for you? The old Hall, and my father’s favour, and all I might have if I pleased. It is different from Loch Diarmid, Isabel; but I care for nothing but you; and you will not make the least little sacrifice for me.’
‘I would make any sacrifice—any sacrifice; there is nothing so hard but I would try to do it—for you, Horace,’ said the girl with tears.
‘And yet you will not come away with me for two or three days, and be made my wife! What are you afraid of, Isabel? Can you not trust me? Do you think I would harm you? Tell me what it is you fear?’
‘Fear!’ said Isabel surprised, lifting her eyes to his face. ‘When you are with me what can I fear?’
‘Then why don’t you trust me?’ said the young fellow, with a sudden flush on his face.
‘I trust you as I trust myself,’ said Isabel. ‘Could I care for anyone as I care for you, and not trust him? It is my own folk I am thinking of. I cannot deceive my own folk. Oh, dinna ask me, Horace, and I will do anything else in the world.’
‘Your own folk!’ said Horace, with a little contempt; ‘Jean Campbell, perhaps, that is not good enough to be your housekeeper. I am deceiving father and mother for you, Isabel, and I never grumble. To think of your father’s widow in comparison with me!’
‘I think of Margaret,’ said Isabel, ‘my twin sister. Oh, never ask me more! It would kill my Margaret. Me to deceive her that has been part of herself. Oh, Horace, dinna ask me! I would die to please you; but not even to please you, would I hurt her. I canna do it. I would sooner die!’
Young Stapylton’s face grew red all over with a passionate, furious colour: then he drew his breath hard and restrained himself. For one moment he grasped Isabel’s hand, which rested on his arm, with a firm pressure, which would have made her scream had she been less startled. Then he loosed it with a strange little laugh which was not pleasant to hear.
‘Isabel.’ he said, ‘if you don’t make me hate Margaret before all’s over, it will be a wonder. Do you forget what you have told me? or do you think I forget? Would I ever ask you to leave your sister, if things were here just as they are in other places? Have you not told me that the age of miracles has come back; and don’t I know that there is nobody in the place so good as Margaret? Why should she die when the rest recover? It stands to reason; and you are not going to spend all your lives together, you two. Of course you will marry some time: and so will she—when she is better,’ the young man added after a pause.
‘Margaret marry? Never,