Chapter 2: Some Guests

“Be useful where thou livest, that they may
Both want and wish thy pleasing presence still...
Find out men’s wants and will
And meet them there.”
Herbert.

“HUGH, we shall have to do entertaining.”

General Macdonald gave a little groan.

“I have patiently gone round with you to leave cards when people are out. Then you have dragged me to dinners and lunches and teas, and I hoped now that we might be left in peace. Of course, I expected the neighbours to call, and they have done their duty. Are we to go round and round the treadmill of society as they do in town?”

Rowena laughed lightly. She was a three-months-old bride now, and was quite able to manage this husband of hers.

“My dear, we have our duties as well as they. And we are told to be ‘given to hospitality.’ We cannot accept invitations and never give any in return. Shall we have a simple garden-party? An ‘At Home’ in about a fortnight from now? The strawberries and peaches will be ripe, and we can have tea under the cedars on the lawn.”

“I believe you love crowds. Personally, I loathe them.” General Macdonald’s tone was sharp. He added more gently:

“We have not been very long married, Rowena, and we had no proper honeymoon. You must forgive me if I still wish to keep you to myself.”

“We must not be selfish, dear. You wrong me when you think I love gaiety. But I do love my fellow-creatures; and this one afternoon in their society will not hurt us. I want to get it over before Mysie’s holidays begin. Now, please, put on your pleasantest expression, for I am going to ask another favour. Don’t you think Mysie would like some companions sometimes? It would be so good for her as she does not go to school. I thought we might ask George Holt and his sisters up here and give them a good time; and Marion would be able to have a nice quiet holiday with her mother. Will you let me invite them here for a month of their holidays? Oh, do!”

She had drawn nearer him, and General Macdonald put his arm round her.

“I will do anything you like, Rowena, when you look at me like that!”

She laughed again gaily.

“What a confession of weakness!” she said. “Now I know how I can get my way with you.”

And so the garden-party was given, and Rowena moved about amongst her guests and captivated them all by her charming words and smiles. Mysie, in a soft muslin frock and large shady straw hat, was such a transformation from the little kilted tomboy that some who had seen her scrambling about in the glen before hardly recognized her now. The General was drawn out of his shell. He even found points of interest with Colonel Arnold Rashleigh, who had taken the lodge where Rowena had spent her year of convalescence.

The Miss Arnold Rashleighs spent most of their time on the tennis-courts, but one of them, Dora by name, attached herself to Rowena during the latter part of the afternoon, and they made friends over Shags, who had been with old Mrs. Mactavish when she was caretaker of the lodge, and who now had been adopted by the Arnold Rashleighs.

“I was very fond of him,” Rowena admitted; “but when I came here, I heard that you had taken him, and my husband has six dogs already, so I felt I had better not add to the number. Shags is very human. As you may have heard, I spent a lonely year at the lodge, and he was my constant companion.”

“How could you have stood it? Three months are all we can put in. Joyce and I are much too energetic to waste our time over these wilds.”

“But you are young and strong. I had to follow doctor’s orders, or I dare say I should have been on my back still. And I found during that year at the lodge that life was much fuller and richer than I had ever imagined before. I was introduced into a perfectly new environment.”

“How interesting! Tell me.”

“How can I tell you in a few words? I found that a part of me had never been cultivated or enjoyed life at all, it was sleeping—almost dead. It began to wake up, and every day or so I saw fresh things.”

“Oh, I suppose you set to work to study Nature with microscopes, and that kind of thing?”

“I must tell you about it another day,” said Rowena, smiling down upon the puzzled face of the girl. “Anyhow, I learnt some of the secret joys of solitude; and when I was frivolously inclined, Shags whiled away my time with his tricks and gambols. I wish you loved the loch and glen as I do. Now tell me about your life in town.”

“Oh, I’m not quite so ambitious as Joyce. She means to go into Parliament, but I’m not keen on politics. I work a good deal for women’s industries. We aren’t idlers, I can assure you. We mean to take our proper place in the world now.”

“It’s splendid having work like that,” said Rowena enthusiastically. “Are you an idealist, I wonder? What is your goal?”

“Oh, I suppose it is to do something worth living for before one dies,” said Dora. “We can dispense with men, you know; they’re very good for recreation and amusement, but as for settling down with one in these wilds, as you have done, I couldn’t, to save my life!”

“You think it waste of time.”

“You’re right. Utter waste!”

Rowena shook her head, with her sunny smile.

“No,” she said; “I hope and trust I’m not wasting my life. I have my own scheme of work, and I can pursue it even here. I would like to press you into it as a recruit, but we must know each other better first before I can venture to give you a full explanation of it.”