Urged more or less all his life by a sort of innate rebellion
against social law, he had done great wrongs--whether also committed
what are called crimes, I cannot tell: no repentance had followed
the remorse their consequences had sometimes occasioned. And now the
possibility of remorse even was gradually forsaking him. Such a man
belongs rather to the kind demoniacal than the kind human; yet so
long as nothing occurs giving to his possible an occasion to embody
itself in the actual, he may live honoured, and die respected. There
is always, not the less, the danger of his real nature, or rather
unnature, breaking out in this way or that diabolical.
Although he went so little out of the house, and apparently never
beyond the grounds, he yet learned a good deal at times of things
going on in the neighbourhood: Davie brought him news; so did
Simmons; and now and then he would have an interview with his half
acknowledged relative, the factor.
One morning before he was up, he sent for Donal, and requested him
to give Davie a half-holiday, and do something for him instead.
"You know, or perhaps you don't know, that I have a house in the
town," he said, "--the only house, indeed, now belonging to the
earldom--a not very attractive house which you must have seen--on
the main street, a little before you come to the Morven Arms."
"I believe I know the house, my lord," answered Donal, "with strong
iron stanchions to the lower windows, and--?"
"Yes, that is the house; and I daresay you have heard the story of
it--I mean how it fell into its present disgrace! The thing happened
more than a hundred years ago.
Pages:
359
360
361
362
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383