Lady Florimel gave a loud cry. Mrs. Courthope ran to her assistance.
"My lady's in a dead faint," she whispered, and left the room to get
help.
Malcolm lifted Lady Florimel in his great arms and bore her tenderly
to her own apartment. There he left her to the care of her women and
returned to the chamber of death.
Meantime, Mr. Graham and Mr. Soutar had come. When Malcolm re-entered
the schoolmaster took him kindly by the arm and said, "Malcolm, there
can be neither place nor moment fitter for the solemn communication
I am commissioned to make to you: I have, as in the presence of your
dead father, to inform you that you are now marquis of Lossie; and
God forbid you should be less worthy as marquis than you have been as
fisherman!"
Malcolm stood stupefied. For a while he seemed to himself to be
turning over in his mind something he had heard read from a book, with
a nebulous notion of being somehow concerned in it. The thought of his
father cleared his brain. He ran to the dead body, kissed its lips as
he had once kissed the forehead of another, and falling on his knees
wept, he knew not for what. Presently, however, he recovered himself,
rose, and, rejoining the two men, said, "Gentlemen, hoo mony kens this
turn o' things?"
"None but Mr. Morrison, Mrs. Catanach and ourselves--so far as I
know," answered Mr. Soutar.
"And Miss Horn," added Mr. Graham, "She first brought out the truth
of it, and ought to be the first to know of your recognition by your
father.
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