It was little that I saw of my old school companions now that I had
become a farm worker and spent my days in the fields. Sometimes,
indeed, when I was tending my nibbling flock on the hillside, or
driving them over to the distant pasture land by the margin of the
loch of Harray, where the grass grew sweetest, I would chance to
see Thora Kinlay on her way from Crua Breck to Stromness, and
occasionally she would come to Lyndardy to see my sister Jessie.
These were the summer days; but when the harvest season came round,
and our crop of oats had to be gathered in, and, later still, our
turnips stored away for the winter, I was then always busy with my
work, and very seldom had opportunity of speaking with Thora, or of
even seeing her from a distance.
And yet I had often a wish to be near her, and to show her what
kindness or sympathy a lad can show to a girl whom he believes to
have but little happiness in life. For the treatment that Thora
received at her home was becoming day by day more severe.
With Tom she of course had no pursuits in common; he treated her
with harshness, and as much as possible she avoided him. Even Mrs.
Kinlay seemed to regard her with very scant affection, and as the
girl grew in years her position at the farm became that of a
servant rather than of a daughter. As for Carver Kinlay himself, he
seldom spoke a gentle word to body or beast, and Thora had no
exception from his severity. His continued ill treatment of her
was, however, the more difficult to endure, since from simple abuse
it often extended to actual brutality. She could never understand
why her father and mother were so unkind to her, and to hear a few
words of sympathy was always comforting.
One day late in the autumn I was tending our sheep on the banks
above the cliffs of Gaulton, lying on the soft green turf with my
hands under my chin, looking dreamily across the sea towards the
blue outline of hills on the Scotch coast. I had just finished
reading the last pages of Robinson Crusoe, and the book had fallen
from my hand. Like my sheep, I was languid with the heat of the
noonday sun, and the sight of the ships and the whirling seagulls
was refreshing to me. The sound of the waves down below on the
rocks was soothing.
Presently something dropped lightly on the grass before my eyes. It
was a sprig of sweetbrier. I turned lazily and saw Thora standing
by my side. Without speaking a word she sat down, and together we
looked out upon the blue sea.
We remained silent for several moments without greeting each other.
But at last I said:
"I was thinking maybe you'd be coming across to see me, Thora, one
o' these bonnie days, now that we never meet at the school. It was
good o' ye to come."
She turned to me with a smile, but I saw that her eyes were
moistened with tears.
"What has gone wrong, Thora?" I continued. "Has Carver been ill
using you again?"
"Yes, he's aye using me ill," she said, sobbing and wiping her
eyes. "I was in the garden just now, nipping some dead leaves from
the briar bush, when he came in at the gate. He never likes to see
me among my flowers, and when he found me there he got into a
passion, and walked over the beds, and kicked the plants about with
his sea boots. Then he ordered me away into the house, and said
that if I wanted work to do, I might go and clean out the stable. I
told him that was a man's work, not a lassie's; and at that he took
up a stick, and struck me with it across the back."
And here she sobbed again.
I did not speak, but I felt my blood run hot in indignation against
Carver Kinlay. I would have liked to thrash him.
"If I were a lad like you, Halcro," she continued, "it's not long I
would bide at Crua Breck. I would run away to sea. But what can a
helpless lassie do? Nobody has a good word to say for my father
since the Curlew was lost, and--I canna help it--I hae just as
great an ill will at him as anybody else has."
"They say that it was all through Carver that my father was
drowned," I said.
"Tell me, Halcro, what was the quarrel between your father and
mine? What way did it come about?"
"Well, I canna tell ye the ins and outs o' it all, but my father
had some secret about Carver, and Carver was aye afraid o' him. You
see, Thora, folks say that when a man saves another from the sea,
there's sure to be a quarrel between them. And my father saved
Carver Kinlay--not, perhaps, from the sea, but he saved his life."
"How was that, Halcro?"
"It was when you were a bairn, Thora. A ship was wrecked here on
the Gaulton rocks, and all your family were aboard. Your mother and
Tom were picked up by the Curlew, but Carver and you werena found
for some days after the wreck. My father found you both in a cave,
down in the cliff, and if it hadna been for him, I suppose you
wouldna be here now, Thora, to say that Carver had beaten you."
"That's a strange thing you're telling me, Halcro. I never heard of
it before. And what ship was it that was wrecked?"
"The Undine."
"The Undine! I've seen that name on a box at Crua Breck that father
keeps his money in. But tell me all about it. Did Captain Ericson
tell you about the wreck?"
"No. I only heard of it a week before he was drowned. It was Colin
Lothian and my uncle Mansie that told it me. Auld Colin kens all
about it, and more than he told to me."
"Colin is a good old man, Halcro. When next I see him I will ask
him to tell me what it was that he kept from you. Colin would keep
nothing from me, I believe."
"Maybe not. But listen, and I will give you the story as I heard
it."
Thora lay down on the grass, with her hands under her chin, and I
proceeded to tell her of the wreck of the Undine.
"Thank you, Halcro!" she said when I finished. "That is all very
new to me. I remember nothing of being in that cave. How cold I
must have been! But Carver was good to me then. I can almost
forgive him for trampling over my flowers."
Then, after a pause, she asked: "Have you ever been in that cave,
Halcro? Where is it?"
"I've not been in it," I said; "but I ken whereabout it is. Come
and I will show you."
And then I took her out to an abutting point of the headland, and
indicated the position of the cavern behind a great rock that hid
its entrance, a few feet above the high-tide mark.
"Halcro, d'you think we could get down there and see the cave?" she
asked. "Where are your climbing ropes?"
"We can manage it, I think, if you'll try it with me, Thora," I
said.
"Ay will I try it. Do you think I'm afraid?" said she.
Now, this adventure that Thora proposed was no small one, for the
North Gaulton cliffs are amongst the wildest and most rugged in all
Pomona, and they are very steep and dangerous to the climber. Yet
Thora was a cool-headed girl, strong of foot and wrist, and very
adventurous. I remember on one occasion, when several of us were
bird nesting together on the Black Craigs, she happened to get
stranded on a corner of rock, and could not either return or get
round the projecting point. I was watching her, and saw that she
had the wrong foot foremost. Her position was extremely dangerous,
for one false move would have sent her headlong to a frightful
death. But, holding on with one hand, she coolly took a piece of
oatcake from her pocket, and munched it. Then with a dexterous
movement she changed her position, got safely round the point, and
went onward.
"Why, Thora, were you not feared for yoursel?" I asked, when I got
near her again.
"If I'd been feared, Halcro, I wouldna be here now," she quietly
replied.
"I daresay that; but what made ye think of eatin' the bannock when
ye were in such danger?"
And, said she, "Weel, I just thought I was needing it."
But with all Thora's daring I was too sensible of the dangers of
the Gaulton Craigs to allow her to make the descent of an
unfamiliar precipice without climbing ropes, and when we had
determined to explore the cave, I ran home for my lines and an old
piece of tar rope to use as a torch in case we should require a
light.
Thora was anxious about my sheep possibly straying in my absence,
but I had a certain confidence in my flock, and assured her that as
I had never known them to stray, there was little danger of them
doing so now, especially as I had no dog to drive them over the
banks. We accordingly left the sheep grazing or sleeping
contentedly on the open braes, and proceeded on our adventure.
One end of the rope was firmly secured round a jut of rock, so that
the other extremity, when it was thrown over the brink, would fall
as near as possible to the mouth of the cavern. I went down some
distance to see that all was right and easy, and then we made the
descent together.
Neither of us made much use of the rope, but it was there for Thora
to take hold of if she should find that she could not get secure
hold on the jags of rock for her feet and hands; and I kept close
to her to aid her if need were. A stranger in Orkney might have
marvelled to see us, a lad and lass, climbing with such ease about
the face of a precipice of nearly two hundred feet in height above
the turbulent sea; but the thing was simple enough to our practised
hands and feet, and the regular layers and shelves of the old red
sandstone afforded for the most part secure resting places.
As we got further down, the disturbed sea birds fluttered and
screamed around our heads, the boldest even offering to peck at our
hands, but fearing to do so for all the clatter they made about it.
Once a great gray brent goose, with black head and staring eyes,
approached Thora with a loud, harsh cry, and flapped its wide,
outstretched wings against her. Thora took hold of the rope tightly
with both hands, and placing her feet on a narrow ledge of rock,
looked round and uttered a shrill, "Tr-r-r-r," frightening the bird
away.
When we got safely down to within a couple of fathoms of the
surface of the clear water, we left the rope and made our way along
a strip of flaggy gneiss, until we reached an immense boulder which
had been detached from the main cliff. This great rock lay before
the cavern in a way that, as we found, not only hid the entrance from
view, but also--except, I suppose, in very stormy weather--prevented
the sea from flowing in. I crept behind this barrier, holding Thora's
hand, and we were soon at the mouth of the cave.
A slanting ray of sunshine found its way within, illumining the
great vaulted roof and the dripping stalactites, that looked like
giant icicles hanging above us. We were able to walk or scramble
over the rocks and shingle for a considerable distance.
When we passed into a part of the grotto where the darkness
deepened, however, Thora began to show signs of timidity. She spoke
of having heard about many an Orcadian who, in attempting to reach
the innermost recesses of such caverns, had been taken possession
of by the evil spirits that were commonly believed to inhabit these
places; and the strangely-echoing sounds we heard were exaggerated
in her imagination, and became to her as the weird voices of
kelpies and water nymphs.
I endeavoured to allay her fears as I proceeded to strike a light,
and reminded her of the magic stone that I had hanging at my neck;
but still she was reluctant to go further.
"Take you the stone yourself then, Thora, if you're afraid," I
said, as I took the cord from my neck. "It will keep you from
danger." And I looped the cord over her head.
Now Thora had an implicit faith in the virtues of that little
stone, and when she felt it resting on her throat her fears were at
once conquered.
It took some trouble to light our torch, but with the help of some
wool from my cap as tinder I set to work with flint and steel, and
at last we got the tar rope in a blaze. Thora took the torch in
hand and picked her way over the rocky floor, exploring every nook
and cranny of the cave. So rapidly did she skip from stone to stone
and climb over the intervening boulders, that I frequently found it
difficult to keep up with her.
We tried to find some traces of the wreck of the Undine, or of
anyone having lived there, but we found nothing beyond a great heap
of oyster shells that had been thrown into one corner. But Carver
Kinlay might very well have existed comfortably in this immense
place, for, besides the dried fish that he was said to have found
among the wreckage, there was a fine bed of oysters within easy
reach of the entrance to the cave, and these shellfish are good
enough eating, I believe. How he managed to keep Thora alive for so
long without other food was, however, a thing I could with
difficulty understand, unless she fed upon the sea-birds' eggs.
Thora, herself, remembered nothing of having been in the cave
before, but she was very anxious to reach its furthest limits, and,
trusting to me to follow her, she went fearlessly onward.
Sometimes she would stoop to lift a stone, and would throw it in
front of her to discover if there was a clear passage, for the
light burned but dimly. Once when she did so the stone fell upon
something that gave a peculiar hollow sound, as though some wooden
box or barrel had been struck.
I took little notice of this, for I was at the moment groping my
way into a side chamber of the cave. I was feeling my way back
towards the torch, when Thora called me to her as though she had
made some new discovery. But as I hurried in the direction whence
her voice sounded, I was startled by a loud and piercing scream
which filled the cavern and re-echoed through the empty corridors.
For a moment I fancied it was the shrieking of some monster
inhabitant of the cave and was about to beat a retreat when I heard
my name called again.
"Halcro! Halcro! Help! help!"
And then the whole place was in utter darkness, and I heard nothing
but the dying echoes, and a strange purling of running water.
I made my way as speedily as I could to where I had last seen the
lighted torch, and as I got further and further into the cave, the
sound of running water grew more distinct, until I heard it just at
my feet. It was not the singing ripple of a shallow rivulet, but
the sonorous sound of a deep stream that, so far as I could make
out, ran athwart the cavern. I went down on my knees and put my
hand in the water to feel which direction it took, for I did not
now doubt that my companion had fallen in, and was even now
struggling somewhere in the dark water that was rushing past me.
My first impulse was to throw myself into the stream and swim about
until I found her, but this I considered would be vain, and I tried
to first find where she was by getting her if possible to answer
me. I called her several times by name, at the same time following,
as well as I could in the darkness, the direction taken by the
current. Oh, how I wished we had brought two torches instead of
only the one that was now lost!
As I crawled about from rock to rock, guiding myself by the
indistinct sounds I heard, I blamed myself for not having listened
to Thora's words of expressed fear at the opening of the cave. That
she had the viking's stone in her possession was a matter of small
comfort to me when I seriously reflected upon the extreme danger of
the situation, and I feared that, in spite of the supernatural aid,
she might even now be drowned, and that I would never again see her
fair face in life.
But I was determined not to leave the cave until I had found her,
and, accordingly, I continued the search with growing consternation.
No response came to my constant cries of "Thora! Thora!" and I
wandered hither and thither in the difficult darkness for what
appeared to me fully an hour's time. I became hopeless, and even
thought of trying to find my own way out of the cavern, that I
might summon help from Crua Breck. But still I was urged by some
inward feeling to go onward yet a little further.
Passing at length round an abutting angle of ragged wall, I entered
what appeared to be the extreme chamber of the cavern; and here my
eyes were for a moment dazzled by the appearance of a bright though
thin beam of golden sunlight, which shone from the west through a
narrow fissure in the rock, and glittered upon the unruffled
surface of a large and deep pool of water. With renewed hope I
again called Thora; but not far from where I was standing the water
curled in a cascade over its rocky bed, so to continue its
subterranean course into the sea, and the noise it made in falling
rendered my voice inaudible. The sight of that dark water gliding
smoothly to the edge of rock, and there tumbling over into greater
depths, seemed to tell me only too plainly what Thora's fate had
been.
I now began to despair of being able to escape into the outer air
before the night came on; the changing hues of the stream of light
that entered the cave already indicated the setting of the sun. But
by the welcome help of such light as remained I carefully surveyed
the chamber in which I stood.
Just as I was giving a last look round, I observed a slight
movement on the opposite edge of the stream. One hurried glance was
enough, for there, not a dozen yards from me, was Thora, clinging
with clasped hands to a large piece of rock, her long, fair hair
touched by the fading crimson light and dangling in the stream,
that rapidly passed her as though it would sweep her with it to
some unknown destiny. She seemed totally unconscious of all that
was going on around her, and I saw that her exhausted strength
could not long sustain her in her perilous position. Even as I was
thinking how best to reach her, I saw her hands suddenly relax
their hold upon the rock, and her helpless form floated slowly with
the current towards the dark abyss beyond.
Without hesitation I plunged into the stream. A few strong strokes
brought me to her side, and with one hand I firmly grasped her by
the arm. Another second and we both would have been carried over
the cataract, but the sense of our imminent danger gave me courage,
and with a great effort of strength I swam with my burden to the
side of the stream from which I had plunged, and eagerly clung to
the rock until my strength was renewed.
It was with considerable difficulty that I at last managed to raise
myself and the girl from the water, and place her unconscious form
upon a flat slab of rock. And now I endeavoured with such simple
skill as I could command to restore her exhausted animation. This
was a task I was little fitted for; but just as the last faint ray
of light died away and left the cavern in darkness, I had the
satisfaction of hearing her draw a deep breath and then utter my
name.
I found it no easy thing to carry her in my arms to the mouth of
the cave, and many halts did I make by the way, trying to discover
the light that should tell me that our peril was over. Before we
had gone very far, however, she was conscious enough to help me in
some sort, and by our united efforts we at length got so far on our
right way as to come in sight of the light of day, and thereafter
our journey was easy. The evening breeze that met us revived my
companion considerably, and she was able to stand up and thank me
in her girlish way for delivering her from her dangerous plight.
When she was sufficiently recovered to speak, she told me how it
was she had fallen into the water.
She had found a large tarpaulin spread out as though it covered
some hidden boxes, and, calling to me, she had tried to raise the
tarpaulin to look beneath it. But in standing up to do so she
unfortunately missed her foothold on the slippery rock, and falling
backward was plunged into the stream; and this was all that she
knew, except that being swept along by the water and struggling to
keep afloat she happened to touch a rock at the side, and had there
held on until, as she had expected, I was able to help her.
Having thus far got out of the cave, there remained yet the
difficulty of climbing up the cliff in the twilight. If I could get
Thora as far as the rope, I felt that the rest would be
comparatively easy. But she was very weak and cold, and I feared
for the result.
Fortunately, the shelf of rock along which we had to pass was
sufficiently wide for us to walk along by clinging to the cliff.
This was done with great care, and when the rope was reached I
bound it several times round her waist and secured it firmly under
her arms. Being assured that she was then quite safe in her
position, I took hold of the higher part of the climbing line and
with its assistance scaled the crag.
When I reached the top I gave Thora the signal, and by hauling the
rope up with all my strength I helped her to ascend. It was a long
time ere I felt sure that she was safe, but at last I heard her
call out that she was all right, and I stretched my hand down to
her. She took hold of it, and I assisted her until she stepped once
more upon the soft turf, and then, still holding her hand, I led
her home, deeply thankful that our adventure had ended without
fatality.