CHAPTER I

[Illustration: _Frontispiece._ _Her face turned towards the window._]

ARMOREL OF LYONESSE

A Romance of To-day

BY

WALTER BESANT

AUTHOR OF 'ALL SORTS AND CONDITIONS OF MEN'

[Illustration]

A NEW EDITION

_WITH TWELVE ILLUSTRATIONS BY FRED. BARNARD_

London

CHATTO & WINDUS, PICCADILLY

1891

_The Illustrations to this Story are reproduced by kind permission of

the Proprietors of 'The Illustrated London News'_

CONTENTS

_PART I._

CHAPTER PAGE

I. THE CHILD OF SAMSON 1

II. PRESENTED BY THE SEA 11

III. IN THE BAR PARLOUR 17

IV. THE GOLDEN TORQUE 23

V. THE ENCHANTED ISLAND 35

VI. THE FLOWER-FARM 45

VII. A VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY 56

VIII. THE VOYAGERS 62

IX. THE LAST DAY BUT ONE 69

X. MR. FLETCHER RETURNS FOR HIS BAG 80

XI. ROLAND'S LETTER 86

XII. THE CHANGE 91

XIII. ARMOREL'S INHERITANCE 95

_PART II._

I. SWEET COZ 115

II. THE SONATA 122

III. THE CLEVEREST MAN IN LONDON 127

IV. MASTER OF ALL THE ARTS 134

V. ONLY A SIMPLE SERVICE 139

VI. THE OTHER STUDIO 148

VII. A CANDID OPINION 153

VIII. ALL ABOUT MYSELF 160

IX. TO MAKE HIM HAPPY 166

X. THE SECRET OF THE TWO PICTURES 173

XI. A CRITIC ON TRUTH 178

XII. TO MAKE THAT PROMISE SURE 186

XIII. THE DRAMATIST 192

XIV. AN HONOURABLE PROPOSAL 198

XV. NOT TWO MEN, BUT ONE 201

XVI. THE PLAY AND THE COMEDY 205

XVII. THE NATIONAL GALLERY 217

XVIII. CONGRATULATIONS 223

XIX. WHAT NEXT? 229

XX. A RECOVERY AND A FLIGHT 235

XXI. ALL LOST BUT---- 242

XXII. THE END OF WORLDLY TROUBLES 254

XXIII. THE HOUR OF TRIUMPH 264

XXIV. THE CUP AND THE LIP 267

XXV. TO FORGET IT ALL 280

XXVI. NOT THE HEIR, AFTER ALL 288

XXVII. THE DESERT ISLAND 292

XXVIII. AT HOME 299

XXIX. THE TRESPASS OFFERING 306

ARMOREL OF LYONESSE

_PART I_

CHAPTER I

THE CHILD OF SAMSON

It was the evening of a fine September day. Through the square window,

built out so as to form another room almost as large as that which had

been thus enlarged, the autumn sun, now fast declining to the west,

poured in warm and strong; but not too warm or too strong for the girl

on whose head it fell as she sat leaning back in the low chair, her

face turned towards the window. The sun of Scilly is never too fierce

or too burning in summer, nor in winter does it ever lose its force;

in July, when the people of the adjacent islands of Great Britain and

Ireland venture not forth into the glare of the sun, here the soft sea

mists and the strong sea air temper the heat; and in December the sun

still shines with a lingering warmth, as if he loved the place. This

girl lived in the sunshine all the year round; rowed in it; lay in it;

basked in it bare-headed, summer and winter; in the winter she would

sit sheltered from the wind in some warm corner of the rocks; in

summer she would lie on the hillside or stand upon the high headlands

and the sea-beat crags, while the breezes, which in the Land of

Lyonesse do never cease, played with her long tresses and kept her

soft cheek cool.

The window was wide open on all three sides; the girl had been doing

some kind of work, but it had dropped from her hands, and now lay

unregarded on the floor; she was gazing upon the scene before her, but

with the accustomed eyes which looked out upon it every day. A girl

who has such a picture continually before her all day long never tires

of it, though she may not be always consciously considering it and

praising it. The stranger, for his part, cannot choose but cry aloud

for admiration; but the native, who knows it as no stranger can, is

silent. The house, half-way up the low hill, looked out upon the

south--to be exact, its aspect was S. W. by S.--so that from this

window the girl saw always, stretched out at her feet, the ocean, now

glowing in the golden sunshine of September. Had she been tall enough,

she might even have seen the coast of South America, the nearest land

in the far distance. Looking S. W., that is, she would have seen the

broad mouth of Oroonooque and the shores of El Dorado. This broad

sea-scape was broken exactly in the middle by the Bishop's Rock and

its stately lighthouse rising tall and straight out of the water; on

the left hand the low hill of Annet shut out the sea; and on the right

Great Minalto, rugged and black, the white foam always playing round

its foot or flying over its great black northern headland, bounded and

framed the picture. Almost in the middle of the water, not more than

two miles distant, a sailing ship, all sails set, made swift way,

bound outward one knows not whither. Lovely at all times is a ship in

full sail, but doubly lovely when she is seen from afar, sailing on a

smooth sea, under a cloudless sky, the sun of afternoon lighting up

her white sails. No other ships were in sight; there was not even the

long line of smoke which proclaims the steamer below the horizon;

there was not even a Penzance fishing-boat tacking slowly homewards

with brown sails and its two masts: in this direction there was no

other sign of man.

The girl, I say, saw this sight every day: she never tired of it,

partly because no one ever tires of the place in which he was born and

has lived--not even an Arab of the Great Sandy Desert; partly because

the sea, which has been called, by unobservant poets, unchanging, does

in fact change--face, colour, mood, even shape--every day, and is

never the same, except, perhaps, when the east wind of March covers

the sky with a monotony of grey, and takes the colour out of the face

of ocean as it takes the colour from the granite rocks, last year's

brown and yellow fern, and the purple heath. To this girl, who lived

with the sea around her, it always formed a setting, a background, a

frame for her thoughts and dreams. Wherever she went, whatever she

said or sang, or thought or did, there was always in her ears the

lapping or the lashing of the waves; always before her eyes was the

white surge flying over the rocks; always the tumbling waves. But, as

for what she actually thought or what she dreamed, seeing how ignorant

of the world she was, and how innocent and how young, and as for what

was passing in her mind this afternoon as she sat at the window, I

know not. On the first consideration of the thing, one would be

inclined to ask how, without knowledge, can a girl think, or imagine,

or dream anything? On further thought, one understands that knowledge

has very little to do with dreams or fancies. Yet, with or without

knowledge, no poet, sacred bard, or prophet has ever been able to

divine the thoughts of a girl, or to interpret them, or even to set

them down in consecutive language. I suppose they are not, in truth,

thoughts. Thought implies reasoning and the connection of facts, and

the experience of life as far as it has gone. A young maiden's mind is

full of dimly seen shadows and pallid ghosts which flit across the

brain and disappear. These shadows have the semblance of shape, but

it is dim and uncertain: they have the pretence of colour, but it

changes every moment: if they seem to show a face, it vanishes

immediately and is forgotten. Yet these shadows smile upon the young

with kindly eyes; they beckon with their fingers, and point to where,

low down on the horizon, with cloudy outline, lies the Purple

Island--to such a girl as this the future is always a small island

girt by the sea, far off and lonely. The shadows whisper to her; they

sing to her; but no girl has ever yet told us--even if she

understands--what it is they tell her.

She had been lying there, quiet and motionless, for an hour or more,

ever since the tea-things had been taken away--at Holy Hill they have

tea at half-past four. The ancient lady who was in the room with her

had fallen back again into the slumber which held her nearly all day

long as well as all the night. The house seemed thoroughly wrapped and

lapped in the softest peace and stillness; in one corner a high clock,

wooden-cased, swung its brass pendulum behind a pane of glass with

solemn and sonorous chronicle of the moments, so that they seemed to

march rather than to fly. A clock ought not to tick as if Father Time

were hurried and driven along without dignity and by a scourge. This

clock, for one, was not in a hurry. Its tick showed that Time rests

not--but hastes not. There is admonition in such a clock. When it has

no one to admonish but a girl whose work depends on her own sweet

will, its voice might seem thrown away; yet one never knows the worth

of an admonition. Besides, the clock suited the place and the room.

Where should Time march with solemn step and slow, if not on the quiet

island of Samson, in the archipelago of Scilly? On its face was

written the name of its maker, plain for all the world to see--'Peter

Trevellick, Penzance, A.D. 1741.'

The room was not ceiled, but showed the dark joists and beams above,

once painted, but a long time ago. The walls were wainscotted and

painted drab, after an old fashion now gone out: within the panels

hung coloured prints, which must have been there since the beginning

of this century. They represented rural subjects--the farmer sitting

before a sirloin of beef, while his wife, a cheerful nymph, brought

him 'Brown George,' foaming with her best home-brewed; the children

hung about his knees expectant of morsels; or the rustic bade farewell

to his sweetheart, the recruiting-sergeant waiting for him, and the

villagers, to a woman, bathed in tears. There were half a dozen of

those compositions simply coloured. I believe they are now worth much

money. But there were many other things in this room worth money.

Opposite the fireplace stood a cabinet of carved oak, black with age,

precious beyond price. Behind its glass windows one could see a

collection of things once strange and rare--things which used to be

brought home by sailors long before steamers ploughed every ocean and

globe-trotters trotted over every land. There were wonderful things

in coral, white and red and pink; Venus's-fingers from the

Philippines; fans from the Seychelles; stuffed birds of wondrous hue,

daggers and knives, carven tomahawks, ivory toys, and many other

wonders from the far East and fabulous Cathay. Beside the cabinet was

a wooden desk, carved in mahogany, with a date of 1645, said to have

been brought to the islands by one of the Royalist prisoners whom

Cromwell hanged upon the highest carn of Hangman's Island. There was

no escaping Cromwell--not even in Scilly any more than in Jamaica. In

one corner was a cupboard, the door standing open. No collector ever

came here to gaze upon the treasures unspeakable of cups and saucers,

plates and punch-bowls. On the mantelshelf were brass candlesticks and

silver candlesticks, side by side with 'ornaments' of china, pink and

gold, belonging to the artistic reign of good King George the Fourth.

On the hearthrug before the fire, which was always burning in this

room all the year round, lay an old dog sleeping.

Everybody knows the feeling of a room or a house belonging to the old.

Even if the windows are kept open, the air is always close. Rest, a

gentle, elderly angel, sits in the least frequented room with folded

wings. Sleep is always coming to the doors at all hours: for the sake

of Rest and Sleep the house must be kept very quiet: nobody must ever

laugh in the house: there is none of the litter that children make:

nothing is out of its place: nothing is disturbed: the furniture is

old-fashioned and formal: the curtains are old and faded: the carpets

are old, faded, and worn: it is always evening: everything belonging

to the house has done its work: all together, like the tenant, are

sitting still--solemn, hushed, at rest, waiting for the approaching

end.

The only young thing at Holy Hill was the girl at the window.

Everything else was old--the servants, the farm labourers, the house

and the furniture. In the great hooded arm-chair beside the fire

reposed the proprietor, tenant, or owner of all. She was the oldest

and most venerable dame ever seen. At this time she was asleep: her

head had dropped forward a little, but not much; her eyes were closed;

her hands were folded in her lap. She was now so very ancient that she

never left her chair except for her bed; also, by reason of her great

antiquity, she now passed most of the day in sleep, partly awake in

the morning, when she gazed about and asked questions of the day. But

sometimes, as you will presently see, she revived again in the

evening, became lively and talkative, and suffered her memory to

return to the ancient days.

By the assistance of her handmaidens, this venerable lady was enabled

to present an appearance both picturesque and pleasing, chiefly

because it carried the imagination back to a period so very remote. To

begin with, she wore her bonnet all day long. Fifty years ago it was

not uncommon in country places to find very old ladies who wore their

bonnets all day long. Ursula Rosevean, however, was the last who still

preserved that ancient custom. It was a large bonnet that she wore, a

kind of bonnet calculated to impress very deeply the imagination of

one--whether male or female--who saw it for the first time: it was of

bold design, as capacious as a store-ship, as flowing in its lines as

an old man-of-war--inspired to a certain extent by the fashions of the

Waterloo period--yet, in great part, of independent design. Those few

who were permitted to gaze upon the bonnet beheld it reverently.

Within the bonnet an adroit arrangement of cap and ribbons concealed

whatever of baldness or exiguity as to locks--but what does one know?

Venus Calva has never been worshipped by men; and women only pay their

tribute at her shrine from fear--never from love. The face of the

sleeping lady reminded one--at first, vaguely--of history. Presently

one perceived that it was the identical face which that dread

occidental star, Queen Elizabeth herself, would have assumed had she

lived to the age of ninety-five, which was Ursula's time of life in

the year 1884. For it was an aquiline face, thin and sharp; and if her

eyes had been open you would have remarked that they were bright and

piercing, also like those of the Tudor Queen. Her cheek still

preserved something of the colour which had once made it beautiful;

but cheek and forehead alike were covered with lines innumerable, and

her withered hands seemed to have grown too small for their natural

glove. She was dressed in black silk, and wore a gold chain about her

neck.

The clock struck half-past five, melodiously. Then the girl started

and sat upright--as awakened out of her dream. 'Armorel,' it seemed to

say--nay, since it seemed to say, it actually did say--'Child Armorel,

I am old and wise. For a hundred and forty-three years, ever since I

left the hands of the ingenious Peter Trevellick, of Penzance, in the

year 1741, I have been counting the moments, never ceasing save at

those periods when surgical operations have been necessary. In each

year there are 31,536,000 moments. Judge, therefore, for yourself how

many moments in all I have counted. I must, you will own, be very wise

indeed. I am older even than your great-great-grandmother. I remember

her a baby first, and then a pretty child, and then a beautiful woman,

for all she is now so worn and wizened. I remember her father and her

grandfather. Also her brothers and her son, and her grandson--and your

own father, dear Armorel. The moments pass: they never cease: I tell

them as they go. You have but short space to do all you wish to do.

You, child, have done nothing at all yet. But the moments pass.

Patience. For you, too, work will be found. Youth passes. You can hear

it pass. I tell the moments in which it melts away and vanishes. Age

itself shall pass. You may listen if you please. I tell the moments in

which it slowly passes.'

Armorel looked at the clock with serious eyes during the delivery of

this fine sermon, the whole bearing of which she did not perhaps

comprehend. Then she started up suddenly and sprang to her feet, stung

by a sudden pang of restlessness, with a quick breath and a sigh. We

who have passed the noon of life are apt to forget the disease of

restlessness to which youth is prone: it is an affection which greatly

troubles that period of life, though it should be the happiest and the

most contented; it is a disorder due to anticipation, impatience, and

inexperience. The voyage is all before: youth is eager to be sailing

on that unknown ocean full of strange islands. Who would not be

restless with such a journey before one and such discoveries to make?

Armorel opened the door noiselessly, and slipped out. At the same

moment the old dog awoke and crept out with her, going delicately and

on tiptoe, lest he should awaken the ancient lady. In the hall outside

the girl stood listening. The house was quite silent, save that from

the kitchen there was wafted on the air a soft droning--gentle,

melodious, and murmurous, like the contented booming of a bumble-bee

among the figwort. Armorel laughed gently. 'Oh!' she murmured, 'they

are all asleep. Grandmother is asleep in the parlour; Dorcas and

Chessun are asleep in the kitchen; Justinian is asleep in the cottage;

and I suppose the boy is asleep somewhere in the farmyard.'

The girl led the way, and the dog followed.

She passed through the door into the garden of the front. It was not

exactly a well-ordered garden, because everything seemed to grow as it

pleased; but then in Samson you have not to coax flowers and plants

into growing: they grow because it pleases them to grow: this is the

reason why they grow so tall and so fast. The garden faced the

south-west, and was protected from the north and east by the house

itself and by a high stone wall. There is not anywhere on the island a

warmer and sunnier corner than this little front garden of Holy Hill.

The geranium clambered up the walls beside and among the branches of

the tree-fuchsia, both together covering the front of the house with

the rich colouring of their flowers. On either side of the door grew a

great tree, with gnarled trunk and twisted branches, of lemon verbena,

fragrant and sweet, perfuming the air; the myrtles were like unto

trees for size; the very marguerites ran to timber of the smaller

kind; the pampas-grass in the warmest corner rose eight feet high,

waving its long silver plumes; the tall stalk still stood which had

borne the flowers of an aloe that very summer; the leaves of the plant

itself were slowly dying away, their life-work, which is nothing at

all but the production of that one flowering stem, finished. That

done, the world has no more attractions for the aloe: it is

content--it slowly dies away. And in the front of the garden was a row

of tall dracæna palms. An old ship's figure-head, thrown ashore after

a wreck, representing the head and bust of a beautiful maiden, gilded,

but with a good deal of the gilt rubbed off, stood on the left hand

of the garden, half hidden by another fuchsia-tree in flower: and a

huge old-fashioned ship's lantern hung from an iron bar projecting

over the door of the house.

The house itself was of stone, with a roof of small slates. Impossible

to say how old it was, because in this land stone-work ages rapidly,

and soon becomes covered with yellow and orange lichen, while in the

interstices there grows the grey sandwort; and in the soft sea air and

the damp sea mists the sharp edges even of granite are quickly rounded

off and crumbled. But it was a very old house, save for the square

projecting window, which had been added recently--say thirty or forty

years ago--a long, low house of two storeys, simply built; it stands

half-way up the hill which slopes down to the water's edge; it is

protected from the north and north-east winds, which are the deadliest

enemies to Scilly, partly by the hill behind and partly by a spur of

grey rock running like an ancient Cyclopean wall down the whole face

of the hill into the sea, where for many a fathom it sticks out black

teeth, round which the white surge rises and tumbles, even in the

calmest time.

Beyond the garden-wall--why they wanted a garden-wall I know not,

except for the pride and dignity of the thing--was a narrow green,

with a little, a very little, pond; in the pond there were ducks; and

beside the green was a small farmyard, containing everything that a

farmyard should contain, except a stable. It had no stable, because

there are no horses or carts upon the island. Pigs there are, and

cows; fowls there are, and ducks and geese, and a single donkey for

the purpose of carrying the flower-baskets from the farm to the

landing-place; but neither horse nor cart.

Beyond the farmyard was a cottage, exactly like the house, but

smaller. It was thatched, and on the thatch grew clumps of samphire.

This was the abode of Justinian Tryeth, bailiff, head man, or foreman,

who managed the farm. When you have named Ursula Rosevean, and

Armorel, her great-great-granddaughter, and Justinian Tryeth, and

Dorcas his wife--she was a native of St. Agnes, and therefore a Hicks

by birth--Peter his son, and Chessun his daughter, you have a complete

directory of the island, because nobody else now lives on Samson.

Formerly, however, and almost within the memory of the oldest

inhabitant, according to the computation of antiquaries and the voice

of tradition, this island maintained a population of over two score.

The hill which rises behind the house is the southern hill of the two,

which, with the broad valley between them, make up the island of

Samson. This hill slopes steeply seaward to south and west. It is not

a lofty hill, by any means. In Scilly there are no lofty hills. When

Nature addressed herself to the construction of this archipelago she

brought to the task a light touch: at the moment she happened to be

full of feeling for the great and artistic effects which may be

produced by small elevations, especially in those places where the

material is granite. Therefore, though she raised no Alpine peak in

Scilly, she provided great abundance and any variety of bold

coast-line with rugged cliffs, lofty carns, and headlands piled with

rocks. And her success as an artist in this _genre_ has been

undoubtedly wonderful. The actual measurement of Holy Hill,

Samson--but why should we measure?--has been taken, for the admiration

of the world, by the Ordnance Survey. It is really no more than a

hundred and thirty-two feet--not a foot more or less. But then one

knows hills ten times that height--the Herefordshire Beacon, for

example--which are not half so mountainous in the effect produced.

Only a hundred and thirty-two feet--yet on its summit one feels the

exhilaration of spirits caused by the air, elsewhere of five thousand

feet at least. On its southern and western slopes lie the fields which

form the flower-farm of Holy Hill.

Below the farmyard the ground sloped more steeply to the water: the

slope was covered with short heather fern, now brown and yellow, and

long trailing branches of bramble, now laden with ripe blackberries,

the leaves enriched with blazon of gold and purple and crimson.

Armorel ran across the green and plunged among the fern, tossing her

arms and singing aloud, the old dog trotting and jumping, but with

less elasticity, beside her. She was bare-headed; the sunshine made

her dark cheeks ruddy and caused her black eyes to glow. Hebe, young

and strong, loves Phoebus, and fears not any freckles. When she came

to the water's edge, where the boulders lie piled in a broken mass

among and above the water, she stood still and looked across the sea,

silent for a moment. Then she began to sing in a strong contralto; but

no one could hear her, not even the coastguard on Telegraph Hill, or

he of the Star Fort: the song she sang was one taught her by the old

lady, who had sung it herself in the old, old days, when the road was

always filled with merchantmen waiting for convoy up the Channel, and

when the islands were rich with the trade of the ships, and their

piloting, and their wrecks--to say nothing of the free trade which

went on gallantly and without break or stop. As she sang she lifted

her arms and swung them in slow cadence, as a Nautch-girl sometimes

swings her arms. What she sang was none other than the old song--

Early one morning, just as the sun was rising,

I heard a maid sing in the valley below:

Oh! don't deceive me. Oh! never leave me.

How could you use a poor maiden so?

In the year of grace 1884 Armorel was fifteen years of age. But she

looked nineteen or twenty, because she was so tall and so well-grown.

She was dressed simply in a blue flannel; the straw hat which she

carried in her hand was trimmed with red ribbons; at her throat she

had stuck a red verbena--she naturally took to red, because her

complexion was so dark. Black hair; black eyes; a strongly marked

brow; a dark cheek of warm and ruddy hue; the lips full, but the mouth

finely curved; features large but regular--she was already, though so

young, a tall and handsome woman. Those able to understand things

would recognise in her dark complexion, in her carriage, in her eyes,

and in her upright figure, the true Castilian touch. The gipsy is

swarthy; the negro is black; the mulatto is dusky: it is not the

colour alone, but the figure and the carriage also, which mark the

Spanish blood. A noble Spanish lady; yet how could she get to Samson?

She wore no gloves--you cannot buy gloves in Samson--and her hands

were brown with exposure to sea and sun, to wind and rain: they were

by no means tiny hands, but strong and capable hands; her arms--no one

ever saw them, but for shape and whiteness they could not be

matched--would have disgraced no young fellow of her own age for

strength and muscle. That was fairly to be expected in one who

continually sailed and rowed across the inland seas of this

archipelago; who went to church by boat and to market by boat; who

paid her visits by boat and transacted her business by boat, and went

by boat to do her shopping. She who rows every day upon the salt

water, and knows how to manage a sail when the breeze is strong and

the Atlantic surge rolls over the rocks and roughens the still water

of the road, must needs be strong and sound. For my own part, I admire

not the fragile maiden so much as her who rejoices in her strength.

Youth, in woman as well as in man, should be brave and lusty; clean of

limb as well as of heart; strong of arm as well as of will; enduring

hardness of voluntary labour as well as hardness of involuntary pain;

with feet that can walk, run, and climb, and with hands that can hold

on. Such a girl as Armorel--so tall, so strong, so healthy--offers,

methinks, a home ready-made for all the virtues, and especially the

virtues feminine, to house themselves therein. Here they will remain,

growing stronger every day, until at last they have become part and

parcel of the very girl herself, and cannot be parted from her.

Whereas, when they visit the puny creature, weak, timid, delicate--but

no--'tis better to remain silent.

How many times had the girl wandered, morning or afternoon, down the

rough face of the hill, and stood looking vaguely out to sea, and

presently returned home again? How many such walks had she taken and

forgotten? For a hundred times--yea, a thousand times--we do over and

over again the old familiar action, the little piece of the day's

routine, and forget it when we lie down to sleep. But there comes the

thousandth time, when the same thing is done again in the same way,

yet is never to be forgotten. For on that day happens the thing which

changes and charges a whole life. It is the first of many days. It is

the beginning of new days. From it, whatever may have happened before,

everything shall now be dated until the end. Mohammed lived many

years, but all the things that happened unto him or his successors

are dated from the Flight. Is it for nothing that it has been told

what things Armorel did and how she looked on this day? Not so, but

for the sake of what happened afterwards, and because the history of

Armorel begins with this restless fit, which drove her out of the

quiet room down the hillside to the sea. Her history begins, like

every history of a woman worth relating, with the man cast by the sea

upon the shores of her island. The maiden always lives upon an island,

and whether the man is cast upon the shore by the sea of Society, or

the sea of travel, or the sea of accident, or the sea of adventure, or

the sea of briny waves and roaring winds and jagged rocks, matters

little. To Armorel it was the last. To you, dear Dorothy or Violet, it

will doubtless be by the sea of Society. And the day that casts him

before your feet will ever after begin a new period in your reckoning.

Armorel stopped her song as suddenly as she had begun it. She stopped

because on the water below her, not far from the shore, she saw a

strange thing. She had good sea eyes--an ordinary telescope does not

afford a field of vision much larger or clearer across water than

Armorel's eyes--but the thing was so strange that she shaded her

forehead with her hand, and looked more curiously.

It would be strange on any evening, even after the calmest day of

summer, when the sun is setting low, to see a small boat going out

beyond Samson towards the Western Islets. There the swell of ocean is

always rolling among the rocks and round the crags and headlands of

the isles. Only in calm weather and in broad daylight can the boatman

who knows the place venture in those waters. Not even the most skilled

boatman would steer for the Outer Islands at sunset. For there are

hidden rocks, long ridges of teeth that run out from the islands to

tear and grind to powder any boat that should be caught in their

devouring jaws. There are currents also which run swiftly and

unexpectedly between the islands to sweep the boat along with them

till it shall strike the rocks and so go down with any who are abroad;

and there are strong gusts which sweep round the headlands and blow

through the narrow sounds. So that it is only when the day is calm and

in the full light of the sun that a boat can sail among these islands.

Yet Armorel saw a boat on the water, not half a mile from Samson, with

two men on board. More than this, the boat was apparently without oars

or sails, and it was drifting out to sea. What did this mean?

She looked and wondered. She looked again, and she remembered.

The tide was ebbing, the boat was floating out with the tide; the

breeze had dropped, but there was still something left--what there was

came from the south-east and helped the boat along; there was not much

sea, but the feet of Great Minalto were white, and the white foam kept

leaping up the sides, and on her right, over the ledges round White

Island, the water was tearing and boiling, a white and angry heap.

Why, the wind was getting up, and the sun was setting, and if they did

not begin to row back as hard as they could, and that soon, they would

be out to sea and in the dark.

She looked again, and she thought more. The sinking sun fell upon the

boat, and lit it up so plainly that she could now see very well two

things. First, that the boat was really without any oars or sails at

all; and next, that the two men in her were not natives of Scilly. She

could not discern their faces, but she could tell by their appearance

and the way they sat in the boat that they were not men of the place.

Besides, what would an islander want out in a boat at such a time and

in such a place? They were, therefore, visitors; and by the quiet way

in which they sat, as if it mattered not at all, it was perfectly

plain that they understood little or nothing of their danger.

Again she considered, and now it became certain to her, looking down

upon the boat, that the current was not taking her out to sea at all,

which would be dangerous enough, but actually straight on the ridge or

ledge of rocks lying off the south-west of White Island. Then, seized

with sudden terror, she turned and fled back to the farm.

CHAPTER II

PRESENTED BY THE SEA

'Peter!' cried Armorel in the farmyard. 'Peter! Peter! Wake up! Where

is the boy? Wake up and come quick!'

The boy was not sleeping, however, and came forth slowly, but

obediently, in rustic fashion. He was a little older than most of

those who still permit themselves to be called boys: unless his looks

deceived one, he was a great deal older, for he was entirely bald,

save for a few long, scattered hairs, which were white. His beard and

whiskers also consisted of nothing but a few sparse white hairs. He

moved heavily, without the spring of boyhood in his feet. Had Peter

jumped or run, one might in haste have inferred a condition of drink

or mental disorder. As for his shoulders, too, they were rounded, as

if by the weight of years--a thing which is rarely seen in boys. Yet

Armorel called this antique person 'the boy,' and he answered to the

name without remonstrance.

'Quick, Peter!' she cried. 'There's a boat drifting on White Island

Ledge, and the tide's running out strong; and there are two men in

her, and they've got no oars in the boat. Ignorant trippers, I

suppose! They will both be killed to a certainty, unless---- Quick!'

Peter followed her flying footsteps with a show of haste and a

movement of the legs approaching alacrity. But then he was always a

slow boy, and one who loved to have his work done for him. Therefore,

when he reached the landing-place, he found that Armorel was well

before him, and that she had already shipped mast and sail and oars,

and was waiting for him to shove off.

Samson has two landing beaches, one on the north-east below Bryher

Hill, and the other farther south, on the eastern side of the valley.

There might be a third, better than either, on Porth Bay, if anyone

desired to put off there, on the west side facing the other islands,

where nobody has any business at all except to see the rocks or shoot

wild birds.

The beach used by the Holy Hill folk was the second of these two; here

they kept their boats, and had their old stone boat-house to store the

gear; and it was here that Armorel stood waiting for her companion.

Peter was slow on land; at sea, however, he alone is slow who does not

know what can be got out of a boat, and how it can be got. Peter did

possess this knowledge; all the islanders, in fact, have it. They are

born with it. They also know that nothing at sea is gained by hurry.

It is a maxim which is said to rule or govern their conduct on land as

well as afloat. Peter, therefore, when he had pushed off, sat down and

took an oar with no more appearance of hurry than if he were taking a

boat-load of boxes filled with flowers across to the port. Armorel

took the other oar.

'They are drifting on White Island Ledge,' repeated Armorel; 'and the

tide is running out fast.'

Peter made no reply--Armorel expected none--but dipped his oar. They

rowed in silence for ten minutes. Then Peter found utterance, and

spoke slowly.

'Twenty years ago--I remember it well--a boat went ashore on that very

Ledge. The tide was running out--strong, like to-night. There was

three men in her--visitors they were, who wanted to save the boatman's

pay. Their bodies was never found.'

Then both pulled on in silence, and doggedly.

In ten minutes or more they had rounded the Point at a respectful

distance, for reasons well known to the navigator and the nautical

surveyor of Scilly. Peter, without a word, shipped his oar. Armorel

did likewise. Then Peter stepped the mast and hoisted the sail,

keeping the line in his own hand, and looked ahead, while Armorel took

the helm.

'It's Jinkins's boat,' said Peter, because they were now in sight of

her. 'What'll Jinkins say when he hears that his boat's gone to

pieces?'

'And the two men? Who are they? Will Jinkins say nothing about the

men?'

'Strangers they are; gentlemen, I suppose. Well, if the breeze doesn't

soon---- Ah, here it is!'

The wind suddenly filled the sail. The boat heeled over under the

breeze, and a moment after was flying through the water straight up

the broad channel between the two Minaltos and Samson.

The sun was very low now. Between them and the west lay the boat they

were pursuing--a small black object, with two black silhouettes of

figures clear against the crimson sky. And now Armorel perceived that

they had by this time gotten an inkling, at least, of their danger,

for they no longer sat passive, but had torn up a plank from the

bottom, with which one, kneeling in the bows, was working as with a

paddle, but without science. The boat yawed this way and that, but

still kept on her course drifting to the rocks.

'If she touches the Ledge, Peter,' said Armorel, 'she will be in

little bits in five minutes. The water is rushing over it like a

mill-stream.'

This she said ignorant of mill-streams, because there are none on

Scilly; but the comparison served.

'If she touches,' Peter replied, 'we may just go home again. For we

shall be no good to nobody.'

Beyond the boat they could plainly see the waters breaking over the

Ledge; the sun lit up the white foam that leaped and flew over the

black rocks just showing their teeth above the water as the tide went

down.

Here is a problem--you may find plenty like it in every book of

algebra. Given a boat drifting upon a ledge of rocks with the current

and the tide; given a boat sailing in pursuit with a fair wind aft;

given also the velocity of the current and the speed of the boat and

the distance of the first boat from the rocks: at what distance must

the second boat commence the race in order to catch up the first

before it drives upon the rocks?

This second boat, paying close attention to the problem, came up hand

over hand, rapidly overtaking the first boat, where the two men not

only understood at last the danger they were in, but also that an

attempt was being made to save them. In fact, one of them, who had

some tincture or flavour of the mathematics left in him from his

school days, remembered the problems of this class, and would have

given a great deal to have been back again in school working out one

of them.

Presently the boats were so near that Peter hailed, 'Boat ahoy! Back

her! Back her! or you'll be upon the rocks. Back her all you know!'

'We've broken our oars,' they shouted.

'Keep her off!' Peter bawled again.

Even with a plank taken from the bottom of the boat a practised

boatman would have been able to keep her off long enough to clear the

rocks; but these two young men were not used to the ways of the sea.

'Put up your hellum,' said Peter, quietly.

'What are you going to do?' The girl obeyed first, as one must do at

sea, and asked the question afterwards.

'There's only one chance. We must cut across her bows. Two lubbers!

They ought not to be trusted with a boat. There's plenty of room.' He

looked at the Ledge ahead and at his own sail. 'Now--steady.' He

tightened the rope, the boat changed her course. Then Peter stood up

and called again, his hand to his mouth, 'Back her! Back her! Back her

all you know!' He sat down and said quietly, 'Now, then--luff it

is--luff--all you can.'

The boat turned suddenly. It was high time. Right in front of

them--only a few yards in front--the water rushed as if over a

cascade, boiling and surging among the rocks. At high tide there would

have been the calm, unruffled surface of the ocean swell; now there

were roaring floods and swelling whirlpools. The girl looked round,

but only for an instant. Then the boat crossed the bows of the other,

and Armorel, as they passed, caught the rope that was held out to her.

One moment more and they were off the rocks, in deep water, towing the

other boat after them.

Then Peter arose, lowered the sail, and took down his mast.

'Nothing,' he said, 'between us and Mincarlo. Now, gentlemen, if you

will step into this boat we can tow yours along with us. So--take

care, sir! Sit in the stern beside the young lady. Can you row, either

of you?'

They could both row, they said. In these days a man is as much ashamed

of not being able to row as, fifty years ago, he was ashamed of not

being able to ride. Peter took one oar and gave the other to the

stranger nearest. Then, without more words, he dipped his oar and

began to row back again. The sun went down, and it suddenly became

cold.

Armorel perceived that the man beside her was quite a young man--not

more than one- or two-and-twenty. He wore brave attire--even a brown

velvet jacket, a white waistcoat, and a crimson necktie; he also had a

soft felt hat. Nature had not yet given him much beard, but what there

was of it he wore pointed, with a light moustache so arranged as to

show how it would be worn when it became of a respectable length. As

he sat in the boat he seemed tall; and he did not look at all like one

of the bawling and boastful trippers who sometimes come over to the

islands for a night and pretend to know how to manage a boat. Yet----

'What do you mean,' asked the girl, severely, 'by going out in a boat,

when you ought to have known very well that you could not manage her?'

'We thought we could,' replied this disconcerted pretender, with

meekness suitable to the occasion. Indeed, under such humiliating

circumstances, Captain Parolles himself would become meek.

'If we had not seen you,' she continued, 'you would most certainly

have been killed.'

'I begin to think we might. We should certainly have gone on those

rocks. But there is an island close by. We could swim.'

'If your boat had touched those rocks you would have been dead in

three minutes,' this maid of wisdom continued. 'Nothing could have

saved you. No boat could have come near you. And to think of standing

or swimming in that current and among those rocks! Oh! but you don't

know Scilly.'

'No,' he replied, still with a meekness that disarmed wrath, 'I'm

afraid not.'

'Tell me how it happened.'

The other man struck in--he who was wielding the oar. He also was a

young man, of shorter and more sturdy build than the other. Had he

not, unfortunately, confined his whole attention in youth to football,

he might have made a good boatman. Really, a young man whose

appearance conveyed no information or suggestion at all about him

except that he seemed healthy, active, and vigorous, and that he was

presumably short-sighted, or he would not have worn spectacles.

'I will tell you how it came about,' he said. 'This man would go

sketching the coast. I told him that the islands are so beautifully

and benevolently built that every good bit has got another bit on the

next island, or across a cove, or on the other side of a bay, put

there on purpose for the finest view of the first bit. You only get

that arrangement, you know, in the Isles of Scilly and the Isles of

Greece. But he wouldn't be persuaded, and so we took a boat and went

to sea, like the three merchants of Bristol city. We saw Jerusalem and

Madagascar very well, and if you hadn't turned up in the nick of time

I believe we should have seen the river Styx as well, with Cocytus

very likely: good old Charon certainly: and Tantalus, too much

punished--overdone--up to his neck.'

Armorel heard, wondering what, in the name of goodness, this talker of

strange language might mean.

'When his oar broke, you know,' the talker went on, 'I began to laugh,

and so I caught a crab; and while I lay in the bottom laughing like

Tom of Bedlam, my oar dropped overboard, and there we were. Five

mortal hours we drifted; but we had tobacco and a flask, and we didn't

mind so very much. Some boat, we thought, might pick us up.'

'Some boat!' echoed Armorel. 'And outside Samson!'

'As for the rocks, we never thought about them. Had we known of the

rocks, we should not have laughed----'

'You have saved our lives,' said the young man in the velvet jacket.

He had a soft sweet voice, which trembled a little as he spoke. And,

indeed, it is a solemn thing to be rescued from certain death.

'Peter did it,' Armorel replied. 'You may thank Peter.'

'Let me thank you,' he said, softly and persuasively. 'The other man

may thank Peter.'

'Just as you like. So long, that is, as you remember that it will have

to be a lesson to you as long as you live never to go out in a boat

without a man.'

'It shall be a lesson. I promise. And the man I go out with, next

time, shall not be you, Dick.'

'Never,' she went on, enforcing the lesson, 'never go in a boat alone,

unless you know the waters. Are you Plymouth trippers? But then

Plymouth people generally know how to handle a boat.'

'We are from London.' In the twilight the blush caused by being taken

for a Plymouth tripper was not perceived. 'I am an artist, and I came

to sketch.' He said this with some slight emphasis and distinction.

There must be no mistaking an artist from London for a Plymouth

tripper.

'You must be hungry.'

'We are ravenous, but at this moment one can only feel that it is

better to be hungry and alive than to be drowned and dead.'

'Oh!' she said, earnestly, 'you don't know how strong the water is. It

would have thrown you down and rolled you over and over among the

rocks, your head would have been knocked to pieces, your face would

have been crushed out of shape, every bone would have been broken:

Peter has seen them so.'

'Ay! ay!' said Peter. 'I've picked 'em up just so. You are well off

those rocks, gentlemen.'

Silence fell upon them. The twilight was deepening, the breeze was

chill. Armorel felt that the young man beside her was shivering--perhaps

with the cold. He looked across the dark water and gasped: 'We are

coming up,' he said, 'out of the gates of death and the jaws of hell.

Strange! to have been so near unto dying. Five minutes more, and there

would have been an end, and two more men would have been created for no

other purpose but to be drowned.'

Armorel made no reply. The oars kept dipping, dipping, evenly and

steadily. Across the waters on either hand flashed lights: St. Agnes

and the Bishop from the south--they are white lights; and from the

north the crimson splendour of Round Island: the wind was dropping,

and there was a little phosphorescence on the water, which gleamed

along the blade of the oar.

In half an hour the boat rounded the new pier, and they were in the

harbour of Hugh Town at the foot of the landing steps.

'Now,' said Armorel, 'you had better get home as fast as you can and

have some supper.'

'Why,' cried the artist, realising the fact for the first time, 'you

are bare-headed! You will kill yourself.'

'I am used to going about bare-headed. I shall come to no harm. Now go

and get some food.'

'And you?' The young man stood on the stepping-stones ready to mount.

'We shall put up the sail and get back to Samson in twenty minutes.

There is breeze enough for that.'

'Will you tell us,' said the artist, 'before you go--to whom we are

indebted for our very lives?'

'My name is Armorel.'

'May we call upon you? To-night we are too bewildered. We cannot say

what we ought and must say.'

'I live on Samson. What is your name?'

'My name is Roland Lee. My friend here is called Dick Stephenson.'

'You can come if you wish. I shall be glad to see you,' she corrected

herself, thinking she had been inhospitable and ungracious.

'Am I to ask for Miss Armorel?'

She laughed merrily. 'You will find no one to ask, I am afraid. Nobody

else, you see, lives on Samson. When you land, just turn to the left,

walk over the hill, and you will find the house on the other side.

Samson is not so big that you can miss the house. Good-night, Roland

Lee! Good-night, Dick Stephenson!'

'She's only a child,' said the young man called Dick, as he climbed

painfully and fearfully up the dark and narrow steps, slippery with

sea-weed and not even protected by an inner bar. 'I suppose it doesn't

much matter since she's only a child. But I merely desire to point out

that it's always the way. If there does happen to be an adventure

accompanied by a girl--most adventures bring along the girl: nobody

cares, in fact, for an adventure without a girl in it--I'm put in the

background and made to do the work while you sit down and talk to the

girl. Don't tell me it was accidental. It was the accident of design.

Hang it all! I'll turn painter myself.'

CHAPTER III

IN THE BAR PARLOUR

At nine o'clock the little bar parlour of Tregarthen's was nearly

full. It is a very little room, low as well as little, therefore it is

easily filled. And though it is the principal club-room of Hugh Town,

where the better sort and the notables meet, it can easily accommodate

them all. They do not, however, meet every evening, and they do not

all come at once. There is a wooden settle along the wall, beautifully

polished by constant use, which holds four: a smaller one beside the

fire, where at a pinch two might sit; there is a seat in the window

which also might hold two, but is only comfortable for one. A small

round table only leaves room for one chair. This makes sitting

accommodation for nine, and when all are present, and all nine are

smoking tobacco like one, the atmosphere is convivially pungent. This

evening there were only seven. They consisted of the two young men

whose perils on the deep you have just witnessed; a Justice of the

Peace--but his office is a sinecure, because on the Scilly Isles

virtue reigns in every heart; a flower-farmer of the highest standing;

two other gentlemen weighed down with the mercantile anxieties and

interests of the place--they ought to have been in wigs and square

brown coats, with silver buckles to their shoes; and one who held

office and exercised authority.

The art of conversation cannot be successfully cultivated on a small

island, on board ship, or in a small country town. Conversation

requires a continual change of company, and a great variety of topics.

Your great talker, when he inconsiderately remains too long among the

same set, becomes a bore. After a little, unless he goes away, or

dies, or becomes silent, they kill him, or lock him up in an asylum.

At Tregarthen's he would be made to understand that either he or the

rest of the population must leave the archipelago and go elsewhere. In

some colonial circles they play whist, which is an excellent method,

perhaps the best ever invented, for disguising the poverty or the

absence of conversation. At Tregarthen's they do not feel this

necessity--they are contented with their conversation; they are so

happily contented that they do not repine even though they get no more

than an observation dropped every ten minutes or so. They are not

anxious to reply hurriedly; they are even contented to sit silently

enjoying the proximity of each other--the thing, in fact, which lies

at the root of all society. The evening is not felt to be dull, though

there are no fireworks of wit and repartee. Indeed, if Douglas Jerrold

himself were to appear with a bag full of the most sparkling epigrams

and repartees, nobody would laugh, even when he was kicked out into

the cold and unappreciative night--the stars have no sense of

humour--as a punishment for impudence.

This evening the notables spoke occasionally; they spoke slowly--the

Scillonians all talk slowly--they neither attempted nor looked for

smartness. They did not tell stories, because all the stories are

known, and they can now only be told to strangers. The two young men

from London listened without taking any part in the talk: people who

have just escaped--and that narrowly--a sharp and painful death by

drowning and banging on jagged rocks are expected to be hushed for

awhile. But they listened. And they became aware that the talk, in

whatever direction it wandered, always came back to the sea.

Everything in Scilly belongs to the sea: they may go up country, which

is a journey of a mile and a half, or even two miles--and speak for a

moment of the crops and the farms; but that leads to the question of

import and export, and, therefore, to the vessels lying within the

pier, and to the steam service to Penzance and to vessels in other

ports, and, generally, to steam service about the world. And again,

wherever two or three are gathered together in Scilly, one at least

will be found to have ploughed the seas in distant parts. This confers

a superiority on the society of the islands which cannot, even in

these days, be denied or concealed. In the last century, when a man

who was known to have crossed the Pacific entered a coffee-house, the

company with one accord gazed upon him with envy and wonder. Even now,

familiarity hath not quite bred contempt. We still look with

unconcealed respect upon one who can tell of Tahiti and the New

Hebrides, and has stood upon the mysterious shores of Papua. And, at

Tregarthen's this evening, these two strangers were young; they had

not yet made the circuit of the round earth; they had had, as yet, not

many opportunities of talking with travellers and sailors. Therefore,

they listened, and were silent.

Presently, one after the other, the company got up and went out. There

is no sitting late at night in Scilly. There were left of all only the

Permanent Official.

'I hear, gentlemen,' he said, 'that you have had rather a nasty time

this evening.'

'We should have been lost,' said the artist, 'but for a--young lady,

who saw our danger and came out to us.'

'Armorel. I saw her towing in your boat and landing you. Yes, it was a

mighty lucky job that she saw you in time. There's a girl! Not yet

sixteen years old! Yet I'd rather trust myself with her in a boat,

especially if she had the boy Peter with her, than any boatman of the

islands. And there's not a rock or an islet, not a bay or a headland

in this country of bays and capes and rocks, that she does not know.

She could find her way blindfold by the feel of the wind and the force

of the current. But it's in her blood. Father to son--father to son

and daughter too--the Roseveans are born boatmen.'

'She saved our lives,' repeated the artist. 'That is all we know of

her. It is a good deal to know, perhaps, from our own point of view.'

'She belongs to Samson. They've always lived on Samson. Once there

were Roseveans, Tryeths, Jenkinses, and Woodcocks on Samson. Now, they

are nearly all gone--only one family of Rosevean left, and one of

Tryeth.'

'She said that nobody else lived there.'

'Well, it is only her own family. They've started a flower-farm lately

on Holy Hill, and I hear it's doing pretty well. It's a likely

situation, too, facing south-west and well sheltered. You should go

and see the flower-farm. Armorel will be glad to show you the farm,

and the island too. Samson has got a good many curious things--more

curious, perhaps, than she knows, poor child!'

He paused for a moment, and then continued: 'There's nobody on the

island now but themselves. There's the old woman, first--you should

see her too. She's a curiosity by herself--Ursula Rosevean--she was a

Traverse, and came from Bryher to be married. She married Methusalem

Rosevean, Armorel's great-great-grandfather--that was nigh upon eighty

years ago; she's close upon a hundred now; and she's been a widow

since--when was it?--I believe she'd only been a wife for twelve

months or so. He was drowned on a smuggling run--his brother Emanuel,

too. Widow used to look for him from the hill-top every night for a

year and more afterwards. A wonderful old woman! Go and look at her.

Perhaps she will talk to you. Sometimes, when Armorel plays the

fiddle, she will brighten up and talk for an hour. She knows how to

cure all diseases, and she can foretell the future. But she's too old

now, and mostly she's asleep. Then there's Justinian Tryeth and

Dorcas, his wife--they're over seventy, both of them, if they're a

day. Dorcas was a St. Agnes girl--that's the reason why her name was

Hicks: if she'd come from Bryher she'd have been a Traverse; if from

Tresco she'd have been a Jenkins. But she was a Hicks. She's as old as

her husband, I should say. As for the boy, Peter----'

'She called him the boy, I remember. But he seemed to me----'

'He's fifty, but he's always been the boy. He never married, because

there was nobody left on Samson for him to marry, and he's always been

too busy on the farm to come over here after a wife. And he looks more

than fifty, because once he fell off the pier, head first, into the

stern of a boat, and after he'd been unconscious for three days, all

his hair fell off except a few stragglers, and they'd turned white.

Looks most as old as his father. Chessun's near fifty-two.'

'Who is Chessun?'

'She's the girl. She's always been the girl. She's never married, just

like Peter her brother, because there was no one left on Samson for

her. And she never leaves the island except once or twice a year, when

she goes to the afternoon service at Bryher. Well, gentlemen, that's

all the people left on Samson. There used to be more--a great many

more--quite a population, and if all stories are true, they were a

lively lot. You'll see their cottages standing in ruins. As for

getting drowned, you'd hardly believe! Why, take Armorel alone. Her

father, Emanuel--he'd be about fifty-seven now--he was drowned--twelve

years ago it must be now--with his wife and his three boys, Emanuel,

John, and Andrew, crossing over from a wedding at St. Agnes. He

married Rovena Wetherel, from St. Mary's. Then there was her

grandfather, he was a pilot--but they were all pilots--and he was cast

away taking an East Indiaman up the Channel, cast away on Chesil Bank

in a fog--that was in the year 1845--and all hands lost. His

father--no, no, that was his uncle--all in the line were drowned;

that one's uncle died in his bed unexpectedly--you can see the bed

still--but they do say, just before some officers came over about a

little bit of business connected with French brandy. One of the

Roseveans went away, and became a purser in the Royal Navy. Those were

the days for pursers! Their accounts were never audited, and when

they'd squared the captain and paid him the wages and allowances for

the dummies and the dead men, they had left as much--ay, as a couple

of thousand a year. After this he left the Navy and purveyed for the

Fleet, and became so rich that they had to make him a knight.'

'Was there much smuggling here in the old days?'

'Look here, sir; a Scillonian in the old days called himself a pilot,

a fisherman, a shopkeeper, or a farmer, just as he pleased. That was

his pleasant way. But he was always--mind you--a smuggler. Armorel's

great-great-great-grandfather, father of the old lady's husband--him

who was never heard of afterwards, but was supposed to have been cast

away off the French coast--he was known to have made great sums of

money. Never was anyone on the islands in such a big way. Lots of

money came to the islands from smuggling. They say that the St.

Martin's people have kept theirs, and have got it invested; but, for

all the rest, it's gone. And they were wreckers too. Many and many a

good ship before the islands were lit up have struck on the rocks and

gone to pieces. What do you think became of the cargoes? Where were

the Scilly boats when the craft was breaking up? And did you never

hear of the ship's lantern tied to the horns of a cow? They've got one

on Samson could tell a tale or two; and they've still got a

figure-head there which ought to have haunted old Emanuel Rosevean

when his boat capsized off the coast of France.'

'An interesting family history.'

'Yes. Until the Preventive Service put an end to the trade, the

Roseveans were the most successful and the most daring smugglers in

the islands. But an unlucky family. All these drownings make people

talk. Old wives' talk, I dare say. But for something one of them

did--wrecking a ship, robbing the dead, who knows--they say the bad

luck will go on till something is done--I know not what.'

He got up and put on his cap, the blue-cloth cap with a cloth peak,

much affected in Scilly, because the wind blows off any other form of

hat ever invented.

'It is ten o'clock--I must go. Did you ever hear the story, gentlemen,

of the Scillonian sailor?' He sat down again. 'I believe it must have

been one of the Roseveans. He was on board a West Indiaman, homeward

bound, and the skipper got into a fog and lost his reckoning. Then he

asked this man if he knew the Scilly Isles. "Better nor any book,"

says the sailor. "Then," says the skipper, "take the wheel." In an

hour crash went the ship upon the rocks. "Damn your eyes!" says the

skipper, "you said you knew the Scilly Isles." "So I do," says the

man; "this is one of 'em." The ship went to pieces, and near all the

hands were lost. But the people of the islands had a fine time with

the flotsam and the jetsam for a good many days afterwards.'

'I believe,' said the young man--he who answered to the name of

Dick--'that this patriot is buried in the old churchyard. I saw an

inscription to-day which probably marks his tomb. Under the name is

written the words "Dulce et decor"--but the rest is obliterated.'

'Very likely--they would bury him in the old churchyard. Good-night,

gentlemen!'

'Roland!' The young man called Dick jumped from the settle. 'Roland!

Pinch me--shake me--stick a knife into me--but not too far--I feel as

if I was going off my head. The fair Armorel's father was a corsair,

who was drowned on his way from the coast of France, with his

grandfather and his great-grandfather and great-grand-uncles, after

having been cast away upon the Chesil Bank, and never heard of again,

though he was wanted on account of a keg of French brandy picked up in

the Channel. He made an immense pile of money, which has been lost;

and there's an old lady at the farm so old--so old--so very, very

old--it takes your breath away only to think of it--that she married

Methusalem. Her husband was drowned--a new light, this, on

history--and of course she escaped on the Ark--as a stowaway or a

cabin passenger. Armorel plays the fiddle and makes the old lady

jump.'

'We'll go over there to-morrow.'

'We will. It is a Land of Enchantment, this outlying bit of Lyonesse.

Meanwhile, just to clear my brain, I think I must have a whisky. The

weakness of humanity demands it.

Oh! 'twas in Tregarthen's bar,

Where the pipes and whiskies are----

They are an unlucky family,' he went on, 'because they "did

something." Remark, Roland, that here is the very element of romance.

My ancestors have "done something" too. I am sure they have, because

my grandfather kept a shop, and you can't keep a shop without "doing

something." But Fate never persecuted my father, the dean, and I am

not in much anxiety that I too shall be shadowed on account of the old

man. Yet look at Armorel Rosevean! There's distinction, mind you, in

being selected by Fate for vicarious punishment. The old corsair

wrecked a ship and robbed the bodies: therefore, all his descendants

have got to be drowned. Dear me! If we were all to be drowned because

our people had once "done something," the hungry, insatiate sea would

be choked, and the world would come to an end. A Scotch whisky,

Rebecca, if you please, and a seltzer! To-morrow, Roland, we will once

more cross the raging main, but under protection. If you break an oar

again, you shall be put overboard. We will visit this fair child of

Samson. Child of Samson! The Child of Samson! Was Delilah her mother,

or is she the grand daughter of the Timnite? Has she inherited the

virtues of her father as well as his strength? Were the latter days of

Delilah sanctified and purified? Happily, she is only as yet a

child--only a child, Roland'--he emphasised the words--'although a

child of Samson.'

* * * * *

In the night a vision came to Roland Lee. He saw Armorel once more

sailing to his rescue. And in his vision he was seized with a mighty

terror and a shaking of the limbs, and his heart sank and his cheek

blanched; and he cried aloud, as he sank beneath the cold waters: 'Oh,

Armorel, you have come too late! Armorel, you cannot save me now.'

CHAPTER IV

THE GOLDEN TORQUE

The morning was bright, the sky blue, the breeze fresh--so fresh that

even in the Road the sea broke over the bows and the boat ran almost

gunwale under. This time the two lands-men were not unprotected: they

were in charge of two boatmen. Humiliating, perhaps; but your true

courage consisteth not in vain boasting and arrogant pretence, and he

is safest who doth not ignorantly presume to manage a boat. Therefore,

boatmen twain now guided the light bark and held the ropes.

'Dick,' said Roland, presently, looking ahead, 'I see her. There she

is--upon the hillside among the brown fern. I can see her, with her

blue dress.'

Dick looked, and shook his short-sighted head.

'I only see Samson,' he said. 'He groweth bigger as we approach. That

is not uncommon with islands. I perceive that he hath two hills, one

on the north and the other on the south; he showeth--perhaps with

pride--a narrow plain in the middle. The hills appear to be strewn

with boulders, and there are carns, and perhaps Logan stones. There is

always a Logan stone, but you can never find it. There are also, I

perceive, ruins. Samson looks quite a large island when you come near

to it. Life on Samson must be curiously peaceful. No post-office, no

telegrams, no telephones, no tennis, no shops, no papers, no

people--good heavens! For a whole month one would enjoy Samson.'

'Don't you see her?' repeated Roland. 'She is coming down the

hillside.'

'I dare say I do see her if I knew it; but I cannot at this distance,

even with assisted eyes----'

'Oh! a blue dress--blue--against the brown and yellow of the fern. Can

you not----?'

Dick gazed with the slow, uncertain eyes of short sight, and adjusted

his glasses.

'My pal,' he said, 'to please you I would pretend to see anything. In

fact, I always do: it saves trouble. I see her plainly--blue dress,

you say--certainly--sitting on a rock----'

'Nonsense! She is walking down the hill. You don't see her at all.'

'Quite so. Coming down the hill,' Dick replied, unmoved.

'She has been in my mind all night. I have been thinking all kinds of

things--impossible things--about this nymph. She is not in the least

common, to begin with. She is----'

'She is only a child, Roland. Don't----'

'A child? Why shouldn't she be a child? I suppose I may admire a

beautiful child? Do you insinuate that I am going to make love to

her?'

'Well, old man, you mostly do.'

'It was not so dark last night but one could see that she is a very

beautiful girl. She looks eighteen, but our friend last night assured

us that she is not yet sixteen. A very beautiful girl she is: features

regular, and a head that ought to be modelled. She is dark, like a

Spaniard.'

'Gipsy, probably. Name of Stanley or Smith--Pharaoh Stanley was, most

likely, her papa.'

'Gipsy yourself! Who ever heard of a gipsy on Scilly? You might as

well look for an organ-grinder! Spanish blood, I swear! Castilian of

the deepest blue. Then her eyes! You didn't observe her eyes?'

'I was too hungry. Besides, as usual, I was doing all the work.'

'They are black eyes----'

'The Romany have black eyes--roving eyes--hard, bold, bad, black

eyes.'

'Soft black--not hard black. The dark velvet eyes which hold the

light. Dick, I should like to paint those eyes. She is now looking at

our boat. I can see her lifting her hand to shade her eyes. I should

like to paint those eyes just at the moment when she gives away her

heart.'

'You cannot, Childe Roland, because there could only be one other

person present on that interesting occasion. And that person must not

be you.'

'Dick, too often you are little better than an ass.'

'If you painted those eyes when she was giving away her heart it might

lead to another and a later picture when she was giving away her

temper. Eyes which hold the light also hold the fire. You might be

killed with lightning, or, at least, blinded with excess of light.

Take care!'

'Better be blinded with excess of light than pass by insensible. Some

men are worse than the fellow with the muck-rake. He was only

insensible to a golden crown; they are insensible to Venus. Without

loveliness, where is love? Without love, what is life?'

'Yet,' said Dick, drily, 'most of us have got to shape our lives for

ourselves before we can afford to think of Venus.'

It will be understood that these two young men represented two large

classes of humanity. One would not go so far as to say that mankind

may be divided into those two classes only: but, undoubtedly, they are

always with us. First, the young man who walketh humbly, doing his

appointed task with honesty, and taking with gratitude any good thing

that is bestowed upon him by Fate. Next, the young man who believes

that the whole round world and all that therein is are created for his

own special pleasure and enjoyment; that for him the lovely girls

attire themselves, and for his pleasure go forth to dance and ball;

for him the actress plays her best; for him the feasts are spread, the

corks are popped, the fruits are ripened, the suns shine. To the

former class belonged Dick Stephenson: to the latter, Roland Lee.

Indeed, the artistic temperament not uncommonly enlists a young man in

the latter class.

'Look!' cried the artist. 'She sees us. She is coming down the hill.

Even you can see her now. Oh! the light, elastic step! Nothing in the

world more beautiful than the light, elastic step of a girl. Somehow,

I don't remember it in pictures. Perhaps--some day--I may----' He

began to talk in unconnected jerks. 'As for the Greek maiden by the

sea-shore playing at ball and showing bony shoulders, and all that--I

don't like it. Only very young girls should play at ball and jump

about--not women grown and formed. They may walk or spring as much as

they like, but they must not jump, and they must not run. They must

not laugh loud. Violent emotions are masculine. Figure and dress alike

make violence ungraceful: that is why I don't like to see women jump

about. If they knew how it uglifies most of them! Armorel is only a

child--yes--but how graceful, how complete she is in her movements!'

She was now visible, even to a short-sighted man, tripping lightly

through the fern on the slope of the hill. As she ran, she tossed her

arms to balance herself from boulder to boulder. She was singing, too,

but those in the boat could not hear her; and before the keel touched

the sand she was silent.

She stood waiting for them on the beach, her old dog Jack beside her,

a smile of welcome in her eyes, and the sunlight on her cheeks. Hebe

herself--who remained always fifteen from prehistoric times until the

melancholy catastrophe of the fourth century, when, with the other

Olympians, she was snuffed out--was not sweeter, more dainty, or

stronger, or more vigorous of aspect.

'I thought you would come across this morning,' she said. 'I went to

the top of the hill and looked out, and presently I saw your boat.

You have not ventured out alone again, I see. Good-morning, Roland

Lee! Good-morning, Dick Stephenson!'

She called them thus by their Christian names, not with familiarity,

but quite naturally, and because when she went into the world--that is

to say, to Bryher Church--on Sunday afternoon, each called unto each

by his Christian name. And to each she gave her hand with a smile of

welcome. But it seemed to Dick, who was observant rather than jealous,

that his companion appropriated to himself and absorbed both smiles.

'Shall I show you Samson? Have you seen the islands yet?'

No; they had only arrived two days before, and were going back the

next day.

'Many do that,' said the girl. 'They stay here a day or two: they go

across to Tresco and see the gardens: then perhaps they walk over

Sallakey Down, and they see Peninnis and Porthellick and the old

church, and they think they have seen the islands. You will know

nothing whatever about Scilly if you go to-morrow.'

'Why should we go to-morrow?' asked the artist. 'Tell me, that, Dick.'

'I, because my time is up, and Somerset House once more expects me.

You, my friend,' Dick replied, with meaning, 'because you have got

your work to do and you must not fool around any longer.'

Roland Lee laughed. 'We came first of all,' he said, turning to

Armorel, 'in order to thank you for----'

'Oh! you thanked me last night. Besides it was Peter----'

'No, no. I refuse to believe in Peter.'

'Well, do not let us say any more about it. Come with me.'

The landing-place of Samson is a flat beach, covered with a fine white

sand and strewn with little shells--yellow and grey, green and blue.

Behind the beach is a low bank on which grow the sea-holly, the

sea-lavender, the horned poppy, and the spurge, and behind the bank

stretches a small plain, low and sandy, raised above the high tide by

no more than a foot or two. Armorel led the way across this plain to

the foot of the northern hill. It is a rough and rugged hill, wild and

uncultivated. The slope facing the south is covered with gorse and

fern, the latter brown and yellow in September. Among the fern at this

season stood the tall dead stalks of foxglove. Here and there were

patches of short turf set about with the withered flowers of the

sea-pink, and the long branches of the bramble lay trailing over the

ground. The hand of some prehistoric giant has sprinkled the slopes of

this hill with boulders of granite: they are piled above each other so

as to make carns, headlands, and capes with strange resemblances and

odd surprises. Upon the top they found a small plateau sloping gently

to the north.

'See!' said Armorel. 'This is the finest thing we have to show on

Samson, or on any of the islands. This is the burial-place of the

kings. Here are their tombs.'

'What kings?' asked Dick, looking about him. 'Where are the tombs?'

'The kings,' Roland repeated; 'there can be no other kings. These are

their tombs. Do not interrupt.'

'The ancient kings,' Armorel replied, with historic precision. 'These

mounds are their tombs. See--one--two--half a dozen of them are here.

Only kings had barrows raised over them. Did you expect graves and

headstones, Dick Stephenson?'

'Oh, these are barrows, are they?' he replied, in some confusion. A

man of the world does not expect to be caught in ignorance by the

solitary inhabitant of a desert island.

'A long time ago,' Armorel went on, 'these islands formed part of the

mainland. Bryher and Tresco, St. Helen's, Tean, St. Martin's and St.

Mary's, were all joined together, and the road was only a creek of the

sea. Then the sea washed away all the land between Scilly and the

Land's End. They used to call the place Lyonesse. The kings of

Lyonesse were buried on Samson. Their kingdom is gone, but their

graves remain. It is said that their ghosts have been seen. Dorcas saw

them once.'

'I should like to see them very much,' said Roland.

'If you were here at night, we could go out and look for them. I have

been here often after dark looking for them.'

'What did you see?'

She answered like unto the bold Sir Bedivere--who, perhaps, was

standing on that occasion not far from this hill-top.

'I saw the moonlight on the rocks, and I heard the beating of the

waves.'

Quoth Dick: 'The spook of a king of Lyonesse would be indeed worth

coming out to see.'

Armorel led the way to a barrow, the top of which showed signs of the

spade.

'See!' she said. 'Here is one that has been opened. It was a long time

ago.'

There were the four slabs of stone still in position which formed the

sides of the grave, and the slab which had been its cover lying close

beside.

Armorel looked into the grave. 'They found,' she whispered, 'the bones

of the king lying on the stone. But when someone touched them they

turned to dust. There is the dust at your feet in the grave. The wind

cannot bear it away. It may blow the sand and earth into it, but the

dust remains. The rain can turn it into mud, but it cannot melt it.

This is the dust of a king.'

The young men stood beside her silent, awed a little, partly by the

serious look in the girl's face, and partly because, though it now

lay open to the wind and rain, it was really a grave. One must not

laugh beside the grave of a man. The wind lifted Armorel's long

locks and blew them off her white forehead: her eyes were sad and

even solemn. Even the short-sighted Dick saw that his friend was

right: they were soft black eyes, not of the gipsy kind; and he

repented him of a hasty inference. To the artist it seemed as if

here was a princess of Lyonesse mourning over the grave of her

buried king and--what?--father--brother--cousin--lover? Everything,

in his imagination, vanished--except that one figure: even her

clothes were changed for the raiment--say the court mourning--of

that vanished realm. And also, like Sir Bedivere, he heard nothing

but the wild water lapping on the crag.

And here followed a thing so strange that the historian hesitates

about putting it down.

Let us remember that it is thirty years, or thereabouts, since this

barrow was laid open; that we may suppose those who opened it to have

had eyes in their heads; that it has been lying open ever since; and

that every visitor--to be sure there are not many--who lands on Samson

is bound to climb this hill and visit this open barrow with its

perfect kistvaen. These things borne in mind, it will seem indeed

wonderful that anything in the grave should have escaped discovery.

Roland Lee, leaning over, began idly to poke about the mould and dust

of the grave with his stick. He was thinking of the girl and of the

romance with which his imagination had already clothed this lonely

spot; he was also thinking of a picture which might be made of her; he

was wondering what excuse he could make for staying another week at

Tregarthen's--when he was startled by striking his stick against

metal. He knelt down and felt about with his hands. Then he found

something and drew it out, and arose with the triumph that belongs to

an archæologist who picks up an ancient thing--say, a rose noble in a

newly ploughed field. The thing which he found was a hoop or ring. It

was covered and encrusted with mould; he rubbed this off with his

fingers. Lo! it was of gold: a hoop of gold as thick as a lady's

little finger, twisted spirally, bent into the form of a circle, the

two ends not joined, but turned back. Pure gold: yellow, soft gold.

'I believe,' he said, gasping, 'that this must be--it _is_--a torque.

I think I have seen something like it in museums. And I've read of

them. It was your king's necklace: it was buried with him: it lay

around the skeleton neck all these thousand years. Take it, Miss

Armorel. It is yours.'

'No! no! Let me look at it. Let me have it in my hands. It is

yours'--in ignorance of ancient law and the rights of the lord

proprietor--'it is yours because you found it.'

'Then I will give it to you, because you are the Princess of the

Island.'

She took it with a blush and placed it round her own neck, bending

open the ends and closing them again. It lay there--the red, red

gold--as if it belonged to her and had been made for her.

'The buried king is your ancestor,' said Roland. 'It is his legacy to

his descendant. Wear the king's necklace.'

'My luck, as usual,' grumbled Dick, aside. 'Why couldn't I find a

torque and say pretty things?'

'Come,' said Armorel, 'we have seen the barrows. There are others

scattered about--but this is the best place for them. Now I will show

you the island.'

The hill slopes gently northward till it reaches a headland or carn of

granite boldly projecting. Here it breaks away sharply to the sea.

Armorel climbed lightly up the carn and stood upon the highest

boulder, a pretty figure against the sky. The young men followed and

stood below her.

[Illustration: _Armorel climbed lightly up the carn._]

At their feet the waves broke in white foam (in the calmest weather

the Atlantic surge rolling over the rocks is broken into foam), a

broad sound or channel lay between Samson and the adjacent island: in

the channel half a dozen rocks and islets showed black and

threatening.

'The island across the channel,' said Armorel, 'is Bryher. This is

Bryher Hill, because it faces Bryher Island. Yonder, on Bryher is

Samson Hill, because it faces Samson Island. Bryher is a large place.

There are houses and farms on Bryher, and a church where they have

service every Sunday afternoon. If you were here on Sunday, you could

go in our boat with Peter, Chessun, and me. Justinian and Dorcas

mostly stay at home now, because they are old.'

'Can anybody stay on the island, then?' asked Roland, quickly.

'Once the doctor came for Justinian's rheumatism, and bad weather

began and he had to stay a week.'

'His other patients meanly took advantage and got well, I suppose,'

said Dick.

'I hope so,' Armorel replied simply.

She turned and looked to the north-east, where lie the eastern

islands, the group between St. Martin's and St. Mary's, a miniature in

little of the greater group. From this point they looked to the eye of

ignorance like one island. Armorel distinguished them. There were

Great and Little Arthur; Ganilly, with his two hills, like Samson; the

Ganninicks and Meneweather, Ragged Island, and Inisvouls.

'They are not inhabited,' said the girl, pointing to them one by one;

'but it is pleasant to row about among them in fine weather. In the

old time, when they made kelp, people would go and live there for

weeks together. But they are not cultivated.'

Then she turned northwards, and showed them the long island of St.

Martin's, with its white houses, its church, its gentle hills, and its

white and red daymark on the highest point. Half of St. Martin's was

hidden by Tresco, and more than half of Tresco by Bryher. Over the

downs of Tresco rose the dome of Round Island, crowned with its white

lighthouse. And over Bryher, out at sea, showed the rent and jagged

crest of the great rock Menovawr.

'You should land on Tresco,' said Armorel. 'There is the church to

see. Oh! it is a most beautiful church. They say that in Cornwall

itself there is hardly any church so fine as Tresco Church. And then

there are the gardens and the lake. Everybody goes to see the gardens,

but they do not walk over the down to Cromwell's Castle. Yet there is

nothing in the islands like Cromwell's Castle, standing on the Sound,

with Shipman's Head beyond. And you must go out beyond Tresco, to the

islands which we cannot see here--Tean and St. Helen's, and the rest.'

Then she turned westward. Lying scattered among the bright waters,

whitened by the breeze, there lay before their eyes--dots and specks

upon the biggest maps, but here great massive rocks and rugged islets

piled with granite, surrounded by ledges and reefs, cut and carved by

winds and flying foam into ragged edges, bold peaks, and defiant

cliffs--places where all the year round the seals play and the

sea-gulls scream, and, in spring, the puffins lay their eggs, with the

oyster-catchers and the sherewaters, the shags and the hern. Over all

shone the golden sun of September, and round them all the water leaped

and sparkled in the light.

'Those are the Outer Islands.' The girl pointed them out, her eyes

brightening. 'It is among the Outer Islands that I like best to sail.

Look! that great rock with the ledge at foot is Castle Bryher; that

noble rock beyond is Maiden Bower; the rock farthest out is Scilly. If

you were going to stay, we would sail round Scilly and watch the waves

always tearing at his sides. You cannot see from here, but he is

divided by a narrow channel; the water always rushes through this

channel roaring and tearing. But once we found it calm--and we got

through; only Peter would never try again. If you were going to

stay--sometimes in September it is very still----'

'I did not know,' said Roland, 'that there was anything near England

so wonderful and so lovely.'

'You cannot see the islands in one morning. You cannot see half of

them from this hill. You like them more and more as you stay longer,

and see them every day with a different light and a different sea.'

'You know them all, I suppose?' Roland asked.

'Oh! every one. If you had sailed among them so often, you would know

them too. There are hundreds, and every one has got its name. I think

I have stood on all, though there are some on which no one can land,

even at low tide and in the calmest weather. And no one knows what

beautiful bays and beaches and headlands there are hidden away and

never seen by anyone. If you could stay, I would show them to you. But

since you cannot----' She sighed. 'Well, you have not even seen the

whole of Samson yet--and that is only one of all the rest.'

She leaped lightly from the rocks, and led them southward.

'See!' she said. 'On this hill there are ten great barrows at least,

every one the tomb of a king--a king of Lyonesse. And on the sides of

the hill--they kept the top for the kings--there are smaller barrows,

I suppose of the princes and princesses. I told you that the island

was a royal burying-ground. At the foot of the hill--you can see

them--are some walls which they say are the ruins of a church; but I

suppose that in those days they had no church.'

They left these venerable tombs behind them and descended the hill. At

its foot, between the two hills, there lies a pretty little bay,

circular and fringed with a beach of white sand. If one wanted a port

for Samson, here is the spot, looking straight across the Atlantic,

with Mincarlo lying like a lion couchant on the water a mile out.

'This is Porth Bay,' said their guide. 'Out there at the end is Shark

Point. There are sharks sometimes, I believe: but I have never seen

them. Now we are going up the southern hill.'

It began with a gentle ascent. There were signs of former cultivation;

stone walls remained, enclosing spaces which once were fields--nothing

in them now but fern and gorse and bramble and wild flowers. Half-way

up there stood a ruined cottage. The walls were standing, but the roof

was gone and all the woodwork. The garden-wall remained, but the

little garden was overrun with fern.

'This was my great-great-grandmother's cottage,' said Armorel. 'It was

built by her husband. They lived in it for twelve months after they

were married. Then he was drowned, and she came to live at the farm.

See!'--she showed them in a corner of the garden a little wizened

apple-tree, crouching under the stone wall out of the reach of the

north wind--'she planted this tree on her wedding-day. It is too old

now to bear fruit; but she is still living, and her husband has been

dead for seventy-five years. I often come to look at the place, and to

wonder how it looked when it was first inhabited. There were flowers,

I suppose, in the garden, when she was young and happy.'

'There are more ruins,' said Roland.

'Yes, there are other ruins. When all the people except ourselves went

away, these cottages were deserted, and so they fell into decay. They

used to live by smuggling and wrecking, you see, and when they could

no longer do either, they had to go away or starve.'

They stood upon the highest point of Holy Hill, some twenty feet above

the summit of the northern hill, and looked out upon the Southern

Islands.

'There!' said Armorel, with a flush of pride, because the view here is

so different and yet so lovely.

'Here you can see the South Islands. Look! there is Minalto, which you

drifted past yesterday: those are the ledges of White Island, where

you were nearly cast away and lost: there is Annet, where the

sea-birds lay their eggs--oh! thousands and thousands of puffins,

though now there are not any: you should see them in the spring. That

is St. Agnes--a beautiful island. I should like to show you Camberdizl

and St. Warna's Cove. And there are the Dogs of Scilly beyond--they

look to be black spots from here. You should see them close: then you

would understand how big they are and how terrible. There are Gorregan

and Daisy, Rosevean and Rosevear, Crebawethan and Pednathias; and

there--where you see a little circle of white--that is Retarrier

Ledge. Not long ago there was a great ship coming slowly up the

Channel in bad weather: she was filled with Germans from New York

going home to spend the money they had saved in America: most of them

had their money with them tied up in bags. Suddenly, the ship struck

on Retarrier. It was ten o'clock in the evening and a great sea

running. For two hours the ship kept bumping on the rocks: then she

began to break up, and they were all drowned--all the women and all

the children, and most of the men. Some of them had life-belts on, but

they did not know how to tie them, and so the things only slipped down

over their legs and helped to drown them. The money was found on them.

In the old days the people of the islands would have had it all; but

the coastguard took care of it. There, on the right of Retarrier, is

the Bishop's Rock and lighthouse. In storms, the lighthouse rocks like

a tree in the wind. You ought to sail over to those rocks, if it was

only to see the surf dashing up their sides. But, since you cannot

stay----' Again she sighed.

'These are very interesting islands,' said Dick. 'Especially is it

interesting to consider the consequences of being a native.'

'I should like to stay and sail among them,' said Roland.

'For instance'--Dick pursued his line of thought--'in the study of

geography. We who are from the inland parts of Great Britain must

begin by learning the elements, the definitions, the terminology. Now

to a Scilly boy----'

'A Scillonian,' the girl corrected him. 'We never speak of Scilly

folk.'

'Naturally. To a Scillonian no explanation is needed. He knows,

without being told, the meaning of peninsula, island, bay, shore,

archipelago, current, tide, cape, headland, ocean, lake, road,

harbour, reef, lighthouse, beacon, buoy, sounding--everything. He must

know also what is meant by a gale of wind, a stiff breeze, a dead

calm. He recognises, by the look of it, a lively sea, a chopping sea,

a heavy sea, a roaring sea, a sulky sea. He knows everything except a

river. That, I suppose, requires very careful explanation. It was a

Scilly youth--I mean a Scillonian--who sat down on the river bank to

wait for the water to go by. The history seems to prove the commercial

intercourse which in remote antiquity took place between Phoenicia

and the Cassiterides or Scilly Islands.'

Armorel looked puzzled. 'I did not know that story of a Scillonian and

a river,' she said, coldly.

'Never mind his stories,' said Roland. 'This place is a story in

itself: you are a story: we are all in fairyland.'

'No'--she shook her head. 'Bryher is the only island in all Scilly

which has any fairies. They call them pixies there. I do not think

that fairies would ever like to come and live on Samson: because of

the graves, you know.'

She led them down the hill along a path worn by her own feet alone,

and brought them out to the level space occupied by the

farm-buildings.

'This is where we live,' she said. 'If you could stay here, Roland

Lee, we could give you a room. We have many empty rooms'--she

sighed--'since my father and mother and my brothers were all drowned.

Will you come in?'

She took them into the 'best parlour,' a room which struck a sudden

chill to anyone who entered therein. It was the room reserved for days

of ceremony--for a wedding, a christening, or a funeral. Between these

events the room was never used. The furniture presented the aspect

common to 'best parlours,' being formal and awkward. In one corner

stood a bookcase with glass doors, filled with books. Armorel showed

them into this apartment, drew up the blind, opened the window--there

was certainly a stuffiness in the air--and looked about the room with

evident pride. Few best parlours, she thought, in the adjacent islands

of St. Mary's, Bryher, Tresco, or even Great Britain itself, could

beat this.

She left them for a few minutes, and came back bearing a tray on which

were a plate of apples, another of biscuits, and a decanter full of a

very black liquid. Hospitality has its rules even on Samson, whither

come so few visitors.

'Will you taste our Scilly apples?' she said. 'These are from our own

orchard, behind the house. You will find them very sweet.'

Roland took one--as a general rule, this young man would rather take a

dose of medicine than an apple--and munched it with avidity. 'A

delicious fruit!' he cried. But his friend refused the proffered gift.

'Then you will take a biscuit, Dick Stephenson? Nothing? At least, a

glass of wine?'

'Never in the morning, thank you.'

'You will, Roland Lee?' She turned, with a look of disappointment, to

the other man, who was so easily pleased and who said such beautiful

things. 'It is my own wine--I made it myself last year, of ripe

blackberries.'

'Indeed I will! Your own wine? Your own making, Miss Armorel? Wine of

Samson--the glorious vintage of the blackberry! In pies and in

jam-pots I know the blackberry, but not, as yet, in decanters. Thank

you, thank you!'

He smiled heroically while he held the glass to the light, smelt it,

rolled it gently round. Then he tasted it. 'Sweet,' he said,

critically. 'And strong. Clings to the palate. A liqueur wine--a

curious wine.' He drank it up, and smiled again. 'Your own making! It

is wonderful! No--not another drop, thank you!'

'Shall I show you?'--the girl asked, timidly--'would you like to see

my great-great-grandmother? She is so very old that the people come

all the way from St. Agnes only just to look at her. Sometimes she

answers questions for them, and they think it is telling their

fortunes. She is asleep. But you may talk aloud. You will not awaken

her. She is so very, very old, you know. Consider: she has been a

widow nearly eighty years.'

She led them into the other room, where, in effect, the ancient dame

sat in her hooded chair fast asleep, in cap and bonnet, her hands, in

black mittens, crossed.

'Heavens!' Roland murmured. 'What a face! I must draw that face!

And'--he looked at the girl bending over the chair placing a pillow in

position--'and that other. It is wonderful!' he said aloud. 'This is,

indeed, the face of one who has lived a hundred years. Does she

sometimes wake up and talk?'

'In the evening she recovers her memory for awhile and

talks--sometimes quite nicely, sometimes she rambles.'

'And you have a spinning-wheel in the corner.'

'She likes someone to work at the spinning-wheel while she talks. Then

she thinks it is the old time back again.'

'And there is a violin.'

'I play it in the evening. It keeps her awake, and helps her to

remember. Justinian taught me. He used to play very well indeed until

his fingers grew stiff. I can play a great many tunes, but it is

difficult to learn any new ones. Last summer there were some ladies at

Tregarthen's--one of them had a most beautiful voice, and she used to

sing in the evening with the window open. I used to sail across on

purpose to land and listen outside. And I learned a very pretty tune.

I would play it to you in the evening if you were not going away.'

'I am not obliged to go away,' the young man said, with strangely

flushing cheeks.

'Roland!' That was Dick's voice--but it was unheeded.

'Will you stay here, then?' the girl asked.

'Here in this house? In your house?'

'You can have my brother Emanuel's room. I shall be very glad if you

will stay. And I will show you everything.' She did not invite the

young man called Dick, but this other, the young man who drank her

wine and ate her apple.

'If your--your--your guardian--or your great-great-grandmother

approves.'

'Oh! she will approve. Stay, Roland Lee. We will make you very happy

here. And you don't know what a lot there is to see.'

'Roland!' Again Dick's warning voice.

'A thousand thanks!' he said. 'I will stay.'

CHAPTER V

THE ENCHANTED ISLAND

The striking of seven by the most sonorous and musical of clocks ever

heard reminded Roland of the dinner-hour. At seven most of us are

preparing for this function, which civilisation has converted almost

into an act of praise and worship. Some men, he remembered, were now

walking in the direction of the club: some were dressing: some were

making for restaurants: some had already begun. One naturally

associates seven o'clock with the anticipation of dinner. There are

men, it is true, who habitually take in food at midday and call it

dinner: there are also those who have no dinner at all. He began to

realise that he was not, this evening, going to have any dinner at

all. For he was now at the farmhouse, sitting in the square window

with Armorel: he had gone back to Tregarthen's and returned with his

portmanteau and his painting gear: fortunately he had also taken an

abundant lunch at that establishment. He had become an inhabitant of

Samson. The increased population, therefore, now consisted of seven

souls.

In fact, there was no dinner for him. Everybody in Samson dines at

half-past twelve: he had tea with Armorel at half-past four: after tea

they wandered along the shore and stood upon Shark Point to see the

sun set behind Mincarlo, an operation performed with zeal and

despatch, and with great breadth and largeness of colouring. When the

shades of evening began to prevail they were fain to get home quickly,

because there is no path among the boulders, nor have former

inhabitants provided hand-rails for visitors on the carns. Therefore

they retraced their steps to the farm, and Armorel left him sitting

alone in the square window while she went about some household duties.

In the quiet room the solemn clock told the moments, and there was

light enough left to discern the ghostly figure of the ancient dame

sleeping in her chair. The place was so quiet and so strange that the

visitor presently felt as if he was sitting among ghosts. It is at

twilight, in fact, that the spirits of the past make themselves most

readily felt, if not seen. Now, it was exactly as if he had been in

the place before. He knew, now, why he had been so suddenly and

strangely attracted to Samson. He _had been there before_--when, or

under what conditions, he knew not, and did not ask himself. It is a

condition of the mind known to everybody. A touch--a word--a look--and

we are transported back--how many years ago? The hills, the rocks, the

house, Armorel herself--all were familiar to him. The thing was

absurd, yet in his mind it was quite clear. It was so absurd that he

thought his mind was wandering, and he arose and went out into the

garden. There, the figure-head of the woman under the tall

fuchsia-tree--the glow from the fire in the sitting-room fell upon the

face through the window--seemed to smile upon him as upon an old

friend. He went back again and sat down. Where was Armorel?

This strange familiarity with an unknown place quickly passes, though it

may return. He now began to feel as if, perhaps, he was making a

mistake. He was living on an island, with, practically, no other

companion than a girl of fifteen. Dick, who had become suddenly grumpy

on learning his resolution to stay, might be right. Well, he would

sketch and paint; he would be very careful; not a word should be said

that might disturb the child's tranquillity. No--Dick was a fool. He was

going to have a day or two--just a day or two--of quiet happiness. The

girl was young and beautiful and innocent. She was also made happy--she

showed that happiness without an attempt at concealment--because he was

going to stay. What would follow?

Well--it was an adventure. One does not ask what is going to follow on

first encountering an adventure. What young man, besides, sallying

forth upon a simple holiday, looks to find himself upon a desert

island with no other companion than a trustful and admiring maiden of

fifteen?

Then Armorel returned and took a chair beside him. He was a little

surprised--but then, on a desert island nothing happens as on terra

firma--that she did not ring for lights, and was still not without

some hope of dinner. They took up the thread of talk about the

islands, concerning which Roland Lee perceived that he would before

long know a good deal. Local knowledge is always interesting; but it

does not, except to novelists, possess a marketable value. One cannot,

for instance, at a dinner-party, turn the conversation on the

respective families of St. Agnes and St. Martin's. He made a mental

note that he would presently change the subject to one of deeper

personal interest. Perhaps he could get Armorel to talk about herself.

That would be very much more interesting than to hear about the three

Pipers' Holes of Tresco, White, and St. Mary's Islands. How did she

live--this girl--and what did she do--and what did she think?

Meantime, while the girl herself was talking of the rocks and bays,

the crags and coves, the white sand and the grey granite, the seals

and the shags, the puffins and the dottrells, she was wondering, for

her part, what manner of man this was--how he lived, and what he did,

and what he thought. For when man and woman meet they are clothed and

covered up; they are a mystery each to the other; never, since the

Fall, have we been able to read each other's hearts.

But when the clock struck seven Armorel sprang to her feet, as one who

hath a serious duty to perform, and preparations to make for it.

First she pulled down the blind, and so shut out what was left of the

twilight. The fire had sunk low, but by its light she was dimly

visible. She pushed back the table; she placed two chairs opposite the

old lady, and another chair before the spinning-wheel.

'Something,' said the young man to himself, 'is certainly going to

happen. One can no longer hope for dinner. Family prayers, perhaps; or

the worship of the old lady as an ancestor. The descendants of the

ancient people of Lyonesse no doubt bow down to the sun and dance to

the moon, and pass the children through the holèd stone, and make Baal

fires, and worship their grandmothers. It will be an interesting

function. But, perhaps, only family prayers.'

Armorel took down the fiddle that hung on the wall and began to tune

it, twanging the strings and drawing the bow across in the manner

which so pleasantly excites the theatre before the music begins.

'Not family prayers, then,' said the young man, perhaps disappointed.

What did happen, however, was a series of things quite new and wholly

unexpected. Never was known such a desert island.

First of all, the lady of many generations moved uneasily in her sleep

at the twanging of the strings, and her fingers clutched at her dress

as if she was startled by an uneasy dream.

And then the door opened, and a small procession of three came in. At

this point, had the young man been a Roman Catholic, he would have

crossed himself. As he was not, he only started and murmured, 'As I

thought. The worship of the ancestor! These are the ghosts of the

grandfather and the grandmother. The old lady is a mummy. They are all

ghosts--I shall presently awake and find myself on my back among the

barrows.'

First came an ancient dame, but not so ancient as she of the great

chair. Grey-headed she was, and equipped in a large cap; wrinkled was

her face, and her chin, for lack of teeth, approached her nose, quite

in the ancestral manner. She was followed by an old man, also

grey-headed and grey-bearded, wrinkled of face, his shoulders bent and

twisted with rheumatism, his fingers gnarled and twisted. These two

took the chairs set for them by Armorel. The third in the procession

was a woman already elderly and with streaks of grey in her hair. She

was thin and sharp-faced. She sat down before the spinning-wheel and

began to work, not as you may now see the amateur, but in the quiet,

quick, professional manner which means business.

The stranger was not quite right in his conjecture. They were not

ancestors. The old man, who had worked on the farm, man and boy, for

nearly seventy years, and now managed it altogether, was Justinian

Tryeth. The old woman was Dorcas, his wife. The middle-aged woman was

their daughter Chessun, who had been maid on the farm, as her brother

Peter had been boy, all her life.

Whatever was intended was clearly a daily function, because each

dropped into his own place without hesitation. The old woman had

brought some knitting with her, her daughter picked up the thread of

the spindle, and the old man, taking the tongs, stimulated the coals

into a flame, which he continually nursed and maintained with new

fuel. There was neither lamp nor candle in the room; the ruddy

firelight, rising and falling, played about the room, warming the drab

panels into crimson, sinking into the dark beams of the joists,

flashing among the china in the cupboard, painting red the

Venus's-fingers in the cabinet, and throwing strange lights and

shadows upon the aged lady in the chair. Was she really alive? Was

she, after all, only a mummy?

Roland looked on breathless. What was to be done next? Time had gone

back eighty years--a hundred and eighty years--any number of years. As

they sat here in the firelight with the spinning-wheel, the old

serving-people with their mistress, without lamp or candle, so they

sat in the generations long gone by. And again that curious feeling

fell upon him that he had seen it all before. Yet he could not

remember what was to be done next. Armorel, the tuning complete,

turned with a look of inquiry to the old man.

'"Singleton's Slip,"' he commanded with the authority of a professor.

The girl began to play this old tune. Perhaps you remember the style

of the fiddler--he is getting scarce now--who used to sit in the

corner and play the hornpipe for the sailors in the days when every

sailor could dance the hornpipe. Perhaps you do not remember that

fiddler and his style. That is your misfortune. For there was a noble

freedom in the handling of his bow, and the interpretation of his

melodies was bold and original. He poured into the music all the

spirit it was capable of containing, and drew out of his hearers every

emotion that each particular tune was able to draw. Because you see

tunes have their limitations. You cannot strike every chord in the

human heart with a simple hornpipe. This sailor's best friend,

however, did all that could be done. And always conscientious, if you

please, never allowing his playing to become slovenly or to lack

spirit.

Armorel played after the manner of this old fiddler, standing up to

her work in the middle of the room.

'Singleton's Slip' is a ditty which was formerly much admired by those

who danced the hey, the jig, or the simple country dance: it was also

much played by the pipe and tabor upon the village green; it

accompanied the bear when he carried the pole; it assisted those who

danced on stilts; and it lent spirit to those who frolicked in the

morrice. Charles II. knew it; Tom D'Urfey wrote words to it, I

believe, but I have not yet found them in his collection; Rochester

must certainly have danced to it. Armorel played it; first cheerfully

and loudly, as if to arouse the spirits of those who listened, to

remind them that legs may be shaken to this tune, and that ladies may

be, and should be, when this tune begins, taken to their places and

presently handed round and down the middle. Then she played it

trippingly, as if they were actually all dancing. Then she played it

tenderly--there is, if you come to think of it, a good deal of

possible tenderness in the air--and, lastly, she played it joyfully,

yet softly. How had she learned all these modes and moods?

While she played the old man listened critically, nodding his head and

beating the time. Then, fired with memory, he bent his arms and worked

his fingers as if they held the fiddle and the bow. And he threw back

his head and thrust out his leg and leaned sideways, just like that

jolly fiddler of whom we have just been reminded. Such, my friends, is

the power of music.

After a little while Justinian stopped this imaginary performance, and

sitting forward yielded himself wholly to the influence of the tune,

cracking his fingers over his head and beating time with one foot, just

as you may see the old villager in the old coloured prints--no villager

in these days of bad beer ever cracks his fingers or shows any external

signs of joyful emotion. As for the two serving-women, they reminded the

spectator of the supers on the stage who march when they are told to

march, sit down to feast when they are ordered, and swell a procession

for a funeral or a festival, all with unmoved countenance, showing a

philosophy so great that the triumph of victory or the disaster of

defeat finds them equally calm and self-contained--that is to say, the

two women showed no sense at all of being pleased or moved by

'Singleton's Slip.' They went on--one with her knitting and the other

with her spinning.

As for the ancient lady, however, when the music began she

straightened herself, sat upright, and opened her eyes. Then Chessun

hastened to adjust her bonnet: if ladies sleep in their bonnets, these

adornments have a tendency to fall out of the perpendicular. Heaven

forbid that we should gaze upon Ursula Rosevean with her bonnet

tilted, like a lady in a van coming home to Wapping from Fairlop Fair!

This done, the venerable dame looked about her with eyes curiously

bright and keen. Then she began to beat time with her fingers; and

then she began to talk; but--and this added to the strangeness of the

whole business--nobody seemed to regard what she said. It was much as

if the Oracle of Delphi were pouring out the most valuable prophecies

and none of her attendants paid any heed. 'If,' thought the young man,

'I were to take down her words, they would be a Message.' And what

with the voice of the Oracle, the spirited fiddling, the firelight

dancing about the room, the old man snapping his fingers, and perhaps

some physical exhaustion following on the absence of dinner, the young

man felt as if the music had got into his head; he wanted to get up

and dance with Armorel round and round the room; he would not have

marvelled had Dorcas and Justinian bidden him lead out Chessun and so

take hands, round twice, down the middle and back again, set and turn

single--where had he learnt these phrases and terms of the old country

dance? Nowhere; they belonged to the place and to the music and to the

time--and that was at least a hundred and eighty years back.

The fiddle stopped. Armorel held it down, and looked again at her

master.

''Tis well played,' he said. 'A moving piece. Now, "Prince Rupert's

March."'

She nodded, and began another tune. This is a piece which may be

played many ways. First, to those who understand it rightly, it

indicates the tramp of an army, the riding of the cavalry, the

jingling of sabres. Next, it may serve for a battle-piece, and you

shall hear between the bars the charge of the horse and the clashing

of the steel. Or, it may be played as a triumphal march after victory;

or, again, as a country dance, in which a stately dignity takes the

place of youthful mirth and merriment. At such a dance, to the tune of

'Prince Rupert's March,' the elders themselves--yea, the Justice of

Peace, the Vicar, the Mayor and Aldermen, and the Head-borough

himself--may stand up in line.

And now Roland became conscious of the old lady's words; he heard them

clear and distinct, and as she talked the firelight fell upon her

eyes, and she seemed to be gazing fixedly upon the stranger.

'When the "Princess Augusta," East Indiaman, struck upon the

Castinicks in the middle of the night, she went to pieces in an

hour--any vessel would. They said she was wrecked by the people of

Samson, who tied a ship's lantern between the horns of a cow. But it

was never proved. There are other islands in Scilly, and other

islanders, if you talk of wrecking. Some of the dead bodies were

washed ashore, and a good part of the cargo, so that there was

something for everybody; a finer wreck never came to the islands.

What! If a ship is bound to be wrecked, better that she should strike

on British rocks and cast her cargo ashore for the king's subjects.

Better the rocks of Scilly than the rocks of France. What the sea

casts up belongs to the people who find it. That is just. But you must

not rob the living. No. That is a great crime. 'Twas in the year '13.

When Emanuel Rosevean, my father-in-law, rescued the passenger who was

lying senseless lashed to a spar, he should not have taken the bag

that was hanging round his neck. That was not well done. He should

have given the man his bag again. He stood here before he went away.

"You have saved my life," he said. "I had all my treasure in a bag

tied about my neck. If I had brought that safe ashore I could have

offered you something worth your acceptance. But I have nothing. I

begin the world again." Emanuel heard him say this, and he let him go.

But the bag was in his box. He kept the bag. Very soon the wrath of

the Lord fell upon the house, and His Hand has been heavy upon us ever

since. No luck for us--nor shall be any till we find the man and give

him back his bag of treasure.'

She went on repeating this story with small variations and additions.

But Roland was now listening again to the fiddle.

Armorel stopped again.

'"Dissembling Love,"' said her master.

She began that tune obediently.

The stranger within the gates seemed compelled to listen. His brain

reeled; the old woman fascinated him. The words which he had heard had

been few, but now he seemed to see, standing before the fire, his hair

powdered, and in black silk stockings and shoes with steel buckles,

the man who had been saved and robbed shaking hands with the man who

had saved and robbed him. Oh! it was quite clear; he had seen it all

before; he remembered it. This time he heard nothing of the tune.

'My husband, Methusalem, my dear husband, with his only brother, began

to pay for that wickedness. They were capsized crossing to St. Mary's,

and drowned. If I had thought what was going to happen I would have

taken the bag and walked through all England looking for him until I

had found him. Yes--if it took me fifty years. But I knew nothing. I

thought our happiness would last for ever. Five-and-twenty years

after, my son, Emanuel, was cast away in the Bristol Channel piloting

a vessel. They struck on Steep Holm in a fog. And your own father,

Armorel, was drowned with his wife and three boys on their way home

from a wedding-feast at St. Agnes.'

Here her voice dropped, and Roland heard the concluding bars of

'Dissembling Love,' which Armorel was playing with quite uncommon

tenderness.

When she stopped, Justinian gave her no rest. '"Blue Petticoats,"' he

commanded.

Armorel again obeyed.

Then the old lady went back in memory to the days of her girlhood--now

so long ago. Nowhere now can one find an old lady who will tell of her

girlish days when the century was not yet arrived at the age of ten.

'We shall dance to-night,' she said, 'on Bryher Green. My boy will be

there. We shall dance together. John Tryeth from Samson will play his

fiddle. We shall dance "Prince Rupert's March" and "Blue Petticoats"

and "Dissembling Love." The Ensign from the garrison is coming and the

Deputy Commissary. They will drink my health. But they shall not have

me for partner. My boy will be there--my own boy--the handsomest man

on all the islands, though he is so black. That's the Spaniard in him.

His mother was a Mureno--Honor Mureno, the last of the Murenos. He has

got the old Spaniard's sword still. It's the Spanish blood. It gives

my boy his black eyes and his black hair; it makes his cheeks

swarthy; and it makes him proud and hot-tempered. I like a man to be

quick and proud if he's strong and brave as well. When I have sons,

the Lord make them all like their father!'

So she went on talking of her lover.

Armorel stopped and looked again at her master.

'"The Chirping of the Lark,"' he said.

Armorel began this tune. It is of an artificial character, lending

itself less readily than the rest to emotion; the composer called it

'The Chirping of the Lark' because he wanted a title: it resembles the

song of that warbler in no single particular. But it changed the old

lady's current of thought.

'This long war,' she said, looking round cheerfully, 'will be the

making of the islands if it lasts. Never was there so much money

about: we roll in money: the women have all got silks and satins: the

men drink port wine and the finest French brandy, which they run over

for themselves: the merchantmen put into the road, and the sailors

spend their money at the port. Why shouldn't we go on fighting the

French until they haven't a ship left afloat? My man made the run last

week, and hid the cargo--I know where. I shall help him to carry the

kegs across to the garrison, where they want brandy badly. A fine run

and a good day's work!'

She looked around with a jubilant countenance. Then another memory

seized her, and the light left her eyes.

'Better be drowned yourself than marry a man who is going to be

drowned! Better not marry at all than lose your husband six months

afterwards. It is long ago, now, Armorel. Time goes on--one can

remember. He would be very old now--yes--very old. Sometimes I see him

still. But he has not grown old where he is staying. That is bad for

me, because he liked young women, not old women. Men mostly do. They

are so made, even the oldest of them. Perhaps the old women, when they

rise again, are made young again, so that their lovers may love them

still.'

The clock struck half-past eight. Armorel stopped playing and the old

lady stopped talking at the same moment. Her eyes closed, her head

fell forward, she became comatose.

Then the two serving-women got up and helped her, or carried her, out

of the room to her bedroom behind. And the old man arose, and without

so much as a good-night hobbled away to his own cottage.

'She will go to bed now,' said Armorel. 'Chessun will take in her

broth and her wine, and she will sleep all night.'

'Do you have this performance every night?'

'Yes; the playing seems to put life and heart into her. All the

morning she dozes, or if she wakes she is not often able to talk; but

in the evening, when we sit around the fire just as they used to sit

in the old days, without candles--because my people were poor and

candles were dear--and when Chessun spins and I play--she revives and

sits up and talks, as you have seen her.'

'Yes. It is rather ghostly.'

'Justinian used to play--oh! he could play very well indeed.'

'Not so well as you.'

'Yes--much better--and he knows hundreds of tunes. But his fingers

became stiff with rheumatism, and, as he had put off teaching Peter

until it was too late, he taught me. That is all.'

'I think you play wonderfully well. Do you play nothing but old

tunes?'

'I only know what I have learned. There is that song which I heard the

lady sing last year--I don't know what it is called. Tell me if you

like it.'

She struck the strings again and played a song full of life and

spirit, of tenderness and fond memory--a bright, sparkling song--which

wanted no words.

'Oh!' cried Roland, 'you are really wonderful. You are playing the

"Kerry Dance."'

She laughed and layed down the violin.

'We must not have any more playing to-night. Do you really like to

hear me play? You look as if you did.'

'It is wonderful,' he replied. 'I could listen all night. But if there

is to be no more music, shall we look outside?'

If there were no light in the house the ship's lantern was hanging up,

with one of those big ship's candles in it which are of such noble

dimensions, and of generosity so unbounded in the matter of tallow.

There was no moon; but the sky was clear and the sea could be seen by

the light of the stars, and the revolving lights of Bishop's Rock and

St. Agnes flashed across the water.

The young man shivered.

'We are in fairyland,' he said. 'It is a charmed island. Nothing is

real. Armorel, your name should be Titania. How have you made me hear

and believe all these things? How do you contrive your sorceries? Are

you an enchantress? Confess--you cannot, in sober truth, play those

tunes; the old lady is in reality only a phantom, called into visible

shape by your incantations? But you are a benevolent witch--you will

not turn me into a pig?'

'I do not understand. There have been no sorceries. There are no

witches left on the Scilly Islands. Formerly there were many. Dorcas

knows about them. I do not know what was the good of them.'

'I suppose you are quite real, after all. It is only strange and

incomprehensible.'

'It is a fine night. To-morrow it will be a fine day with a gentle

breeze. We will go sailing among the Outer Islands.'

'The air is heavy with perfume. What is it? Surely an enchanted land!'

'It is the scent of the lemon-verbena tree--see, here is a sprig. It

is very sweet.'

'How silent it is here! Night after night never to hear a sound.'

'Nothing but the sound of the waves. They never cease. Listen--it is a

calm night. But you can hear them lapping on the beach.'

Ten minutes later, when they returned to the house, they found candles

lighted and supper spread. A substantial supper, such as was owed to a

man who had had no dinner. There was cold roast fowl and ham; there

was a lettuce-salad and a goodly cheese. And there was the unexpected

and grateful sight of a 'Brown George,' with a most delectable ball of

white froth at the top. Also, Roland remarked the presence of the

decanter containing the blackberry wine.

'Now you shall have some supper.' Armorel assumed the head of the

table and took up the carving-knife. 'No, thank you--I can carve very

well. Besides, you are our visitor, and it is a pleasure to carve for

you. Will you have a wing or a leg? Do you like your ham thin? Not too

thin? Oh, how hungry you must be! That is ale--home-brewed ale: will

you take some? or would you prefer a glass of the blackberry wine?

No?--help yourself.'

'The beer for me,' said Roland. He filled and drank a tumbler of the

beverage dear to every right-minded Briton. It was strong and

generous, with flakes of hop floating in it like the bee's-wing in

port. 'This is splendid beer,' he said. 'I do not remember that I ever

tasted such beer as this. It is humming ale--October ale--stingo. No

wonder our forefathers fought so well when they had such beer as this

to fight upon!'

'Peter is proud of his home-brewed.'

'Do you make everything for yourselves? Is Samson sufficient for all

the needs of the islanders? This beer is the beer of Samson--strong

and mighty. My hair is growing long already--and curly.'

'We make all we can. There are no shops, you see, on Samson. We bake

our own bread: we brew our own beer: we make our own butter: we even

spin our own linen.'

'And you make your own wine, Armorel.' He called her naturally by her

Christian name. You could not call such a girl 'Miss Armorel' or 'Miss

Rosevean.' 'It is a wonderful island!'

After supper they sat by the fireside, and, by permission, he smoked

his pipe.

Then, everybody else on the island being in bed and asleep, they

talked. The young man had his way. That is to say, he encouraged the

girl to talk about herself. He led her on: he had a soft voice, soft

eyes, and a general manner of sympathy which surprised confidence.

She began, timidly at first, to talk about herself, yet with feminine

reservation. No woman will ever talk about herself in the way which

delights young men. But she told him all he asked: her simple lonely

life--how she arose early in the morning, how she roamed about the

island and sang aloud with none to hear her but the sea-gulls and the

shags.

'Do you never draw?' he asked.

She had tried to draw, but there was no one to help her.

'Do you read?'

No, she seldom read. In the best parlour there was a bookcase full of

books, but she never looked at them. As for the old lady and Dorcas,

they had never learned to read. She had been at school over at St.

Mary's, till she was thirteen, but she hardly cared to read.

'And the newspapers--do you ever read them?'

She never read them. She knew nothing that went on.

As for her ambitions and her hopes--if he could get at them. Fond

youth!--as if a girl would ever tell her ambitions! But Armorel,

apparently, had none to tell. She lived in the present; it was joy

enough for her to wander in the soft warm air of her island home, upon

the hills and round the coast, to cruise among the rocks while the

breeze filled out the sail and the sparkling water leaped above the

bow.

So far she told: nay, she hid nothing, because there was nothing to

hide. She told no more because, as yet, her ambitions and her dreams

of the future had no shape: they were vague and misty--she was only

aware of their existence when restlessness seized her and impelled her

to get up and run over the hills to Porth Bay and back again.

But at night, when she went to bed, she experienced quite a new and

disquieting sensation. It showed at least that she was no longer a

child, but already on the threshold of womanhood. With blushing cheek

and beating heart she remembered that for an hour and more she had

been talking about nothing but herself! What would Mr. Roland Lee

think of a girl who could waste his time in talking about nothing but

herself?

CHAPTER VI

THE FLOWER-FARM

Roland, startled out of sleep by the sudden feeling of danger which

always seizes us in a strange bed--except a bed at an inn--sat up and

looked around him. His room was small and low and simply furnished. He

was lying on a feather bed of the old-fashioned kind; the bedstead was

of wood, but without curtains. He presently remembered where he was:

on Samson Island--the guest of a child, a girl of fifteen.

He sprang out of bed and threw open the window. His room was over the

porch. The fragrance of the lemon-verbena tree arose like steam from

a haystack, and filled his chamber. Below him, and beyond the garden,

the geese waddled on the green, the ducks splashed in the pond, and in

the farmyard Peter walked about slowly, carrying a pitchfork in his

hands, but, apparently, for amusement rather than use, as if it had

been a court sword.

He looked at his watch. It was half-past seven. At this time in London

he would have been still in the first long slumber of the night. Now

he was eager to be up and dressed, if only for a better understanding

of the situation. To be the guest of a child has the freshness of

novelty; but it is a situation which might lead to complications.

Suppose a guardian, or a lawyer, or a cousin of some kind were to

cross over in a boat and ask what he was doing there. And suppose he

had no better reply than the plain truth--that this young lady had

been so good as to invite him. Would a man go down to stay at a

country house on the simple invitation of a school-girl? At the same

time, this girl appeared to be the mistress of the establishment.

There was an ancient lady--too old for superintendence--and there were

servants. Well, if no guardian challenged his presence, why, then, for

a single day--he must not stay more--it surely mattered little. The

girl was but a child. Yet he must not stay longer. Perhaps they were

not too well off: he must not be a burden. And, again, though the girl

invited him to stay she named no limit of time. She did not invite him

to stay, for a week or for a fortnight. Perhaps she expected him to go

away that very morning.

He proceeded--with somewhat thoughtful countenance, considering these

things--to dress, paying as much attention to his personal appearance

as a young man should, and an old man must. It is the privilege of

middle-aged men to go slovenly if they please: no one regardeth him of

middle age. While their locks are turning grey and their children are

growing up they are in the thick of the day's work, and they may

disregard, if they choose, the mysteries of the toilette. Apollo,

however, must be as jealous about his apparel and adornment as the

Graces themselves, who are always represented at the moment before the

choice is made. A velvet jacket and a white waistcoat are trifles in

themselves, but they become a youthful figure and a face which has

finely-cut features and is decorated with a promising silky beard,

pointed withal, and the brown shading of a young moustache. Besides,

he who is an artist thinks more than other young men about such

things. Dress, to him, as to a woman, becomes costume. Colour has to

be considered; such picturesqueness as is possible in modern fashion

is aimed at; the artistic craving for fitness and beauty must be

satisfied. Roland did what he could: and with his velvet coat, a clean

white waistcoat, a crimson scarf, a good figure, and a handsome face,

he was as handsome a youth of twenty-one as one is likely to find

anywhere.

Again, as he opened his door and began to descend the narrow stairs,

there came over him that curious feeling of having been in the place

before. He had felt it in the evening when Armorel played 'Dissembling

Love.' Now he felt it again. And when he stood in the porch he seemed

to remember standing there once--long ago, long ago--but how long he

could not tell; nor, as happened to him before, could he remember what

had happened on that occasion.

Armorel herself was in the garden looking for some flowers for the

breakfast-table. She greeted him with a smile of welcome and a

friendly grasp of the hand. There was also a look of kindly solicitude

on her face which would have suited a châtelaine of forty years. Had

he slept well? Had he really been provided with everything he wanted?

Was there anything at all lacking? If so, would he speak to Chessun?

Breakfast, she said, leaving him in the garden, would be served in a

few minutes.

Would he speak to Chessun? Then, it seemed as if she meant him to stay

another night. What should he do?

Then Armorel came back.

'Breakfast is quite ready,' she said. 'Come in, Roland Lee. It is a

beautiful morning. There is a fresh breeze and a smooth sea. We can go

anywhere this morning. I have spoken to Peter, and he will be ready to

go with us in an hour or so. I think we may even get out to Scilly and

Maiden Bower.'

Yes; the morning was bright and the sky was clear. In the golden

sunshine of September the islets across the water showed like

creations of a poet's dream.

Roland drew a deep breath of admiration. 'Everybody,' he said, 'ought

to come to Scilly and to stay a long time.'

He turned from the view to the girl beside him. She had changed her

blue flannel dress for a daintier and a prettier costume--think not

that there are no shops at Hugh Town--of grey nun's cloth, daintily

embroidered in front. Still at her throat she wore a red flower, and

round her neck clung the golden torque found in the old king's grave.

Her dark eyes glowed: her lips were parted in a smile: her cheek

showed the dewy bloom that some girls, fortunate above their sisters,

can exhibit when they first appear in the morning: her long tresses

were now tied up and confined; she looked as if she had just stepped

forth from her chamber, fresh from her sleep. No one certainly could

have guessed that she had been up since six; nor that the fish which

had been hissing in the frying-pan, and were now lying meekly side by

side in a dish on the breakfast-table, were of her own catching. An

hour's sitting in the boat off Samson Ledge with hook and line had

procured this splendid contribution to the morning banquet. Fish

fragrant with the salt sea: fish that had not been packed tight in

boxes, nor travelled in railway trains, nor been slapped about on

counters, nor been packed in ice; fish that can never lie on a London

table--these were set out before Roland's hungry gaze.

The ancient dame did not appear. The two breakfasted, as they had

supped, together. I do not know how or where Armorel learned the art

and practice of hospitality, but certainly she showed a true feeling

in the matter of feeding--especially at breakfast. First, the table

was decorated with the autumn leaves of the bramble--crimson, yellow,

purple--few, indeed, know how beautiful a table may be made when

decorated with these leaves. There were also a few late flowers from

the garden; but not many. The coffee was strong, the milk hot and

thick, the bread and butter home-made, like the beer of yester eve:

the ham was cured by Chessun: the eggs were collected by Armorel: she

had also with her own hands made the jam and the cake.

Armorel sat behind the cups with as much ease as if she had been

accustomed from infancy to entertain young gentlemen at breakfast. She

was serious over her task, and poured out the coffee as if it was

something precious, not to be wasted or carelessly administered, which

is the spirit in which all good food should be approached. She did not

ask any questions, nor did she talk much during the banquet. Perhaps

she had an instinctive perception of the great truth that breakfast,

which is taken at the beginning of the day--the sacred day, with all

its possibilities and its chances of what may happen; the fateful day,

which alone and unaided may change the whole course and current of a

life--should be approached with a becoming gravity. At breakfast the

man fortifies himself before he goes forth to work. But he has the

work before him. In the evening it is done: he has passed through the

dangers of the day: he still lives: he has received no hurt: he has,

we hope, prospered in his honest handiwork: he may laugh and rejoice.

But at breakfast we should be serious.

'What will you do,' asked Armorel, breakfast completed, 'until Peter

is ready? He has got some work, you know, before he can come out.'

'I should like first,' he said, 'to see your flower-farm, if I may.'

'If you please. But there is nothing to see at this time of the year.

You must not think we grow flowers all the year round. If you were

here in February, you would see the fields covered with beautiful

flowers--iris, anemone, jonquil, narcissus, and daffodil. They are

very pretty then, and the air is sweet with their scent. But now the

fields are quite bare.'

'I should like to see them, however.'

'I will show them to you. It is a great happiness to the islands,'

said Armorel, gravely, 'that we have found out the flower-farming.

Everybody was very poor before. All the old ways of living were gone,

you see. A long time ago the people had wrecks every winter--the sea

cast up quantities of things which they could sell, or they went out

in boats and took the things out of the hold when the ship was on the

rocks. And then they were all smugglers: the Scillonians used to run

over to France openly, day and night, with no one to stop them. And

they used to carry fruit and vegetables out to the homeward-bound

ships in the Channel. And then they were pilots as well. Some of the

men used to make as much as two hundred pounds a year as pilots. My

grandfathers were all pilots. They were smugglers too; and they had

this farm and grew vegetables for the ships. Then the Government built

the lighthouses, and there were no more wrecks; and the Preventive

Service came and stopped the smuggling; and since the steamers took

the place of the sailing-ships no vessels put in here, and there are

no more pilots wanted. So, you see, it was as if nothing was left at

all.'

'It does seem rough on the people.'

'First they tried kelp-making. They collected the sea-weed and put it

in a kiln or furnace, and made a fire under it. I can show you some of

the old furnaces still. But that came to an end. Then they tried a

fishing company; but I believe it did not pay. And then they began to

build ships; but I suppose other people could build them better. So

that came to an end too. And for some time I do not know how all the

people lived. As for the farms, they could never grow enough for the

islands. Then a great many of the people went away. They had to go, or

they would have starved. Some went to England, and some to America,

and some to Australia. All the families went away from Samson, one by

one, until at last there were none left but ourselves and Justinian.

On Bryher and St. Martin's they became fishermen, but not here. As for

Justinian, he sent away all his boys except Peter. Oh! they have done

very well--splendidly. One is a coastguard, and one is bo's'n in the

Queen's Navy. One is captain of a steamer trading between Philadelphia

and Cuba, and one is actually chief steward on a great Pacific liner!

Justinian is very proud of him.'

'Indeed, yes,' said Roland, 'with reason.'

'The Scillonians,' the girl continued, proudly, 'all get on very well

wherever they go. They are honest, you see, as well as clever.'

'And the flower-farming?'

'Somebody discovered that the early spring flowers, which begin here

in January, could be carried to London and sold quite fresh. And then

everybody began to plant bulbs. That is all. We have had a farm of

some kind here for I do not know how many generations.'

'Since the time,' Roland suggested, 'when, in consequence of the

separation of Scilly from the mainland and the disappearance of

Lyonesse, the royal family found themselves left in Samson.'

She laughed. 'Well, all these stone inclosures on the hill belonged to

our farm. We grew things and ate them, I suppose. Perhaps we sold

them. But we were then poor, I know, and now we have no more trouble.'

Beside and behind the farmhouse on the slope of the hill they came

upon a series of little fields following one after the other. They

were quite small--some mere patches, none larger than a garden of

ordinary size, and they were all enclosed and shut in by high hedges,

so that they looked like largish boxes with the lids off. Some of the

hedges were of elm, growing thick and close; some of escallonia, with

its red flowers; some of veronica, its purple blossom like heads of

bulrush; some of the service-tree; and some, but not many, of

tamarisk, its pink bunches of blossom all displayed at this time of

the year. But the fields were now brown and bare, and had nothing at

all growing in them, except a few patches of gladiolus, now dying.

Beyond these fields, however, there were others of larger area, with

ruder hedges formed by laths, reeds, wooden palings, and stone walls.

These were inclosed, and partly sheltered for the growth of

vegetables.

'These are our fields,' said Armorel. 'At this time of the year there

is nothing to show you. Our harvest begins in January, and lasts till

May; but February and March are our best months. See--there is Peter,

with a young man from Bryher, planting bulbs for next year: they are

taken up every three years and replanted.'

Peter, in fact, was at work. He was superintending--a form of work

which he found to suit him best--while the young man from Bryher, who

looked more than half sailor, with a broad, long-handled spade, was

leisurely turning over the light sandy soil and laying in the bulbs

side by side out of a great basket.

'It seems an easy form of agriculture,' said Roland.

'It is not hard. There is nothing to do after this until the flowers

are picked. But sometimes a cold wind will come down from the north

and will kill a whole field full of blossoms--in spite of all our

hedges. That is a terrible loss. When everything goes well, we cut the

flowers, pack them in boxes, carry them over to the port, and next

morning they are sold in London--oh! and all over the country, in

every big town.'

'I shall never again behold a daffodil in February,' said Roland,

'without thinking of Samson. You have lent a new association to the

spring flowers. Henceforth they will bring back this glorious view of

sea and islands, grey and black rocks, the splendid sunshine and the

fresh breeze--and,' he added, with a winning smile and deferential

eyes, 'the Lady of Lyonesse.'

Armorel laughed. It was very nice to be called the Lady of

Lyonesse--nobody before had ever called her anything except plain

Armorel. And it was quite a new experience to have a young gentleman

treating her with deference as well as compliment.

At the back of the house was an orchard, through which they presently

passed. Like the flower-fields, it was protected by a high hedge. But

the apple-trees looked like the olives of Provence: every one seemed

in the last decay of age. They were twisted and dwarfish; the branches

grew in queer angles and elbows, as if they were crouching down out of

reach of the north wind; the trunks were bent, and, which completed

their resemblance to the olive, all alike were covered and clothed

with a thick grey lichen, clinging to every bough like a glove, and

hanging like a fringe. If you tear it off, the tree begins to shiver

and shake, though on Samson it is never cold.

'Let us sit down,' said Roland, 'in this secluded spot and talk. Have

I your leave, Armorel, to---- Thank you.' He filled and lit his

briar-root, and lay back on the warm bank, gazing upwards at the blue

sky through the leaves and the twisted branches of an aged apple-tree.

'It is good to be here. Do you know how very, very good it was of you

to ask me, Armorel? And do you know how very, very rash it was?'

The girl, who showed her youth and inexperience in many little ways,

regarded him with admiration unconcealed. Certainly, he was a

personable young man, even picturesque; when his beard should be a

little longer, when his moustache should be a little stronger, he

might be able to pass for Charles I. idealised, and in early manhood,

when as yet he had not begun to dissimulate.

'I was so glad when you promised to stay,' she replied, truthfully.

'Again, it is most good of you to say so. But, Armorel, a dreadful

misgiving has possessed me. Does your--does the Ancestress approve of

the invitation?'

Armorel laughed. 'Why,' she said, 'we never consult her about

anything. She is too old, you know.'

'Was nobody consulted at all? Did you ask me here all out of your own

head, as the children say?'

'Why not? There is nobody to consult. Why should I not ask you?'

'It was very good of you--only--well--you are younger than most ladies

who invite people to their house.'

'Well--but I asked you,' she replied, with a little irritation, 'and

you said you would come. You asked if anybody could stay on the

island.'

'Yes, of course.' He did not explain that at first he thought the

place was a lodging-house. The mistake was not unnatural; but he could

not explain. 'I ought to have known,' he said. 'You are the Queen of

Samson, as well as a Princess in Lyonesse. I beg your Majesty to

forgive the ignorance of a traveller from foreign parts.'

'Justinian and Peter manage the farm. Dorcas and Chessun manage the

house. There is no one to ask,' she added, simply, 'what I am doing.'

She said this with a touch of sadness.

'Have you no relations--cousins--nobody?'

'I have some far-off cousins. They live in London, I believe. One of

them went away--a long, long time ago, in the Great War--and became a

purser in the Navy. After that he was purveyor for the Fleet, and was

made a knight. He was my grandfather's cousin, so I suppose he is dead

by this time, but I dare say he has left children.'

'You are very lonely, Armorel.'

'I had three brothers; but they were all drowned--father, mother,

three brothers, all drowned together coming from St. Agnes. That was

ten years ago, when I was only a little girl and did not know what it

meant. All our misfortunes, my great-great-grandmother says, are due

to the wickedness of her husband's father, who took a bag of treasure

from the neck of a passenger rescued from a wreck. You heard her last

night. Do you think that God would drown my innocent brothers and my

innocent father and mother all on the same day, because, eighty years

ago, that wicked thing was done?'

'No, Armorel. I can believe a great deal, but that I cannot believe.'

'And so, you see, I am quite alone. Why should I not invite you to

stay here?'

'There is not, in reality, Armorel, any reason, except that you did

not know anything about me.'

'Oh! but I saw you and talked with you.'

'Yes; but that was not enough. We do not ask people into our houses

unless we know something about them.'

'I could see that you were a gentleman.'

'You are very good to think so. Let me try to justify that belief.

But, Armorel, seriously, there are thieves and rogues and wicked men

in the world. Some of these may come to Scilly. Do not ask another

stranger. Believe me, it is dangerous. As for me, you have shown me

your flower-farm and have entertained me hospitably: let me thank you

and take my departure.'

'Go away? Take your departure? Why?' Armorel looked ready to cry. 'You

have only just come. You have seen nothing.'

'Do you wish me to stay another night?'

'Of course I do. What is it, Roland Lee? You have got something on

your mind. Why should you not stay?'

'I should like somebody,' he replied, weakly, 'to approve. If the

Ancestress, or even Dorcas, or Chessun herself, would approve----'

'Why, of course Dorcas approves. She says it is the best thing in the

world for me to have someone here to talk to. She said so yesterday

evening, and again this morning.'

'In that case, Armorel, and since it is so delightful here--and so

new--and since you are so kind, I will stay one more day.'

He remembered his friend's warning, and the grumpiness which he showed

on the way back. His conscience smote him, but not severely. He would

be very careful. And, after all, she was but a child. He would just

stay the one day and make a sketch or two. Then he would go away.

'That is settled, then. One more day--or, perhaps, one more week, or a

month, or a year,' she said, laughing. 'And now, before Peter is

ready, I must leave you for ten minutes, because I have to make a cake

for your tea this evening. As for dinner, we shall have that in the

boat, or on one of the islands. It is my business, you know, to make

the puddings and the cakes.'

'Armorel--you shall not. I would rather go without.'

'You shall certainly not go without a cake. Why, I like to make

things. It would be dull here indeed if I had not got things to do all

day long.'

'Do you not find it dull sometimes, even with things to do?'

'Perhaps. Sometimes. I suppose we are all of us tempted to be

discontented at times, even when we have so many blessings as I

enjoy.' Armorel was young enough, you see, to talk the language of her

nurses and serving-women.

'How do you get through the day?'

'I get up at six o'clock, except in winter, when it is too dark. I

have a run with Jack after breakfast; we run up the hill and down the

other side--round Porth Bay, just to see the waves beating on White

Island Ledge, where you very nearly----'

'Very nearly,' Roland echoed, 'but for you.'

'Then we run up Bryher Hill and stand on the carn just for Jack to

bark at the north wind.'

'Sometimes it rains.'

'Oh, yes--and sometimes it blows such a gale of wind that I could not

stand on the carn for a moment. Then I stay at home and make or mend

something. There are always things to be made or mended. Then we are

always wanting stores of some kind or other, and I have to go over to

Hugh Town and buy them. At Hugh Town there are shops where they keep

beautiful things--you can buy anything you want at Hugh Town. We

cannot make pins and needles at home, can we? Then we have dinner, and

Granny is brought in. Sometimes she wakes up then, and gets lively,

and knows everything that is going on. She will talk quite sensibly

for an hour at a time. And I have my fiddle to practise. After tea,

when the days are long enough, I go up on the hills again and wander

about till dark.'

'And do you never have any companions at all?' he asked with a

curious, unreasoning, perfectly inexcusable touch of jealousy, because

it could not matter to him even if all the young men of St. Mary's and

Bryher and Tresco and St. Martin's came over every Sunday to court

this dainty damsel. Yet he did feel the least bit anxious.

'Never any companions. Nobody ever comes here. They used to come, when

Granny was still able to talk, in order to ask her advice. She was so

wise, you see.'

'And every evening you make music for the Ancestress and the worthy

Tryeth family?'

'Yes, and then I have supper and go to bed. Generally by nine o'clock

we are all asleep in the house.'

'It would be a monotonous life if you were older. But it is only a

preliminary or a preparation to something else. It is the overture,

played in soft music, to the happy comedy of your future life,

Armorel.'

'You mean to say something kind,' she replied. 'Of course, my life

must seem dull to you.'

'One cannot always live on lovely skies and sunlit seas and enchanted

islands.'

'Sometimes it seems to me that a little more talk would be pleasant.

Justinian talks very well, to be sure; but he is the only one. He

knows quantities of wrecks. It would astonish you to hear him tell of

the wrecks he has seen. Dorcas talks very little now, because she has

lost all her teeth. Chessun is a silent woman, because she's always

been kept under by her mother. And Peter's not a talkative boy,

because he's always been kept under both by his father and his mother.

Besides, he got that nasty fall which made all his hair fall off. You

can't wonder if he thinks about that a good deal. And they are all

getting old.'

'Yes. They seem to be getting very old indeed. Some day they will

follow the example of other old people and vanish. Then, Armorel, you

will be like Robinson Crusoe or Alexander Selkirk.'

'I know all about Alexander Selkirk. He lived alone on Juan Fernandez,

having been put ashore by Captain Stradling, of the "Cinque Ports." He

had been four years and four months on the island when Captain Woodes

Rogers found him. He was clothed in goat-skin. He built two huts with

pimento-trees, and covered them with long grass and lined them with

the skin of goats. He made fire by rubbing two sticks together on his

knee. And he lived by catching goats. You mean, Roland Lee,' she said,

with great seriousness, 'that some day or other all these old people

will die--my great-great-grandmother, Justinian, Dorcas, and even

Peter and Chessun, and that then I shall be alone on the island. That

would be terrible. But it will not happen in that way. I am sure it

will not, because it would be so very terrible. We are in the Lord's

hand, and it will not be allowed.'

The young man coloured and dropped his eyes. There certainly was not a

single girl of all those whom he knew in London who could have said

such a thing so simply and so sincerely. Not the youngest girl fresh

from the most religious teaching could say such a thing. Yet they go

to church a good deal oftener than Armorel, whose chances were only

once a week, and then only when the weather was fine. This it is to be

a Scillonian, and to believe what you hear in church. Roland had no

reply to make. Even to hint that faith so simple and so complete was

rare would have been cruel and wicked.

'You have quoted Woodes Rogers,' he said presently. 'Have you read

that good old navigator? It is not often that one finds a girl quoting

from Woodes Rogers.'

'Oh! I do not read much. There is a bookcase full of books; but I only

read the voyages. There is a whole row of them. Woodes Rogers,

Shelvocke, Commodore Anson, Wallis, Carteret, and Cook--and more

besides. I like Carteret best, because his ship was so small and so

crazy, and his men so few and so weak, and yet he would keep on

traversing the ocean as long as he could, and discovered a great deal

more than his commander, who cowardly deserted him.'

'There are other things in the world besides voyages--and other

books.'

'I learned the other things at school. There was geography--the world

is only the Scilly Islands spread out big--and history, too. You would

be surprised to find what a lot of English history there is that

belongs to Scilly. Queen Elizabeth built the Star Fort--you've seen

the Star Fort on the Garrison. There is Charles the First's Castle, on

Tresco, all in ruins; and, down below it, Cromwell's Castle, which I

will show you. And Charles the Second stayed here. Oh! and there was

the Spanish Armada; I must not forget that, because of another

great-great-far-off-great-grandfather, three hundred years ago, who

was wrecked here.'

'How was that?'

'He was a captain, or officer of some kind, on board one of the

Spanish ships; his name was Don Hernando Mureno. After the Armada was

defeated and driven away, some of the ships came down the Irish Sea,

and among them his ship--and she ran ashore on one of the Outer

Islands--I think on Maiden Bower. How many were saved I cannot tell

you; but some were, and among them Don Hernando Mureno himself. He

stayed here, and never wanted to go away any more; but married a

Scillonian, and lived out his life on Bryher, and is buried at the old

church at St. Mary's, where I could show you his grave and the

headstone--though the letters are all gone by this time. I have his

sword still, and I will show it to you. One of my grandfathers married

his granddaughter. They say I take after the Spanish side.'

'You are a true Castilian, Armorel; unless, indeed, you happen to be

an Andalusian or a Biscayan.'

'Do you think I ought to read the other books?' she asked him,

anxiously. 'If you really think so, I will try--I will, really.'

I suppose that no young man--not even the most hardened lecturers at

Newnham--ever becomes quite indifferent to the spectacle of Venus

entrusting the care of her intellect to a young philosopher. It is a

moving spectacle, and still novel. It makes a much more beautiful

picture than that of Venus handing over the care of her soul to the

Shaven and Shorn. Roland coloured. He felt at once the responsibility

and the delicacy of the task thus offered him.

'We will look into the shelves,' he said. 'I suppose that the

Ancestress no longer reads?'

'She never learned to read at all. She can neither read nor write: yet

there was never anyone who knew so much. She could cure all diseases,

and the people came over here from all the islands for her advice.

Dorcas knew a great deal, but she does not know the half or the

quarter of her mistress's knowledge.'

'Armorel'--Roland knocked out the ashes of his pipe--'I think you

want--very badly--someone to advise you.'

'Will you advise me, Roland Lee?'

'Child'--he slowly got up--'all my life, so far, I have been looking

for someone to advise and help myself. You must not lean upon a reed.

Come--let us seek Peter the boy, and launch the ship and go forth upon

our voyage about this sea of many islands. Perchance we may discover

Circe upon one of them--unless you are yourself Circe--and I shall

presently find myself transformed; but you are too good to turn me

into anything except a prince or a poet. And we may light upon St.

Brandan's Land; or we may find Judas Iscariot floating on that island

of red-hot brass; or we may chance on Andromeda, and witness the

battle of Perseus and the dragon; or we may find the weeping

Ariadne--everything is possible on an island.'

'Roland Lee,' said the girl, 'you are talking like your friend Dick

Stephenson. Why do you say such extravagant things? This is the island

of Samson, and I am nothing in the world but Armorel Rosevean.'

CHAPTER VII

A VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY

All day long the boat sailed about among the channels and over the

shallow ledges of the Outer or Western Islands, whither no boat may

reach save on such a day, so quiet and so calm. The visitor who comes

by one boat and goes away by the next thinks he has seen this

archipelago. As well stand inside a great cathedral for half an hour

and then go away thinking you have seen it all. It takes many days to

see these fragments of Lyonesse, and to get a time sense of the place.

They sailed round the southern point of Samson, and they steered

westward, leaving Great Minalto on the lee, towards Mincarlo, lying,

like an old-fashioned sofa, high at the two ends and flat in the

middle. They found a landing at the southern point, and clambered up

the steep and rocky sides of the low hill. On this island there are

four peaks with a down in the middle, all complete. It is like a

doll's island. Everywhere in Scilly there are the same features:

here a hill strewn with boulders; here a little down, with fern and

gorse and heath; here a bay in which the water, on such days as it can

be approached, peacefully laps a smooth white beach; here dark caves

and holes in which the water always, even in the calmest day of

summer, grumbles and groans, and, when the least sea rises, begins to

roar and bellow--in time of storm it shrieks and howls. Those who sail

round these rumbling water-dungeons begin to think of sea monsters.

Hidden in those recesses the awful calamary lies watching, waiting,

his tentacles forty feet long stretching out in the green water,

floating innocently till they touch their prey, then seizing and

haling it within sight of the baleful, gleaming eyes and within reach

of the devouring mouth. In these holes, too, lie the great

conger-eels--they fear nothing that swims except that calamary; and in

these recesses walk about the huge crabs which devour the dead bodies

of shipwrecked sailors. On the sunlit rocks one looks to see a

mermaiden, with glittering scales, combing out her long fair tresses:

perhaps one may unfortunately miss this beautiful sight, which is rare

even in Scilly; but one cannot miss seeing the seals flopping in the

water and swimming out to sea, with seeming intent to cross the broad

ocean. And in windy weather porpoises blow in the shallow waters of

the sounds. All round the rocks at low tide hangs the long sea-weed,

undisturbed since the days when they manufactured kelp, like the rank

growth of a tropical creeper: at high tide it stands up erect, rocking

to and fro in the wash and sway of the water like the tree-tops of the

forest in the breeze. Everywhere, except in the rare places where men

come and go, the wild sea-birds make their nests; the shags stand on

the ledges of the highest rocks in silent rows gazing upon the water

below; the sea-gulls fly, shrieking in sea-gullic rapture--there is

surely no life quite so joyous as a sea-gull's; the curlews call; the

herons sail across the sky; and, in spring, millions of puffins swim

and dive and fly about the rocks, and lay their eggs in the hollow

places of these wild and lonely islands.

These things, which one presently expects and observes without wonder

in all the islands, were new to Roland when he set foot on the rugged

rock of Mincarlo. He climbed up the steep sides of the rock and stood

upon the top of its highest peak. He made two or three rapid sketches

of rock and sea, the girl looking over his shoulder, watching

curiously, for the first time in her life, the growth of a picture.

[Illustration: _Watching curiously, for the first time in her life,

the growth of a picture._]

Then he stood and looked around. The great stones were piled about;

the brown turf crept up their sides; where there was space to grow,

the yellow branches of the fern were spread; and on all four sides lay

the shining water.

'All my life,' he said, 'I have dreamed of islands. This is true joy,

Armorel. For a permanency, Samson is better than Mincarlo, because

there is more of it. But to come here sometimes--to sit on this carn

while the wind whistles in your ear, and the waves are lapping against

the rocks all day long and always----Armorel, is there any other

world? Are there men and women living somewhere? Is there anybody but

you and me--and Peter?' he added, hastily. 'I don't believe in London.

It is a dream. Everything is a dream but the islands and the boat and

Armorel.'

She was only a child, but she turned a rosy red at the compliment.

Nothing but the boat and herself. She was very fond of the boat, you

see, and she felt that the words conveyed a high compliment. Then they

began to explore the rest of this mountainous island, which has such a

variety of scenery all packed away in the small space of twelve acres.

When they had walked over the whole of Mincarlo that is accessible,

they returned to their landing-place, where Peter sat in the boat

keeping her off, with head bent as if he was asleep.

'It must be half-past twelve,' said Armorel. 'I am sure you are

hungry. We will have dinner here.'

'No better place for a picnic. Come along, Peter. Bear a hand with the

basket. Here, Armorel, is a rock that will do for a table, and here is

one on which we two can sit. There is a rock for you, Peter. Now! The

opening of a luncheon-basket is always a moment of grave anxiety. What

have we got?'

'This is a rabbit-pie,' said Armorel. 'And this is a cake-pudding. I

made it yesterday. Do you like cake-pudding? Here are bread and salt

and things. Can you make your dinner off a rabbit-pie, Roland Lee?'

'A very good dinner too.' The young man now understood that on Samson

one uses the word dinner instead of lunch, and that supper is an

excellent cold spread served at eight. 'A very good dinner, Armorel. I

mean to carve this. Sit down and let me see you make a good dinner.'

An admirable rabbit-pie, and an excellent cake-pudding. Also, there

had not been forgotten a stone jar filled with that home-brewed of

which the like can no longer be found in any other spot in the British

Islands. I hope one need do no more than indicate the truly

appreciative havoc wrought by the young gentleman among all these good

gifts and blessings.

After dinner, to lie in the sunshine and have a pipe, looking across

the wide stretch of sunny water to the broken line of rocks and the

blue horizon beyond, was happiness undeserved. Beside him sat the

girl, anxious that he should be happy--thinking of nothing but what

might best please her guest.

Then they got into the boat again, and sailed half a mile or so due

north by the compass, until they came within another separate

archipelago, of which Mincarlo is an outlying companion.

It is the group of rocks, called the Outer or the Western Islands,

lying tumbled about in the water west of Bryher and Samson. Some of

them are close together, some are separated by broad channels. Here

the sea is never calm: at the foot of the rocks stretch out ledges,

some of them bare at low water, revealing their ugly black stone

teeth: the swell of the Atlantic on the calmest days rises and falls

and makes white eddies, broken water, and flying spray. Among these

rocks they rowed: Peter and Roland taking the oars, while Armorel

steered. They rowed round Maiden Bower, with its cluster of granite

forts defying the whole strength of the Atlantic, which will want

another hundred thousand years to grind them down--about and among the

Black Rocks and the Seal Rocks, dark and threatening: they landed on

Ilyswillig, with his peak of fifty feet, a strange wild island: they

stood on the ledge of Castle Bryher and looked up at the tower of

granite which rises out of the water like the round keep of a Norman

castle: they hoisted sail and stood out to Scilly himself, where his

twin rocks command the entrance to the islands. Scilly is of the dual

number: he consists of two great mountains rising from the water

sheer, precipitous, and threatening: each about eighty feet high, but

with the air of eight hundred; each black and square and terrible of

aspect: they are separated by a narrow channel hardly broad enough for

a boat to pass through.

'One day last year,' said Armorel--'it was in July, after a fortnight

of fine weather--we went through this channel, Peter and I--didn't we,

Peter? It was a dead calm, and at high tide.'

The boy nodded his head.

The channel was now, the tide being nearly high, like a foaming

torrent, through which the water raced and rushed, boiling into

whirlpools, foaming and tearing at the sides. The rapids below Niagara

are not fiercer than was this channel, though the day was so fair and

the sea without so quiet.

'Once,' said Peter, breaking the silence, 'there was a ship cast up by

a wave right into the fork of the channel. She went to pieces in ten

minutes, for she was held in a vice like, while the waves beat her

into sticks. Some of the men got on to the north rock--what they call

"Cuckoo"--and there they stuck till the gale abated. Then people saw

them from Bryher, and a pilot-boat put off for them.'

'So they were saved?' said Roland.

'No, they were not saved,' Peter replied, slowly. ''Twas this way: the

pilot-boat that took them off the rock capsized on the way home. So

they was all drowned.'

'Poor beggars! Now, if they had been brought safe ashore we might have

been told what these rocks look like in rough weather: and what Scilly

is like when you have climbed it: and how a man feels in the middle of

a storm on Scilly.'

'You can see very well what it is like from Samson,' said Armorel.

'The waves beat upon the rocks, and the white spray flies over them

and hides them.'

'I should like to hear as well as to see,' said Roland. 'Fancy the

thunder of the Atlantic waves against this mass of rock, the hissing

and boiling in the channel, the roaring of the wind and the dashing of

the waves! I wonder if any of these shipwrecked men had a sketch-book

in his pocket.

'To be drowned,' he continued, 'just by the upsetting of a boat, and

after escaping death in a much more exciting manner! Their companions

were torn from the deck and hurled and dashed against the rock, so

that in a moment their bones were broken to fragments, and the

fragments themselves were thrown against the rocks till there was

nothing left of them. And these poor fellows clung to the rock, hiding

under a boulder from the driving wind--cold, starving, wet, and

miserable. And just as they thought of food and shelter and warmth

again, to be taken and plunged into the cold water, there to roll

about till they were drowned! A dreadful tragedy!'

Having thus broken the ice, Peter proceeded to relate more stories of

shipwreck, taking after his father, Justinian Tryeth, whose

conversational powers in this direction were, according to Armorel,

unrivalled. There is a shipwreck story belonging to every rock of

Scilly, and to many there are several shipwrecks. As there are about

as many rocks of Scilly as there are days in the year, the stories

would take long in the telling.

Fortunately, Peter did not know all. It is natural, however, that a

native of Samson, and the descendant of many generations of wreckers,

should love to talk about wrecks. Therefore he proceeded to tell of

the French frigate which came over to conquer Scilly in 1798, and was

very properly driven ashore by the sea which owns allegiance to

Britannia, and all hands lost, so that the Frenchmen captured no more

than their graves, which now lie in a triumphant row on St. Agnes. On

Maiden Bower he placed, I know not with what truth, the wreck of the

Spaniard which gave Armorel an ancestor. On Mincarlo he remembered the

loss of an orange-ship on her way from the Azores. On Menovaur he had

seen a collier driven in broad daylight and broken all to pieces in

half a day, and of her crew not a man saved. Other things, similarly

cheerful, he narrated slowly while the sunshine made these grey rocks

put on a hospitable look and the boat danced over the rippling waves.

With his droning voice, his smooth face with the long white hair upon

it, like the last scanty leaves upon a tree, he was like the figure of

Death at the Feast, while Armorel--young, beautiful, smiling--reminded

her guest of Life, and Love, and Hope.

They sailed round so many of these rocks and islets: they landed on so

many: they lingered so long among the reefs, loth to leave the wild,

strange place, that the sun was fast going down when they hoisted sail

and steered for New Grinsey Sound on their homeward way.

You may enter New Grinsey Sound either from the north or from the

south. The disadvantage of attempting it from the former on ordinary

days is that those who do so are generally capsized and frequently

drowned. On such a day as this, however, the northern passage may be

attempted. It is the channel, dangerous and beset with rocks and

ledges, between the islands of Bryher and Tresco. As the boat sailed

slowly in, losing the breeze as it rounded the point, the channel

spread itself out broad and clear. On the right hand rose,

precipitous, the cliffs and crags of Shipman's Head, which looks like

a continuation of Bryher, but is really separated from the island by a

narrow passage--you may work through it in calm weather--running from

Hell Bay to the Sound. On the left is Tresco, its downs rising steeply

from the water, and making a great pretence of being a very lofty

ascent indeed. In the middle of the coast juts out a high promontory,

surrounded on all sides but one by the water. On this rock stands

Cromwell's Castle, a round tower, older than the Martello Towers. It

still possesses a roof, but its interior has been long since gutted.

In front of it has been built a square stone platform or bastion,

where once, no doubt, they mounted guns for the purpose of defending

this channel against an invader, as if Nature had not already defended

it by her ledges and shallows and hardly concealed teeth of granite.

To protect by a fort a channel when the way is so tortuous and

difficult, and where there are so many other ways, is almost as if

Warkworth Castle, five miles inland, on the winding Coquet, had been

built to protect the shores of Northumberland from the invading Dane:

or as if Chepstow above the muddy Wye had been built for the defence

of Bristol. There, however, the castle is, and a very noble picture it

made as the boat slowly voyaged through the Sound. The declining sun,

not yet sunk too low behind Bryher, clothed it with light and

splendour, and brought out the rich colour of grey rock and yellow

fern upon the steep hillside behind. Beyond the castle, in the midst

of the Sound, rose a pyramidal island, a pile of rocks, seventy or

eighty feet high, on whose highest carn some of Oliver Cromwell's

prisoners were hanged, according to the voice of tradition, which,

somehow, always goes dead against that strong person.

Roland, who had exhausted the language of delight among the Outer

Islands, contemplated this picture in silence.

'Do you not like it?' asked the girl.

'Like it?' he repeated. 'Armorel! It is splendid.'

'Will you make a sketch of it?'

'I cannot. I must make a picture. I ought to come here day after day.

There must be a good place to take it from--over there, I think, on

that beach. Armorel! It is splendid. To think that the picture is to

be seen so near to London, and that no one comes to see it!'

'If you want to come day after day, Roland,' she said, softly, 'you

will not be able to go away to-morrow. You must stay longer with us on

Samson.'

'I ought not, child. You should not ask me.'

'Why should you not stay if you are happy with us? We will make you as

comfortable as ever we can. You have only to tell us what you want.'

She looked so eagerly and sincerely anxious that he yielded.

'If you are really and truly sure,' he said.

'Of course I am really and truly sure. The weather will be fine, I

think, and we will go sailing every day.'

'Then I will stay a day or two longer. I will make a picture of

Cromwell's Castle--and the hill at the back of it and the water below

it. I will make it for you, Armorel; but I will keep a copy of it for

myself. Then we shall each have a memento of this day--something to

remember it by.'

'I should like to have the picture. But, oh! Roland!--as if I could

ever forget this day!'

She spoke with perfect simplicity, this child of Nature, without the

least touch of coquetry. Why should she not speak what was in her

heart? Never before had she seen a young man so brave, so gallant, so

comely: nor one who spoke so gently: nor one who treated her with so

much consideration.

He turned his face: he could not meet those trustful eyes, with the

innocence that lay there: he was abashed by reason of this innocence.

A child--only a child. Armorel would change. In a year or two this

trustfulness would vanish. She would become like all other girls--shy

and reserved, self-conscious in intuitive self-defence. But there was

no harm as yet. She was a child--only a child.

As the sun went down the bows ran into the fine white sand of the

landing-place, and their voyage was ended.

'A perfect day,' he murmured. 'A day to dream of. How shall I thank

you enough, Armorel?'

'You can stay and have some more days like it.'

CHAPTER VIII

THE VOYAGERS

This was the first of many such voyages and travels, though not often

in the outside waters, for the vexed Bermoothes themselves are not

more lashed by breezes from all the quarters of the compass than these

isles of Scilly. They sailed from point to point, and from island to

island, landing where they listed or where Armorel led, wandering for

long hours round the shores or on the hills. All the islands, except

the bare rocks, are covered with down and moorland, bounded in every

direction by rocky headlands and slopes covered with granite

boulders. They were quite alone in their explorations: no native is

ever met upon those downs: no visitor, except on St. Mary's, wanders

on the beaches and around the bays. They were quite alone all the day

long: the sea-breeze whistled in their ears; the gulls flew over their

heads--the cormorants hardly stirred from the rocks when they climbed

up; the hawk that hung motionless in the air above them changed not

his place when they drew near. And always, day after day, they came

continually upon unexpected places: strange places, beautiful places:

beaches of dazzling white: wildly heaped carns: here a cromlech, a

logan stone, a barrow--Samson is not the only island which guards the

tombs of the Great Departed--a new view of sea and sky and

white-footed rock. I believe that there does not live any single man

who has actually explored all the isles of Scilly: stood upon every

rock, climbed every hill, and searched on every island for its

treasures of ancient barrows, plants, birds, carns, and headlands.

Once there was a worthy person who came here as chaplain to St.

Martin's. He started with the excellent intention of seeing

everything. Alas! he never saw a single island properly: he never

walked round one exhaustively. He wrote a book about them, to be sure;

but he saw only half. As for Samson, this person of feeble

intelligence even declared that the island was not worth a second

visit! After that one would shut the book, but is lured on in the hope

of finding something new.

One must not ask of the islanders themselves for information about the

isles, because few of them ever go outside their own island unless to

Hugh Town, where is the Port, and where are the shops. Why should

they? On the other islands they have no business. Justinian Tryeth,

for instance, was seventy-five years of age; Hugh Town he knew, and

had often been there, though now Peter did the business of the farm at

the Port: St. Agnes he knew, having wooed and won a wife there: he had

been to Bryher Church, which is close to the shore--the rest of Bryher

was to him as unknown as Iceland. As for St. Martin's, or Annet, or

Great Ganilly, he saw them constantly; they were always within his

sight, yet he had never desired to visit them. They were an emblem, a

shape, a name to him, and nothing more. It is so always with those who

live in strange and beautiful places: the marvels are part of their

daily life: they heed them not, unless, like Armorel, they have no

work to do and are quick to feel the influences of things around them.

Most Swiss people seem to care nothing for their Alps, but here and

there is one who would gladly spend all his days high up among the

fragrant pines, or climbing the slope of ice with steady step and

slow.

But these young people did try to visit all the islands. Upon Roland

there fell the insatiate curiosity--the rage--of an explorer and a

discoverer. He became like Captain Cook himself: he longed for more

islands: every day he found a new island. 'Give,' cries he who sails

upon unknown seas and scans the round circle of the horizon for the

cloudy peak of some far-distant mountain, 'give--give more

islands--still more islands! Let us sail for yonder cloud! Let us sail

on until the cloud becomes a hill-top, and the hill another island!

Largesse for him who first calls "Land ahead!" There shall we find

strange monsters and treasures rare, with friendly natives, and girls

more blooming than those of fair Tahiti. Let us sail thither, though

it prove no more than a barren rock, the resting-place of the

sea-lion; though we can do no more than climb its steep sides and

stand upon the top while the spray flies over the rocks and beats upon

our faces.' In such a spirit as Captain Carteret (Armorel's favourite)

steered his frail bark from shore to shore did Roland sail among those

Scilly seas.

Of course they went to Tresco, where there is the finest garden in all

the world. But one should not go to see the garden more than once,

because its perfumed alleys, its glasshouses, its cultivated and

artificial air, are somehow incongruous with the rest of the islands.

As well expect to meet a gentleman in a Court dress walking across

Fylingdale Moor. Yet it is indeed a very noble and royal garden: other

gardens have finer hothouses: none have a better show of flowers and

trees of every kind: for variety it is like unto the botanical gardens

of a tropical land: you might be standing in one of the alleys of the

garden of Mauritius, or of Java, or the Cape. Here everything grows

and flourishes that will grow anywhere, except, of course, those

plants which carry patriotism to an extreme and refuse absolutely to

leave their native soil. You cannot go picking pepper here, nor can

you strip the cinnamon-tree of its bark. But here you will see the

bamboos cluster, tall and graceful: the eucalyptus here parades his

naked trunk and his blue leaves: here the fern-tree lifts its circle

of glory of lace and embroidery twenty feet high: the prickly pear

nestles in warm corners: the aloe shoots up its tall stalk of flower

and of seed: the palms stand in long rows: and every lovely plant,

every sweet flower, created for the solace of man, grows abundantly,

and hastens with zeal to display its blossoms: the soft air is full of

perfumes, strange and familiar: it is as if Kew had taken off her

glass roofs and placed all her plants and trees to face the English

winter. But, then, the winter of Scilly is not the winter of Great

Britain. The botanist may visit this garden many times, and always

find something to please him; but the ordinary traveller will go but

once, and admire and come away. It is far better outside on the breezy

down, where the dry fern and withered bents crack beneath your feet,

and the elastic turf springs as you tread upon it. There are other

things on Tresco: there is a big fresh-water lake--it would be a

respectable lake even in Westmoreland--where the wild birds disport

themselves: beside it South American ostriches roam gravely, after

the manner of the bird. It is pleasant to see the creatures. There is

a great cave, if you like dark damp caves: better than the cave, there

is a splendid bold coast sloping steeply from the down all round the

northern part of the island.

Then they walked all round St. Mary's. It is nine miles round; but if,

as these young people did, you climb every headland and walk round

every bay, and descend every possible place where the boulders make a

ladder down to the boiling water below, it is nine hundred miles

round, and, for its length, the most wonderful walk in all the world.

They crossed the broad Sound to St. Agnes, and saw St. Warna's

wondrous cove: they stood on the desolate Gugh and the lonely Annet,

beloved of puffins: they climbed on every one of the Eastern Islands,

and even sailed, when they found a day calm enough to permit the

voyage, among the Dogs of Scilly, and clambered up the black boulders

of Rosevear and scared the astonished cormorants from wild Goreggan.

One day it rained in the morning. Then they had to stay at home, and

Armorel showed the house. She took her guest into the dairy, where

Chessun made the butter and scalded the cream--that rich cream which

the West-country folk eat with everything. She made him stand by and

help make a junket, which Devonshire people believe cannot be made

outside the shadow of Dartmoor: she took him into the kitchen--the old

room with its old furniture, the candlesticks and snuffers of brass,

the bacon hanging to the joists, the blue china, the ancient pewter

platters, the long bright spit--a kitchen of the eighteenth century.

And then she took him into a room which no longer exists anywhere else

save in name. It was the still-room, and on the shelves there stood

the elixirs and cordials of ancient time: the currant gin to fortify

the stomach on a raw morning before crossing the Road; the cherry

brandy for a cold and stormy night; the elderberry wine, good mulled

and spiced at Christmas-time; the blackberry wine; the home-made

distilled waters--lavender water, Hungary water, Cyprus water, and the

Divine Cordial itself, which takes three seasons to complete, and

requires all the flowers of spring, summer, and autumn. Then they went

into the best parlour, and Armorel, opening a cupboard, took out an

old sword of strange shape and with faded scabbard. On the blade there

was a graven Latin legend. 'This is my ancestor's sword,' she said.

'He was an officer of the Spanish Armada--Hernando Mureno was his

name.'

'You are indeed a Spanish lady, Armorel. Your ancestor is well known

to have been the bravest and most honourable gentleman in King

Philip's service.'

'He remained here--he would not go home: he married and became a

Protestant.'

She put back the sword in its place, and brought forth other things to

show him--old-fashioned watches, old compasses, sextants, telescopes,

flint-and-steel pistols--all kinds of things belonging to the old days

of smuggling and of piloting.

Then she opened the bookcase. It should have been filled with

histories of pirates and buccaneers; but it was not: it contained a

whole body of theology of the Methodist kind. Roland tossed them over

impatiently. 'I don't wonder,' he said, 'at your reading nothing if

this is all you have.' But he found one or two books which he set

aside.

As they wandered about the islands, of course they talked. It wants

but little to make a young man open his heart to a girl; only a pair

of soft and sympathetic eyes, a face full of interest and questions of

admiration. Whether she tells him anything in return is quite another

matter. Most young men, when they review the situation afterwards,

discover that they have told everything and learned nothing. Perhaps

there is nothing to learn. In a few days Armorel knew everything about

her guest. He had come from Australia--from that far-distant land--in

search of fortune. He had as yet made but few friends. He was unknown

and without patrons. He had no family connections which would help

him. The patrimony on which he was to live until he should begin to

succeed was but small, and although he held money-making in the

customary contempt, it was necessary that he should make a good deal,

because--which is often the case--his standard of comfort was pitched

rather high: it included, for instance, a good club, good cigars, and

good claret. Also, as he said, an artist should be free from sordid

anxieties: Art demands an atmosphere of calm: therefore, he must have

an income. This, like everything that does not exist, must be created.

Man is godlike because he alone of creatures can create: he, and he

alone, constantly creates things which previously did not exist--an

income, honour, rank, tastes, wants, desires, necessities, habits,

rules, and laws.

'How can you bear to sell your pictures?' asked the girl. 'We sell our

flowers, but then we grow them by the thousand. You make every picture

by itself--how can you sell the beautiful things? You must want to

keep them every one to look at all your life. Those that you have

given to me I could never part with.'

'One must live, fair friend of mine,' he replied, lightly. 'It is my

only way of making money, and without money we can do nothing. It is

not the selling of his pictures that the artist dreads--that is the

necessity of Art as a profession: it is the danger that no one will

care about seeing them or buying them. That is much more terrible,

because it means failure. Sometimes I dream that I have become old and

grey, and have been working all my life, and have had no success at

all, and am still unknown and despised. In Art there are thousands of

such failures. I think the artist who fails is despised more than any

other man. It is truly miserable to aspire so high and to fall so low.

Yet who am I that I should reach the port?'

'All good painters succeed,' said the girl, who had never seen a

painter before or any painting save her own coloured engravings. 'You

are a good painter, Roland. You must succeed. You will become a great

painter in everybody's estimation.'

'I will take your words for an oracle,' he said. 'When I am

melancholy, and the future looks dark, I will say, "Thus and thus

spoke Armorel."'

The young man who is about to attempt fortune by the pursuit of Art

must not consider too long the wrecks that strew the shores and float

about the waters, lest he lose self-confidence. Continually these

wrecks occur, and there is no insurance against them: yet continually

other barques hoist sail and set forth upon their perilous voyage. It

may be reckoned as a good point in this aspirant that he was not

over-confident.

'Some are wrecked at the outset,' he said. 'Others gain a kind of

success. Heavens! what a kind! To struggle all their lives for

admission to the galleries, and to rejoice if once in a while a

picture is sold.'

'They are not the good painters,' the girl of large experience again

reminded him.

'Am I a good painter?' he replied, humbly. 'Well, one can but try to

do good work, and leave to the gods the rest. There is luck in things.

It is not every good man who succeeds, Armorel. To every man, however,

there is allotted the highest stature possible for him to reach. Let

me be contented if I grow to my full height.'

'You must, Roland. You could not be contented with anything less.'

'To reach one's full height, one must live for work alone. It is a

hard saying, Armorel. It is a great deal harder than you can

understand.'

'If you love your work, and if you are happy in it----' said the girl.

'You do not understand, child, Most men never reach their full height.

You can see their pictures in the galleries--poor, stunted things. It

is because they live for anything rather than their work. They are

pictures without a soul in them.'

Now, when a young man holds forth in this strain, one or two things

suggest themselves. First, one thinks that he is playing a part,

putting on 'side,' affecting depths--in fact, enacting the part of the

common Prig, who is now, methinks, less common than he was. If he is

not a prig uttering insincere sentimentalities, he may be a young man

who has preserved his ideals beyond the usual age by some accident.

The ideals and beliefs and aspirations of young men, when they first

begin the study of Art in any of its branches, are very beautiful

things, and full of truths which can only, somehow, be expressed by

very young men. The third explanation is that in certain

circumstances, as in the companionship of a girl not belonging to

society and the world--a young, innocent, and receptive girl--whose

mind is ready for pure ideas, uncontaminated by earthly touch, the old

enthusiasms are apt to return and the old beliefs to come back. Then

such things may spring in the heart and rise to the lips as one could

not think or utter in a London studio.

Sincere or not, this young man pursued his theme, making a kind of

confession which Armorel could not, as yet, understand. But she

remembered. Women at all ages remember tenaciously, and treasure up in

their hearts things which they may at some other time learn to

understand.

'There was an old allegory, Armorel,' this young man went on, 'of a

young man choosing his way, once for all. It is an absurd story,

because every day and all day long we are pulled the other way.

Sometimes it makes me tremble all over only to think of the flowery

way. I know what the end would be. But yet, Armorel, what can you know

or understand about the Way of Pleasure, and how men are drawn into it

with ropes? My soul is sometimes sick with yearning when I think of

those who run along that Way and sing and feast.'

'What kind of Way is it, Roland?'

'You cannot understand, and I cannot tell you. The Way of Pleasure and

the Way of Wealth. These are the two roads by which the artistic life

is ruined. Yet we are dragged into them by ropes.'

'You shall keep to the true path, Roland,' the girl said, with

glistening eyes. 'Oh! how happy you will be when you have reached your

full height--you will be a giant then.'

He laughed and shook his head. 'Again, Armorel, I will take it from

your lips--a prophecy. But you do not understand.'

'No,' she said. 'I am very ignorant. Yet if I cannot understand, I can

remember. The Way of Pleasure and the Way of Wealth. I shall remember.

We are told that we must not set our hearts upon the things of this

world. I used to think that it meant being too fond of pretty frocks

and ribbons. Dorcas said so once. Since you have come I see that there

are many, many things that I know nothing of. If I am to be dragged to

them by ropes, I do not want to know them. The Way of Pleasure and the

Way of Wealth. They destroy the artistic life,' she repeated, as if

learning a lesson. 'These ways must be ways of Sin, don't you think?'

she asked, looking up with curious eyes.

Doubtless. Yet this is not quite the modern manner of regarding and

speaking of the subject. And considering what an eighteenth-century

and bourgeois-like manner it is, and how fond we now are of that

remarkable century, one is surprised that the manner has not before

now been revived. When we again tie our hair behind and assume

silver-buckled shoes and white silk stockings, we shall once more

adopt that manner. It was not, however, artificial with Armorel. The

words fell naturally from her lips. A thing that was prejudicial to

the better nature of a man must, she thought, belong to ways of Sin.

Again--doubtless. But Roland did not think of it in that way, and the

words startled him.

'Puritan!' he said. 'But you are always right. It is the instinct of

your heart always to be right. But we no longer talk that language. It

is a hundred years old. In these days there is no more talk about

Sin--at least, outside certain circles. There are habits, it is true,

which harm an artist's eye and destroy his hand. We say that it is a

pity when an artist falls into these habits. We call it a pity,

Armorel, not the way of Sin. A pity--that is all. It means the same

thing, I dare say, so far as the artist is concerned.'

CHAPTER IX

THE LAST DAY BUT ONE

The last day but one! It always comes at length--it is bound to

come--the saddest, the most sentimental of all days. The boy who

leaves school--I speak of the old-fashioned boy and the ancient

school--where he has been fagged and bullied and flogged, on this last

day but one looks round with a choking throat upon the dingy walls and

the battered desks. Even the convict who is about to be released after

years of prison feels a sentimental melancholy in gazing for the last

time upon the whitewashed walls. The world, which misunderstands the

power of temptation and is distrustful as to the reality of

repentance, will probably prove cold to him. How much more, then, when

one looks around on the last day but one of a holiday! To-morrow we

part. This is the last day of companionship.

Roland's holiday was to consist of a day or two, or three at the

most--yet lo! the evening and the morning were the twenty-first day.

There was always something new to be seen, something more to be

sketched, some fresh excuse for staying in a house where this young

man lived from the first as if he had been there all his life and

belonged to the family. Scilly has to be seen in cloud as well as in

sunshine: in wind and rain as well as in fair weather: one island had

been accidentally overlooked; another must be re-visited.

So the days went on, each one like the days before it, but with a

difference. The weather was for the most part fine, so that they could

at least sail about the islands of the Road. Every morning the young

man got up at six and, after a bathe from Shark Point, walked all

round Samson and refreshed his soul by gazing upon the Outer Islands.

Breakfast over, he took a pipe in the farmyard with Justinian and

Peter, who continually talked of shipwrecks and of things washed

ashore. During this interval Armorel made the puddings and the cakes.

When she had accomplished this delicate and responsible duty, she came

out, prepared for the day. They took their dinner-basket with them,

and sallied forth: in the afternoon they returned: in the evening, at

seven o'clock, the table was pushed back: the old serving people came

in; the fire was stirred into animation; Armorel played the

old-fashioned tunes; and the ancient lady rallied, and sat up, and

talked, her mind in the past. All the days alike, yet each one

differing from its neighbours. There is no monotony, though place and

people remain exactly the same, when there is the semblance of

variety. For, besides the discovery of so many curious and interesting

islands, this fortunate young man, as we have seen, discovered that

his daily companion, though so young--'only a child'--was a girl of

wonderful quickness and ready sympathy. A young artist wants

sympathy--it is necessary for his growth: sympathy, interest, and

flattery are necessary for the artistic temperament. All these Armorel

offered him in large measure, running over. She kept alive in him that

faith in his own star which every artist, as well as every general,

must possess. Great is the encouragement of such sympathy to the young

man of ambitions. This consideration is, indeed, the principal excuse

for early marriages. Three weeks of talk with such a girl--no one else

to consider or to interrupt--no permission to be sought--surely these

things made up a holiday which quite beat the record! Three whole

weeks! Such a holiday should form the foundation of a life-long

friendship! Could either of them ever forget such a holiday?

Now it was all over. For very shame Roland could make no longer any

excuses for staying. His sketch-book was crammed. There were materials

in it for a hundred pictures--most of them might be called Studies of

Armorel. She was in the boat holding the tiller, bare-headed, her hair

flying in the breeze, the spray dashing into her face, and the clear

blue water rushing past the boat: or she was sitting idly in the same

boat lying in Grinsey Sound, with Shipman's Head behind her: or she

was standing on the sea-weed at low water under the mighty rock of

Castle Bryher: or she was standing upright in the low room, violin in

hand, her face and figure crimsoned in the red firelight: or she was

standing in the porch between the verbena-trees, the golden

figure-head smiling benevolently upon her, and the old ships lanthorn

swinging overhead with an innocent air, as if it had never heard of a

wreck and knew not how valuable a property may be a cow, judiciously

treated--with a lighted lanthorn between its horns--on a stormy night.

There were other things: sketches of bays and coves, and headlands and

carns, gathered from all the islands--from Porthellick and Peninnis on

St. Mary's, which everybody goes to see, to St. Warna's Cove on St.

Agnes, whither no traveller ever wendeth.

A very noble time. No letters, no newspapers, no trouble of any kind:

yet one cannot remain for ever even in a house where such a permanent

guest would be welcomed. Now and then, it is true, one hears how such

a one went to a friend's house and stayed there. La Fontaine, Gay,

and Coleridge are examples. But I have never heard, before this case,

of a young man going to a house where a quite young girl, almost a

child, was the mistress, and staying there. Now the end had come: he

must go back to London, where all the men and most of the women have

their own shows to run, and there is not enough sympathy to go round:

back to what the young artist, he who has as yet exhibited little and

sold nothing, calls his Work--putting a capital letter to it, like the

young clergyman. Perhaps he did not understand that under the eyes of

a girl who knew nothing about Art he had done really better and finer

work, and had learned more, in those three weeks than in all the time

that he had spent in a studio. Well; it was all over. The sketching

was ended: there would be no more sailing over the blue waves of the

rolling Atlantic outside the islands: no more quiet cruising in the

Road: no more fishing: no more clambering among the granite rocks: no

more sitting in sunny places looking out to sea, with this bright

child at his side.

Alas! And no more talks with Armorel. From the first day the child sat

at his feet and became his disciple, Heloïse herself was not an apter

pupil. She ardently desired to learn: like a curious child she asked

him questions all day long, and received the answers as if they were

gospel: but no child that he had ever known betrayed blacker gaps of

ignorance than this girl of fifteen. Consider. What could she know?

Other girls learn at school: Armorel's schooling was over at fourteen,

when she came home from St. Mary's to her desert island. Other girls

continue their education by reading books: but Armorel never read

anything except voyages of the last century, which treat but little of

the modern life. Other girls also learn from hearing their elders

talk: but Armorel's elders never talked. Other girls, again, learn

from conversation with companions: but Armorel had no companions. And

they learn from the shops in the street, the people who walk about,

from the church, the theatre, the shows: but Armorel had no better

street than the main street of Hugh Town. And they learn from society:

but this girl had none. And they learn from newspapers, magazines, and

novels: but Armorel had none of these. No voice, no sound of the outer

world reached Alexandra Selkirk of Samson. Juan Fernandez itself was

not more cut off from men and women. Therefore, in her seclusion and

her ignorance, this young man came to her like another Apollo or a

Vishnu at least--a revelation of the world of which she knew nothing,

and to which she never gave a thought. He opened a door and bade her

look within. All she saw was a great company painting pictures and

talking Art; but that was something. As for what he said, this young

man ardent, she remembered and treasured all, even the lightest

things, the most trivial opinions. He did not abuse her confidence.

Had he been older he might have been cynical: had he not been an

artist he might have been flippant: had he been a City man and a

money-grub he might have shown her the sordid side of the world. Being

such as he was he showed her the best and most beautiful part--the

world of Art. But as for these black gaps of ignorance, most of them

remained even after Roland's visit.

'Your best friend, Armorel,' said her guest, 'would not deny that you

are ignorant of many things. You have never gone to a dinner-party or

sat in a drawing-room: you cannot play lawn-tennis; you know none of

the arts feminine: you cannot talk the language of Society: oh! you

are a very ignorant person indeed! But then there are compensations.'

'What are compensations? Things that make up? Do you mean the boat and

the islands?'

'The boat is certainly something, and the islands give a flavour of

their own to life on Samson, don't they? If I were talking the usual

cant I should say that the chief compensation is the absence of the

hollow world and its insincere society. That is cant and humbug,

because society is very pleasant, only, I suppose, one must not expect

too much from it. Your real compensations, Armorel, are of another

kind. You can fiddle like a jolly sailor, all of the olden time. If

you were to carry that fiddle of yours on to the Common Hard at

Portsea not a man among them all, even the decayed veteran--if he

still lives--who caught Nelson, the Dying Hero, in his arms, but would

jump to his feet and shuffle--heel and toe, double-step, back-step,

flourish and fling. I believe those terms are correct.'

'I am so glad you think I can fiddle.'

'You want only instruction in style to make you a very fine violinist.

Besides, there is nothing more pleasing to look at, just now, than a

girl playing a violin. It is partly fashion. Formerly it was thought

graceful for a girl to play the guitar, then the harp; now it is the

fiddle, when it is not the zither or the banjo. That is one

compensation. There is another. I declare that I do not believe there

is in all London a girl with such a genius as yours for puddings and

pies, cakes and biscuits. I now understand that there is more wanted,

in this confection, than industry and application. It is an art. Every

art affords scope for genius born not made. The true--the really

artistic--administration of spice and sugar, milk, eggs, butter, and

flour requires real genius--such as yours, my child. And as to the

still-room, there isn't such a thing left, I believe, in the whole

world except on Samson, any more than there is a spinning-wheel. Who

but yourself, Armorel, possesses the secret, long since supposed to be

hopelessly lost, of composing Cyprus water, and the Divine Cordial? In

this respect, you belong to a hundred years ago, when the modern

ignorance was unknown. And where can I find--I should like to know--a

London girl who understands cherry brandy, and can make her own

blackberry wine?'

'You want to please me, Roland, because you are going away and I am

unhappy.' She hung her head in sadness too deep for tears. 'That is

why you say all these fine things. But I know that they mean very

little. I am only an ignorant girl.'

'I must always, out of common gratitude, want to please you. But I am

only speaking the bare truth. Then there is the delicate question of

dress. An ordinary man is not supposed to know anything about dress,

but an artist has always to consider it. There are certainly other

girls--thousands of other girls--more expensively dressed than you,

Armorel; but you have the taste for costume, which is far better than

any amount of costly stuff.'

'Chessun taught me how to sew and how to cut out.' But the assurance

of this excellence brought her no comfort.

'When I am gone, Armorel, you will go on with your drawing, will you

not?' It will be seen that he endeavoured, as an Apostle of Art, to

introduce its cult even on remote Samson. That was so, and not without

success. The girl, he discovered, had been always making untaught

attempts at drawing, and wanted nothing but a little instruction. This

was a fresh discovery. 'That you should have the gift of the pencil is

delightful to think of. The pencil, you see, is like the Jinn--I fear

you have no Jinn on Samson--who could do almost anything for those who

knew how to command his obedience, but only made those people

ridiculous who ignorantly tried to order him around. If you go on

drawing every day I am sure you will learn how to make that Jinn

obedient. I will send you, when I get home, some simple books for your

guidance. Promise, child, that you will not throw away this gift.'

'I will draw every day,' she replied, obediently, but with profound

dejection.

'Then there is your reading. You must read something. I have looked

through your shelves, and have picked out some books for you. There is

a volume of Cowper and of Pope, and an old copy of the _Spectator_,

and there is Goldsmith's "Deserted Village."'

'I will read anything you wish me to read,' she replied.

'I will send you some more books. You ought to know something about

the world of to-day. Addison and Goldsmith will not teach you that.

But I don't know what to send you. Novels are supposed to represent

life; but then they pre-suppose a knowledge of the world, to begin

with. You want an account of modern society as it is, and the thing

does not exist. I will consider about it.'

'I will read whatever you send me. Roland, when I have read all the

books and learned to draw, shall I have grown to my full height?

Remember what you said about yourself.'

'I don't know, Armorel. It is not reading. But----' He left the

sentence unfinished.

'Who is to tell me--on Samson?' she asked.

In the afternoon of this day Roland planted his easel on the plateau

of the northern hill, where the barrows are, and put the last touches

to the sketch, which he afterwards made into the first picture which

he ever exhibited. It appeared in the Grosvenor of '85: of course

everybody remembers the picture, which attracted a very respectable

amount of attention. It was called the 'Daughter of Lyonesse.' It

represented a maiden in the first blossom of womanhood--tall and

shapely. She was dressed in a robe of white wool thrown over her left

shoulder and gathered at the waist by a simple belt of brown leather:

a white linen vest was seen below the wool: round her neck was a

golden torque: behind her was the setting sun: she stood upon the

highest of a low pile of granite boulders, round the feet of which

were spread the yellow branches of the fern and the faded flowers of

the heather: she shaded her eyes from the sun with her left hand, and

looked out to sea. She was bare-headed: the strong breeze lifted her

long black hair and blew it from her shoulders: her eyes were black

and her complexion was dark. Behind her and below her was the

splendour of sun and sky and sea, with the Western Islands rising

black above the golden waters.

The sketch showed the figure, but the drapery was not complete: as yet

it was a study of light and colour and a portrait.

'I don't quite know,' said the painter, thoughtfully, 'whether you

ought not to wear a purple chiton: Phoenician trade must have

brought Phoenician luxuries to Lyonesse. Your ancestors were

tin-men--rich miners--no doubt the ladies of the family went dressed

in the very, very best. I wonder whether in those days the King's

daughter was barefooted. The _caliga_, I think--the leather

sandal--would have been early introduced into the royal family on

account of the spikiness of the fern in autumn and the thorns of the

gorse all the year round. The slaves and common people, of course,

would have to endure the thorns.'

He continued his work while he talked, Armorel making no reply,

enacting the model with zeal.

'It is a strange sunset,' he went on, as if talking to himself, 'a day

of clouds, but in the west a broad belt of blue low down in the

horizon: in the midst of the belt the sun flaming crimson: on either

hand the sky aglow, but only in the belt of clear: above is the solid

cloud, grey and sulky, receiving none of the colour: below is also the

solid, sulky cloud, but under the sun there spreads out a fan of light

which strikes the waters and sets them aflame in a long broad road

from the heavens to your feet, O child of Lyonesse. Outside this road

of light the waters are dull and gloomy: in the sky the coloured belt

of light fades gradually into soft yellows, clear greens, and azure

blues. A strange sunset! A strange effect of light! Armorel, you see

your life: it is prefigured by the light. Overhead the sky is grey and

colourless: where the glow of the future does not lie on the waters

they are grey and colourless. Nothing around you but the waste of

grey sea: before you black rocks--life is always full of black rocks:

and beyond, the splendid sun--soft, warm, and glowing. You shall

interpret that in your own way.'

Armorel listened, standing motionless, her left hand shading her eyes.

'If the picture,' he went on, 'comes out as I hope it may, it will be

one of those that suggest many things. Every good picture, Armorel, as

well as every good poem, suggests. It is like that statue of Christ

which is always taller than the tallest man. Nobody can ever get above

the thought and soul of a good picture or a good poem. There is always

more in it than the wisest man knows. That is the proof of genius.

That is why I long all day for the mysterious power of putting into my

work the soul of everyone who looks upon it--as well as my own soul.

When you come to stand before a great picture, Armorel, perhaps you

will understand what I mean. You will find your heart agitated with

strange emotions--you will leave it with new thoughts. When you go

away from your desert island, remember every day to read a piece of

great verse, to look upon a great picture, and to hear a piece of

great music. As for these suggested thoughts, you will not perhaps be

able to put them into words. But they will be there.'

Still Armorel made no reply. It was as if he were talking to a statue.

'I have painted you,' he said, 'with the golden torque round your

neck: the red gold is caught by the sunshine: as for your dress, I

think it must be a white woollen robe--perhaps a border of purple--but

I don't know---- There are already heaps of colour--colour of sky and

of water, of the granite with the yellow lichen, and of brown and

yellow fern and of heather faded---- No--you shall be all in white,

Armorel. No dress so sweet for a girl as white. A vest of white linen

made by yourself from your own spinning-wheel, up to the throat and

covering the right shoulder. Are you tired, child?'

'No--I like to hear you talk.'

'I have nearly done--in fact,' he leaned back and contemplated his

work with the enthusiasm which is to a painter what the glow of

composition is to the writer, 'I have done all I can until I go home.

The sun of Scilly hath a more golden glow in September than the sun of

St. John's Wood. If I have caught aright--or something like it--the

light that is around you and about you, Armorel---- The sun in your

left hand is like the red light of the candle through the closed

fingers. So--I can do no more--Armorel! you are all glorious within

and without. You are indeed the King's Daughter: you are clothed with

the sun as with a garment: if the sun were to disappear this moment,

you would stand upon the Peak, for all the island to admire--a flaming

beacon!'

His voice was jubilant--he had done well. Yet he shaded his eyes and

looked at canvas and at model once more with jealousy and suspicion.

If he had passed over something! It was an ambitious picture--the most

ambitious thing he had yet attempted.

'Armorel!' he cried. 'If I could only paint as well as I can see! Come

down, child; you are good indeed to stand so long and so patiently.'

She obeyed and jumped off her eminence, and stood beside him looking

at the picture.

'Tell me what you think,' said the painter. 'You see--it is the King's

Daughter. She stands on a peak in Lyonesse and looks forth upon the

waters. Why? I know not. She seeks the secrets of the future, perhaps.

She looks for the coming of the Perfect Knight, perhaps. She expects

the Heaven that waits for every maiden--in this world as well as in

the next. Everyone may interpret the picture for himself. She is

young--everything is possible to the young. Tell me, Armorel, what do

you think?'

She drew a long breath. 'A--h!' she murmured. 'I have never seen

anything like this before. It is not me you have painted, Roland. You

say it is a picture of me--just to please and flatter me. There is my

face--yet not my face. All is changed. Roland, when I am grown to my

full height, shall I look like this?

'If you do, when that day comes, I shall be proved to be a painter

indeed,' he replied. 'If you had seen nothing but yourself--your own

self--and no more, I would have burnt the thing. Now you give me

hopes.

Afterwards, Armorel loved best to remember him as he stood there

beside this unfinished picture, glowing with the thought that he had

done what he had attempted. The soul was there.

Out of the chatter of the studio, the endless discussions of style and

method, he had come down to this simple spot, to live for three weeks,

cut off from the world, with a child who knew nothing of these things.

He came at a time when his enthusiasm for his work was at its

fiercest: that is, when the early studies are beginning to bear fruit,

when the hand has acquired command of the pencil and can control the

brush, and when the eye is already trained to colour. It was at a time

when the young artist refuses to look at any but the greatest work,

and refuses to dream of any future except that of the greatest and

noblest work. It is a splendid thing to have had, even for a short

time, these dreams and these enthusiasms.

'The picture is finished,' said Armorel, 'and to-morrow you will go

away and leave me.' The tears welled up in her eyes. Why should not

the child cry for the departure of this sweet friend?

'My dear child,' he said, 'I cannot believe that you will stay for

ever on this desert island.'

'I do not want to leave the island. I want to keep you here. Why don't

you stay altogether, Roland? You can paint here. Have we made you

happy? Are you satisfied with our way of living? We will change it for

you, if you wish.'

'No--no--it is not that. I must go home. I must go back to my work.

But I cannot bear to think of you left alone with these old people,

with no companions and no friends. The time will come when you will

leave the place and go away somewhere--where people live and talk----'

He reflected that if she went away it might be among people ignorant

of Art and void of culture. This beautiful child, who might have been

a Princess--she was only a flower-farmer of the Scilly Islands. What

could she hope or expect?

'I do not want to go into the world,' she went on. 'I am afraid,

because I am so ignorant. People would laugh at me. I would rather

stay here always, if you were with me. Then we would do nothing but

sail and row and go fishing: and you could paint and sketch all the

time.'

'It is impossible, Armorel. You talk like a child. In a year or two

you will understand that it is impossible. Besides, we should both

grow old. Think of that. Think of two old people going about sailing

among the islands for ever: I, like Justinian Tryeth, bald and bowed

and wrinkled: you, like Dorcas--no, no; you could never grow like

Dorcas: you shall grow serenely, beautifully old.'

'What would that matter?' she replied. 'Some day, even, one of us

would die. What would that matter, either, because we should only be

parted by a year or two? Oh! whether we are old or young the sea never

grows old, nor the hills and rocks--and the sunshine is always the

same. And when we die there will be a new heaven and a new earth--you

can read it in the Book of Revelation--but no more sea, no more sea.

That I cannot understand. How could angels and saints be happy without

the sea? If one lives among people in towns, I dare say it may be

disagreeable to grow old, and perhaps to look ugly like poor Dorcas;

but not, no, not when one lives in such a place as this.'

'Where did you get your wisdom, Armorel?'

'Is that wisdom?'

'When I go away my chief regret will be that I kept talking to you

about myself. Men are selfish pigs. We should have talked about

nothing but you. Then I should have learned a great deal. See how we

miss our opportunities.'

'No, no; I had nothing to tell you. And you had such a great deal to

tell me. It was you who taught me that everybody ought to try to grow

to his full height.'

'Did I? It was only a passing thought. Such things occur to one

sometimes.'

She sat down on a boulder and crossed her hands in her lap, looking at

him seriously and gravely with her great black eyes.

'Now,' she said, 'I want to be very serious. It is my last chance.

Roland, I am resolved that I will try to grow to my full height. You

are going away to-morrow, and I shall have no one to advise me. Give

me all the help you can before you go.'

'What help can I give you, Armorel?'

'I have been thinking. You have told me all about yourself. You are

going to be a great artist: you will give up all your life to your

work: when you have grown as tall as you can, everybody will

congratulate you, and you will be proud and happy. But who is to tell

me? How shall I know when I am grown to my full height?'

'You have got something more in your mind, Armorel.'

'Give me a model, Roland. You always paint from a model yourself--you

told me so. Now, think of the very best actual girl of all the girls

you know--the most perfect girl, mind: she must be a girl that I can

remember and try to copy. I must have something to think of and go by,

you know.'

'The very best actual girl I know?' he laughed, with a touch of the

abominable modern cynicism which no longer believes in girls. 'That

wouldn't help you much, I am afraid. You see, Armorel, I should not

look to the actual girls I know for the best girl at all. There is,

however'--he pulled his shadowy moustache, looking very wise--'a most

wonderful girl--I confess that I have never met her, but I have heard

of her: the poets keep talking about her--and some of the novelists

are fond of drawing her; I have heard of her, read of her, and dreamed

of her. Shall I tell you about her?'

'If you please--that is, if she can become my model.'

'Perhaps. She is quite a possible girl, Armorel, like yourself. That

is to say, a girl who may really develop out of certain qualities. As

for actual girls, there are any number whom one knows in a way--one

can distinguish them--I mean by their voices, their faces, and their

figures and so forth. But as for knowing anything more about them----'

'Tell me, then, about the girl whom you do know, though you have never

seen her.'

'I will if I can. As for her face--now----'

'Never mind her face,' she interrupted, impatiently.

'Never mind her face, as you say. Besides, you can look in the glass

if you want to know her face.'

'Yes; that will do,' said Armorel, simply. 'Now go on.'

'First of all, then, she is always well dressed--beautifully

dressed--and with as much taste as the silly fashion of the day

allows. A woman, you know, though she is the most beautiful creature

in the whole of animated nature, can never afford to do without the

adornments of dress. It does not much matter how a man goes dressed.

He only dresses for warmth. In any dress and in any rags a handsome

man looks well. But not a woman. Her dress either ruins her beauty or

it heightens it. A woman must always, and at all ages, look as

beautiful as she can. Therefore, she arranges her clothes so as to set

off her beauty when she is young: to make her seem still beautiful

when she is past her youth: and to hide the ravages of time when she

is old. That is the first thing which I remark about this girl. Of

course, she doesn't dress as if her father was a Silver King. Such a

simple stuff as your grey nun's cloth, Armorel, is good enough to make

the most lovely dress.'

'She is always well dressed,' his pupil repeated. 'That is the first

thing.'

'She is accomplished, of course,' Roland added, airily, as if

accomplishments were as easy to pick up as the blue and grey shells on

Porth Bay. 'She understands music, and plays on some instrument. She

knows about art of all kinds--art in painting, sculptures,

decorations, poetry, literature, music. She can talk intelligently

about art; and she has trained her eye so that she knows good work.

She is never carried away by shams and humbug.'

'She has trained her eye, and knows good work,' Armorel repeated.

'Above all, she is sympathetic. She does not talk so as to show how

clever she is, but to bring out the best points of the man she is

talking with. Yet when men leave her they forget what they have said

themselves, and only remember how much this girl seems to know.'

'Seems to know?' Armorel looked up.

'One woman cannot know everything. But a clever woman will know about

everything that belongs to her own set. We all belong to our own set,

and every set talks its own language--scientific, artistic, whatever

it is. This girl does not pretend to enter into the arena; but she

knows the rules of the game, and talks accordingly. She is always

intelligent, gracious, and sympathetic.'

'She is intelligent, gracious, and sympathetic,' Armorel repeated. 'Is

she gracious to everybody--even to people she does not like?'

'In society,' said Roland, 'we like everybody. We are all perfectly

well-bred and well-behaved: we always say the kindest things about

each other.'

'Now you are saying one thing and meaning another. That is like your

friend Dick Stephenson. Don't, Roland.'

'Well, then, I have very little more to say. This girl, however, is

always a woman's woman.'

'What is that?'

'Difficult to explain. A wise lady once advised me when I went

courting, first to make quite sure that the girl was a woman's woman.

I think she meant that other girls should speak and think well of her.

I haven't always remembered the advice, it is true, but----' Here he

stopped short and in some confusion, remembering that this was not an

occasion for plenary confession.

But Armorel only nodded gravely. 'I shall remember,' she said.

'The rest you know. She loves everything that is beautiful and good.

She hates everything that is coarse and ugly. That is all.'

'Thank you--I shall remember,' she repeated. 'Roland, you must have

thought a good deal about girls to know so much.'

He blushed: he really did. He blushed a rich and rosy red.

'An artist, you know,' he said, 'has to draw beautiful girls.

Naturally he thinks of the lovely soul behind the lovely face. These

things are only commonplaces. You yourself, Armorel--you--will shame

me, presently--when you have grown to that full height--for drawing a

picture so insufficient of the Perfect Woman.'

He stooped slightly, as if he would have kissed her forehead. Why not?

She was but a child. But he refrained.

[Illustration: _He stooped slightly, as if he would have kissed her

forehead._]

'Let us go home,' he said, with a certain harshness in his voice. 'The

sun is down. The clouds have covered up the belt of blue. You have

seen your splendid future, Armorel, and you are back in the grey and

sunless present. It grows cold. To-morrow, I think, we may have rain.

Let us go home, child: let us go home.'

CHAPTER X

MR. FLETCHER RETURNS FOR HIS BAG

Half an hour later the blinds were down, the fire was brightly

burning, the red firelight was merrily dancing about the room, and the

table was pushed back. Then Dorcas and Justinian came in--the two old

serving-folk, bent with age, grey-headed, toothless--followed by

Chessun--thin and tall, silent and subdued. And Armorel, taking her

violin, tuned it, and turned to her old master for instructions, just

as she had done on the first and every following night of Roland's

stay.

'"Barley Break,"' said Justinian.

Armorel struck up that well-known air. Then, as before, the ancient

dame started, moved uneasily, sat upright, and opened her eyes and

began to talk. But to-night she was not rambling: she did not begin

one fragment of reminiscence and break off in the middle. She started

with a clear story in her mind, which she began at the beginning and

carried on. When Armorel saw her thus disposed, she stopped playing

'Barley Break,' which may amuse the aged mind and recall old

merriment, but lacks earnestness.

'"Put on thy smock o' Monday,"' said Justinian.

This ditty lends itself to more sustained thought. Armorel put more

seriousness into it than the theme of the music would seem to

warrant. The old lady, however, seemed to like it, and continued her

narrative without interrupting it at any point. Armorel also observed

that, though she addressed the assembled multitude generally, she kept

glancing furtively at Roland.

'The night was terrible,' said the ancient dame, speaking distinctly

and connectedly; 'never was such a storm known--we could hear the

waves beating and dashing about the islands louder than the roaring of

the wind, and we heard the minute-gun, so that there was little sleep

for anyone. At daybreak we were all on the shore, out on Shark Point.

Sure enough, on the Castinicks the ship lay, breaking up fast--a

splendid East Indiaman she was. Her masts were gone and her bows were

stove in--as soon as the light got strong enough we could see so

much--and the shore covered already with wreck. But not a sign of

passengers or crew. Then my husband's father, who was always first,

saw something, and ran into the water up to his middle and dragged

ashore a spar. And, sure enough, a man was lashed to the spar. When

father hauled the man up, he was quite senseless, and he seemed dead,

so that another quarter of an hour would have finished him, even if

his head had not been knocked against a rock, or the spar turned over

and drowned him. Just as father was going to call for help to drag him

up, he saw a little leather bag hanging from his neck by a leather

thong. There were others about, all the people of Samson--fifty of

them--men, women, and children--all busy collecting the things that

had been washed ashore, and some up to their waists in the water after

the things still floating about. But nobody was looking. Therefore,

father, thinking it was a dead man, whipped out his knife, cut the

leather thong, and slipped the bag into his own pocket, not stopping

to look at it. No one saw him, mind--no one--not even your father,

Justinian, who was close beside him at the time.'

'Ay, ay,' said Justinian: 'if father had seen it, naturally----' But

his voice died away, and Roland was left to wonder what, under such

circumstances, a native of Samson would have done.

'No one saw it. Father thought the man was dead. But he wasn't.

Presently he moved. Then they carried him up the hill to the

farm--this very house--and laid him down before the fire--just at your

feet, Armorel--and I was standing by. "Get him a cordial," says

father. So we gave him a dram, and he drank it and opened his eyes. He

was a gentleman--we could see that--not a common sailor: not a common

man.'

Here her head dropped, and she seemed to be losing herself again.

'Try her with a Saraband,' said Justinian, as if a determined effort

had to be made. Armorel changed her tune. A Saraband lends itself to a

serious and even solemn turn of thought. As a dance it requires the

best manners, the bravest dress, and the most dignified air. It will

be seen, therefore, that to a mind bent upon a grave narrative of

deeds lamentable and fateful, the Saraband, played in a proper frame

of mind, may prove sympathetic. The ancient lady lifted her head,

strengthened by the opening bars, which, indeed, are very strong, and

resumed her story. Armorel, to be sure, and all her hearers, knew the

history well, having heard it every night in disjointed bits. The Tale

of the Stolen Treasure was familiar to her: it was more than

familiar--it was a bore: the Family Doom seemed unjust to her: it

disturbed her sense of Providential benevolence: yet she threw all her

soul into the Saraband in order to prolong by a few minutes the waking

and conscious moments of this remote ancestress. A striking

illustration, had the others understood it, of filial piety.

'But I was standing close by father,' she went on--'I was beside him

on the beach, and I saw it. I saw him cut the thong and slip the bag

into his pocket. When he came to himself, I whispered to father,

"There's his bag: you've got his bag in your pocket." "I know," he

said, rough. "Hold your tongue, girl." So I said no more, but waited.

Then the man opened his eyes and tried to sit up; but he couldn't,

being still dizzy with the beating of the waves. But he looked at us,

wondering where he was. "You are ashore, Master," said father. "The

only one of all the ship's company that is, so far." "Ashore?" he

asked. "Ay, ashore: where else would you be? Your ship's in splinters:

your captain and your crew are dead men all. But you're ashore." With

that the man shut his eyes and lay quiet for a time. Then he opened

them again. "Where am I?" he asked. "You are on Samson, in Scilly," I

told him. Then he tried to get up again, but he couldn't. And so we

carried him upstairs and laid him on the bed.

'He was in bed for nigh upon six weeks. Never was any man so near his

latter end. I nursed him all the time. He had a fever, and his head

wandered. In his rambling he told me who he was. His name was Robert

Fletcher--Robert Fletcher,' she repeated, nodding to Roland with

strange significance. 'A brave gentleman, and handsome and

well-mannered. He had been in the service of an Indian King; and,

though he was only thirty, he had made his fortune and was bringing it

home, thinking that he would do nothing more all his life but just sit

down and enjoy himself. All his fortune was in the bag. When he

recovered he told me that the last thing he remembered, before he was

washed off the ship, was feeling for the safety of his bag. And it was

gone. And he was a beggar. Poor man! And I knew all the time where the

bag was and who had it. But I could not tell him. If father sinned

when he kept the bag, I sinned as well, because I knew he kept it. If

father was punished when his son was drowned, that son was my husband,

and I was punished too.'

She stopped, and it seemed as if for the evening she had run down; but

Armorel stimulated her again, and she went on, looking more and more

at the face of the stranger that was in their gates.

'While he lay ill and was like to die, father was uneasy--I know why.

He wanted him to die, because then he could keep the treasure with a

quiet mind. "All's ours that comes ashore," that's what we used to

say. He never confessed his thoughts--but I, who knew what was in the

bag, guessed them very well.

'The stranger began to recover, and father fell into a gloomy fit, and

would go and sit by himself for hours. Nobody dared ask him--for he

was a man of short temper and rough in his speech--what was the matter

with him, but I knew very well. He was gloomy because he didn't want

to lose that bag. But the man got better, and at last quite well, and

one morning he came down dressed in clothes that father lent him,

because his own were ruined in the washing of him ashore, and he bade

us all farewell. "Captain Rosevean," he said, very earnestly, "when I

left India I was rich: I was carrying all my fortune home with me in a

small compass, for safety, as I thought. I was going to be a rich man,

and work no more. Well--I have escaped with my life, and that is all.

If I were not a beggar I would offer you half my fortune for saving my

life. As it is, I can offer you nothing but my gratitude."

'So he shook hands with father, who stood as white as a sheet, for all

he was a ruddy-faced man and inclined to brandy. "And farewell,

Mistress Ursula," he said. "Farewell, my kind nurse." So he kissed me,

being a courteous gentleman. "I shall come back again to see you," he

said; "I shall surely come back. Look to see me some day, when you

least expect me." So he went away, and they rowed him over to the

Port, and he sailed to Penzance. Father went to his own room, where

the treasure was. And my heart sank heavy as lead. The more I thought

of the wickedness, the heavier fell my heart. There was father and his

son, my husband, and myself and my own son not yet born. The Hand of

the Lord would be upon us for that wickedness. I ought to have cried

out to the stranger before he went away that his treasure was safe and

that we were keeping it for him. But I didn't. Then I tried to comfort

myself. I said that when he came again I would give him back the bag,

even if I had to steal it from father's chest.

'It was a long time ago--they are all gone, swallowed up by the

sea--which was right, because we stole the treasure from the sea. He

never came back. I looked for him to come after my husband was

drowned, and after my son went too, and my grandson--but he never came

again as he promised. And at last, at last'--her voice rose almost to

a shriek, and everybody jumped in his chair; but Armorel continued to

play the Saraband slowly and with much expression--'at last he has

come back, and we are saved. All that are left of us are saved.

Armorel, my child, you are saved. Your bones shall not lie rotting

among the sea-weed: your flesh shall not be devoured by crabs and

conger-eels: you may sail without fear among the islands. For he has

kept his promise and has come back.

Then she rose--she, who had not stood upon her feet for three

years--actually rose and stood up, or seemed to stand: the red light,

playing on her face, made her eyes shine like two balls of fire.

'You,' she cried, pointing her long, skinny, finger at Roland. 'You!

oh! you have come at last. You have suffered all that innocent blood

to be shed: but you have come at last.' She sank back among her

pillows, but her finger still pointed at the stranger. 'Sir,' she said

now, with tremulous voice, 'you are welcome. Late though it is, Mr.

Fletcher, you are welcome. When you came a day or two ago I wondered,

being now very old and foolish, if it was really you. Now I know. I

remember, though it is nearly eighty years ago. You are welcome again

to Samson, Mr. Fletcher. You find me changed, no doubt. I knew you

would keep your promise and come again, some time or other. As for

you, I see little change. You are dressed differently, and when you

were here last your hair was worn in another fashion. But you are no

older to look at. You are not changed at all by time. You would not

know me again. How should you? I suppose you knew--somebody told you,

perhaps--that the bag was safe after all. That knowledge has kept you

young. Nothing short of that knowledge could have kept you young. I

assure you, Sir, had I known where to find you I would have taken the

bag and its contents to you long, long ago. And now you are come back

in search of it.'

'It was eighty years ago!' Dorcas whispered to Chessun, shuddering.

'He must be more than a hundred!'

'A hundred years!' returned her daughter, with pallid cheeks. 'It

isn't in nature. He looks no more than twenty. Mother, is he a man and

alive?'

'Pretend that you are Mr. Fletcher,' whispered Armorel. 'Do not

contradict her. Say something.'

'It is a long time ago,' said Roland. 'I should have kept my promise

much sooner. And as for that bag--you saved my life, you know. Pray

keep the bag. It has long been forgotten.'

'Keep the bag? Do you know what is in it? Do you know what it is

worth? That, Mr. Fletcher, is your politeness. We, who have suffered

so much from the possession of the bag, cannot believe that you have

forgotten it, because if we have suffered for our guilt you must have

suffered through that guilt. Else there would be no justice. No

justice at all unless you have suffered too. Else all those lives have

been wasted and thrown away.'

The old lady spoke with the voice and firmness of a woman of fifty.

She looked strong: she sat up erect. Armorel played on, now softly,

now loudly. The serving-folk looked on open-mouthed: the women with

terror undisguised. Was this gentleman, so young and so pleasant, none

other than the man whose injury had brought all these drownings upon

the family? Nearly eighty years ago that happened. Then, he must be a

ghost! What else could he be? No human creature could come back after

eighty years still so young.

'When I said, Madam,' Roland explained, 'that I had forgotten the bag,

what I meant was that after losing it so long I had quite abandoned

all hope of finding it again. I assure you that I have not come here

in search of it. In fact, I thought it was lying at the bottom of the

sea, where so many other treasures lie.'

'It is not at the bottom of the sea, Mr. Fletcher. You shall have it

again, to-morrow. You are still so young that you can enjoy your

fortune. Make good use of it, Sir, and do not forget the poor. I have

counted the contents again and again. They are not things that wear

out and rust, are they? No, no. You must often have laughed to think

that the moth and the worm cannot destroy that treasure. You will be

very pleased to have it back.'

'I shall be very pleased indeed,' he echoed, 'to have my treasure

again.'

'Face and voice unchanged.' The old lady shook her head. 'And after

eighty years. It is a miracle, yet not a greater miracle than the

Vengeance which has pursued this house so long. This single crime has

been visited upon the third and fourth generation. 'Tis time that

punishment should cease at last--cease at last! I must tell you, Mr.

Fletcher,' she went on, 'that when my husband was drowned and my

father-in-law died, I took possession of the bag and everything else.

I said nothing to my son. Why? Because, until the owner of the stolen

bag came back, the curse was on him and his children. No--no; I would

not let him know. But I knew very well what would happen to all of

them. Oh! yes; I knew, and I waited. But he was happy, and his son and

his grandson and his great-grandson, until they were drowned, one

after the other. And still you stayed away.'

'Madam, had I known, I would have returned fifty years ago and more,

in time to have saved them all.'

'You might have come sooner, Sir, permit me to say, and so have saved

some.' It was wonderful how erect the old lady held herself, and with

what firmness and precision she spoke.

'There is now only one left--the child Armorel. To-morrow, Sir, you

shall have your bag again. Once more you are our guest: this time, I

hope you will leave a blessing instead of a curse upon the house.'

At this moment Armorel ceased playing. Then this ancient lady stopped

talking. She looked round: her eyes lost their fire: her face its

expression: her mouth its firmness: she fell back in her pillows, and

her head dropped.

Dorcas and Chessun rose and carried her to her own room. The old man

got up, too, and shambled out. Armorel pushed the table into its

place, and lit the candles. The incident was closed. In the morning

the old lady had forgotten everything.

'Almost,' said Roland, 'she has made me believe that my name is

Fletcher. Shall I to-morrow morning ask her for the bag? Where is that

bag? Armorel, it is a true story. I am quite certain of it.'

'Oh, yes, it is true. Justinian knows about the wreck, though it

happened before he was born. Mr. Fletcher was the only man saved of

all the ship and company--captain, officers, crew, and passengers--the

only one. He was rescued by Captain Rosevean himself and brought here.

He had the bedroom where you sleep--the bedroom which was my brother

Emanuel's room. Here he lay ill a long time, but recovered and went

away.'

'And the bag?'

'I know nothing about the bag. That has gone long ago, I suppose, with

all the money that my people made by smuggling and by piloting. I have

seen her watching you for some days past: I thought she would speak to

you last night. To-morrow she will have forgotten everything.'

'I suppose I have some kind of resemblance to Mr. Robert Fletcher,

presumably deceased. Well--but, Armorel, this is a fortunate evening.

The family luck has come back--I have brought it back. The Ancient one

said so, and you are saved. She may call me Fletcher--call me

Tryeth--call me any name that flyeth--if she only calls me him who

arrived in time to save you, Armorel.'

CHAPTER XI

ROLAND'S LETTER

Roland went away. Like Mr. Robert Fletcher, he promised to return,

and, like her great-great-grandmother, but for other reasons, Armorel

treasured this promise. Also like Mr. Robert Fletcher, now presumably

deceased, Roland went away with the sense of having left something

behind him. Not his heart, dear reader. A young man of twenty-one does

not give away his heart in the old-fashioned way any longer: he

carries it about with him, carefully kept in its proper place: what

Roland had left behind him, for awhile, was a part of himself. It

would perhaps come back to him in good time, but for the present it

remained on Samson, and discoursed to the rest of him in London

whenever he would listen, on the beauties of that archipelago and the

graces of the child Armorel. And this part of himself, which haunted

Samson, made him sit down and write a letter. It would have been a

tender, a sorrowful, an affectionate letter had it not been for that

other part of him--the greater part--which went to London. That other

part of him remonstrated. 'She is but a simple country girl,' it said.

'Her future will be to marry a simple Scillonian. Why disturb her

mind? Why seek to plant the seeds of discontent under the guise of

culture? Leave her--leave her to herself. Forget those dark eyes, in

whose depths there seemed to lie so sweet, so great a soul. Believe

me, there was nothing at all behind those eyes but ignorance and

curiosity. How could there be anything? Leave her in peace. Or, since

you must write, let it be a cold letter--friendly, but fatherly--and

let her understand clearly that the visit can produce no further

consequences whatever.' Thus the London half of him--the bigger half.

Perhaps his friend Dick Stephenson remonstrated in the same strain.

But the lesser half insisted on writing a letter of some kind--and had

his way.

He wrote a letter, and sent it off.

It was the very first letter that had ever been sent to Samson. Of

that I am quite sure. No letters ever reached that island. If people

had business with Samson, they transacted it at the Port with

Justinian or Peter. Of course it was the first letter that had ever

been received by Armorel. Peter brought it across for her. He had

wrapped the unaccustomed thing in brown paper for fear the spray

should fall upon it. Armorel drew it forth from its covering and gazed

upon it with the wonder of a child who gets an unexpected toy. She

read over the address a dozen times: '"Miss Rosevean"--look at it,

Dorcas. What a pity you cannot read! "Miss Rosevean"--he might have

written "Armorel"--"Island of Samson, Scilly." Of course, it is from

Roland. No one else would write to me.' Then she opened it carefully,

so as not to injure any part of the writing--indeed, Roland possessed

that desirable, but very rare, gift of a very beautiful hand. No

Penman of the monastery: no scrivener of a later age: no Arab or

Persian scribe, could write a more beautiful hand. It was a hand in

which every letter was clearly formed, as if it made a picture of

itself, and every word was a Group, like the Eastern Isles of Scilly,

to be admired by the whole world.

The letter began--the London portion conceding so much--with a

pen-and-ink sketch of the writer's head: if it was just a little

idealised, who shall blame the limner? This was delightful. Armorel

had no portrait of her friend. What would follow after such a

beautiful beginning? Then the writing began, and Armorel addressed

herself seriously to the mastering of and the meaning of the letter. I

blush to record the fact, but Armorel read handwriting slowly.

Consider. Since she left school she had seen none: while at school she

had seen little. People easily forget such a simple thing, though we

who write all day long cannot understand how a man can forget how to

write. Yet there are many working-men who cannot read handwriting, nor

can they themselves write. They have had no occasion, all their lives,

to use either accomplishment, and so have readily forgotten it--a fact

which shows the profound wisdom of the School Boards in teaching

spelling. Armorel could read the letter, but she read it slowly.

It seemed, when she read it first, sentence by sentence, a really

beautiful letter--regarded as a letter in the abstract. After she had

read it two or three times over, and had mastered the whole document,

she began to understand that the writer of it was not the man she

remembered, not the man whose memory she loved and cherished, not at

all her friend Roland Lee. All the old _camaraderie_ was gone. It was

the letter of another man altogether. It was cold and stiff. The

coldness went to the girl's heart. She had never known Roland to be

cold. Where was the sympathy which formerly flowed in magnetic

currents from one to the other? Where was the brotherly interest?--she

called it brotherly. The writer spoke, it is true, with gratitude

overwhelming, of his stay on the island, and her hospitality. But,

good gracious! Armorel wanted no thanks. His visit had made her happy:

he knew that. Why should he take up a page and a half in returning

thanks to her, when her own heart was full of gratitude to him? He

said that the three weeks he had spent among the islands had been a

holiday which he could never forget--this was very good, so far; but

then he spoiled all by adding that he should not readily

forget--'readily forget' he wrote--his fair companion and guide among

those labyrinthine waters. 'Fair companion!' What had fairness to do

with it? Armorel had been his pupil: he taught her all day long. She

did not want to be called his 'fair companion': that was mockery. She

wanted to be called 'his dear friend' or 'his dear sister': that would

have gone straight to her heart. She expected at least so much when

she opened the letter. But worse--far worse--was to follow. He

actually spoke of the possibilities of their never meeting again, the

world (outside Scilly) being so very wide. Never to meet again! And he

had promised to return: he had faithfully promised. Why, he had only

to take the steamer from Penzance: Samson Island would not sail away.

Why did he not rather say when he was to be expected? Worst of all, he

spoke of her forgetting him. Oh! how could she forget him? As for the

rest of the letter, the paternal advice to continue in the path of

industry, and so forth, no clergyman in the pulpit could speak more

wisely: but these things touched not the girl. Woman wants affection

rather than wisdom, even though she understands, or has, at least,

been told, that Wisdom delivereth from the way of the Evil Man.

Armorel at length laid the letter down with a sigh and a tear. She

kept it in her pocket for some days, and read it every day: but with

increasing sadness. Finally, she laid it in a drawer where were all

the sketches, fragments of illustration, and outline drawings which

Roland had given her. She would read it no longer. She would wait till

Roland came back, and she would ask him what it meant. Perhaps it was

the way of the world to be so cold and so constrained in

letter-writing.

There came a box with the letter. It contained books--quite a large

number of books--selected by Roland with the view of suiting the case

of one who dwells upon a desert island. It was just as if Captain

Woodes Rogers had left Alexander alone upon Juan Fernandez, and gone

home to make up for him a parcel of books intended to show him what

went on in the wider world. There were also drawing materials,

colours, brushes, pencils, books of instruction, and books of music.

Roland the fatherly--the London part of Roland--neglected nothing that

might be solidly serviceable to the young Person. Observe, here, one

of those black gaps of ignorance already spoken of in this girl of the

Lonely Isles. She did not know that an answer to the letter was

absolutely necessary. In the London studio the writer sat wondering

why no answer came. He had been so careful, too: not a word which

could be misunderstood: he had been so truly fatherly. And yet no

reply.

Nobody was at hand to tell Armorel that she must sit down and write

some kind of an answer. She tried, in fact: she made several attempts.

But she could not write anything that satisfied her. The coldness of

the letter chilled her. She wanted to write as she had talked with

him--all out of the fulness of her heart. How could she write to this

frigid creature? The writer of such a letter could not be her dear

companion who laughed and made her laugh, sang and made her sing, made

pictures for her, told her all about his own private ambitions, and

had no secrets from her: it was a strange man who wrote to her and

signed the name of Roland Lee. The real Roland would never have hinted

at the possibility of her forgetting him, or at the chance of their

never meeting again. The real Roland would have written to say when he

was coming again. She could not reply to this impostor.

Therefore, she never answered that letter at all; and so she got no

more letters. It was a pity, because, had she written what was in her

mind, for very pity the real Roland would have returned to her. Once,

and once only, the voice of Roland came to her across the sea--and

then it was a changed voice. He spoke no more. But he would come

again: he said he would come again. Every day she sat on the hill

beside the barrow, and gazed across the Road. She could see the pier

of Hugh Town and the vessels in the port: perhaps Roland had come over

from Penzance by the morning steamer, and would shortly sail across

the Road, and leap out upon the beach, and run to meet and greet her,

with both hands outstretched, the light of affection in his eyes, and

the laugh of welcome in his voice. She was graver and more silent than

before: she did not sing so often as she walked among the ferns: she

did not prattle to Chessun and Dorcas while she made her cakes and

puddings. But nobody noticed any change in her: the serving-women, if

they observed any, would have said only that Armorel was growing into

a woman already.

The autumn changed to winter. Roland would not come in winter, when

the sea is stormy and there is little sunshine. She must wait now

until spring. Meantime, on Samson, where are no trees except those

wizened and crooked little trees of the orchard, there is not much to

mark the winter except the cold wind and the short days. Here there is

never frost or snow, hail or ice. The brown turf is much the same in

December as in August; the dead fern is not so yellow; the dead and

dying leaves of the bramble are not so splendid. The wind is colder,

the sky is more grey; otherwise winter makes little difference in the

external aspect of this archipelago. When the short days begin, the

brown fields of the flower-farms clothe themselves with the verdure of

spring: before the New Year has fairly set in, some of the fresh

delicate flowers have been already cut and laid in the hothouse to be

sent across to Covent Garden. The harvest of the year begins with its

first day, and they reap it from January to May.

There are plenty of things on such a farm for a girl to do. Armorel

did not, if you please, sit down to weep. But she daily recalled with

tender regret every one of the pleasant days of that companionship.

She kept her promise, too: she read something every morning in the

books which Roland had sent her: every afternoon she attempted to

carry on the drawing lesson by herself: she practised her violin

diligently: and every evening she played the old tunes to the old

lady, and awakened her once more to life and memory. There was no

change, except that everything now was coloured by what he had said.

She was to grow to her full height--he had told her how--but at

present she hardly saw her way to carrying out those instructions. Her

full height! Ignorant of the truth--since such a girl grown to her

full height would be so tall as to be out of all proportion, not only

to Samson, but even to St. Mary's itself.

Sometimes one falls into the habit of associating a single person with

an idea, a thought, an anticipation, a place. Whenever the mind turns

to this thought, the person is present. For example, there is a street

in London which I have learned, from long habit, to associate with a

second-hand bookseller. He was a gentle creature, full of reading, who

had known many men. I sometimes sat at the back of his shop conversing

with him. Sometimes a twelve-month would pass without my seeing him at

all. But always when I think of this street I think of this old

gentleman. The other day I passed through it. Alas! the shutters were

up: the house was to let: my gentle friend was gone. Armorel

associated her future--the unknown future--with Roland. Suppose that

when that future should be the present she should find the shutters

up, the house deserted, the tenant dead!

The harvest of flowers was well begun: the boxes piled in the hold of

the steamer merrily danced in the roll of the Atlantic waves as the

_Lady of the Isles_ made her way to Penzance: in London the delicate

narcissus and the jonquil returned to the dinner-tables, and stood

about in glasses. Roland Lee bought them and took them home to his

studio, where he sat looking at them, reminded of Armorel--who had

never even answered his letter. Perhaps the flowers came from Samson.

Why did the girl send him no answer to his letter? Then his memory

went back to that little island with its two hills, and its barrows,

and the quiet house--and to the girl who lived there. On what rock of

Samson was she sitting? Where was she at that moment? Gazing somewhere

over the wild waste of waters, the wind blowing about her curls, and

the beating of the waves in her ears. She had forgotten him. Why not?

He was only a visitor of a week or two. She was nothing but a

child--and an ignorant farmer-girl living in a desert island.

Ignorant? No; that was not the word. He saw her once more standing in

the middle of the room, the ruddy firelight in her eyes and on her

cheeks, playing 'Singleton's Slip' and 'Prince Rupert's March,' while

the Ancient Lady mopped and mowed and discoursed of other days. And

again: he saw her standing on the beach when he said farewell, the

tears in her eyes, her voice choked. Then he longed again, as he had

longed then, to take her in his arms, even in the presence of Peter

the boy, to soothe and kiss her and bid her weep no more, because he

would never, never leave her.

So strong was the impression made upon this young man by this child of

fifteen, that after six months spent in the society of many other

girls, of charms more matured, he still remembered her, and thought of

her with that kind of yearning regret which is perilously akin to

love. An untaught, ignorant girl--whose charm lay in her innocent

confidence, her soft black eyes, and the beauty of the maiden emerging

from the child--could hardly make a permanent impression on a man of

the world, even a young man of only twenty-one. The time would go on,

and the girl would be forgotten, except as a pleasant memory

associated with a delightful holiday. An artist is, perhaps, above his

fellows, liable to swift and sudden changes; his mind dwells

continually on beauty. All lovely girls have not black hair and black

eyes. Apollo, himself, the god of artists, loved not only all the nine

Muses and all the three Graces, but a good many nymphs and princesses

as well--such is the artistic temperament, so catholic is its

admiration of beauty.

CHAPTER XII

THE CHANGE

'A change,' said Roland, 'will surely come, and that before long. I

cannot believe'--Armorel remembered the words afterwards--'that you

will stay on this island for ever.' It needed no unusual gift of

prophecy to foretell impending change when the most important member

of the household was nearing her hundredth year.

The change foretold actually came in April, when the flower-fields had

lost their beauty and the harvest of Scilly was nearly over. Late

blossoms of daffodil still reared their heads among the thick leaves,

though their blooming companions had all been cut off to grace London

tables; there were broad patches of wallflower little regarded; the

leaves of the bulbs were drooping and already turning brown: these

were the signs of approaching summer to the Scillonian, who has

already had his spring. On the adjacent island of Great Britain the

primrose clustered on the banks; the hedges of the West Country were

splendid, putting forth tender leaves over a wealth of wild flowers;

the chestnut-buds were swollen and sticky, ready to burst. Do we not

know the signs and tokens of coming spring? On Scilly, the lengthening

day--there are no hedges and no trees to speak of--the completion of

the flower harvest, and the drooping of the daffodil-leaves in the

fields are the chief signs of spring. Yet there are other signs: if

there are no woods to show the tender leaf of spring, there are the

green shoots of the fern on the down: and there are the birds. The

puffin has already come back; he comes in his thousands: he arrives in

April, and he departs in September: whence he cometh and whither he

goeth no man hath ever learned nor can naturalist discover. At the

same time comes the guillemot, and sometimes the solan-goose: the tern

and the sheerwater come too, if they come at all, in spring: but the

wild ducks and the wild geese depart before the flower-harvest is

finished.

Armorel got up one morning in April a little earlier than usual. It

was five o'clock: the sun was rising over Telegraph Hill on St.

Mary's. She ran down the stairs, opened the door, and stood on the

porch drawing a deep breath. No one was as yet stirring on Samson,

though I think Peter was beginning to turn in his bed. Out at sea

Armorel saw a great steamer, homeward bound, perhaps an Australian

liner: the level rays of the early sun shone on her spars and made

them stand out clear and fine against the sky: behind her streamed her

long white cloud of smoke and steam, hanging over the water, light and

feathery. There were no other ships visible. The air was cold, but the

sun of April was already strong. Armorel shivered, caught her hat, and

ran over the hill, singing as she went, not knowing that in the night,

while she slept, the Angel of Death had visited the house.

About seven o'clock she came back, having completely circumnavigated

the island of Samson, and made, as usual, many curious observations

and discoveries in the manners and customs of puffins, terns, and

shags. She returned in the cheerful mood which belongs to youth,

health, and readiness for breakfast. She instantly perceived, however,

on arriving, that something had happened--something unusual. For Peter

stood in the porch: what was Peter doing in the porch at seven o'clock

in the morning, when he ought to have been ministering to the pigs?

Further, Peter was standing in the attitude of a boy who waits to be

sent on an errand. It is an attitude of expectant readiness--of zeal

according to duty--of activity bought and freely rendered. You will

observe this attitude in all office boys--except telegraph-boys: they

never assume it: they affect no zeal: they betray no eagerness to put

in a fair day's work. Such an attitude would lack the dignity due to a

Government officer. And at sight of Armorel Peter hung his head as one

who sorrows, or is ashamed or repentant. What did he do that for? What

had happened? Why should he hang his head?

She asked these questions of Peter, who only shook his head and

pointed within. She heard Justinian's voice giving some directions.

She also heard Dorcas and Chessun. They were all three speaking in low

voices. She hurried in. The door of the old lady's bedroom--that

sacred apartment into which no one, except the two handmaidens, had

ever ventured--stood wide open; not only that, but Justinian himself

was in the room--actually in the room--and beside the bed. Then

Armorel understood what had happened. On no other condition would

Justinian be admitted to his old mistress's room. On the other side of

the bed stood Dorcas and Chessun. Seeing Armorel at the door, these

two ladies instantly lifted up their voices and wailed aloud--nay,

they shrieked and screamed their lamentations, as if it was the first

time in the world's history that death had carried off an aged woman.

This they did by a kind of instinct: the thing, though they knew it

not, was a survival. In ancient times it was the custom in Lyonesse

that the women should all wail and weep and shriek, and beat their

breasts and tear their hair, and cut their cheeks with their nails,

while the body of the dead king or warrior was carried up the slope of

the hill to be laid in its kistvaen and covered with its barrow on

Samson island.

They wailed aloud, then, because it had always been the right thing

for the women of Samson to do. Otherwise, when one so ancient dies at

last, mind and memory gone before, what place is there for wailing and

weeping? One natural tear we drop, for all must die; but grief belongs

to the death-bed of the young. There needed no shriek of the women nor

anyone's speech to tell Armorel that the white face upturned on the

bed was not the face of a living woman. They had folded the dead hands

across her breast: the eyes were closed: the countless wrinkles of the

aged face were smoothed out: the lips were parted with a wan smile.

After many, many years, Ursula, the widow, was gone to rejoin her

husband. Pray Heaven her desire be granted, and that she rise again

young and beautiful--such a woman as that ill-starred sailor, dragged

to the bottom of the sea by the weight of Robert Fletcher's bag, had

loved in life!

Peter presently sailed across the Road, and returned with the doctor.

It is the part of the doctor not only to usher the new-born into life,

but to bar or open the gates of the tomb: without him very few of us

die, and without him no one can be buried. This man of science

graciously expressed his willingness to acknowledge, though he had not

been called in, that the deceased died of old age. Then he went back.

In the evening there was no music. The violin remained in its place;

the great chair was empty; no one brought out the spinning-wheel; the

table was not pushed back. How was the long evening to be got through

without the violin? How could those ancient tunes be played any more

in the presence of that empty chair? When the serving-folk came in as

usual and sat round the fire, and the women sighed and moaned, and

Justinian stimulated the coals to a flame, and the ruddy light played

upon their faces, Armorel began to think that a continuance of these

evenings would be tedious. Then they began to talk, the conversation

naturally turning on Death and Judgment, and the prospects of Heaven

and the departed.

'She was not one of them,' said Dorcas, 'as would never talk of such

things. I've often heard her say she wanted to rise again, young and

beautiful, same as she was when her husband was took, so that he

should love her again.'

'Nay,' said Justinian; 'that's foolish talk. There's neither marrying

nor giving in marriage there. You ought to know so much, Dorcas.

Husbands and wives will know each other, I doubt not, if it's only for

the man's forgiveness after the many crosses and rubs. 'Twould be a

pity, wife, if we didn't know each other, golden crown and all. I'd be

sorry to think you were not about somewhere.'

Armorel listened without much interest. She wondered vaguely how

Dorcas would look in a golden crown, and hoped that she might not

laugh when she should be permitted to gaze upon her thus wonderfully

adorned. Then she listened in silence while these thinkers followed up

their speculations on the next world and the decrees of Heaven, with

the freedom of their kind. A strangely brutal freedom! It consigns,

without a thought of pity, the majority of mankind to a doom which

they are too ignorant to realise and too stupid to understand. The

deceased lady, it was agreed, might, perhaps--though this was by no

means certain--have fallen under Conviction of Sin at some remote

period, before any of them knew her. Not since, that was certain. And

as for her husband, he was cut off in his sins--like all the

Roseveans, struck down in his sins, without a warning. So that if the

old lady expected to meet him, after their separation of nearly eighty

years, on the Shores of Everlasting Praise, she would certainly be

disappointed, because he was otherwise situated and disposed of.

Therefore she might just as well go up old and wrinkled. This kind of

talk was quite familiar to Armorel, and generally meant nothing to

her. The right of private judgment is claimed and freely exercised in

Scilly, where that branch of the Church Catholic called Bryanite

greatly flourishes. Formerly, she would have passed over this talk

without heeding. Now, she had begun to think of these as well as of

many other things. Roland's words on religious things startled her

into thinking. She listened, therefore, wondering what view people

like Roland Lee would take of her great-grandfather's present

condition, and of the poor old lady's prospects of meeting him again.

Then her thoughts wandered from these nebulous speculations, and she

heard no more, though the conversation became lurid with the flames of

Tartarus, and these old religioners gloated over the hopeless

sufferings of the condemned. A sweet and holy thing, indeed, has

mankind made of the Gospel of Great Joy!

Before they separated, Chessun rose and left the room noiselessly.

Armorel had no experience of the situation, but she knew that

something was going to be done, something connected with the impending

funeral--something solemn.

In fact, Chessun returned after ten minutes or a quarter of an hour,

the others making a pretence of expecting nothing. Doctrinal

meditation was written on Justinian's brow: resignation on that of

Dorcas. Chessun bore in her hands a tray with glasses and a silver

tankard filled with something that steamed. It was a posset, made with

biscuits, new milk and sherry, nutmeg and sugar--an emotional drink,

strong, sweet, comforting, very good for mournful occasions, but, of

late years, unfortunately, gone out of fashion.

They all had a glass, the two women moaning over their glasses, and

the old man shaking his head. Then they went to bed.

They had a posset every night until the funeral. They buried the

ancient dame on Bryher. A boat carried the coffin across the water to

the landing-place in New Grinsey Sound, behind which stands the little

old church with its churchyard. Armorel and her household followed in

one of the family boats, as in a mourning-carriage. All the people of

Tresco and Bryher were present at the funeral; and most of them came

across to Samson after the ceremony to drink a glass of wine and eat a

slice of cake, the women no longer wailing and the men no longer

shaking their heads.

All the Roseveans who have escaped the vengeance of Mr. Fletcher's

terrible bag lie in Bryher churchyard. They are mostly widows, poor

things! They sleep alone, because their husbands' bones lie about

among the tall weeds in the tranquil depths of the ocean.

And Armorel, looking forward, thought with terror of the long, silent

evenings, while the old serving-folk would sit round in the firelight,

silent, or saying things that might as well have been left unsaid.

CHAPTER XIII

ARMOREL'S INHERITANCE

'You are now the mistress, dearie,' said Dorcas. 'It is time that you

should learn what that means.'

It was the morning after the funeral--the Day of Accession--the

beginning of the new reign.

'Why, Dorcas, it makes no difference, does it? There are still the

flowers and the house and everything.'

'Yes--there's everything.' The old woman nodded her head meaningly.

'Oh! yes--there is everything. Oh! you don't know--you don't

suspect--nobody knows--what a surprise is in store for you!'

'What surprise, Dorcas?'

'You've never been into her room except to see her lying dead. It's

your room now. You can go in whenever you like. Always the master or

the mistress has slept in that room. When her father-in-law died she

took the room. And she's slept in it ever since. And no one, except me

and Chessun to clean up and sweep and dust, has ever been in that room

since. And now it's yours.'

'Well, Dorcas, it may be mine; but I shall go on sleeping in my own

room.'

'Then keep it locked--keep it locked up--day and night. There's nobody

in Samson to dread--but keep it locked! As for sleeping in it, time

enough, perhaps, when you come to marry. But keep it locked----'

'Why, Dorcas, what is in it?'

'I am seventy-five years old and past,' Dorcas went on. 'I was fifteen

when I came to the house, and here I've been ever since. Not one of

the grandchildren nor the great-grandchildren ever came in here. No

one ever knew what is kept here.'

'What is it, then?' Armorel asked again.

'She used to come here alone, by daylight, regularly once a month. She

locked the door when she came in. No one ever knew what she was doing,

and no one ever asked. One day she forgot to lock the door, and by

accident I opened it, and saw what she was doing.'

'What was she doing?'

'She'd opened all the cupboards and boxes, and she'd spread out all

the things, and was counting, and--no, no--you may guess, when you

have looked for yourself, what she was doing. I shut the door softly,

and she never knew that I'd looked in upon her. She might have been

overseen from the orchard, but no one ever went in there except to

gather the fruit. To make safe, however, I've put up a muslin blind

now, because Peter might take it into his head--boys go everywhere

peering and prying. Nobody knows what I saw. I never even told

Justinian. Men blab, you see: they get together, and they drink--then

they blab. You can never trust a man with a secret. How long would it

be before Peter would let it out if he knew? Once over at Hugh Town,

drinking at a bar, and all the world would know in half an hour. No,

no; the secret was hers: it was mine as well--but that was an

accident--she never knew that: now it will be yours and mine. And we

will tell nobody--nobody at all.'

'Where shall I find this wonderful secret, Dorcas?'

'Wherever you look, dearie. Oh! the room is full of things. There

can't be such another room in all the world. It's crammed with things.

Look everywhere. If they knew, all the young lords and princes would

be at your feet, Armorel, because you are so rich. Best keep it

secret, though, and get richer.'

'I so rich? Dorcas, you are joking!'

'No--you shall look and find out. Not that you will understand at

first--because, how should you know the value of things? Here's her

bunch of keys. She always carried them in her pocket, and at night she

kept them under her pillows--and there I found them, sure enough, when

she was cold and dead. Take them, child. I never told her

secret--no--not even to my own husband. Take the keys, child. They are

yours--your own. You can open everything: you can look at everything:

you can do what you like with everything. It's your inheritance. But

tell no one,' she repeated, earnestly. 'Oh! my dear, let it remain a

secret. Don't let anyone see you when you come in here. Lock the door,

as she did--and keep it locked.'

The old woman led Armorel by the hand to the door of the room where

there was to be found the Great Surprise. She opened it, placed a

bunch of keys in her hand, pushed her in and closed it behind her,

whispering, 'Lock it, and keep it locked.'

The girl turned the key obediently, wondering what would happen next.

The room was on the ground floor, looking out upon the orchard, with a

northern aspect, so that the sun could only shine in for a small

portion of the year, during the summer months. The apple-trees were

now in blossom, the white pink and flowers bright in the sunshine

contrasting with the grey lichen which wrapped every branch and hung

down like ribbons. The room was the oldest part of the house, the only

remaining portion of an earlier house: it was low and small: the

fireplace had never been modernised: it stood wide open, with its dogs

and its broad chimney: the window was of three narrow lights, one of

which could be opened: all were still provided with the old diamond

panes in their leaden setting. Armorel observed the muslin blind put

up by Dorcas to keep out prying eyes. In dull and cloudy days the room

would be gloomy. As it was, even with the bright sunshine out of

doors, the air seemed cold and oppressive--perhaps from the fresh

association of Death. Armorel shivered as she looked about her.

The greater part of the room was taken up by a large bed. In the old

lady's time it had curtains and a head, and things at the four corners

like the plumes of a hearse, but in faded crimson. Then it looked

splendid. Now, the bed had been stripped: curtains and plumes and all

were gone, and only the skeleton bed left, with its four great solid

posts and its upper beams, and its feather bed lying exposed, with the

bare pillow-cases upon the mattress. But the bedstead was magnificent

without its trappings, because it was made of mahogany black with age:

they no longer make such bedsteads. There was also a table--an old

black table--with massive legs; but there was nothing on it.

Between door and wall there was a row of pegs, with a chair beneath

them. Now, by some freak of chance, when Dorcas and Chessun hung up

the ancient dame's things for the last time--her great bonnet, and the

cap of many ribbons within it, and her silk dress--they arranged them

so as to present a most extraordinary presentment of the venerable

lady herself--much elongated and without any face: she seemed to be

sitting in the chair below the pegs, dressed as usual, and nodding her

great bonnet, but pulled out to eight or ten feet in length. Armorel

caught the ghostly similitude and started, trembling. It seemed as if

in a moment the wrinkled old face, with the hawk-like nose and the

keen eyes, would come back to the bonnet and the cap. She was so much

startled that she turned the bonnet round. And then the figure seemed

watching with the shoulders. This was uncanny, but it was not so

terrible as the faceless form.

Beside the fireplace was a cupboard--one of those huge cupboards which

one only finds in the old houses. Armorel tried the door, but it was

locked. Against the wall stood a chest of drawers, brass-bound,

massive. She tried the handles, but every lock was fast. Under the

window stood an old sea-chest. It was a very big sea-chest. One would

judge, from its rich carvings and its ornamental ironwork, that it was

probably the sea-chest of an admiral at least--perhaps that of Admiral

Hernando Mureno, Armorel's ancestor, if such was his rank in the navy

of his Catholic Majesty. The sight of this sea-chest caused the girl

to shiver with the fear of expectation. Nobody contemplates the

absolutely unknown without a certain fear. It contained, she was

certain, the things that Dorcas had seen, of which she would not

speak. The chest seemed to drag her: it cried, 'Open me. Look inside

me--see what I have got to show you.'

Then she remembered, as one in a dream, hearing people talk. Words

long forgotten came back to her. 'Twas in Hugh Town, whither she went

across to school when she was as yet a little girl. 'What have the

Roseveans'--thus and thus said the voice--'done with all their money?

They've never spent anything: they've gone on saving and saving. Some

day we shall find out what became of it.' Was she going to find out

what had become of it?

The old lady, in her most lucid moments, had never dropped the least

hint of any inheritance, except that disagreeable necessity of getting

drowned on account of the unfortunate Robert Fletcher. And that was

not an inheritance to gladden the heart. Yet there was an inheritance.

It was here, in this room. And she was locked in alone, in order that

she, herself unseen by any, might discover what it was.

Baron Bluebeard's last wife--she who afterwards, as a beautiful, rich,

and lively young widow, set so many hearts aflame--was not more

curious than Armorel. Nor was she, in the course of her

investigations, more afraid than Armorel. The girl looked nervously

about the room, so ghostly and so full of shadow. All old rooms have

their ghosts, but some of them have so many that one is not afraid of

them. There is a sense of companionship in a crowd of ghosts. This

room had only one--that of the woman who had grown old in it--who had

spent nearly eighty years in it. All the old ghosts had grown tired of

this monotonous room, gone away and left the place to her. Armorel not

only 'believed in ghosts'--many of us accord to these shadows a

shadowy, theoretical belief--she actually knew that ghosts do

sometimes appear. Dorcas had seen many--Chessun herself, while not

going actually that length, threw out hints. She herself had often,

too, gone to look for them. Now she glanced nervously where the

'things' were hanging, expecting to see the ancestral figure reappear,

shoulders move, the bonnet and cap turn round, the old, old face

within them, ready to warn, to admonish, and to guide. If this had

happened, it would have seemed to Armorel nothing but what was natural

and in the regular course of things looked for. But, outside, the sun

shone on the white apple-blossom. No one is very much afraid of ghosts

in the sunshine.

She encouraged herself with this reflection, and began with unlocking

the chest of drawers. The lower drawers, when they were opened,

contained nothing but the 'things' of her great-great-grandmother.

Among them was a box roughly made--a boy's box made with a jack-knife:

it contained a gold watch with a French name upon it--a very old

watch, with a representation of the Annunciation in low relief on the

gold face. There were also in the box two or three gold chains and

sundry rings and trinkets. Armorel took them out and laid them on the

table. They were, she said to herself, part of her inheritance. Was

this the Great Surprise spoken of by Dorcas? She tried the two upper

drawers. They were locked, but she easily found the right key, and

opened them. She found that they were filled with lace; they were

crammed with lace. There were packets of lace tied up tight, rolls of

lace, cardboards with lace wound round and round--an immense quantity

of lace was lying in these drawers. As for its value, Armorel knew

nothing. Nor did she even ask herself what the value might be. She

only unrolled one or two packets, and wondered vaguely what in the

world she should do with so much lace. And she wished it was not so

yellow. Yet the packets she unrolled contained Valenciennes--some of

it half a yard wide, precious almost beyond price. Armorel knew,

however, very well how it had got there, and what it meant. The

descendant of so many brave runners was not ignorant that lace,

velvet, silk and satin, brandy and claret, all came from the French

coast with which her gallant forefathers were so familiar before the

Preventive Service interfered. This, then, was left from the smuggling

times. They had not sold all. They had kept enough, in fact, to stock

half a dozen West-End shops, to adorn the trousseau of fifty

Princesses. And here the stuff had lain undisturbed since--well,

perhaps, since the unfortunate visit of Mr. Robert Fletcher.

'My inheritance, so far,' said Armorel, 'is a pile of yellow lace and

a gold watch and chain and some trinkets. Is this the Great Surprise?'

But she looked at the sea-chest. Something more must be there.

Next she turned to the cupboard. It was locked and double-locked. But

she found the key. The cupboard was one of those great receptacles

common in the oldest houses, almost rooms in themselves, but dark

rooms, where mediæval housekeepers kept their stores. In those days,

housekeeping on a respectable scale meant the continual maintenance of

immense stores. All the things which now we get from shops as we want

them were then laid in store long before they were wanted. Outside the

country town there were no shops; and, even in London itself, people

did not run to the shop every day. The men had great quantities of

shirts--three clean shirts a day was the allowance of a solid city man

under good Queen Anne--a city man who respected himself: the women had

a corresponding quantity of flowered petticoats. Wine was by no means

the only thing laid down for future years. All these accumulations

helped to give solidity to the appearance of life. When a woman

thought of her cupboards filled with fine linen and a man of his

cellars filled with wine, the uncertainty and brevity of life alleged

by the Preacher seemed not to concern them. It would be absurd to lay

down a great bin of good port if one was not going to live long enough

to drink it. The fashion, therefore, has its advantages.

Armorel threw open the door and looked in. The place was so dark that

she was obliged to light a candle in order to examine the shelves

running round the sides of the cupboard. There was a strange smell in

the place, which, perhaps, had not been opened for a long time. Bales

of some kind lay upon the upper shelves. Armorel took down two and

opened them. They contained silk--strong, rich silk. She rolled them

up and put them back. On a lower shelf was a most singular collection.

In the front row were one--two--no fewer than six punch-bowls, all of

silver except one, and that was of silver gilt. This must be the Great

Surprise. Armorel took them all out and placed them on the table. For

the most part they showed signs of having been used with freedom--one

has heard of an empty punch-bowl being kicked about the place as a

conclusion to the feast. But six punch-bowls! 'They came,' said

Armorel, 'from the wrecks.' Behind the punch-bowls were silver

candlesticks, silver snuffers, silver cups, silver tankards--some with

coats-of-arms, some with names engraven. There was also a great silver

ship, one of those galleons in silver which formerly adorned Royal

banquets. All these Armorel took out and arranged upon the table.

Among them was a tall hour-glass mounted in silver. Armorel set the

sand running again, after many years. On the floor there were packets

and bundles tied up and rolled together. Armorel opened one of them,

and, finding that it contained a packet of gold lace and a pair of

gold epaulettes, she left them undisturbed. And standing against the

wall, stacked behind the bundles of gold lace, were swords--dozens of

swords. What could she do with swords? Well, then, now, at last, she

had found the Great Surprise. But still the sea-chest seemed to drag

her and to call to her: 'Open me! Open me! See what I have got for

you!'

'So far, then,' she said, 'I have inherited a pile of lace; a gold

watch, rings, and chains; six punch-bowls, twenty-four silver

candlesticks, twelve silver cups, four great tankards, a silver ship,

I know not how many old swords, and a bundle of gold lace. I wonder if

these things make a person rich?'

If so, great wealth does not satisfy the soul. This was certain,

because Armorel really felt no richer than before. Yet the array of

punch-bowls was truly imposing, and the silver candlesticks, the

snuffers, the tankards, the cups, and the ship, though they sadly

wanted the brush and the chamois leather, with a pinch of 'whitenin','

were worthy of a College Plate-Room. One might surely feel a little

elation at the thought of owning all this silver, even if one did not

understand its intrinsic value. But, like the effect of champagne,

such elation would quickly wear off.

Next, Armorel remembered the secret cupboard at the head of the bed.

Her own bed had its secret recess at the head--every respectable

bedstead used formerly to have them. Where else could money be hidden

away safely? To be sure, everybody knew this hiding-place, but

everybody pretended not to know. It was an open secret, like the

concealed drawer in a schoolboy's desk. Our forefathers were full of

such secrets that everybody knew. The stocking in the teapot: the

receptacle under the hearthstone: the hidden compartment in the

cabinet: the secret room: the secret staircase: the recess in the head

of the bed--these were all secrets that everybody knew and everybody

respected. I think that even the burglar respected these conventions.

Armorel knew how to open the panel--she found the spring and it flew

open, rustily, as if it had not been opened for a great many years.

Behind the panel was a recess eighteen inches long and about nine

inches deep. And here stood a Black Jack--nothing less than a Black

Jack; a quart Jack, not a Leather Jack, but a tankard made of tin and

painted with hunting scenes something like an Etruscan vase, or

perhaps more like a Brown George. Why should anyone want to hide away

a Black Jack? This quart pot, however, held something better than

stingo--even stronger: it was half-filled with foreign money. Here

were moidores, doubloons, ducats, pieces-of-eight, Louis d'ors,

Spanish pillar dollars, sequins, gold coins from India--nothing at all

in the pot less than a hundred years old. Armorel took out a handful

and looked at them. Well, gold coins do look like money. She began to

feel really rich. She had a quart tankard half-full of gold coins. She

added the Black Jack to the other treasures on the table. All this

foreign money must have come out of the wrecks. And, since it was all

so old, out of wrecks that had happened before the memory even of the

Ancient Lady. This, then, was perhaps the Great Surprise.

But there remained the sea-chest under the window, and again, when

Armorel looked upon it, the chest continued to call to her, 'Open me!

Open me! See what I have for you!'

Armorel found the key which unlocked it, and threw open the lid.

Within, there was the deep tray which belongs to every sea-chest. This

was filled with a quantity of uninteresting brown canvas bags. She

wanted to see what was below, and tried to lift the tray, but it was

too heavy. Then, still regarding the bags as of no account, she took

one out. It was heavy, and when she lifted it there was a clink as of

coin. It was tied tightly at the mouth with a piece of string. She

opened it. Within there were gold coins. She took out a handful: they

were all sovereigns, some of them worn, some quite new and fresh from

the Mint. She poured out the whole contents of the bag on the table.

Why, it was actually full of golden sovereigns. Nothing else in the

bag. All golden sovereigns! And there were five hundred of them. She

counted them. Five hundred pounds! She had never, it is true, thought

much about money--but--five hundred pounds! It seemed an amazing sum.

Five hundred pounds! And all in a single bag. And such a little bag as

this. She put back the money and tied up the bag.

Then she took out another bag. This was as big as the first, and

heavier. It was full of guineas--Armorel counted them. There were also

five hundred of them. Some of them were so old that they bore the

impression of the elephant, and therefore belonged to the seventeenth

century. But most of them belonged to the eighteenth century, and bore

the heads of the three first Georges. Five hundred guineas--and never

before had Armorel seen a guinea! Well, she thought, that made a

thousand pounds. She took up another bag and opened it. That, too,

weighed as much and was full of gold. And another, and yet another.

They were all full of gold. And now she knew what Dorcas

meant--this--nothing but this--was the Great Surprise! Not the

punch-bowls, or the lace, or the bales of silk, but these bags full of

gold constituted her wealth. She understood money, you see: lace and

silk were beyond her. This was her inheritance!

Consider: the Roseveans, from father to son, had been from time

immemorial wreckers, smugglers, and pilots. They were also farmers. On

their little farm they grew nearly enough to support their simple

lives. They had pigs and poultry; they had milch cows; they had a few

sheep; they kept geese, pigeons, ducks; they made their own beer and

their own cordials and strong waters; they made their own linen; they

were unto themselves millers, tinkers, carpenters, cabinet-makers,

builders, and thatchers. They grew their own salads and vegetables,

and if they wanted any fruit they grew that as well. Oats and barley

they grew, clover and hay. I believe that on Samson wheat has never

been grown--indeed, there are only eighty acres in all. There was

left, therefore, little to buy. Coals, wood for fuel and for

carpentering, things in iron, crockery, tools, cloth clothes, flannel,

flour, and sometimes a little beef--what else did they want? As for

fish, they had only to catch as much as they wanted. Tea, coffee,

sugar, and so forth came in with later civilisation, when small ale,

possets, and hypsy died out.

In order to provide these small deficiencies they were pilots, to

begin with. This trade brought in a steady income. They also sent out

boats, filled with fresh vegetables, to meet the homeward-bound East

Indiamen. And they were also, like the rest of the artless islanders,

wreckers and smugglers. In the former capacity they occasionally

acquired an extraordinary quantity of odd and valuable things. In the

latter profession they made at times, and until the Peace and the

Preventive Service put an end to the business, a really fine income.

Then, on Samson, they continued to live after the patriarchal fashion

and in the old simplicity. Each Captain Rosevean in turn was the

chieftain or sheik. To him his family brought all that they earned or

found. The sea-chest took it all. For three hundred years, at least,

this sea-chest received everything and gave up nothing. Nobody ever

took anything out of it: nobody looked into it: nobody knew, until

Ursula counted the money and made bags for it, what there was in the

chest. Nobody ever asked if they were rich or how rich they were.

There was no bank on Samson: there is not even now a bank in the

Scilly archipelago at all: nobody understood any other way of saving

money than the good old fashion of putting it by in a bag. On Samson

there never were thieves, even when as many as fifty people lived on

the island. Therefore the Captain Rosevean of the time, though he knew

not how much was saved, nor did he ever inquire, laid the last

additions to the pile in the tray of the old sea-chest with the rest,

and, having locked it up, dropped the key in his pocket, and went

about his business in perfect confidence, never thinking either that

it might be stolen, or that he might count up his hoard, proceed to

enjoy it, and alter his simple way of life. Every Captain Rosevean in

succession added to that hoard every year; not one among them all

thought of spending it or taking anything from it. He added to it.

Nobody ever counted it until the reign of Ursula. It was she who made

the little brown bags of canvas: she, usurping the place of Family

Chief or Sheik, took from her sons and grandsons all the money that

they made. They gave it over to her keeping--she was the Family Bank.

And, like her predecessors in that room, she told no one of the hoard.

Most of the bags contained guineas of George I., George II., and

George III., down to the year 1816, when the Mint left off coining

guineas. A few contained sovereigns of later date; but the family

savings since that year had been small and uncertain. The really fat

time--the prosperous time--when the money poured in, was during the

long war which lasted for nearly five-and-twenty years.

There were actually forty of these bags. Armorel laid them out upon

the table and counted them. Forty! And each bag to all appearance, for

she only counted two, contained five hundred guineas or pounds. Forty

times five hundred--that makes twenty thousand pounds, if all were

sovereigns! There are, I am told, a few young ladies in this country

who have as much as twenty thousand pounds for their dot. There are

also a great many young ladies in France, and an amazing multitude,

whom no man may number, in the United States of America, who have as

much. But I am quite sure that not one of these heiresses, except

Armorel herself, has ever actually gazed upon her fortune in a

concrete form--tangible--to be counted--to be weighed--to be admired.

It is a pity that they cannot do this, if only because they would then

see for themselves what a very small pile of gold a fortune of twenty

thousand pounds actually makes. This would make them humble. Armorel

stood looking at the table thus laden with bewildered eyes.

'I have got,' she murmured, 'twenty thousand sovereigns and guineas at

least: I have got a painted pot full of old money. I have got six

punch-bowls, a great silver ship, a large number of silver

candlesticks and cups: I have got a silver-mounted hour-glass'--its

sand was now nearly run--'I have got a great quantity of lace and

silk. I suppose all this does make riches. Whatever shall I do with

it? Shall I give it to the poor? or shall I put it back into the box

and leave it there? But perhaps there is something else in the box.'

The chest, in fact, continued to call aloud to be examined. Even while

Armorel looked at her glittering treasures spread out upon the table

she felt herself drawn towards the chest. There was more in it. There

was another Surprise waiting for her--even a greater Surprise,

perhaps, than that of the bags of gold. 'Search me!' cried the chest.

'Search me! Look into the innermost recesses of me: explore my

contents to the very bottom: let nothing escape your eyes.'

Armorel knelt down before the chest and took out the tray. It was

empty now, and she could lift it easily.

Beneath the tray there was a most miscellaneous collection of things.

They lay in layers, separated and divided--Ursula's hand was here--by

silk handkerchiefs of the good old kind--the bandanna, now gone out of

fashion.

First Armorel took out and laid on the floor a layer of silver spoons,

silver ladles, even silver dishes, all of antique appearance and for

the most part stamped with a crest or a coat-of-arms: for in the old

days if a man was Armiger he loved to place his shield on everything;

to look at it and glory in it: to let others see it and envy it.

Then she found a layer of watches. There were gold watches and silver

watches; the latter of all kinds, down to the veritable turnip. The

glasses were broken of nearly all, and, if one had examined, the works

would have been found rusted with the sea-water which had got in. What

were they worth now? Perhaps the value of the cases and of the jewels

with which the works were set, and more with one or two, where

miniatures adorned the back and jewels were set in the face. Armorel

turned with impatience from the watches to the gold chains, which lay

beside them. There were yards of gold chain: gold chains of all kinds,

from the heavy English make to the dainty interlaced Venetian and

thread-like Trichinopoly; there were silver chains also--massive

silver chains, made for some extinct office-bearer, perhaps bo's'n on

the Admiral's ship of the Great Armada. Armorel drew up some of the

chains and played with them, tying them round her wrists and letting

them slip through her fingers--the pretty delicate things, which spoke

of wealth almost as loudly as the bags of guineas.

She laid them aside, and took up a silk handkerchief containing a

small collection of miniatures. They were almost all portraits of

women: young and pretty women: ladies on land whose faces warmed the

hearts and fired the memories of men at sea. The miniatures had hung

round the necks of some and had lain in the sea-chests of others,

whose bones had long since melted to nothing in the salt sea depths,

while those of their mistresses had turned to dust beneath the aisle

of some village church, their memory long since forgotten, and their

very name trampled out by the feet of the rustics.

Armorel laid aside these pictures--they were very pretty, but she

would look at them again another time.

The next parcel was a much larger one. It consisted of snuff-boxes.

There were dozens of snuff-boxes: one or two of gold: one or two

silver-gilt: some silver. In the lids of some were pictures, some most

beautifully and delicately executed; some of subjects which Armorel

did not understand--and why, she thought, should painters draw people

without proper clothes? Venus and the Graces and the Nymphs, in whom

our eighteenth-century ancestors took such huge delight, were to this

young person merely people. The snuff-boxes were very well in their

way, but Armorel had no inclination to look at them again.

Then she found in a handkerchief, the four corners of which were

loosely tied together, a great quantity of rings. There were rings of

every kind--the official ring or the ring of office, the signet-ring,

the ring with the shield, the ring with the name of a ship, the ring

with the name of a regiment, mourning-rings, wedding-rings,

betrothal-rings, rings with posies, cramp-rings with the names of the

Magi on them--but their power was gone--gimmal-rings, rings episcopal,

rings barbaric, mediæval, and modern, rings set with every kind of

precious stone--there were hundreds of rings. All drowned sailors used

to have rings on their fingers.

Armorel began to get tired of all these treasures. Beneath them,

however, at the bottom of the box, lay piled together a mass of

curios. They were stowed away for the most part in small boxes, of

foreign make and appearance: ivory boxes: carved wood boxes. They

consisted of all kinds of things, such as gold and silver buckles,

brooches, painted fans, jewel-hilted daggers, crystal tubes of attar

of roses, and knives of curious construction. The girl sighed: she

would look over them at another time. They would, perhaps, add

something to the inheritance, but for the moment she was satisfied.

She had seen enough. She was putting back a dagger whose jewelled

handle flashed in the unaccustomed light, when she saw, lying half

hidden among this pile of curious things, the corner of a chagreen

case. This attracted her curiosity, and she took it out. The chagreen

had been green in colour, but was now very much discoloured. It had

been fastened by a silver clasp, but this was broken: a small leather

strap was attached to two corners. Armorel expected to find another

bag of money. But this did not contain gold. It was lighter than the

canvas bags. As she took it into her hands she remembered the bag of

Robert Fletcher. Yes. The leathern strap of this case had been cut

through. She held in her hands--she was certain--the abominable Thing

that had brought so much trouble on the family. Again the room felt

ghostly: she heard voices whispering: the voices of all those who had

been drowned: the voices of the women who had mourned for them: the

voice of the old lady who was herself a witness of the crime. They all

whispered together in her ears: 'Armorel, you must find him. You must

give it back to him.'

What was in it? The clasp acted no longer. Armorel lifted the

overlapping leather and looked within. There was a thick roll of silk.

She took this out. Wrapped up in the silk, laid in folds, side by

side, were a quantity of stones--common-looking stones, such as one

may pick up, she thought, on the beach of Porth Bay. There were a

couple of hundred or more, mostly small stones, only one or two of

them bigger than the top of Armorel's little finger.

'Only stones!' she cried. 'All this trouble about a bag full of red

stones!'

Among the stones lay a small folded paper. Armorel opened it. The

paper was discoloured by age or by water, and most of the writing was

effaced. But she could read some of it.

'... from the King of Burmah himself. This ruby I estimate to be worth

... 000_l._ at the very least. The other ... Mines. The second largest

stone weighs ... about 2,000_l._ The smaller ... rt Fletcher.'

It was a note on the contents of the parcel, written by the owner.

The stones, therefore, were rubies, uncut rubies. Armorel knew little

about precious stones and jewels, but she had heard and read of them.

The price of a virtuous woman, she knew, was far above rubies. And

Solomon's fairest among women was made comely with rows of jewels.

Queen Sheba, moreover, brought precious stones among her presents to

the Wise King. The girl wondered why such common-looking objects as

these should be precious. But she was humbly ignorant, and put that

wonder by.

This, then, was nothing less than Robert Fletcher's fortune. He had

this round his neck, and he was bringing it home to enjoy. And it was

taken from him by her ancestor. A wicked thing indeed! A foul and

wicked thing! And the poor man had been sent empty away to begin his

life all over again. She shivered as she looked at them. All for the

sake of these dull, red bits of stone! How can man so easily fall into

temptation? In the empty room, so quiet, so ghostly, she heard again

the whispers, 'Armorel, find him--find the man--and give him back his

jewels.'

She replied aloud, not daring to look round her lest she should see

the pale and eager faces of those who had suffered death by drowning

in consequence of this sin, 'Yes--yes, I will find him! I will find

him!'

She pushed the chagreen case back into its corner and covered it up.

'I will find him,' she repeated. Then she rose to her feet and looked

about the room. Heavens! What a sight! The bags of gold, two of them

open, their contents lying piled upon the table--the chains of gold on

the floor--the handful of old gold coins lying on the table beside the

Black Jack, the snuff-boxes, the miniatures, the punch-bowls, the

rings, the silver cups--the low room, dark and quiet, filled with

ghosts and voices, the recent occupant wagging her shoulders and

shaking the back of her bonnet at her from the opposite wall, and,

through the open window, the sight of the sunlight on the

apple-blossoms mocking the gold and silver in this gloomy cave. She

comprehended, as yet, little of the extent of her good fortune. Lace

and silk, rings and miniatures, snuff-boxes: all these things had no

value to her--of buying and selling she had no kind of experience. All

she understood was that she was the possessor of a vast quantity of

things for which she could find no possible use--one jewelled dagger,

for instance, might be used for a dinner-knife, or for a paper-knife;

but what could she do with a dozen? In addition to this museum of

pretty and useless things she had forty bags with five hundred

guineas, or pounds, in each--twenty-one thousand pounds, say, in cash.

This museum was perfectly unique: no family in Great Britain had such

a collection. It had been growing for more than three hundred years:

it was begun in the time of the Tudor Kings, at least, perhaps even

earlier. Wrecks there were, and Roseveans, on Samson, before the

seventh Henry. I doubt if any other family, even the oldest and the

noblest, has been collecting so long. Certainly no other family, even

in this archipelago of wrecks, can have had such opportunities of

collecting with such difficulties in dissipating. For more than three

hundred years! And Armorel was sole heiress!

She understood that she had inherited something more than twenty

thousand pounds--how much more, she knew not. Now, unless one knows

something of the capacities of one single pound, one cannot arrive at

the possibilities of twenty thousand pounds. Armorel knew as much as

this. Tea at Hugh Town costs two shillings a pound--perhaps

two-and-four--sugar threepence a pound: nun's cloth so much a

yard--serge and flannel so much: coals, so much a ton: wood for fuel,

so much. This was nearly the extent of her knowledge: and it must be

confessed that it goes very little way towards a right comprehension

of twenty thousand pounds.

Once, again, she had heard Justinian talking of the flower-farm. 'It

has made,' he said, 'four hundred pounds this year, clear.' To which

Dorcas replied, 'And the housekeeping doesn't come to half that, nor

near it.' Whence, by the new light of this Great Surprise, she

concluded, first, that the other two hundred, thus made, must have

been added to those money-bags, and, next, that two hundred pounds a

year would be a liberal allowance for her whole yearly expenditure.

Then she made a little calculation. Two hundred pounds a year--two

hundred into twenty thousand--twenty thousand--two and four

noughts--she put five bags in a row for the number--subtract two--she

did so--there remained three--divide by two--she did so--one hundred

years was the result of that sum. Her twenty thousand pounds would

therefore last her exactly one hundred years. At the expiration of the

century all would be gone. For the first time in her life Armorel

comprehended the fleeting nature of riches. And, naturally, the

discovery, though she shivered at the thought of losing all, made her

feel a little proud. A strange result of wealth, to advance the

inheritor one more step in the knowledge of possible misery! She was

like unto the curious youth who opens a book of medicine, only to

learn of new diseases and terrible sufferings and alarming symptoms,

and to imagine these in his own body of corruption. In a hundred years

there would be no more. She would then be reduced to sell the lace and

the other things for what they would then be worth. There would still,

however, remain the flower-farm. She would, after all, be no worse off

than before the Great Surprise. And then there sprang up in her heart

the blossom of another thought, to be developed, later on, into a

lovely flower.

She had risen from her knees now, and was standing beside the table,

vaguely gazing upon her inheritance. It was all before her. So the

Ancient Lady had stood many and many a time counting the money:

looking to see if all was safe: content to count it and to know that

it was there. The old lady was gone, but from the opposite wall her

shoulders and the back of her bonnet were looking on.

Well: Armorel might go on doing exactly the same. She might live as

her forefathers had lived: there was the flower-farm to provide all

their necessities: if it brought in four hundred pounds a year, she

could add two hundred to the heap--in every two years and a half

another bag of five hundred sovereigns. All her people had done

this--why not she? It seemed expected of her; a plain duty laid upon

her shoulders. If she were to live on for eighty years longer--which

would bring her to her great-great-grandmother's age--she would save

eighty times two hundred--sixteen thousand pounds. The inheritance

would then be worth thirty-six thousand pounds--a prodigious sum of

money indeed. And, besides, the Black Jack, with its foreign gold, and

the rings and lace and things!

A strange room it was this morning. What voice was it that whispered

solemnly in her ear, 'Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth,

where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and

steal'?

Never before had this injunction possessed any other significance to

her than belongs to one manifestly addressed to other people. The

Bible is full of warnings addressed to other people. Armorel was like

the Royal Duke who used to murmur during the weekly utterance of the

Commandments, 'Never did that. Never did that.' Now, this precept was

clearly and from the very first intended to meet her own case. Oh! To

live for nothing than to add more bags to that tray in the great

sea-chest!

Roland had prophesied that there would be a change. It had come

already in part, and more was coming.

What next? As yet the girl did not understand that she was mistress of

her own fate. Hitherto things had been done for her. She was now about

to act for herself. But how? If Roland were only here! But he had only

written once, and he had never kept his promise to write back again to

Samson. If he were here he could advise.

She looked around, and saw the heaps of things that were all hers, and

she laughed. The girl whom Roland thought to be only an ignorant and

poor little country girl, a flower-farmer's girl of Samson Island,

living alone with her old grandmother and the serving-folk, was

ignorant still, no doubt. But she was not poor: she was rich--she

could have all that can be bought with money--she was rich. What would

Roland say and think? And she laughed aloud.

She was rich--the last girl in the world to hope, or expect, or desire

riches. Thus Fate mocks us, giving to one, who wants it not, wealth:

and to another, who knows not how to use it, youth: and to a third,

insensible of its power, beauty. The young lady of society, she whom

the good old hymns used to call the Worldling--fond and pretty title!

there are no Worldlings now--would have had no difficulty in knowing

how to use this wonderful windfall. She, indeed, is always longing,

perhaps praying, for money: she is always thinking how delightful it

would be to be rich, and how there is nothing in the whole world more

desirable than much fine gold. But to Lady Worldling, poor thing! such

a windfall never happens. Again, there are all the distressed

gentlewomen, the unappreciated artists, the authors whose books won't

sell, the lawyers who have no clients, the wives whose name is

Quiverful, the tradesman who 'scapes the Bankruptcy Court year after

year by the skin of his teeth, and the poor dear young man who pines

away because he cannot join the rabble rout of Comus--why, why does

not such a windfall ever come to any of these? It never does: yet they

spend all their spare time--all the time when they ought to be

planning and devising ways and means of advancement--in dreaming of

the golden days they would enjoy, if only such a windfall fell to

them. One such man I knew: he dreamed of wealth all his life: he tried

to become rich by taking every year a share in a foreign lottery. Of

course, he never won a prize. While he was yet young and even far down

the shady or outer slope of middle age he continually built castles in

the air, fashioning pleasant ways for himself when he should get that

prize. When he grew old, he dreamed of the will he would make and of

the envy with which other old men, when he was gone, should regard the

memory of one who had cut up so well. So he died poor; but I think he

had always, through his dreaming, been as happy as if he had been

rich.

Armorel told herself, standing in the midst of this great treasure,

that she was rich. Roland had once told her, she remembered, that an

artist ought to have money in order to be free: only in freedom, he

said, could a man make the best of himself. What was good for an

artist might be good for her. At the same time--it is not for nothing

that a girl reads and ponders over the Gospels--there were terrible

words of warning--there were instances. She shuddered, overwhelmed

with the prospects of new dangers.

She knew everything: the room had yielded all its secrets there were

no more cupboards, boxes, or drawers. The sight of the treasures

already began to pall upon her. She applied herself to putting

everything back. First the chagreen case. This she laid carefully in

its corner among the daggers and pistols, remembering that she had

promised to find the owner. How should she do that if she remained on

Samson? Then she put back the snuff-boxes, the miniatures, and the

watches in their silk handkerchiefs: then the box of rings and the

silver spoons and dishes. Then she put the tray in its place and laid

the bags in the tray, and locked the old sea-chest. This done, she

bore back to the shelves in the cupboard the punch-bowls,

candlesticks, tankards, and the big silver ship: she locked and

double-locked the cupboard-door: she crammed the lace into the

drawers, and put back the box of trinkets.

Then she dropped the keys in her pocket. Oh! what a lump to carry

about all day long! But the weight of the keys in her pocket was

nothing to the weight that was laid upon her shoulders by her great

possessions. This, however, she hardly felt at first.

Everything was her own.

When the new King comes to the throne he makes a great clearance of

all the personal belongings of the old King. He gives away his cloaks

and his uniforms, and all the things belonging to the daily life of

his predecessor. That is always done. Therefore, Queen Armorel--Vivat

Regina!--at this point gathered together all her predecessor's

belongings. She turned them out of the drawers and laid them on the

floor--with the great bonnet and the wonderful cap of ribbons. And

then she opened the door. She would give these things to Dorcas. Her

great-great-grandmother should have no more authority there. Even her

clothes must go. If her ghost should remain, it should be without the

bonnet and the cap.

She called Dorcas, who came, curious to know how her young mistress

took the Great Surprise. Armorel had taken it, apparently, as a matter

of course. So the new King stands upon the highest step of the Throne,

calm and collected, as if he had been prepared for this event, and was

expecting it day after day.

'You know all now, dearie?' she whispered, shutting the door

carefully. 'Did you find everything?'

'Yes--I believe I found everything.'

'The silver in the cupboard: the lace: the bags of gold?'

'I think I have found everything, Dorcas.'

'Then you are rich, my dear. No Rosevean before you was ever half so

rich. For none of it has been spent. They've all gone on saving and

adding--almost to the last she saved and added. Oh! the last thing she

lost was the love of saving, and the jealousy of her keys she never

lost. Oh! you are very rich--you are the richest girl in the whole of

Scilly--not even in St. Mary's is there anyone who can compare with

you. Even the Lord Proprietor himself--I hardly know.'

'Yes. I believe I must be very rich,' said Armorel. 'Dorcas, you kept

her secret. Keep mine as well. Let no one know.'

'No one shall know, dearie--no one. But lock the door. Keep the door

locked always.'

'I will. Now, Dorcas, here are all her dresses and things. You must

take them all away and keep them. They are for you.'

'Very well, dearie. Though how I'm to wear black silk---- Oh! Child,'

she cried, out of the religious terrors of her soul--'it is written

that it is harder for a rich man to enter into heaven than for a camel

to pass through the eye of a needle. My dear, if these great riches

are to drag your soul down into hell, it would be better if they were

all thrown into the sea, the silver punch-bowls and the bags of gold

and all. But there's one comfort. It doesn't say, impossible. It only

says, harder. So that now and then, perhaps, a rich man may wriggle

in--just one--and oh! I wish, seeing the number of rich people there

are in the world, that there'd been shown one camel--only a single

camel--going through the needle's eye. Think what a miracle! 'Twould

have brought conviction to all who saw it, and consolation ever

afterwards to all who considered it--oh! the many thousands of

afflicted souls who are born rich! You are not the only one, child,

who is rich through no fault of her own. Often have I told Justinian,

thinking of her, and he not knowing or suspecting, but believing I was

talking silly, that, considering the warnings and woes pronounced

against the rich, we cannot be too thankful. But don't despair, my

dear--it is nowhere said to be impossible. And there's the rich young

man, to be sure, who was told to sell all that he had and to give to

the poor. He went away sorrowful. You can't do that, Armorel, because

there are no poor on Samson. And it's said, "Woe unto you that are

rich, for you have had your consolation!" Well, but if your money

never is your consolation--and I'm sure I don't know what it is going

to console you for--that doesn't apply to you, does it? There's the

story of the Rich Man, again; and there's texts upon texts, when you

come to think of them. You will remember them, child, and they will be

your warnings. Besides, you are not going to waste and riot like a

Prodigal Son, and where your earthly treasure is there you will not

set your heart. You will go on like all the Roseveans before you: and

though the treasure is kept locked up, you will add to it every year

out of your savings, just as they did.'

'There is another parable, Dorcas. I think I ought to remember that as

well. It is that of the Talents. If the man who was rich with Five

Talents had locked them up, he would not have been called a good and

faithful servant.'

'Yes, dearie, yes. You will find some Scripture to comfort and assure

your soul, no doubt. There's a good deal in Scripture. Something for

all sorts, as they say. Though, after all, riches is a dangerous

thing. Child! if they knew it over at St. Mary's, not a young man in

the place but would be sailing over to Samson to try his luck. Our

secret, child, all to ourselves.'

'Yes; our secret, Dorcas. And now take away all these things,

everything that belonged to her: there are her shoes--take them too. I

want the room to be all my own. So.'

When all the things were gone, Armorel closed and locked the door.

Then she ran out of the house gasping, for she choked. Everything was

turned into gold. She gasped and choked and ran out over the hill and

down the steps and across the narrow plain, and up the northern hill,

hoping to drive some of the ghosts from her brain, and to shake off

some of the bewildering caused by the Great Surprise. But a good deal

remained, and especially the religious terrors suggested by that pious

Bryanite Christian and Divider of the Word, Dorcas Tryeth.

When she sat down in the old place upon the carn, the great gulf

between herself and Bryher island reminded her of that great gulf in

the parable. How if she should be the Rich Man sitting for ever and

for ever on the red-hot rock, tormented with pain and thirst--and how

if on Samson Hill beyond she should see Abraham himself, the

patriarch, with Lazarus lying at his feet--as yet she had developed no

Lazarus--but who knows the future? The Rich Man must have been a

thoughtless and selfish person. Until now the parable never interested

her at all: why should it? She had no money.

The other passages, those which Dorcas had kindly quoted in this her

first hour of wealth, came crowding into her mind, and told her they

were come to stay. All these texts she had previously classed with the

denunciations of sins the very meaning of which she knew not. She had

no concern with such wickedness. Nor could she possibly understand how

it was that people, when they actually knew that they must not do such

things, still went on doing them. Now, however, having become rich

herself, all the warnings of the New Testament seemed directed against

herself. Already, the load of wealth was beginning to weigh upon her

young shoulders.

She changed the current of her thoughts. Even the richest girl cannot

be always thinking about woes and warnings. Else she would do nothing,

good or bad. She began to think about the outer world. She had been

thinking of it constantly ever since Roland left her. Now, as she

looked across the broad Roadstead, and remembered that thirty miles

beyond Telegraph Hill rose the cliffs where the outer world

begins--they can be seen in a clear day--a longing, passionate and

irresistible, seized her. She could go away now, whenever she pleased.

She could visit the outer world and make the acquaintance of the

people who live in it.

She laughed, thinking how Justinian, who had never been beyond St.

Mary's, pictured, as he was fond of doing, the outer world. The Sea of

Tiberias was to him the Road: the Jordan was like Grinsey Sound: the

steep place down which the swine fell into the sea was like Shipman's

Head: the Sermon on the Mount took place on just such a spot as the

carn of the North Hill on Samson, with the sun shining on the Western

Islands: the New Jerusalem in his mind was a city like Hugh Town,

consisting of one long street with stone houses, roofed with slate;

each house two storeys high, a door in the middle, and one window on

each side. On the north side of the New Jerusalem was the harbour,

with the ships, the sea-shore, and the open sea beyond: on the south

side was a bay with beaches of white sand and black rocks at the

entrance, exactly like Porth Cressa. And it was a quiet town, with

seldom any noise of wheels, and always the sound of the sea lapping on

either hand, north or south.

Now, there was nothing to keep her: she could go to visit the outer

world whenever she pleased--if only she knew how. A girl of sixteen

can hardly go forth into the wide, wide world all alone, announcing to

the four corners her desire to make the acquaintance of everybody and

to understand anything.

And then she began to remember her teacher's last instructions. The

perfect girl was one who had trained her eye and her hand: she could

play one instrument well: she understood music: she understood art:

she was always gracious, sympathetic, and encouraging: she knew how to

get their best out of men: she was always beautifully dressed: she had

the sweetest and the most beautiful manners.

And here she blushed crimson, and then turned pale, and felt a pang as

if a knife had pierced her very heart. For a dreadful thought struck

her. She thought she understood at last the true reason why Roland

never came back, though he promised, and looked so serious when he

promised.

Why? why? Because she was so ill-mannered. Of course that was the

reason. Why did Roland speak so strongly about the perfect girl's

gracious and sympathetic manners, unless to make her understand, in

this kindly and thoughtful way, how much was wanting in herself? Of

course, he only looked upon her as a common country girl, who knew

nothing, and would never learn anything. He wanted her to understand

that--to feel that she would never rise to higher levels. He drew this

picture of the perfect girl to make and keep her humble. Nay, but now

she had this money--all this wealth--now--now---- She sprang to her

feet and threw out her arms, the gesture that she had learned I know

not where. 'Oh!' she cried, 'it is the gift of the Five Talents! I am

not the rich young man. I have not received these riches for my

consolation. They are my Five Talents. I will go away and learn--I

will learn. I will become the perfect girl. I will train eye and hand.

I will grow--grow--grow--to my full height. That will be true work in

the service of the Giver of those Talents. I shall become a good and

faithful servant when I have risen to the stature that is possible for

me!'

PART II

CHAPTER I

SWEET COZ

'I suppose,' said Philippa, 'that we were obliged to ask her.'

'Well, my dear,' her mother replied, 'Mr. Jagenal is an old friend,

and when----' Her voice dropped, and she did not finish the sentence.

It is absurd to finish a sentence which is understood.

'Perhaps she will not do anything very outrageous.'

'Well, my dear, Mr. Jagenal distinctly said that her manner----' Again

she left the sentence unfinished. Perhaps it was her habit.

'As she bears our name and comes from our place we can hardly deny the

cousinship. In a few minutes, however, we shall know the worst.'

Philippa, dressed for dinner, was standing before the fire, tapping

the fender impatiently with her foot, and playing with her fan. A

handsome girl of three- or four-and-twenty: handsome, not pretty, if

you please, nor lovely. By no means. Handsome, with a kind of beauty

which no painter or sculptor would assign to Lady Venus, because it

lacked softness; nor to Diana, because that huntress, chaste and fair,

was country-bred, and Philippa was of the town--urban. The young lady

was perfectly well satisfied with her own style of beauty. If she

exaggerated a little its power, that is a common feminine mistake. The

exaggeration brings to dress a moral responsibility. Philippa was

dressed this evening in a creamy white silk, which had the effect of

softening a face and manner somewhat cold and even hard. The young men

of the period complained that Philippa was stand-offish. Certainly she

did not commit the mistake, too common among girls, of plunging

straight off into sympathetic interest with every young man. Philippa

waited for the young men to interest her, if they could. Generally,

they could not. And, while many girls listen with affected deference

to the opinions of the young man, Philippa made the young man receive

hers with deference. These plain facts show, perhaps, why Philippa, at

twenty-four, was still free and unengaged.

In appearance she was tall--all young ladies who respect themselves

are tall in these days: her features were clearly cut, if a little

pronounced: her hazel eyes were intellectually bright, though cold:

her hair, the least-marked feature, was of a common brown colour, but

she treated it so as to produce a distinctive effect: her mouth was

fine, though her lips were rather thin: her figure was correct, though

Venus herself would have preferred more of it, and, perhaps, that more

flexible. But it is the commonplace girl, we know, who runs to

plumpness.

She was dressed with greater care than usual that evening, because

people were coming, but not to dinner. The only guests at dinner were

to be one Mr. Jagenal, the well known family solicitor, of Lincoln's

Inn, and a certain far-off cousin, named Armorel Rosevean, from the

Scilly Isles, and her companion and chaperon, one Mrs. Jerome

Elstree--unknown.

'My dear,' her mother began, 'you are too desponding. Mr. Jagenal

assured your father----' She dropped her voice again.

'Oh! He is an old bachelor. What does he know? Our cousin comes from

Scilly. So did we. It does very well to talk of coming from Scilly, as

if it was something grand, but I have been looking into a book about

it. Old families of Scilly, we say. Why, they have never been anything

but farmers and smugglers. And our cousin, I hear, is actually a small

tenant-farmer--a flower-farmer--a kind of market-gardener! She grows

daffodils and jonquils and anemones and snowdrops, and sells them.

Very likely the daffodils on our table have come from her farm.

Perhaps she will tell us about the price they fetch a dozen. And she

will inform us at dinner how she counts the stalks and makes out the

bills.'

'Absurd! She is an heiress. Mr. Jagenal says----'

'An heiress? How can she be an heiress?' Philippa repeated, with

scorn. 'She inherits the lease of a little flower-farm. The people of

Scilly are all quite, quite poor. My book says so. Some years ago the

Scilly folk were nearly starving.'

'Your book must be wrong, Philippa. Mr. Jagenal says that the girl has

a respectable fortune. When a man of his experience says that, he

means----' Here her voice dropped again.

'Well; the island heiress will go back, I dare say, to her

inheritance.'

At this point Mr. Jagenal himself was announced--elderly, precise,

exact in appearance and in language.

'You have not yet seen your cousin?' he asked.

'No. She will be here immediately, I suppose.'

'Your cousin came to our house five years ago. My late partner

received her. She brought a letter from a clergyman then at the Scilly

Islands. She was sixteen, quite ignorant of the world, and a really

interesting girl. She had inherited a very handsome fortune. My late

partner found her tutors and guardians, and she has been travelling

and learning. Now she has come to London again. She chooses to be her

own mistress, and has taken a flat. And I have found a companion for

her--widow of an artist--our young friend Alec Feilding knew about

her--name of Elstree. I think she will do very well.'

'Alec knew her? He has never told me of any lady of that name.'

Philippa looked a little astonished.

Then the girl of whom they were talking, with the companion in

question, appeared.

You know how one forms in the mind a whole image, or group of images,

preparatory; and how these shadows are all dispelled by the appearance

of the reality. At the very first sight of Armorel, Philippa's

prejudices and expectations--the vision of the dowdy rustic, the

half-bred island savage, the uncouth country maiden--all vanished into

thin air. New prejudices might arise--it is a mistake to suppose that

because old prejudices have been cleared away there can be no

more--but, in this case, the old ones vanished. For while Armorel

walked across the room, and while Mrs. Rosevean stepped forward to

welcome her, Philippa made the discovery that her cousin knew how to

carry herself, how to walk, and how to dress. Girls who have learned

these three essentials have generally learned how to talk as well. And

a young lady of London understands at the first glance whether a

strange young person, her sister in the bonds of humanity, is also a

lady. As for the dress, it showed genius either on the part of Armorel

herself or of her advisers. There was genius in the devising and

invention of it. But genius of this kind one can buy. There was the

genius of audacity in the wearing of it, because it was a dress of the

kind more generally worn by ladies of forty than of twenty-one. And it

required a fine face and a good figure to carry it off. Ladies will

quite understand when I explain that Armorel wore a train and bodice

of green brocaded velvet: the sleeves and the petticoat trimmed with

lace. You may see a good deal of lace--of a sort--on many dresses; but

Philippa recognised with astonishment that this was old lace, the

finest lace in the world, of greater breadth than it is now made--lace

that was priceless--lace that only a rich girl could wear. There were

also pearls on the sleeves: she wore mousquetaire gloves--which proved

many things: there were bracelets on her wrists, and round her neck

she had a circlet of plain red gold--it was the torque found in the

kistvaen on Samson, but this Philippa did not know. And she observed,

taking in all these details in one comprehensive and catholic glance

of mind and eye, that her cousin was a very beautiful girl indeed,

with something Castilian in her face and appearance--dark and

splendid. For a simple dinner she would have been overdressed; but

considering the reception to come afterwards, she was fittingly

arrayed. She was accompanied by her companion--Philippa might have

remembered that one must be an heiress in order to afford the luxury

of such a household official. Mrs. Jerome Elstree was almost young

enough to want a chaperon for herself, being certainly a good deal

under thirty. She was a graceful woman of fair complexion and blue

eyes: if Armorel had desired a contrast to herself she could not have

chosen better. She wore a dress in the style which is called, I

believe, second mourning. The dress suggested widowhood, but no longer

in the first passionate agony--widowhood subdued and resigned.

The hostess rose from her chair and advanced a step to meet her

guests. She touched the fingers of Mrs. Elstree. 'Very pleased,

indeed,' she murmured, and turned to Armorel. 'My dear cousin'--she

seized both her hands, and looked as well as spoke most motherly. 'My

dear child, this is, indeed, a pleasure! And to think that we have

known nothing about your very existence all the time! This is my

daughter--my only daughter, Philippa.' Then she subsided into her

chair, leaving Philippa to do the rest. 'We are cousins,' said

Philippa, kindly but with cold and curious eyes. 'I hope we shall be

friends.' Then she turned to the companion. 'Oh!' she cried, with a

start of surprise. 'It is Zoe!'

'Yes,' said Mrs. Elstree, a quick smile on her lips. 'Formerly it was

Zoe. How do you do, Philippa?' Her voice was naturally soft and sweet,

a caressing voice, a voice of velvet. She glanced at Philippa as she

spoke, and her eyes flashed with a light which hardly corresponded

with the voice. 'I was wondering, as we came here, whether you would

remember me. It is so long since we were at school together. How long,

dear? Seven years? Eight years? You remember that summer at the

seaside--where was it? One changes a good deal in seven years. Yet I

thought, somehow, that you would remember me. You are looking very

well, Philippa--still.'

A doubtful compliment, but conveyed in the softest manner, which

should have removed any possible doubt. Armorel looked on with some

astonishment. On Philippa's face there had risen a flaming spot.

Something was going on below the surface. But Philippa laughed.

'Of course, I remember you very well,' she said.

'But, dear Philippa,' Mrs. Elstree went on, softly smiling and gently

speaking, 'I am no longer Zoe. I am Mrs. Jerome Elstree--I am La Veuve

Elstree. I am Armorel's companion.'

'I am sorry,' Philippa replied coldly. Her eyes belied her words. She

was not sorry. She did not care whether good or evil had happened to

this woman. She was too good a Christian to desire the latter, and not

good enough to wish the former. What she had really hoped--whenever

she thought of Zoe--was that she might never, never meet her again.

And here she was, a guest in her own home, and companion to her own

cousin!

Then Mr. Rosevean appeared, and welcomed the new cousin cordially. He

seemed a cheerful, good-tempered kind of man, was sixty years of age,

bald on the forehead, and of aspect like the conventional Colonel of

_Punch_--in fact, he had been in the Army, and served through the

Crimean war, which was quite enough for honour. He passed his time

laboriously considering his investments--for he had great

possessions--and making small collections which never came to

anything. He also wrote letters to the papers, but these seldom

appeared.

Then they went in to dinner. The conversation naturally turned at

first upon Scilly, their common starting-point, and the illustrious

family of the Roseveans.

'As soon as I heard about you, my dear young lady, I set to work to

discover our exact relationship. My grandfather, Sir Jacob--you have

heard of Sir Jacob Rosevean, Knight of Hanover? Yes; naturally--he was

born in the year 1760. He was the younger brother of Captain Emanuel

Rosevean, your great-grandfather, I believe.'

'My grandfathers were all named either Emanuel or Methusalem. They

took turns.'

'Quite so,' Mr. Rosevean nodded his head in approbation. 'The

preservation of the same Christian names gives dignity to the family.

Anthony goes with Ashley: Emanuel or Methusalem with Rosevean. The

survival of the Scripture name shows how the Puritanic spirit lingers

yet in the good old stocks.' Philippa glanced at her mother, mindful of

her own remarks on the old families of Scilly. 'We come of a very fine

old family, cousin Armorel. I hope you have been brought up in becoming

pride of birth. It is a possession which the world cannot give and the

world cannot take away. We are a race of Vikings--conquering Vikings.

The last of them was, perhaps, my grandfather, Sir Jacob, unless any of

the later Roseveans----'

'I am afraid they can hardly be called Vikings,' said Armorel, simply.

'Sir Jacob--my grandfather--was cast, my dear young friend, in the

heroic mould--the heroic mould. Nothing short of that. For the

services which he rendered to the State at the moment of Britannia's

greatest peril, he should have been raised to the House of Lords. But

it was a time of giants--and he had to be contented with the simple

recognition of a knighthood.'

'Jacob Rosevean'--who was it had told Armorel this--long before? And

why did she now remember the words so clearly, 'ran away and went to

sea. He could read and write and cipher a little, and so they made him

clerk to the purser. Then he rose to be purser himself, and when he

had made some money he left the service and became Contractor to the

Fleet, and supplied stores of all kinds during the long war, and at

last he became so rich that they were obliged to make him a Knight.'

'The simple recognition of a Knighthood,' Mr. Rosevean went on. 'This

it is to live in an age of heroes.'

Armorel waited for further details. Later on, perhaps, some of the

heroic achievements of the great Sir Jacob would be related.

Meantime, every hero must make a beginning: why should not Jacob

Rosevean begin as purser's clerk? It was pleasing to the girl to

observe how large and generous a view her cousins took of the family

greatness--never before had she known to what an illustrious stock she

belonged. The smuggling, the wrecking, the piloting, the

farming--these were all forgotten. A whole race of heroic ancestors

had taken the place of the plain Roseveans whom Armorel knew. Well: if

by the third generation of wealth and position one cannot evolve so

simple a thing as an ancient family, what is the use of history,

genealogy, heraldry, and imagination? The Roseveans were Vikings: they

were the terror of the French coast: they went a-crusading with

short-legged Robert: they were rovers of the Spanish Main: the great

King of Spain trembled when he heard their name: they were buccaneers.

Portraits of some of these ancestors hung on the wall: Sir Jacob

himself, of course, was there; and Sir Jacob's great-grandfather, a

Cavalier; and his grandfather, an Elizabethan worthy. Presumably,

these portraits came from Samson Island. But Armorel had never heard

of any family portraits, and she had grown up in shameful ignorance of

these heroes. There was a coat-of-arms, too, with which she was not

acquainted. Yet there were circumstances connected with the grant of

that shield by the Sovereign--King Edward the First--which were highly

creditable to the family. Armorel listened and marvelled. But her host

evidently believed it all: and, indeed, it was his father, not

himself, who had imagined these historic splendours.

'It is pleasing,' he said, 'to revive these memories between members

of different branches. You, however, are fresh from the ancestral

scenes. You are the heiress of the ancient island home: yours is the

Hall of the Vikings: to you have been entrusted the relics of the

past. I look upon you and seem to see again the Rovers putting forth

to drag down the Spanish pride. There are noble memories, Armorel--I

must call you Armorel--associated with that isle of Samson, our

ancient family domain. Let us never forget them.'

The dinner came to an end at last, and the ladies went away.

Mrs. Elstree sat down in the most comfortable chair by the fire and

was silent, leaning her face upon her hands and looking into the

firelight. Mrs. Rosevean took a chair on the other side and fell

asleep. Philippa and Armorel talked.

'I cannot understand,' said Philippa, bluntly, 'how such a girl as you

could have come from Scilly. I have been reading a book about the

place, and it says that the people are all poor, and that Samson, your

island--our island--is quite a small place.'

'I will tell you if you like,' said Armorel, 'as much about myself as

you please to hear.' The chief advantage of an autobiography--as you

shall see, dear reader, if you will oblige me by reading mine, when it

comes out--is the right of preserving silence upon certain points.

Armorel, for example, said nothing at all about Roland Lee. Nor did

she tell of the chagreen case with the rubies. But she did tell how

she found the treasure of the sea-chest, and the cupboard, and how she

took everything, except the punch-bowls and the silver ship and cups,

to London, and how she gave them over to the lawyer to whom she had a

letter. And she told how she was resolved to repair the deficiencies

of her up-bringing, and how, for five long years, she had worked day

and night.

'I think you are a very brave girl,' said Philippa. 'Most girls in

your place would have been contented to sit down and enjoy their good

fortune.'

'I was so very ignorant when I began. And--and one or two things had

happened which made me ashamed of my ignorance.'

'Yet it was brave of you to work so hard.'

'At first,' said Armorel, 'when this good fortune came to me I was

afraid, thinking of the Parable of the Rich Man.' Philippa started and

looked astonished. In the circle of Dives this Parable is never

mentioned. No one regardeth that Parable, which is generally believed

to be a late interpolation. 'But when I came to think, I understood

that it might be the gift of the Five Talents--a sacred trust.'

Philippa's eyes showed no comprehension of this language. Armorel,

indeed, had learned long since that the Bryanite or Early Christian

language is no longer used in society. But Philippa was her cousin.

Perhaps, in the family, it would still pass current.

'I worked most at music. Shall I play to you?'

'Nothing, dear Philippa,' said Zoe, half-turning round, 'would please

you so much as to hear Armorel play. You used to play a little

yourself'--Philippa had been the pride and glory of the school for her

playing--'A little!' Had she lost her memory?

'Will you play this evening?'

'I brought her violin in the carriage,' said Zoe, softly. 'I wanted to

give you as many delightful surprises as possible, Philippa. To find

your cousin so beautiful: to hear her play: and to receive me again!

This will be, indeed, an evening to remember.'

'I will play if you like,' said Armorel, simply. 'But perhaps you have

made other arrangements.'

'No--no--you can play? But of course, you have had good masters. You

shall play instead of me.'

Zoe murmured her satisfaction, and turned again her face to the fire.

'Tell me, Armorel,' said Philippa, 'all this about the Vikings--the

Hall of the Vikings--the Rovers--and the rest of it. Was it familiar

to you?'

'No; I have never heard of any Vikings or Rovers. And there is no

Hall.'

'We are, I suppose, really an old family of Scilly?'

'We have lived in the same place for I know not how many years. One

of the outlying rocks of Scilly is called Rosevean. Oh! there is no

doubt about our antiquity. About the Crusaders, and all the rest of

it, I know nothing. Perhaps because there was nobody to tell me.'

'I see,' said Philippa, thoughtfully. 'Well, it does no harm to

believe these things. Perhaps some of them are true. Sir Jacob,

certainly, cannot be denied; nor the Roseveans of Samson Island. My

dear, I am very glad you came.'