"WIDE TOLD OF IS THIS."
"What had young Garson said to make Uncle Brüs so angry?" asked Yaspard.
"He did not say much that was unpleasant--even from our point of view.
It is the letter of a gentleman anyway; and I know very well that his
mother's son could not say or do or think anything that was not like a
gentleman. I knew her, poor dear, when we were both young. See, here
is the letter. You may read it. It was flung to me. Your uncle did
not care who saw it, or who knows about his 'feud'--oh, I'm sick of the
word."
Yaspard smoothed out the letter, which his uncle had crushed up in his
rage, and read--
"DEAR MR. ADIESEN,--I very much regret being obliged to remind you once
more that Havnholme is part of the Lunda property, and that it was my
dear father's wish that the sea-birds on the island should not be
molested.
"I shall always be very pleased to give you, or any other naturalist,
every facility for studying the birds in their haunts, but I cannot
(knowing as I do so well the mind of my late father in this matter)
permit innocent creatures to be disturbed and distressed as they have
been of late. You know the circumstances to which I allude.
"I do wish (as my father so long wished) that you would meet me and
have a friendly talk, when I have no doubt we could smooth this
matter--I mean your grievance regarding Havnholme. It seems so
unneighbourly, not to say unchristian, to keep up a quarrel from
generation to generation.
"Pardon me if it seems presumptuous of a young fellow like me to write
thus to you; but I feel as it I were only the medium through which my
good noble father were making his wishes known. If you will allow me,
I will call upon you at some early time.--Yours sincerely, FRED GARSON."
"It's a very decent letter," said Yaspard, "and everybody who knows the
young Laird says he is a brick; but I know how Uncle Brüs would flare
up over this. One has only to utter 'holme' or 'Lunda' in uncle's
hearing if one wants to bring the whole feud about one's ears."
Here Signy put in her soft little voice. "But it really was a shame
about the birds, Yaspard. You said so, you know; and oh, I have dreamt
about them ever so often, poor things!"
"That's true. Still, uncle persists that the holme is his property;
and the Lairds of Lunda have always got the name of land-grabbers."
Miss Osla looked up at the boy with a kind of terror in her eyes. "O
Yaspard," she cried, "don't you begin that way too. Don't you believe
all that's told you. Don't you take up that miserable, wicked--yes,
wicked--quarrel."
"Easy, easy, Aunt Osla! I haven't dug up the hatchet yet. But can you
tell me what was the true origin of that affair?"
"I don't believe anybody ever knew what it began about, or why. The
Garsons and Adiesens were born quarrelling with one another, I think."
"But surely you know about the particular part of the family feud which
had to do with Havnholme?"
"Even _that_ began before I was born, and it was about some land that
was exchanged. Your great-grandfather wanted all this island to
himself, and he offered the Laird of Lunda some small outlying islands
instead of the piece of Boden which belonged to _him_. Mr. Garson
agreed, so they 'turned turf'[1] and settled the bargain; and a body
would have thought that was enough. But no! By-and-by they got
debating that the bargain had not been a fair one, then that Havnholme
was not included with the other skerries, and so it went as long as
they lived. After that their sons took it up, and disputed, and
fought, and never got nearer the truth, for there were no papers to be
found to prove who was right; and the tenants who had witnessed the
'turning of turf' would only speak as pleased their master. They
wrangled all their lives about it. One would put his sheep on the
holme, and the other would promptly go and shove the poor beasts into
the sea. One would build a skeö,[2] and the other would pull it down.
These were lawless days, and men might do as they pleased."
"Just like Vikinger," said Yaspard, who quite enjoyed the story.
"Well?"
"They never would speak to each other, even if they met at the church
door, or at a neighbour's funeral. It was very sinful; and they would
not let their children become acquainted. My father made me drop
acquaintance with my school friend when she married Mr. Garson, for no
reason but because she married the son of his enemy. It has been the
same since your uncle came to be Laird. If your father had lived it
would have been different, for _he_ bore ill-feeling to no one; but he
was so much away with his ship, he never got a chance to put things
right; which I _know_ he could have done, for the Laird of Lunda--who
died two years ago--was one of the best of men. A land-grabber! My
friend's husband. He was as good a man as Shetland ere saw. He tried
again and again to be friends with Brüs, but it was no use, and it will
be of no use his boy trying. I know."
"_Something_ shall be of use," muttered Yaspard; then aloud he asked,
"Will uncle answer this letter?"
"My dear, he's done it. There is his answer on the table. He read it
to me, and I felt as if I were listening to a clap of thunder."
"What did he say?"
"He said that Havnholme was his, and that he meant to do with his own
as he pleased. And he said, 'If you set foot in Boden you will receive
the thrashing which such a coxcomb deserves.' He told me to send the
Harrison boys across the sound in your little boat early to-morrow, and
they were to leave the letter at the post-office. They were not to go
to the Ha' for their lives. Brüs never told me to do a harder thing
than to send such a letter to the son of my friend--to the poor lad who
is trying to live like his true-hearted father, and to be at peace with
all men! It is a cruel thing." And here Miss Osla began to weep again.
Yaspard went to the table and picked up the letter, read the address,
and put it in his pocket. "Leave this affair to me, auntie," he said;
"I'll see that Fred Garson gets the letter, and gets it right properly."
Poor Miss Adiesen was too much troubled to notice anything peculiar in
Yaspard's words or expression, but Signy did, and as he left the room
she followed and asked in a whisper--
"Is it going to fit into your idea, brodhor?"
"Fits like the skin to a sealkie," said he.
Yaspard went up the stairs four steps at every stride until he reached
the attics. One of these was used for lumber, and into it he went.
There was a marvellous collection of things in that room, but Yaspard
knew what he had come for, and where to find it. He pulled some broken
chairs from off an old chest which had no lid, and was piled full of
curious swords, cutlasses, horse-pistols, battle-axes, some foils and
masks, and a battered old shield. Not one of all these implements had
been in use for a century--some were of far more ancient date. They
had neither edge, nor point, nor power of any sort beyond what might
lie in their weight if it were brought into play. Yaspard gathered up
as many of these weapons as he could carry, and bore them off to his
own room, where he proceeded to scrub the rust from them with some
sandpaper and a pair of woollen socks. He whistled at his task, and
was infinitely pleased with his own thoughts, which ran something like
this:--
"Oh yes! I'll make it work. I'll turn this old feud into a rare old
lark, I will. How nicely it all fits in for to-morrow--the Harrison
boys to go with the letter in my boat, and the Manse boys spending the
night on Havnholme! What times those boys have, to be sure. They go
everywhere, and stay just as long as they please. I could not count
how many times this summer they have camped out for the night on
Havnholme, and the Grün holme, and the Ootskerries. Guess they'll be
surprised at the waking up they'll get tomorrow!"
When he had cleaned up the armour to his satisfaction, he sat down to
his desk and wrote a letter, which pleased him so much that he read it
twice aloud, and ended by saying--
"Prime! I didn't know that I could express myself so well on paper.
It's as good as Garson's own. I wonder what he will say!"
Then Yaspard went down to supper, and while demolishing his porridge he
said, "Will you make me up a bit of ferdimet,[3] auntie? I am going
off early to-morrow to fish. (It's true," he added to himself, "for
I'll take a rod and fish a fish to make it true.")
"I suppose the Harrisons go with you?" said Aunt Osla. "Don't forget
about your uncle's message to Lunda."
"No, I won't forget."
"You could run across to the post-office before going to fish, and get
it over," she added.
Yaspard often went on such expeditions, therefore there was nothing
unusual in his proceedings on the present occasion, but Signy detected
a new fire in his eyes, and a twitching of the mouth that suggested
ideas! Moreover, she had been on the stair when he came out of the
lumber-room with his arms full of weapons, and Signy's soul was
troubled about its hero.
[1] The old Shetland way of taking possession of land.
[2] "Skeö," a shed for drying fish in.
[3] "Ferdimet," food for a journey.